Friday, July 15, 2011

OMAC #3 (January-February, 1975)



In the world that’s coming, movies will be interactive experiences fed directly into the brain, as OMAC experienced while agents of the Global Peace Agency arranged for his credentials to stop "’flare-ups’" which endanger world peace. Once OMAC was done fighting a giant monster in the ‘70s version of the Matrix, he was awarded the rank of a “five star” general in a time that could not afford any army for him to lead but his left and right. “I’ve got an awesome responsibility… that’s for sure. Like the Peace Agents, my life must be one of dedication… They say I was once someone else… someone who was changed by electronic surgery… into a sort of… god of war!! Now… even the memories of that former life… are gone…”

In THE WORLD THAT’S COMING, even lost memories can be replaced by all the necessities of a new life… What began as “computer dating” will flower into complete “packaged living”! Computers will pick ideal families and backgrounds for those who lack the total human relationship… The Peace Agency will do this for OMAC…

True enough, a female Peace Agent (251, and they let her keep her long brown hair) presented OMAC with “test parents,” kindly elders Mr. and Mrs. Barker. The couple’s lives had been empty without a son, and compatibility had already been calculated, so OMAC gave them the chance they wanted so dearly. Peace Agent 251 found OMAC to be “a person of compassion and warmth,” but a massacre and other border skirmishes orchestrated by the central European dictator Marshal Kafka necessitated he take a break from domesticity. A “capsule plane” launched into orbit, allowed OMAC to make the trip (presumably from the U.S.) in just ten minutes. This very same technology, which opened any part of the world to immediate attack, is exactly the sort of complication OMAC was created to oversee.

Over troubled airspace smart bombs “guided by television” pursued the capsule plane, until OMAC detached his engines to detonate the missiles. This triggered a chute on the capsule, which was targeted by tank fire. OMAC ejected before the capsule was obliterated, and his seat doubled as a “hovering assault chair!!!” Through a mounted microphone, OMAC demanded, “For the sake of world peace, I order you to pull back your forces!” His pleas ignored, OMAC evaded weapons of many stripes to reach a line of tanks to treat them with a chemical nitrogen mixture that resulted in “a frozen wasteland.” Marshal Kafka then launched a fleet of single man Vertical Take-Off planes, which fell to pieces in midair thanks to a highly corrosive spray from OMAC’s chair. Sonic shock from the speed of OMAC’s chair sent mobile artillery falling into a crater. A barrage of barbed cannonballs finally smashed the assault chair, so OMAC continued on foot.

Before another shot could be fired, OMAC ripped apart the gun current like plywood. A “human wave attack” of soldiers followed, but was easily beaten back. OMAC commandeered an “armored golf-cart” and with hood-mounted guns blazing made his way to Kafka’s wheeled bunker. “Halt! In the name of the Global Peace Agency! …You’re a war criminal, Kafka! Surrender to me… and I’ll promise you a fair trial…” Nothing doing, as secret weapon hatches opened and OMAC would have to contend with one very heavily armored structure… next issue!

“A Hundred Thousand Foes!” was by Jack Kirby with D. Bruce Berry.

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