Designer Drug Investigation Exposes Fugitive, Uncovers Criminal Empire
Scandal Generates Unwanted Publicity for Midwestern Farmer
Designer Drug Investigation Exposes Fugitive, Uncovers Criminal EmpireScandal Generates Unwanted Publicity for Midwestern Farmer |
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Monday, September 16, SMALLVILLE, KS - Pete
Ross' parents thought that raising their son in a rural farming community
in Kansas would protect him from the decadent culture of the big city.
They were wrong.
Call it teenage rebellion. The search for identity. Guaranteed shock value in a world where multiple tattoos and body piercings have become common, almost passé. Pete Ross has changed his ethnicity. "It was bound to happen," said Pete's mother, a white Anglo-Saxon Protestant. "White kids are just obsessed with black culture these days. They listen to Rap and Hip-Hop, wear the clothes and the hairstyles, use the slang. It was just a matter of time before they adopted their skin color." Many residents of this small town are shocked. |
But naturally, the kids at Smallville High think it's cool. "I finally have a black friend!" exclaimed Lana Lang when asked what she thought of Pete's transformation. "That's always seemed so cool on TV!"
| Martha Kent, mother of Pete's best friend Clark, said that
she is just trying to be supportive for the Ross family. "I know his
parents are in shock," she said, "but I'm sure this is just a
phase he's going through."
Martha's husband Jonathan is not quite so understanding. "Kids today have no respect for their bodies, or their parents, or the natural order," he said. Pete Ross is the first minor to use the designer drug FUBU-S, also know as the Undercover Brother Serum. Previously it had only been taken by high-profile vigilantes like Frank Castle (a.k.a. the Punisher), wealthy businessmen like Wilson Fisk (a.k.a. the Kingpin), and secret agents like Nick Fury, the former director of SHIELD. FUBU-S is manufactured by Banner Labs, a SHAFT front company that markets the drug in comic books and magazines. Pete Ross has put Smallville, Kansas on the map. But his notoriety has also drawn unwanted attention to Jonathan Kent, his best friend's father. |
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When a news crew from Metropolis arrived in town last week to do a story on Pete, the Kents agreed to an on-camera interview. When the segment aired on the evening news, Jonathan's face was immediately recognized by members of law enforcement.
"Some of the guys thought he looked familiar, so we ran his picture through the FBI computer," said Dan Turpin, an inspector with the Metropolis Police Department. "Turns out Kent's not his real name. He's one of the Duke Boys."
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In the 1980s, the Duke clan was infamous for leading a
resistance movement in Hazzard County, Georgia, where the commissioner was
a supervillain named Boss Hogg, a.k.a. "the Kingpin of the
South."
Back then, Jonathan Kent was still known as Bo Duke and, alongside his cousin Luke, fought the forces of darkness in an orange '69 Dodge Charger they called the General Lee. Bo and Luke were aided in their never-ending battle by their cousin Daisy, and all three of them lived with the resistance movement's leader, Uncle Jesse. Those were the good old days, but they couldn't last forever. |
When your entire county is in the fascist grip of a supervillain who controls the police force and owns all big business, it's not easy being one of the heroes. So when the heat got to be too much for Bo, he bade farewell to his family, changed his name, and married his girlfriend Martha; shortly before baby Clark came along, the two of them moved to Kansas and settled down on a farm in hopes of living a simple, quiet life, far away from the eternal struggle of good vs. evil.
Which is exactly what they did, until fate shoved a TV camera in their faces.
"Bo Duke was on the wrong side of the law since the day he was born," said Turpin, "but the only crime he was ever convicted of was running moonshine. Apparently the cops in Hazzard County are bunch of bumbling morons."
But the unearthing of Jonathan Kent's adventurous past was only the tip of the iceberg for Turpin. While Bo Duke had served his probation for the moonshine charges, he was still wanted for questioning concerning his time as a freedom fighter in Georgia. With new information obtained from a Metropolis PD interview with Jonathan Kent, Turpin was finally able to solve the mystery surrounding Boss Hogg's reign of fear.
| Born Jefferson Davis Hogg, this Dixieland
dictator was a
distant cousin of the Bush clan,
and a member of the international Legion
of Terror. The criminal empire he built in Hazzard was an ideal power
base for the Legion's goal of world domination. For decades it served as a
secluded locale where global supervillains could conduct business away
from the prying eyes of the media.
While Boss Hogg was in power, Hazzard was often host to a variety of evildoers from around the world who were not officially supposed to be on American soil, such as the Latverian tyrant Victor Von Doom. It was also the perfect place to carry out nefarious plots, far away from superhero population centers like New York. One such scheme was the development of Luthor Corp's experimental "Ultra-Whitening Formula." UltraWhite was designed to mutate subjects of any ethnicity into members of a bland, homogeneous Caucasian society, in preparation for President Evil's "New World Order." Since there were no non-whites in Hazzard County to experiment upon, all of them having been lynched long ago, the Legion of Terror decided that the formula would be tested in Gotham City. |
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The first UltraWhite test subject was Gotham's District Attorney Harvey Dent, who had been a thorn in the side of the Legion throughout his career.
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The UltraWhite experiment was deemed 50% successful.
After the injection, half of Dent's body turned Caucasian, while the other
half became twisted and scarred. Dent was driven criminally insane, an
unforeseen side effect of the process.
The horrific transformation ended Dent's career in politics, although ironically he did go by the name "Two-Face" from that point on. His current residence is Arkham Asylum, where he lives with the rest of the nonconformists of Gotham City. |
Although the Legion of Terror pulled out of Hazzard County after Boss Hogg's death in the early '90s, a sweep of the area made by SHAFT Agents over the weekend discovered numerous abandoned underground facilities that had since become infested with minions of AIM, Hydra, Intergang, and other small-time criminal organizations. They are currently being "relocated" as part of a SHAFT training exercise.
Jonathan Kent, for his part, seems relieved that his secret is finally out in the open. His son Clark claims that the revelation has mellowed his father considerably.
| "Dad was always very strict. He was determined to keep
me on the straight and narrow. I understand now what that was all about.
Like most parents from hick upbringings, he was hoping for a better life
for his son, and didn't want me following in his footsteps as an
outlaw."
Now that his neighbors in Smallville are aware of his past, Jonathan no longer has to keep artifacts from his former life hidden away, such as the General Lee. For years he's kept the car parked next to an alien spacecraft in his barn, but in the past few days has been seen driving it all over the countryside. It is a legend among vigilante groupies, surpassed only by the fabled Batmobile in its automotive glory. |
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"Wait 'til you see Mr. Kent drive," said Clark's best friend Pete Ross. "You will believe a man can fly."
