Super DC - The Uncollected Text Adventures : Super DC #2 "The Mask of Moh-Duhn"
Beginning with a short feature entitled "Jimmy's Greatest Scoops," Super DC #2 includes short biographies of Michael Caine and Tom Jones, a two-page spread of Doctor Who and the Cybermen, a profile of race car driver Graham Hill, and the magazine's first contest: "Draw a Badge and Win A Super Prize."
This time around, The Skipper's Mailbag contains a full complement of readers' letters, although they're taken from the letters page of the American comics.
In their text adventure in this issue, Batman and Robin face the Clock King.
The following adventures are reprinted in Super DC #2:
The Fate of the Super-Super-Superman! Superman #198 (July 1967)
The Dog From S.C.P.A.! Superboy #131 (July 1966)
The Fists and the Fury Superman's Girl Friend, Lois Lane #67 (August 1966)
Where There's A Will There's A Slay Detective Comics Vol 1 #367 (September 1967)
* * *
In the single spotlight he looked like a dreadful god come to wreak vengeance. The Mask of Moh Duhn was massive and repulsive, with a single huge eye in the forehead. "The eye ... when you look into the eye, you are in my power!" shrilled Professor Luz.
A concerted sigh ran through the hall. "Yes ... yes ... we are in your power," arose a whispered chorus.
Professor Luz took off the mask and chuckled. He made a signal and the lights were switched on again. "Amazing!" he crooned, walking around the stage and jabbing a pin into members of the platform party who sat staring ahead with unseeing eyes. "They see nothing, and feel nothing. What power this gives me-and what riches!"
At his call, three men emerged from hiding places in the hall. "To work!" cried the professor. "Empty the wallets of the men, and take the jewellery from the women."
The thieves went to work. Luz emptied the pockets of the men on the platform Then he began to put away the mask into a specially-prepared case. As he did so, a buzzer sounded. Luz whipped a communicator from his pocket. "Yes?" he snapped.
A voice from the communicator said: "This is Kahli, on the roof. There is something in the sky, coming closer. I do not think it is a plane ... it cannot be a bird. Luz tugged at his goatee beard. "It must be Superman," he snarled. "Let him come. The Mask of Moh Duhn may be powerless against the Man of Steel, but I think it will help to keep him utterly confused. These poor fools will tell him whatever I suggest!"
The tall figure of Superman shot down from the night sky, the red cape streaming behind broad shoulders. He landed lightly on the pavement, and bounded up the steps towards the attendant. "My super-intuition warned me that something is wrong here!" he rapped.
The attendant gulped. "No, Superman. I've been on duty all the time, and there has been nothing-" He broke off as the doors of the hall burst open, and people began to emerge.
A dozen voices cried out, "We've all been robbed, Superman. There were five tall men with top hats. They wore silver masks, Superman, and the leader smoked a cigar."
Superman held up a hand. "I recognise them from your description. They are the Green Brothers. Don't worry; I shall try and recover your valuables."
He launched himself into the air and zoomed over the great city buildings. "If it was not for the testimony of so many people, I would not have believed that this crime was the work of the Green Brothers," he said to himself. "They were a top criminal gang at one time, but after I brought them to justice they saw the error of their ways. I could have sworn they were all happily settled on the farm they bought.'
He swooped down over the tree tops towards a rambling old ranch- type house. Landing on the porch, he strode to the door which opened at his push. Five tall, weather-beaten men looked up in surprise. Farm life had agreed with the Green Brothers, and they had long since lost their prison pallor. "Hi, Superman," they called out, rising to greet him
"One moment!" warned the Man of Steel. "I must warn you that you are suspected of a hold-up at the City Hall in Metropolis tonight. Do you deny it?"
"Of course we deny it!" roared the eldest brother, Frank. He tossed his cigar angrily into the log fire. "You know we're going straight now, Superman. We had nothing to do with any hold-up. You can search the place if you like."
"I will," said Superman. "But first of all I'm taking you back to Metropolis for police questioning. Will you drive there quietly in your farm truck?"
"Okay," grunted Frank. "Come on, boys. The sooner we get this cleared up, the sooner we can get back to our farming."
As they marched across the farmyard, Superman stopped. He was staring with X-ray eyes at a hay rick. "Boys, I am disappointed in you," he declared. And diving into the hay, he emerged with a bag full of jewellery.
Meanwhile, Professor Luz was gloating over a far bigger hoard of stolen jewellery. "This is magnificent," he chuckled. "It was worth a few bits of jewellery to plant the blame on the Green Brothers. And I am only just beginning! Tomorrow is the day of the Mardi Gras carnival parade and I shall have a chance to try out the mask of Moh Duhn on a really big scale."
His communicator buzzed and Luz grabbed it from the table. "Master," came the voice of Mizrah. "There is a girl reporter here from The Planet."
A cunning look appeared on the professor's face. He began to shovel the loot into a drawer. "Send her in," he ordered.
A pretty, brown-haired girl came in. "Professor Luz, I'm Lois Lane of The Planet, and we would like to run a story about your trip to South America and your discovery of the tomb of Moh Duhn," she said.
The professor fussed around her. "Do sit down, Miss Lane. I shall be delighted to tell you about my adventures. Perhaps first of all you would like to see my greatest trophy, the mask of Moh Duhn?" Luz picked up the mask from its box, and held it before his face. "Behold the eye look at the eye, Miss Lane!"
Lois tried to blink. She caught her breath. "The eye!" she muttered, fast in a hypnotic trance.
Luz put down the mask and rubbed his hands. "Now, Miss Lane, you will listen to my orders-and you will obey! But you will remember nothing of what has happened here today. Is that understood?"
"Yes, Professor," intoned Lois.
"Good. Then you will return to your office and you will write a story about Superman. It will be a story that will scream from the headlines: 'Superman Is A Liar ... Superman Falsely Accuses Green Brothers ... Superman Plants Jewellery In Haystack'. Understand, Miss Lane?"
"Yes," she whispered, scribbling in her notebook.
People read their newspapers with astonishment next morning. Clark Kent sat at his desk in The Planet newsroom gloomily reading the story. When Lois Lane came in, she gave him a cool nod. "Aren't you supposed to be covering the Mardi Gras procession?" she asked. "You'd better get going. The streets are already jammed with people."
Clark picked up his hat and left the office. He struggled through the crowd to a vantage point from which he could see the carnival parade approaching. There were the usual huge grotesque heads made of wood and canvas. But following them came a float painted a strange, greenish hue. Standing on it was a man who held a huge mask before his face ... a mask with one single, penetrating eye.
The green float drew nearer. Through a loudspeaker, the voice of Professor Luz was chanting, "You hate Superman! You hate Superman!" The crowd took up the chant. "We hate Superman!"
The grim-faced reporter turned and fought his way through the crowd. With the hymn of hate ringing in his ears, he bounded into a deserted basement area, and in a few seconds he had switched from newsman to Superman. "Now Professor Luz," he muttered, as he leaped into the air, "I shall settle a score with you!"
He zoomed over the heads of the crowd, and rocketed down towards the green float. Then suddenly, with a gasp, he banked sharply and landed heavily on the road. "No wonder that float is painted such an odd colour; it has been coated with kryptonite-the one substance that can sap my super powers!" he groaned.
Superman heard the mocking laugh of Luz, "Running away, Superman? Maybe The Planet is right, eh? Our hero really is slipping!"
With screams of hate the crowd broke through the crush barriers and raced towards Superman. "Get him!" screamed Luz over the loudspeaker. "Don't let him escape!'
But gathering all his powers, Superman bounded into the air, and reached a roof top. "I must find a way to snatch the mask from Luz without approaching the float," he thought.
He spotted a huge radio pylon on the roof of the Radio Metropolis building. Swiftly he flew to a nearby factory yard. Scooping up several huge coils of steel cable into his mighty arms, he returned to the roof of the radio building. With a wrench he uprooted the pylon from its concrete base. Then he used his tremendous strength to weld lengths of steel cable together.
Leaping to the edge of the roof, he raised his giant fishing rod over his head and taking careful aim, made an expert cast towards the green float.
Zip! The fish hook that Superman had bent from a steel bar ripped into the top of the Mask of Moh Duhn.
Like a flash, the Man of Steel reeled in his catch. He had not only caught the hypnotic mask but Luz as well. For the professor, screaming with terror, had clung to the mask which had brought him so much power.
Superman picked up the mask of Moh Duhn and slowly he crushed it, as an ordinary man would crumple a piece of waste paper. Then tossing it aside, he picked up the trembling Luz. "I shall leave you in the hands of the police," he said. "And then I must see that Lois Lane is freed from your hypnotic power. She's got a new story to write about me-and not quite as uncomplimentary as the last one, I hope!"
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