Marvel Two-In-One No. 23 Death on the Bridge to Heaven
It becomes increasingly evident to Seth that his "skeleton crew" isn't going to work out so he transports his foes to this place.
Known as the Paths of the Gods. The golden bridge leads back to Heliopolis, realm of the Egyptian gods.
The most shocking panel in this entire story is this one.
I'm not complaining but it looks like the Comics Code Authority was once again caught sleeping on the job with this panel. This is horrifically brutal. The brother of Seth, Horus (whom Ben, in typical Thing fashion will repeatedly call 'Horace') is being tortured by slow roasting with Osiris and Isis, Horus' parents, forced to watch their son's torture. Hello?
This torture scene galvanizes the Thing and Thor into action but they're having a heck of a time.
Seth proves to be incredibly tough. To make matters worse, the God of Death ups the ante.
Known as the Devourer, this creature is clearly the Egyptian equivalent of the more familiar Asgardian Destroyer.
This new entrant is so powerful, Thor's initial attacks are ineffective.
The Thing meets with the same result, or rather, lack of result.
From effortlessly wading into an army of skeletons, to this situation; our heroes have a problem.
The fight rages on for several pages. I find the battle cries very amusing.
Thor's battle cry:
Ben can't let the Thunder God hog all the battle cry fun:
Hehehehe.
The Devourer is now fully out of control and the Egyptian gods begin to despair.
The end seems nigh as even Thor succumbs.
The dialog from the gods here is totally defeatist. They've given up - just waiting for the end. The only thing that stands between the Devourer and their destruction is the Thing.
Ben will NOT give up. It is his finest quality. It has always been his finest quality. Far from being Marvel's strongest, Ben will simply not stop until he finds a way. Realizing that the Devourer hates 'Horace' most of all, Ben implements a brilliant plan.
He grabs Horus and dives off the Paths of the Gods. In so doing, he also lures the Devourer beyond the edge.
Ben has taken a risk, for outside the Path of the Gods is the vacuum of space - something that can kill the Thing if not Horus. The never-say-die attitude of the Thing aside, the brilliance of this plan is that the Thing has taken away the one thing that keeps the incredibly strong Devourer dangerous - leverage. With no hard ground to push on any creature that relies on brute strength is automatically rendered helpless.
All these gods and their haughty attitude. In this moment, the down-to-earth Thing proves himself better than any of them.
Thor has recovered enough to save his friend and future fellow Avenger.
