Midnighter #5

The Midnighter returns to seek revenge on the man who sent him back in time, and the results aren't pleasant! Then again, is sickening violence really the answer, when the bad guys have planted a remote-controlled bomb in your chest? Find out as 'Killing Machine' reaches its gruesome conclusion!

In the present, an old man walks up to Paulus' mansion and asks to be let inside. He has a message for Herr Paulus. Once inside and sitting in front of Paulus he tells a short story. He says that he had been in WW2 and his division had been annihilated and he had lost contact with his allies. He was surrounded by a dozen Russians and he couldn't fight them. When he was about to be killed, a man in black appeared and killed them all. He moved, danced between them, "snapping limbs and breaking jaws." Paulus asks the old man to describe his rescuer a he does. He says that the man wore a coat, a moon symbol on his chest and an executioners hood. Then the man tells Paulus what his savior had said. The man-in-black told him that in the year 2006, on this very day and time, he should go to where he was now (Paulus' house) and deliver a message. The message: "I am coming." Then he should leave. The old man follows the man-in-black's orders and leaves immediately. Herr Paulus sits in his chair and thinks.

Traveling through time in Bonnie's time-police car, Midnighter promises that he won't hurt some unnamed male. Bonnie is unsure of Midnighter's promise, but she takes it. She offers to have sex with him, but he turns her down, telling her that he's gay. She doesn't understand, explaining that in the future, there is no "gay" or "straight." Everyone has sex with everyone. Midnighter laughs, then says it's time for an afternoon's killing.

Back in the present, Herr Paulus stands in the observation room of the time chamber with his scientists and bodyguards. He asks his scientists to make sure nothing is traveling towards them through time, and they say that they can detect nothing. They also say that Midnighter can't come back on his own since he has no time machine. Paulus turns to his guards and asks them were Rourke, the head guard is. They say that he was checking the perimeter and should soon be back. Just then, repeated "Oh God's" can be heard down the hall along with "Hop you bastard!" coming from another voice. Moments later, a one-legged, no-armed, blood covered Rourke stumbles into the room and falls down. Behind him, Midnighter walks into the room carrying a sleeping child and says, "Don't say I didn't warn you."

Paulus reaches for the detonator for the bomb in Midnighter's chest, but Midnighter tells him not to. He says he can kill the boy in his arms before Paulus presses the button, and that would erase Paulus, because the boy is him, kidnapped from the past. Midnighter holds up the helmet he'd taken from Rourke and says that it controls every part of the helmets of the other guards, and one of the things the helmets regulate is temperature. Before the guards can get the helmets off, Midnighter overloads them, incinerating the men inside.

After the men are dead, Midnighter tells Paulus that he wants the bomb out of his chest, and if Paulus doesn't make his scientists do it, he'll kill him as a child. Paulus says that Midnighter is bluffing, that he won't kill a child. Midnighter stares him in the eye and asks him if he's sure. Paulus blinks first and asks Midnighter how he knows they won't kill him on the operating table. Midnighter just says that he'll have to stay awake during the whole procedure, and he does, holding the young Anton against his side the entire time.

When the bomb is out and his backup heart is back in, Midnighter kills all the doctors and scientists and blows up the mansion. He takes Paulus outside and tells him that his parents were just as evil as Hitler, and if he'd done what Paulus had wanted and saved them, the world would be even worse than it is now. When that little explanation is over, Midnighter forces Paulus to his knees and kicks his head off.

Midnighter returns the baby Anton Paulus to the time police and they fly off. Midnighter goes back to the Carrier and ignores everyone he walks by. His inner monologue says that he's not a lover, a father or a friend. He's what he was bred to be, and that's the problem.