Go Go Retro

"Um is not an answer!" Judge Judy shouted at the hapless plaintiff, who was increasingly flustered and unable to answer her questions.

"Your Honor, this is an expression of who I am!" the plaintiff finally managed to protest.

"Who are you, then?" Judy shot back. "Somebody who thinks it's appropriate to go around looking like a slob?"

"Your Honor, I don't conform to these dress codes, and-"

"RIDICULOUS! Why are you wasting my time with this garbage?" Judy demanded. "Because you think it's your God-given right to expect a job even when you show up looking like a hobo? Since when is 'scruffy' the new black?"

"Your Honor…" the plaintiff began.

"Verdict in favour of the defendant!" Judy interrupted, slamming her gavel down. "Case dismissed! That's all."

Nancy Stacy and her daughter Jill looked at one another, taking their eyes off the TV for a second.

"Why do so many people go around in public looking like they just got out of bed?" Nancy asked Jill.

"I wish I knew," Jill shrugged. "Too many people at Midtown dress like that, too. I don't know why they think anyone thinks it looks stylish."

"They probably just don't care," Nancy smirked. "That's what makes it all the more annoying-I mean, can you believe that guy suing for wrongful dismissal just because he wouldn't live up to his boss's dress code?"

"…Why didn't he just get another job somewhere else?" Jill blinked.

"Too many people these days are just entitled," Nancy shrugged. "It's the same all over the place-my work has too many casual weeks. Sometimes I just can't stand it…"

"Groceries!" Helen Lieber-Stacy called out as she opened the door to Nancy's townhouse. Helen and her daughter Gwen Stacy walked in, carrying the groceries they'd brought home, and it wasn't long before the Stacy women were putting everything away.

"Somebody called for you while you guys were out," Jill told Gwen as they worked. "He said something about wanting you for a modeling job…"

"Really?" Gwen asked brightly. "Where at?"

"It was at some fashion company," Jill said, as she reached over to the notepad by the phone and looked at the message she'd written down. "It was from...here we go, 'Vaughn-Pope Cosmetics'," Jill read. "Haven't you already done some work with them?"

"Yeah, I did," Gwen grinned. "They pay pretty well too."

"Did you get some of the supplies I asked for?" Jill asked Gwen. Jill was starting at Empire State University this fall, and she was eagerly looking forward to joining Gwen at college.

"Not all of them," Gwen smiled again. "You're forgetting one of the most important pre-school year rituals."

"I am?" Jill asked, before a wry smile began to cross her face as she realized what Gwen was getting at.

"School clothes shopping trip!" Gwen and Jill said at the same time, before they fell into giggling.

SPIDER-WOMAN #67

"GO GO RETRO"

As head of his own fashion conglomerate, Roderick Kingsley lived the good life. He had a sumptuous Long Island estate with its own private hot tub, a bottle of fine Chianti wine and the beautiful Felicia Hardy massaging his shoulders. Despite all this, he was in a very bad mood, the ugly expression on his face clear for all to see.

"You've been in a bad mood all day, daddy," Felicia cooed at Roderick, using the pet name he loved so much. "What's wrong?"

Roderick just hissed in annoyance.

"Come on, honey, you can tell me," Felicia continued, arching her back and stretching out like a cat, leading Roderick to turn and look at her.

"You mean besides the fact that Rebecca caught us in bed?" Roderick sneered at Felicia, referring to his infuriated wife. "How about the fact that I've got the government sniffing around my operations? How about the fact that little blonde bitch got an invitation from Desiree to get another modelling job?" he continued, referring to Gwen and Desiree Vaughn-Pope. Roderick had had a grudge against Gwen ever since she hit him for sexually harassing her, and he'd used his influence in the fashion world to try and ruin her career.

"But don't you own a lot of Desiree's company?" Felicia asked. "Why didn't you just threaten them the way you did the other companies?" Felicia loathed Gwen almost as much as Roderick did, being Gwen's rival in high school and one of her main competitors for acting and modeling jobs.

"I don't control as much stock as I did," Roderick groused. "Some of the intermediaries I was using got cold feet when they heard about the government investigating me, and then they sold their stock to somebody else. Damned if I know who."

"But didn't that Joystick lady do her job?" Felicia persisted, referring to the twisted supervillain Roderick had arranged to have disrupt one of Gwen's auditions. That had been successful-from everything Roderick and Felicia had heard, Gwen's name was now mud in the acting world when it was publicly known that she was the daughter of noted anti-mutant bigot and organized crime supporter George Stacy.

"So what?" Roderick sneered. "I want that little cunt homeless, broke and miserable. I want her selling herself on the street. I'm going nuclear this time…"

Despite herself, Felicia felt a chill at Roderick's words.

Rebecca Kingsley smiled to herself as she worked diligently at her computer. She had been at it for almost three weeks, ever since she'd caught her husband "celebrating" the Fourth of July with that tramp Felicia Hardy, one of the models he'd hired. She'd previously given Roderick hell for ogling the models he hired to model Kingsley Cosmetics' products, but this was the final straw for her. She'd filed for separation and retreated to the house she owned in Miami, where she'd been holed up ever since.

Roderick hadn't made much of an effort to try and patch things up with Rebecca, being tied up with so many other things, but Rebecca wouldn't have responded to him anyway. She hadn't even bothered meeting up with any of their friends in Miami, leading to considerable gossip about what was going on. Apparently, some of their friends were even taking bets on whether they would get back together or they would split up for good. Some of the more ambitious young sharks were making plans, expecting to catch Rebecca on the rebound.

With her long blonde hair, bright green eyes and large breasts, Rebecca looked like the stereotypical dumb blonde. Of course, she was anything but-many of Kingsley Cosmetics' best-selling products, including the Red Lavender and Satin Angel fragrance lines, had sprung from her fertile mind. She'd also proven to be a savvy investor, expanding her fortune well beyond the already large sum she'd inherited as an heiress.

Along with all that, Rebecca had extensively studied securities and divorce law. Although she'd appeared at some of the mandatory society functions in Miami, she'd always left early and had outright ignored any of her New York invitations. Instead, she'd been holed up, working with an almost obsessive demeanor.

She was typing away at the computer when her ClarkePhone rang. With one hand, she quickly snapped up the phone and put it to her ear, even as her other hand continued typing by itself.

"Yeah?" Rebecca asked in a calm, businesslike tone.

"Uh-huh…And you're sure that the deal is all-encompassing?...Good…I never had anything to do with that crap to begin with…No, everything I came up with was all-original…Yes, if I get control I'll fully cooperate…I'm just finishing the email right now…Alright, goodbye."

Rebecca's smile grew all the wider as she contemplated what was coming.

…Just a few more days, you son of a bitch...

…and then your ass is mine…

In popular culture, Germans were often stereotyped as being efficient, uptight and punctual. Most people who met Fritz Von Meyer found that he more than lived up to those stereotypes, almost taking a perverse pride in doing so. As a technical supervisor in the chemistry division of Richmond Industries, Von Meyer was known for carefully managing his division's resources, expecting the best from his employees and not suffering fools easily…

…which perhaps explained why he hated having to deal with Buck Mitty.

As an entomology professor at Metropolitan University, Mitty had always been a competent teacher, popular with the students for his quirky mannerisms. In the academic community, however, he was seen as something of a laughingstock for his theories about how humans and insects could communicate. The university administration tended to see him as a crackpot, kept on only because he was popular with the students. However, they adamantly refused to fund his experiments in trying to communicate with insects.

Infuriated at the university's refusal, Mitty decided to acquire the funds he needed for himself by becoming a costumed supervillain. His first outing as the Humbug, equipped with gauntlets that could magnify the buzzing of insects into loud sonic blasts, had been ruined by Spider-Man. Mitty had only managed to escape after a stray blast had nearly dropped the ceiling of the bank he was robbing onto some innocent bystanders, forcing Spider-Man to let Mitty escape to save the bystanders. Despite that fiasco, Mitty insisted on trying again, and was summarily flattened by Spider-Man in their next encounter.

After serving two and a half years in prison, Mitty was paroled through a program that provided employment to convicted felons, and given a job with Richmond Industries. The company wanted to break into the rapidly growing market for organic, eco-friendly pesticides that caused no harm for the environment, and it had assumed that Mitty's entomological knowledge would help them develop a competitive product.

Mitty had been assigned to Von Meyer's division, but trying to get regular updates from Mitty on his work was like trying to draw blood from a stone. He'd grown increasingly frustrated by Mitty's dismissal of his concerns, Mitty's constantly missing meetings, and his claim that he was working on some top-secret project that he refused to discuss. Von Meyer would normally never have put up with that, but his own boss had been all gung-ho for being involved with the program and had insisted that Von Meyer give Mitty a chance.

Now, after six months of work, Mitty had announced that his grand project was ready. Finally, they were meeting to go over the details of Mitty's proposal.

"This had better be damn good, Mitty," Von Meyer said calmly as they sat down in his office. "You've already gone about $30,000 over budget, and gotten two extensions on your deadlines."

"And it was worth every penny," Mitty assured him confidently. "I've created the ultimate in pest control. Believe me, we'll corner the market?"

"…Really," Von Meyer replied, raising an eyebrow. "If you really think I'll be that impressed, why don't you actually tell me what it is?"

"You have no appreciation for the dramatic," Mitty pouted. Opening the portable cooler he was carrying, Mitty put it on Von Meyer's desk. Opening it up, he took out a small bottle which contained some sort of pinkish liquid.

"What's that, Mitty?" Von Meyer demanded.

"The Holy Grail," Mitty grinned. "It's a nectar that, when exposed to both insects and humans, will allow them to communicate with each other!"

Von Meyer's jaw dropped in amazement.

"It's just a prototype, of course," Mitty continued. "I'll need a few more months to perform human testing, some more money for materials, and so on. I've got all the projections in the documents on the memory stick in my pocket," he continued. "So, what do you think?"

Von Meyer just stared blankly at Mitty, his jaw still hanging open. For his part, Mitty was filled with excitement, certain that he'd wowed his boss and hit a home run.

Finally, Von Meyer spoke.

"THIS is what you spent all that time and money on?!" Von Meyer exploded, his cheeks flushing with anger. "A potion that you can use to talk to bugs? We're trying to develop a pesticide, you numbskull!"

"But…but…" Mitty stammered, astonished at the reaction. "We don't need to kill our insect friends! With this nectar, we can persuade them to leave, and we won't need to hurt them! We can open a new era of dialogue and understanding between man and insect!"

"An era of dialogue and understanding," Von Meyer muttered in disbelief. "They shouldn't have put you in jail, Mitty-they should have put you in the fucking asylum!"

"But, Mr. Von Meyer…" Mitty tried to plead.

"Why me, Lord?" Von Meyer cried out, ignoring Mitty's pleas. "I work hard, I pay my taxes, I donate to charity, I look after my mother…why me?"

"Mr. Von Meyer, this is a dream come true for…" Mitty tried to interrupt again.

"A dream come true?!" Von Meyer shouted back at Mitty. "You're not being paid to develop your cockamamie dreams on my time! No wonder all the other professors thought you were a joke! You've always been a joke! An idiot! A moron! You're a disgrace to your profession!"

"Please…Mr. Von Meyer…" Mitty begged, tears in his eyes as he felt his entire world crashing down around him.

"Get out of my office! Get out of this building! YOU'RE FIRED!"Von Meyer screamed, the veins at his temples bulging.

"You…damn you…" Mitty hissed, an enraged look crossing his face. "You'll pay for this!" he shouted at Von Meyer as he stormed out of his office.

"YOU'LL ALL PAY FOR THIS!" Mitty screamed at his coworkers as he cleaned out his desk.

Three days later…

"What do you mean, you don't know?" Roderick Kingsley snapped into the phone. "They regulate the goddamn stock market!...Why the hell haven't they said anything to you?...Well, then get me an answer, damn it !" he finished, before hanging up the phone and swearing again.

"What do you think they're waiting for?" Roderick's brother Daniel Kingsley asked. Daniel was Roderick's younger brother, a massively built hulk of a man who towered over his skinny, diminutive brother. Daniel typically served as Roderick's brother and confidante, one of the few people who knew about all the dirty laundry Roderick had accumulated in his leadership of Kingsley Cosmetics. Malicious rumors about his competitors, plagiarism of their designs, sabotaging their facilities manipulation of their stock and more were some of his time-honored techniques, and so far he'd always managed to prevent the lawsuits and allegations from harming him.

That was what made his next e-mail so shocking.

Hi there Roddy,

It's been a long time, hasn't it? Our friends have been asking me why we haven't made many of the recent galas together. Palm Beach…the French Riviera…Milan…everyone's been asking after us. They miss us so much…You wouldn't believe the trouble I had coming up with excuses that would allow us to save face. After all, I couldn't tell them that you've been keeping time with that little floozy Felicia Hardy, could I? What would the neighbors think?

Well, we're going to be finding out. We'll see what they think about all the one-off flings, your apparently making Felicia a full-time thing, all of it. Divorce filings do tend to get pretty messy, after all, especially when they involve as much evidence as this one does. You can see why I'm sending this e-mail to your lawyers, too-the attached documents have already been filled out, and my lawyers are down at the courthouse filing them right now.

They say everything comes out in the wash, Roddy…and that includes all of your dirty laundry.

And I do mean all of it.

See you soon, honey!

With all my hate,

Rebecca.

"SON OF A BITCH!" shouted Kingsley in a fury, as he began reading through the documentation.

"What's wrong?" Daniel asked in alarm as he stood up.

"That cow Rebecca-" Kingsley started, before he was interrupted by his office phone.

"WHAT?" he shouted into it in frustration.

"I'm sorry to disturb you, Mr. Kingsley, but there are some people here from the Securities and Information Commission to see you," his assistant said on the other end of the phone.

Kingsley slumped back down in his chair, resting his arms on his desk and putting his head in his hands.

One week later…

"Excellent work, Gwen," the Vaughn-Pope Cosmetics talent coordinator grinned at Gwen as she emerged from the dressing room. "Desiree is sorry she wasn't able to come herself, but she knew you'd be a perfect fit for our new fall collection. We'll be wiring the payment to your account in the next couple of days. Are you going to be available next week?"

"Well, I'm going to have to be getting ready for school in the next couple of weeks," Gwen replied, "but I should be able to fit you in. There were a couple of outfits I really liked-do you think I could keep a couple of them?"

"Well, I'd have to talk with some of my superiors, but I doubt they'd be complaining about free advertising," the talent coordinator smirked. "See you around!"

Gwen had been having an eventful summer, but now that the month of August had started things were looking up. She was now getting steady modelling work with Desiree Vaughn-Pope and Imagic-Nation Costumes that which would go a long way towards paying off the student loan debts she'd acquired in her first two years of university. She could also set aside some of the money to help pay for Jill's tuition, or otherwise help with the household bills. Even with all four of the Stacy women working, the cost of living in New York had not gotten any lower.

Gwen sighed as she considered where she could get some good acting gigs, too. So far, that fat cow Carolyn Jannetty had pretty much ruined her efforts at finding new acting roles. She knew that she could have nailed many of the roles she'd applied for, except that Mrs. Jannetty's smear campaign and the old Stacy luck had both conspired to ruin things for her. After all, how could she have ever expected her old enemy Joystick to expose her as George Stacy's daughter?

She was jolted from her reverie as her smartphone rang. Taking it out of her purse, her heart sank as she saw that it was from Kingsley Cosmetics.

Gwen was about to ignore it when a thought crossed her mind. She wasn't sure why someone from the company would be calling her, unless it was Roderick threatening her. If it was, then she'd be more than ready to hear it…

…and answer it, if necessary, as her superhero alter ego of the spectacular Spider-Woman.

"Hello?" she asked.

"Hi there," a husky female voice answered on the other end. "Are you Gwen Stacy?"

"Yes, I am," Gwen replied in surprise. "Who are you?"

"I'm Rebecca Kingsley, Roderick's soon to be ex-wife and acting head of Kingsley Cosmetics," the voice on the other end replied in a triumphant tone. "You see, Roddy's been taken away by the men in suits."

"He's in an insane asylum?" Gwen asked in astonishment.

"By the time I'm through with him, he probably will be," Rebecca replied, "but no. He's been arrested by the government for all the illegal crap he's been pulling over the last decade, and I'm filing for divorce from him. I'm going to get half his shares in Kingsley Cosmetics…and when you add that to what I already own, this company is going to be mine. The board of directors has already made me the acting president."

Gwen just sat there for a long moment, stunned by what Rebecca Kingsley was telling her.

"…Why are you telling me all this?" she asked in amazement.

"To offer you a job," Rebecca replied. "You see, Roderick had pegged a young lady by the name of Felicia Hardy to be the lead spokesmodel for our fall collection. I believe you know the little tramp?"

"Not fondly," Gwen replied, as she realized where this was going.

"Well, Felicia isn't going to be appearing in any Kingsley ad campaigns any time soon," Rebecca replied. "You see, I caught her in bed with Roderick, and ever since then she's been suffering from a really nasty case of what I call 'being fired and blacklisted from the company' syndrome. Now, I need somebody else to take her place. Would you be interested in the job?"

"Are you kidding?" Gwen asked in surprise. "Of course I am! When do you want me to start?"

"It won't be for a couple of days yet," Rebecca explained. "I still have to make the arrangements. How about I e-mail you the details?"

"Absolutely!" Gwen said with glee, hardly able to believe her good fortune. "I'm really looking forward to it!"

Rebecca laughed to herself as she hung up the phone.

Not only was she going to screw Roderick with the divorce, she'd also be able to sue him on behalf of the company to get what was left of his ownership because of all the danger his antics had put the company in. Kingsley Cosmetics was in for a flurry of lawsuits now that Roderick's dirty dealings were being exposed, and Rebecca intended to minimize the damage as much as she could.

It hadn't been too hard for Rebecca to figure out where all the evidence of Kingsley Cosmetics' dirty dealings was, particularly given her long access to Roderick's personal effects and files. It had been smart of him to provide the necessary information to his next of kin so they could keep things running in case he was incapacitated…but it was stupid of him to end up thinking with his privates instead of his brain by cheating on his wife after he'd already told her where all the bodies were buried.

From there, all she had to do was leak the information to the feds in exchange for an immunity deal, and she was home free.

This is going to be the most expensive fling he ever had, and Felicia isn't even the one getting paid, Rebecca smirked.

Two days later…

Just as she had with the Vaughn-Pope shoot, Gwen hit the Kingsley fall collection session out of the park. Rebecca had invited a number of Kingsley Cosmetics investors to the session, and Gwen knew that from the approving way the investors were looking at her and the other models that they all had dollar signs in their eyes.

When the session had finished, Gwen emerged from the dressing room with the other models. Some of them fell into chatting with Kingsley Cosmetics representatives, others were preparing to leave, and still others were chatting with some of the investors. Looking around, Gwen saw three of the girls chatting excitedly to a middle-aged man with a thick brown beard, and she came over to join them.

"What's going on?" she asked curiously as the investor nodded at her.

"I was just telling them about a new job opportunity that's come up," the bearded man replied. "You're…Gwen Stacy, right?"

"That's right," Gwen nodded and smiled. "How'd you-"

"I heard about you winning that Spring Break beauty pageant," Caesar explained, his grin growing wider. "Anyway, like I was saying, '60s and '70s retro is really in these days. Vintage clothing, Beatles music, classic cars, that sort of thing. You've got all the baby boomers who grew up during that era, and now a lot of the young hipsters are picking up on it too."

"So what does that have to do with us?" another one of the models asked.

"Some partners and I are opening a swinging retro club, and we're looking for performers."

"Performers?" Gwen asked. "You mean like musicians?"

"No, waitresses and dancers," Caesar shook his head. "Sort of like Coyote Ugly, but instead of redneck country dancing, our girls do go-go dancing instead. That's what the Gloom Room A Go-Go offers-classic music and dancing with a modern twist for all generations."

"What does it pay?" another of the girls asked. All of them, Gwen included, gasped in shock when they heard what the hourly rate was.

"And that's not including your tips," Caesar grinned. "If you're interested, all you have to do is visit our website and apply for one of our auditions," he continued, handing out brochures to the girls.

Glancing at it, Gwen noted that one of the benefits it talked about was a flexible schedule.

"What's with this flexible schedule?" Gwen asked. "Would that apply to university students and homework?"

"Of course it does," Caesar beamed. "We know how important a good work-life balance is these days…"

Gwen and the other girls looked at one another, all very intrigued by what Caesar was talking about.

"I've got to go now, but if you have any other questions, feel free to drop us a line at the club's email address," Caesar grinned, as he turned to leave. "Hope to see you all there!"

Gwen left soon after, with the Gloom Room A Go-Go brochure tucked away in her purse.

The large building next to the rural home was outfitted as a large entomological laboratory, filled with specimens and laboratory equipment. Its owner had made a substantial amount of money on the stock market and used his earnings to outfit his laboratory, although according to his broker his success has been due to dumb luck as much as anything else.

Not that Buck Mitty cared much where his success came from. All that mattered to him was successfully completing the nectar he knew would allow him to communicate telepathically with the insect world.

"I'll show them all," he ranted to himself as he worked feverishly. "When I'm rich and famous, I'll rub my prestige in the faces of every one of those sons of bitches who ever laughed at me…and then they'll see who's laughing now!"

Giggling uncontrollably, he looked up at the glass cage on the other side of the room. The cage was filled with a chilling sight-a cloud of thousands of wasps swirling around like a grisly black and yellow fog, emitting a loud buzzing noise that echoed through the room, even with the sound dampeners Mitty had installed to mitigate the buzzing effects.

To Mitty, however, it was the culmination of all his efforts, the realization of his hopes and dreams. Inputting a few commands on his computer, the lab's automated systems began releasing his precious nectar in gaseous form into the cage, dousing all of the wasps at once.

Smiling widely, Mitty picked up a breathing apparatus and applied it to his face, before turning the knob on the canister.

Taking a deep breath, he inhaled the nectar, eager to explore the new world he was about to discover.

The wasps' buzzing became louder and louder until it became a single high-pitched scream, filling Mitty's ears and echoing through his mind. Mitty felt himself flying in all directions at once. His mind seemed to dart from one perspective to the next, connecting with all of the thousands of wasps and leaping between them in turn. The buzzing became louder and louder until it became a full-fledged shriek, one that echoed not just in Mitty's ears, but within his very soul.

Rationally, a small part of him knew the buzzing audible in the lab was not the loud scream he was hearing. But more than that, he knew the wasps felt trapped, trying desperately to escape. That was their scream, their rage, a righteous anger joined to his own.

As if by instinct, Mitty turned back to the controls and entered a command to let the wasps out of their cage. It was not long before the entire miasma flooded over him, entering his ears, piercing his eyes, filling his ears, tearing at his flesh.

They were aggressive creatures by nature-animal instinct taught them to lash out at creatures they perceived as threats.

Mitty's conscious reasoning was bitter resentment and hate, despair at failure upon failure.

Animal instinct and conscious reasoning became one.

(Next Issue: Things are looking up for Gwen as she auditions for work at the Gloom Room A Go-Go, prepares for university and tries to get her acting career back on track. It may all come crashing down, however, when she's forced into action as Spider-Woman to confront the nightmarish monstrosity known as Swarm! All this and more in Spider-Woman #68: Wasp's Nest!)