Alias (Vol. 1), Issue #10 “The End”

* Standalone Issue *

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Alias (Vol. 1), Issue #10 – “The End”!

This is a standalone, so there’s no point in recapping the previous issue or storyline. I’ll do that next time. There was something about Rick Jones. It’s not important.

Enjoy this isolated issue sandwiched in between syrupy layers of Jessica Jones goodness. Whatever that means. It’s 1:00 in the morning and I have to get up for work in five hours. Clearly I’m delirious.

Alias (Vol. 1), Issue #10 [August, 2002]
Written by: Brian Michael Bendis
“The End”

Standalone story, different artwork. Special guest star J. Jonah Jameson! That’s always a sexy time. Jessica Jones is in the office of the Daily Bugle! The receptionist tells her that Jameson will be with her shortly, and no, she doesn’t know why Jamesson called her in.

She looks at the various framed front pages on the wall.

“SPIDER-MAN MENACE?”

“CAPTAIN AMERICA FOUND!”

“KREE-SKRULL WAR ENDS!”

Jameson comes out to the lobby all smokey, looking ravishing as usual! He’s going to get to Jones in a minute, but right now he must loudly berate Betty Brant in front of her. “What the hell is this?” he demands, referring a column where some conservative asshole gunks up the space on his newspaper! None of that anymore, you hear me Betty Brant?!

There’s also a bunch of other things she needs her to do. Now that Jessica Jones is here, a whole slew of people need to get their tight, little asses over here. Some guy named Hendrickson! Some guy named Robbie! Dennis Franz! Jerry Seinfeld! William Hurt! Adolph Hitler! Whatshisface, Ed Begley Jr.! Robert Downey Jr.! Morton Downey Jr.! Give me all the Downey Jrs. you can find!

And Ben Urich.

And does my hair look all right? Please be honest! I need it to be a perfect trapezoid.

“Do you have any employees, Ms. Jones?” Jameson asks Jones.

“No sir.”

“Count yourself a lucky woman.”

Jameson leans over looking like he smells really badly. He looks like he smells like a garbage dump of ashtrays and also garbage. He looks like he smells like garbage. “I have to be honest with you,” he tells the still-confused Jessica Jones. “I haven’t found many people in your line of work that I would say were strong of character.”

Is this a compliment yet? Better hold off, there could be FURTHER BERATEMENT than just the ones thrown at his employees. “I’m sorry?” she responds.

“I’ve worked with some investigators – hired some. Haven’t found one I would let babysit my grandson.”

Robbie Robertson enters the room. I think I know him, sort of. Jameson introduces him as the Editor in Chief. Jameson introduces Jones as someone “who used to dress up as a superhero”. She went by Jewel, you see. She doesn’t do that shit anymore, but she used to do that shit, and that’s kind of hilarious, isn’t it? “Not much to write home about – no offense, Ms. Jones.”

Later she cavorted around town as the “Knightress”, but not many people know about that one. Jameson does though. “Knightress” was just about the only name that wasn’t taken.

“Though I despise your chosen profession, I do admire your going public with your questionable past,” Jameson says rather bluntly, just like he says everything else. About as sharp as a plunger, this one. About his bluntness, of course. Not his intelligence, although that’s up for discussion as well!

Time for Jones to be blunt: what the fuck is this meeting about, anyway? Do you want her to kick Peter Parker’s ass or something? Do you want her to find you pictures of Spider-Man? She’s good at finding pictures of things. “It’s about secret identities of things,” he says. “I thought Robbie would find your background a little interesting considering what I’m about to offer you.”

Jameson splays out a few newspaper clippings about Jessica Jones. Photos of her dressed in tights. Photos of her not dressed in tights. He’s got it all! She didn’t even know she was in the newspaper that many times.

You’re pretty good at being in the newspaper, lady. That’s gonna help us tremendously for, uh, reasons.

Jameson yells for Brant again and asks her to make copies of these clippings for the still-confused Jones to keep. “Make yourself a little scrapbook,” he tells her, and then asks if her fees that are shown on her website are still up to date.

“You want to hire me?” she asks, boggling. Yes, he wants to hire her. He wants to hire her to let a reporter follow her around. Hey look, Ben Urich just showed up! Hey, Ben, did everything come out all right? Heh heh heh! I mean on the toilet, buddy. Did everything come out all right? *nudge* I’m talking about the poop, son. Did you have a good time pushing all that poop out of your butt?

“Jessica is a private investigator,” James tells Urich, who already may know her anyway. “The Daily Bugle is hiring her to find out who Spider-Man really is.”

Brrrt! Hold the phone, dingleberry. That sounds like a public investigator’s job! She’s just here to catch people fucking who shouldn’t be fucking each other! “What we’re hoping for is a series of articles. A real conversation piece to spread over days – but hey! If all it is is a big red headline – then all it is is a big red headline.”

Then Jameson pulls out some material from the Daily Globe, a tabloid rag with headlines like “Osama bin Laden is a Woman!” and “Pulp Hero of Hell’s Kitchen is Blind Lawyer”. Hey, that sounds familiar, doesn’t it?… Osama bin Laden did like high heels, and–

“That Murdock guy pretending he’s a blind shyster? The Globe had that story and they screwed it up,” Jameson continues. “Well, I want to show the world how to crack one of these guys in half.”

Jones is like BUT MATT MURDOCK ISN’T DAREDEVIL, HA HA HA, ARE YOU NUTSO CUCKOO BANANAS? and Urich tells her that Jameson is in denial about that. “I don’t care who that liar sues or what TV show he goes crying to – I know in my gut it’s a fact. Murdock is Daredevil.”

Yeah right, buddy. Take your medicine. Matt Murdock is Jessica Jones’ lawyer and not once has he snapped on that tight, tight spandex while he was in the courtroom.

Anyway, whatever, blah blah blah. Agree to disagree. “I thought that you of all people – someone who crashed and burned so miserably at it – would understand the need to rip that world apart from the inside – to expose those capes for the two-faced, morally corrupt vigilantes that they are!!”

“Uh huh…” is Jones’ only irritated response.

Looking quite dashing, sir, as usual!

“It’s this Spider-Man that should’ve gotten the public spanking,” froths J. Jonah Jerkass Jameson. “It’s Spider-Man that has this coming to him.”

When asked why, Newspaper Hitler merely says “That’s what you’re going to tell me.” So there you go. The Bugle is going to hire Jones to look for Spider-Man and have Urich write about the efforts. “We’ll follow you as you pull the layers, follow the leads, turn over the rocks. How great will this be? Not only will it be killer journalism – but money will actually start shooting out of my ass faster than we can print papers.”

Wow, that sounds nifty, my man! She loves helping guys like you *sniffs the garbage* make a bunch of Ass Money, but she needs some time to think about it.

“Listen, I don’t have time to change your tampons for you. I need an answer.”

“I’m sorry?”

When Jones tries to explain that she wouldn’t even know where to begin, Jameson yells for Brant to fetch him the “Spider-Man map”. “We’ve taken the liberty of compiling a list and a chart of frequent Spider-Man sightings. Places where he is repeatedly seen. See? Empire State University. Queens…”

Ha, yeah. Aunt May and Peter Parker’s house. Mary-Jane Watson’s house. The Osborn house. That school Parker goes to. The Daily Bugle building. We have our finger on it, but we just can’t figure it out!

Jameson promises fame and fortune by successfully pulling this off. So, have you thought about it yet? Remember what he said about the tampons? Are you in or out, kiddo?

“Sure, I’ll do it,” Jones smiles. “But there is the matter of an advance.”

It’s a deal, then! She’s gonna go browse Facebook and see if Spider-Man has been tagged in anyone’s bat mitzvah parties.

TWO MONTHS LATER. Jameson is perusing a piece of paper that is not, in fact, a newspaper! “Ms. Brant, will you tell that useless piece of garbage to get his overpaid butt into my office before I go to his cubicle and light it on fire!”

The useless piece of garbage enters Jameson’s office. His name is Ben Urich and he’s about as useful as a piece of garbage. Jameson yells at the poor sucker about Jessica Jones’ invoices for the last three weeks.

Yo, I’m seein’ double here! Two assholes! Ahhhh ha ha ha hah haaaa!!

Jones has been working at Mercy’s Kitchen, a soup kitchen in Hell’s Kitchen for about three kitchens. Er, weeks. Three weeks. “Said she had it on a good source that one of the regulars at the kitchen is Spider-Man,” Urich explains. “She said–”

So she serves them lunch? She serves these people lunch for hours and hours? And what do you do, Benny? Well, J. Jonah-y, Jamesy, Ben Urich watches and helps! And, uh, buses the tables. And all on the Daily Bugle’s dime! Isn’t that interesting, sir?

“I’m holding a bill for six hundred dollars for tapioca pudding!!” Jameson rages, likely bending that trapezoid head all out of whack. “She’s buying pudding from drunks and trying to get me to pay for it.”

“Well, she did say expenses,” Urich offers helpfully. It’s not very helpful.

“Two hundred dollars an hour, all day every day!! For her to serve pudding to meth addicts–” Jameson continues, obviously preoccupied with his one-track thought.

Here’s Urich’s report so far: they visited about 79 orphanages. They asked around the superhero community for info, and the superhero community said he was an orphan. Bingo bango. Did he mention that Jones has been reading books to the orphans. She’s a nice gal, this one.

“How does reading books to a bunch of unwanted brats help her find out about Spider-Man?” Jameson spits, taking a swig of Jameson and twitching his mustache seductively. And it’s that familiarity breeds trust, dingbat. Don’t you work in a newspaper?

There’s a lot in the report. Jones volunteered in the hospital’s AIDS ward. Soup kitchen. Orphanages. Homeless. AIDS ward. Orphanages. AIDS kitchen. Soup ward. “Damn it, Urich! She’s scamming us!! She’s scamming me!!” J. Jonah J. J. Walker screams. Lots of double exclamation points from this guy. Elaine Benes would NOT approve.

Oh no… my cigar is running out of cigar juice! Start talking faster, Urich!

“Were you ever there when she got one of her little ‘tips’ of hers?” asks Jimmy Jam-Jam ever so pointedly. “Did you ever see any of her so called superhero pals?”

“Uh– no.”

“No?”

“No.”

Benny’s going to get fucking fired. Robbie Robertson is there with his insufferable double name and ready to defend Urich. It’s Jameson’s fault for mocking everything about her to her face. Of course she was going to rob them all blind! Couldn’t you see that from the very beginning, ya dingus? THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT, IDIOT.

Jonah Jammies gets defensive and, knowing that he’s bound by a contract, tells Urich to write down everything this conniving liar has dragged them all through.

“That she what? Fed the homeless, read to orphans, and cared for AIDS patients?”

Uhhh… yeah. Do that. Heh.

“Wow, you know,” Urich rubs his chin, I imagine, “…I actually didn’t see it – it’s a pretty decent scam.”

“You are the worst investigative reporter on the planet Earth.” Jay Joe wants to get his lawyer on the horn. Robbie tells him to drop it. Last thing he needs is PR about the Daily Bugle suing a woman for reading to orphans.

Jameson knows he’s been defeated at this point. BUT, he has one more thing he needs to do: call this woman up and yell in her earhole. “Ms. Jones, this is J. Jonah Jameson, publisher of the Daily Bugle. I just want you to know that your services are no longer required. I know who you are and I know what you tried to pull. You think you’re all clever? Well, let me tell you something, Missy. You aren’t clever… and I pray – I get down on my hands and knees and I pray for the day that you screw up somewhere because my paper will be so far up your nose that – that – that – arrgghhh! I hate you!”