On a rainy night in the American
Midwest, a trucker runs down a cat. He goes out to see if it’s all right and he
is seized by a hulking brute named Roadkill who demands to know if he is the
driver who killed him. The trucker tries to run but the monster takes that as a
sign of guilt, seizes him and breaks the man’s back over his knee. The brute
and the talking cat named Splatt take his truck but Roadkill is dissatisfied
with its appearance and transforms the truck into a fiery monster and drives
on….
In New York City, the Punisher is
gunning down a pair of robbers when he is collected by Doctor Strange. Off the
coast, Namorita is sinking some drug smugglers’ yacht and Strange recruits her.
Elsewhere, Sleepwalker is freed to walk the night when his human host Rick
Sheridan sleeps. Strange brings the three of them before a map of the Central
United States. He tells them of a serial killer who is moving southwest along
the highways. He lists the murder sites and the Eye of Agamotto can’t predict
where he will strike next. Namorita says, “Amarillo” and doesn’t know why.
Punisher is onboard for the mission to stop the killer; Namorita would rather
be with the New Warriors but Strange made her feel guilty earlier by invoking
Namor so she agrees. Sleepwalker does not trust humans so he will look into the
matter in his own way. When asked why he has chosen them, Strange explains that
he has lost much of his power and selected his teammates by means of a special
Tarot deck. Strange and two of his Defenders now set out….
In Amarillo, Texas, Roadkill and
Splatt view the Cadillac Ranch, a display of luxury cars half-buried in the
earth, and decides he wants one like it. So he drives his blazing truck along
the highway, crashing cars at random, terrifying drivers and leaving several
cars protruding from the ground, their dead occupants intact….
Dr. Strange, Namorita and Frank
Castle are waiting at the Sanctum Sanctorum when they see a news report on the
incident in Amarillo. Strange hypnotizes Namorita to learn how she knew where
the next murders would be. It turns out to be from an old song, “(Get Your
Kicks on) Route 66,” which lists the cities on the singer’s journey. Strange
asks if the name “Roadkill” means anything and Namorita explains that he is the
scary host of a horror TV anthology series. Strange transports them all to the
TV studio. The three Defenders burst onto the set while filming is in progress
and Castle guns down the sinister Roadkill—who turns out to be an animatronic.
The show’s creator/producer Pam Daly and the crew are outraged and a fight
breaks out with the embarrassed heroes taking off. Strange explains to the
others that he had encountered Roadkill once before when the creature popped
out of his TV; he now knows that Roadkill was not the actual prop animated by
the Fear Lords merely the solidified image from his TV screen. And now the villain
seems to be seeking revenge for a death that appeared only in a TV backstory….
A couple of truckers pull into a
gas station and, spying Roadkill at the pumps, they beg off. The brute pulls
one of them out of the truck’s cab and jams a gas pump down his throat. The
other drives off, only to be pursued by the monster’s flaming vehicle. The
three Defenders materialize in the sky above and see what’s going on. Strange
tries magic, Punisher gunfire, and Namorita brute strength but none of them
slow down the demonic truck. Roadkill emerges from the truck and takes them on.
Strange tries to convince him he is a fictitious character whose memories exist
only in a script but he doesn’t believe the wizard. Roadkill delivers a
crushing blow to Namorita, boards his truck and drives it through a space warp
and vanishes. Strange feels guilty because the monster is immune to his magic
after their previous encounter so Strange considers himself guilty of all of
Roadkill’s murders as well. Punisher just wants to get Namorita to a hospital….