Deadpool (3rd series) #6

Issue Date: 
March 2009
Story Title: 
How Low Can You Go? (Part 1): Dead in the Water
Staff: 

Daniel Way (writer), Paco Medina (penciler), Juan Vlasco (inker), Marte Gracia (colorist), VC’s Cory Petit (letterer), Jason Pearson (cover artist), Irene Lee (production), Jody Leheup (assistant editor), Axel Alonso (editor), Joe Quesada (editor-in-chief), Dan Buckley (publisher)

Brief Description: 

¬Tigershark is swimming at an aquarium when he gets a call from previous employer, who tells him that Deadpool is still alive. The boss makes Tigershark another deal to kill Deadpool and to bring him his head this time. After Tigershark’s previous attack, Deadpool wakes up at a homeless shelter. Just as he manages to convince the workers there he is okay, Tigershark shows up with a machete. The two men fight and Deadpool ultimately gains the upper hand. He asks Tigershark who sent him but, before he can answer, the police arrive. They think Deadpool has taken the shelter workers hostage and storm the place and shoot him. Sometime later, Deadpool wakes up in a body bag on the docks with Tigershark standing over him. Before Tigershark finish him off, though, Bob, Agent of HYDRA, also shows up to save Deadpool. All three men end up in the water with Deadpool swimming for his rifle as Tigershark drowns Bob.

Full Summary: 

“You there. Yeah….You” Deadpool says, indicating to a beautiful TV news reporter. She holds a microphone towards him and nervously thanks him. She then apologizes as it’s her first time and then proceeds to ask the most obvious question…how did he defeat Tigershark? As well as the beautiful woman, there is also a group of other reporters, including the Pillsbury Dough Boy, Tinkerbelle, Spock, a pink poodle and Gorilla Man. All of them are holding microphones, notepads and cameras and are eagerly looking at Deadpool as he addresses them like at a press conference.

Deadpool replies to her and tells her that it was surprisingly easy. Like everyone else, he was under the impression that Tigershark was a thoroughly badassed individual but, as it turns out, he’s a little pansy. The woman then looks at him sexily, thanks him again and starts to tell him her phone number. But before she can finish he interrupts and tells her to wait out in the hallway as he has no time for romance.

Just then, an overweight and sweaty man calls out his name and asks him to give him specific details on how he defeated Tigershark, as it would help him write his crappy stories. Deadpool insults the man’s tie and then tells him he found this big piece of driftwood and started poking at Tigershark mercilessly. With that, the man scribbles down what Deadpool said on a notepad. But then he pauses a minute as he reads back what he wrote and, with a confused look on his face, asks if that somehow worked. Deadpool asks the man back if he has ever been poked with a big bit of driftwood because he has and it sucked.

(reality)

Deadpool is slumped next to a palm tree on a beach with his costume all blooded and torn up. A seagull sits on his head as two children play around him. The girl calls to her brother and tells him that she is bored of playing with the dead body and that she wants to build a sandcastle. The boy, Robbie, tells his sister that sandcastles are stupid and continues to poke Deadpool in the eye and commenting as it squirts “eye juice.”

(San Diego: Later That Same Day)

A mobile phone rings as it lies next to a large tank of water. In the tank, a sharks fin glides across the water towards the phone. A moment later, Tigershark emerges from the water, rests himself on the side of the pool and answers the phone. The voice on the other end simply tells them that they had an arrangement. Tigershark replies that they did and enquires if they want to make another. The voice asks why they would make another when the first one hasn’t been honored. The voice goes on to tell Tigershark how Deadpool’s body was found washed up on a beach earlier in the morning but that he escaped from the city morgue four hours later.

Tigershark tells the voice that it is their problem and not his. His task was to take Deadpool out which is what he did and if they wanted anything more specific then they should have made it clear. The phone goes quiet for a few seconds and then the voice comes back and tells Tigershark they want Deadpool’s head. If he succeeds, then Tigershark gets double his previous rate but if he fails then they will use every resource to have him killed in the most brutal way possible. The voice then asks if it’s clear to which Tigershark replies “Crystal” just as another voice shouts out to him.

Tigershark closes the phone and tosses it away as a young man walks up to him and asks him what he is doing. The man tells Tigershark he is not supposed to be in the tank and that if his boss finds out he will be fired and then his step-dad will cut off his allowance. He then swears at Tigershark and tells him to get out the water and that he shouldn’t be in there. As he says this, Tigershark gets out the water and tells the man that “neither are they” whilst indicating to the other sharks in the tank. The man gulps as Tigershark towers over him.

Tigershark then looks down to the bucket of fish that the man brought with him and asks if it’s feeding time. The man starts sweating and indicates that it is. Tigershark asks what is he waiting for and, with a big grin on his face, tells him to feed them. In a glass viewing tunnel running along the bottom of the tank, a young boy points out to his mother that a man is swimming in the pool. The young man and bucket of fish are fully submerged in the water as sharks start swimming towards him. The mother looks up and says that he isn’t swimming and then quickly covers her sons eyes as a look of horror goes across his face.

(the next morning)

As a maskless Deadpool lies in a bed, a voice calls out for him to get up. As he starts to rouse, the voice persists and Deadpool looks up to see a beautiful dark-haired woman standing over him. As one of the voices in his head comment on how beautiful she is, the woman, named Rosario from her name tag, tells Deadpool it’s 7am and it’s time to get some breakfast and leave. She explains that the shelter opens back up at nine but to get there early as the beds fill up quickly. The voice in his head repeats how beautiful she is as Deadpool, now dressed in a trench coat, thanks her but tells her he won’t be back. The other voice in his tells him that she is too beautiful.

Rosario helps him up and starts to escort him out but sees blood all over the bed sheets. She asks if that’s his blood and tells him he needs to see a doctor. He replies that it is his blood but he doesn’t need a doctor as he hurriedly pushes past her. Rosario calls to Tom, one of the other workers at the shelter, to come and help her. Deadpool addresses Tom and tells him that he seems like a nice guy but what he doesn’t realize is that Deadpool is not and that if he touches him he will hurt him. Rosario asks Deadpool if he wants her to calls the cops, to which he replies that all he wants to do is leave but he appreciates everything they are trying to do here.

Calming down, she tells him that if he decides he does need help in the future they are not going anywhere. Deadpool replies that he is though as he puts on his mask. The first voice in his head asks if they are not going to stop and talk to the pretty nurse, to which Deadpool confirms that they aren’t. The second voice asks if they are going to kick Tigershark’s ass, to which he replies “yep”. The first voice chips in and asks if he knows how to find him to which Deadpool replies that he doesn’t.

He steps out of the homeless shelter into an alleyway to see Tigershark walking towards him holding a big machete. Deadpool quickly goes back into the shelter and slams the door behind him. Rosario rhetorically asks if he has changed his mind and then answers herself with “good.” The voices in Deadpool’s head suddenly point out the possible outcomes for the situation. The first voice tells him that it’s bad and that Tigershark will bring the place down, people will get hurt… she’ll get hurt. In his mind, he sees the nurse kneeling on the floor, arms outstretched towards him, cut and bruised, and surrounded by the bodies of the other people at the shelter.

The second voice, however, tells him this is awesome. If he takes Tigershark out in front of her she will be all over him and think he is a hero. With that, he sees the nurse smiling, arms outstretched ready to embrace him, and surrounded by the people from the shelter who are holding placards and cheering him. He pauses for a few seconds contemplating the outcomes but before he can make his mind up he is thrown forward as the door is bursts off its hinges into the shelter.

Tigershark enters the shelter and immediately addresses Deadpool and tells him that the reason that he, a super villain with the proportional strength of a tiger shark, carries a machete is that he is going to use it to chop off his head. Deadpool quips back at Tigershark and tells him that answered one of his questions and that he also loves machetes. Just as he starts to reminisce about an adventure he had with a machete, Tigershark slams his weapon down, narrowly missing the mercenary.

Deadpool turns around to see all the people, including Rosario, from the shelter hiding in another room. Just as he asks where they are going, Tigershark swings the machete causing Deadpool to duck. As the nurse peeks through the door from the other room, Deadpool yells for her to hide now but to come back later as he has something to show her. As Tigershark towers over Deadpool, one of the voices ask him if he thinks she will come back. The other replies “not a chance” to which the first voice agree. The voices then tell Deadpool to roll left, just as Tigershark brings his machete down again.

As Deadpool dodges again Tigershark realizes he sucks with the weapon, to which Deadpool agrees. Deadpool knocks the machete out of Tigershark’s hand and then kicks him in the head, sending the assassin reeling backwards. The voices in his head tell Deadpool to pick up the machete, which he does and then subsequently aims it at Tigershark. One of the voices tell him to ask Tigershark who sent him but instead Deadpool tells him that this fight has made him want sushi after he beats Tigershark.

As Deadpool dodges yet another attack, he manages to pin Tigershark down and hold the machete to his throat. One of his voices yells for Deadpool to stop as they need to know who sent him. Deadpool tells the voice to relax and that he won’t kill Tigershark but then he realizes he said it out loud to the villain. Deadpool jumps and slices the machete across Tigershark, causing him to bleed. Now standing over the villain and the machete pointed at his throat again, Deadpool corrects himself and tells him that he won’t kill him yet and demands to know who sent him.

Before Tigershark answers, though, a gunshot rings in the air and Deadpool is hit in the shoulder. Picking out the bullet from the bleeding wound, he sees that it’s made of rubber. With that he turns to see a squad of policemen with guns and riot shields standing in the open doorway. One policeman uses his megaphone and calls for Deadpool to put down his weapon and come out with his hands held high. When Deadpool starts to muse whether anyone has actually done that, he turns to see that Tigershark has now fled the scene.

On the phone in the other room, Rosario is crying as someone on the other end tells her to calm down and that everything will be alright. Just as she is about to shout at them for telling her to remain calm Deadpool interrupts her and apologizes about the mess and tells her that it wasn’t his fault. From outside, the policemen shout that he is completely surrounded. Deadpool asks the nurse if she is on the phone to the cops but before she can finish her answer he grabs the phone off her. He starts to quote a speech out of a film but he forgets the words halfway through and ends up telling the cops that it’s time to get the killing done. On the other end of the phone the policeman hears a scream, assumes Deadpool is killing the hostages and tells his team to “Go, go, go.”

Inside the shelter, Deadpool tells Rosario to relax and that he was just kidding. When the nurse acts confused, he asks her that chicks dig a sense of humor right? She angrily asks what’s wrong with him but, before she can finish, he tells her that if there’s one thing he knows it’s women. And cops. With that, he hears a voice behind and he manages to whisper “call me” to the nurse before the policemen open fire on him as she cowers away.

As Deadpool lies dead and bleeding on the floor one of the policemen comforts the nurse and tells the rest of his squad to bag him up and get him out of there.

A body bag lies on a wooden floor. It starts to unzip itself from within and Deadpool emerges, confused that he isn’t in a morgue. He sits up and looks around to see he is on pier at the dockyards. Before he can react, though, Tigershark suddenly appears behind him with an axe. Before Tigershark can do anything though a voice yells “HAIL HYDRA” and a bullet is shot that narrowly misses his head. Deadpool turns to see Bob, Agent of HYDRA, standing on a nearby pier with a big gun and yelling for Tigershark to stop trying to decapitate his pal.

A confused Deadpool addresses Bob, who asks him if he is okay and calls him “Mr. Wilson.” When Deadpool asks what he is doing there, Bob simply replies that he is saving him. Deadpool turns around to see Tigershark has now disappeared and calls for Bob to throw him his gun. As Bob throws the gun, it falls in the water and the voices in Deadpool’s remind him that Bob throws like a girl. Just then, Tigershark bursts through the wooden pier that Bob is standing on, sending him crashing into the water. Deadpool dives into the water, which causes his inner voices to question if Bob is that much of a friend. As Tigershark holds Bob by his throat underwater, Deadpool swims down to the gun on the seafloor and replies that Bob isn’t but the rifle he dropped was sweet.

Characters Involved: 

Deadpool

Tigershark

Robbie

Robbie’s sister

Male employee at aquarium

Visitors at aquarium

Rosario, nurse at homeless shelter

Tom
Other people at homeless shelter

Policemen

Bob, Agent of Hydra

(in Deadpool’s imagination)

Female news reporter

Pillsbury Dough Boy

Spock

Tinkerbelle

A Pink Poodle

Gorilla Man

Grey alien

Clown

Male news reporter

Story Notes: 

Tigershark attacked Deadpool at the end of Deadpool (3rd series) #5.

“Listen up, you screwheads! Here is a man who would not take it anymore! A man who stood up against the…” is part of a speech from the 1976 film Taxi Driver.

Issue Information: 
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