LIGHTNING BULLET ISSUE ZERO!

VOA: "Flying a few dozen feet in the air, the short hero Lightning Bullet patrols Ruby City.  Suddenly, he spots a group of boys in a vacant lot and it seems that they are picking one of their number.  Flying down, he investigates, hovering in the air above them with a tree blocking their view of him."

"Watta pantie-waist!"

"Watta Buffoon!"

"Look at those ears!  See how big they are?  Jug ears!"

"And that nose!  Ever see anything that big on a kid before?"

VOA: "Four boys were pushing around a smaller fifth boy making fun of him while a sixth and larger boy stood by with a proud grin on his face."

"Maybe we should toss him in a mud puddle?  Teach him to look like that!  And he talks funny too!"

VOA: "The four boys look over at the bigger boy to see what he wants them to do."

"Hmmm ... sounds like a good idea to me ... unless ... maybe you want to pay us to not do that, Heimie?"

"I-I ..."

"This has gone on long enough," a surprisingly deep voice cuts in, "you boys have no idea what you are doing.  No idea the path you are heading down."

'IT'S LIGHTNING BULLET," all six boys chorus.

VOA: "The hero in white with golden lightning bolts on his costume lands in front of the boys."

"You boys are being bullies.  Worse," the diminutive hero lectures, "you are trying to set up a protection racket.  You are taking that first bad step into being a Juvenile Delinquent.  That means that you are trying to become criminals!  Is that what you really want to be, criminals?  Bullies?  Foes of Society?  Would your parents be proud of you?"

The boys gasp at these words.

"You know who else are bullies besides criminals?  Commies.  Is that what you boys are, Commies?"

"No sir, Lightning Bullet!  We aren't Commies, we are true blue Americans!," the five boys chorus.

"Could have fooled me," he replies.  "Commies are the biggest bullies in the world!  Trying to take away anyone and everyone's freedoms!  Forcing everyone to do as they command.  No freedoms.  No thinking any thoughts but what they say you are allowed to think.  Ratting out your friends and family just to make sure you are not considered a bad Commie by their Politburo."

"America!  The Land of the Free!  The Home of the Brave!  How brave are you ganging up on a smaller boy and trying to extort what you can from him?  Hmmm?"

"We're sorry, sir," the boys say ashamedly.

"And another thing, in America, everyone looks different and have different beliefs too.  Race, creed, color and religion are to be no barriers, all that is sacred to the American Way of Life  That's guaranteed to every American by the Constitution.  You are spitting on the Constitution and our Founding Fathers by your actions.  That's what Commies want you to do, spit on our Constitution and our laws.  Are you proud of that?"

"No sir," they say, chocking up a bit.  "We're sorry."

"I want you boys to shake hands and then go your own way.  Think over what you tried to do and realize what your actions could have meant to you and how it would have impacted your futures.  If you had continued and become criminals or worse, Commies, it would have been my job to bring you into face Justice."  

"Mend your ways and become Good American Boys.  You can do that by being polite to all adults you meet.  Respect your parents and teachers.  Listen to them.  Stand up and Proudly say the Pledge of Allegiance in school every day you are there.  Stand up and Salute the Flag with your hand over your heart when it marches by in a parade.  Help out those who need a hand.  Protect those who need protecting.  Stand up for the Rights of Others.  Go to your church, temple or synagogue regularly and thank God you have a country where you can worship in any House of Worship without fearing for your life or being mocked for your beliefs."

"Folks out in Radio Land.  Communism!  The Destruction of Democracy!  The Enslaving of the People!  Beware!  Oppose it with your life blood," Lighting Bullet finishes up.  "Be a Good American!  And Kids?  Stay in School and learn everything you can to grow into a happy, FREE, educated, THINKING adult, doing a job you want to do, not what someone else says you have to do.  Living where you want to, not being told you can't travel.  God Bless American every day!  Thank you."

VOA: "This is radio station KRUB, and this Public Service Announcement was brought to you by the Ruby City School Board and this station.  We thank Lightning Bullet for his aid in presenting it."

Just so you know, all radio stations west of the Mississippi River start their call signs with "K", East of the Mississippi start with "W" TV stations did too I think back then.

FROM THE FILES OF LIGHTNING BULLET COMES ONE OF HIS EARLIEST ADVENTURES AND FIRST ENCOUNTER WITH ONE OF HIS ARCH FOES ... PACK RAT!



Time: Approximately 3 AM, Saturday Morning.
Place: Stately Home of Max Dane




Something wakes up Max from a deep sleep. A noise, slight though it was. He decides to go investigate.

"Probably a feral cat or a coyote wandering around outside," he mutters to himself as he gets out of bed and throws a robe over his pajamas and heads into the hallway to investigate. Leaving the lights off as he can see fine in the darkness with his newly acquired Ultra Vision, Max softly works his way towards his hobby room where he keeps his various collections of small items with the intent to check there first and then head for the kitchen to see if some animal had gotten into the garbage cans again.

Approaching the door to his hobby room, he hears some slight noises that indicates that its inside the room not outside as he originally thought.

"Could have sworn that the windows were closed, " he muttered.

Opening the door and flipping on the light switch, Max is startled to find a small skinny man or boy, about 5' in height, removing his collection of miniature ships in bottles from the shelves and placing them in a small suitcase.

"Whaaa...?"

"OH ho! A light sleeper are you, Dr. Dane," a weaselly nasally voice replies to the confused man, "Here! A gift for you from Pack Rat!"

Before the confused but rapidly awakening Dr. Dane can move, Pack Rat pulls something around his waist, whirls it over his head and lets fly. Max finds himself wrapped up by some kind of bolo-type weapon and the 6'6" man falls to the floor.

"A gift from me to you. A swap you might say," Pack Rat chortles as he goes back to packing away the last of the miniature ships in the bottle. "I acquired that from a not so nice man by the name of El Gaucho."

"Pack Rat?! I've heard of you! You steal anything you can get your hands on, no matter how valuable it is, just so long as you find it interesting! The police have been after you for months!"

"And still haven't caught me, have they? And now, thanks to that nice article from last month in the newspaper about your hobby of collecting these wonderful ships, I am taking them for my own. If you acquire any other interesting things in the future, Doc, be sure to let me know so I can gather them up for myself. TAH!"

With that, the wiry small man waves and slips out the window, closing it behind him and replacing the window screen as well. While Max struggles to free himself, he hears a motorcycle start up and drive away into the night.

"Idiot," he mutters to himself, "you forgot what you can do now."

Concentrating and gathering his Will, he quickly changes size shrinking from 6'6" Max Dane, scientist/inventor, to the 3' tall Lightning Bullet, with his costume appearing in place of his pajamas as he shrinks, he is easily able to slip out of the now loosened bonds.

"Nobody swipes my collection of antique miniature ships in a bottle and gets away with it," the Diminutive Hero snarls, "this is a job for Lightning Bullet!"

Heading for the backdoor of him home, Lightning Bullet slips out, grateful that he lives in an isolated suburb with his closest neighbor over a hill, a quarter of a mile or so away. Taking to the air, he uses his telescopic and ultra vision to try and spot the lights of a motorcycle.

"This time of night, there can't be too many vehicles on the road," he mutters. He spots the headlights of a couple of cars and finally, while flying in the general direction of Ruby City, a single headlight.

"There he is," he says to himself. "Now, do I swoop down and take him or follow him? He could crash if I attack while he is driving and could destroy my property ... and he has to have his stash somewhere. Since the police haven't found his hideout yet, then maybe I should just follow him, find it and then capture him."

Having decided on a course of action, Lightning Bullet flies high in the air and behind the motorcycle, to make himself less noticeable. Pack Rat drives into Ruby City, his motorcycle jacket and soft cap, straight out of The Wild Ones movie that recently came out.

{Marlon Brando from the Wild Ones, a movie that helped make him a star}



Pack Rat eventually comes to the shipping end of Ruby City and drives into a rundown small warehouse. Lightning Bullet lands on the roof and looks for a small window/air vent to look inside. Finding a grimy window he peeks in and doesn't see Pack Rat or the motorcycle anywhere. Going down to the same entrance Pack Rat used, he slips inside and begins to look around quietly.

Using his microscopic vision with his ultra vision, he is able to follow the intermittent tire markings to a large crate. Investigating, he finds it hinges open and inside is the motorcycle, out of sight to everyone.

"That explains that but where did he go," Lightning Bullet mutters quietly.

He looks around the place. The office is empty and shows little sign of use as the two month old mail laying on top of the desk proves. Nothing in the bathrooms. Nothing in the break room. Examining the other crates doesn't reveal much either. He looks around baffled then glances down to a corner where a grating is in place.

"Pack Rat scurried down a hole maybe?" Investigating the grate, a normal sized man would not be able to fit down the hole once the grate was removed but the small suitcase and the small wiry Pack Rat would. Using his vision powers, he determines that the grate has been moved fairly often as the rust on it has flaked off and is lying about in very small quantities. "He must be a contortionist to get down that though."

He sniffs and decides that it doesn't lead down to an active sewer. "Must be an old sewer line that was blocked up or maybe a grease pit? Well, let's go see."

Lightning Bullet removes the grate and lowers himself down into the hole and finds himself in a small, dry circular shaped concrete tunnel. "Old sewer or water main then," he thinks. "But which way?"

Looking around he finally notices the scuff marks of shoes going one way and decides to follow them. The concrete pipe is about 3 &1/2' tall so the Diminutive Hero is able to walk down it easily though he still crouches a bit instinctively to protect his head from any protrusions. Bits of light shine down at intervals from other small grates along the way. Enough that his ultra vision allows him to see somewhat easily, if only for 10' or so ahead of him.



He comes to a Y-junction eventually. Both only go a short distance away and then are blocked off with brick walls One of them, however, is only partially block with a small opening that a child could slip through, "Or a contortionist. This guy has to be a contortionist," Lightning Bullet surmises.

Slipping through himself, he moves quietly, listening as he moves. The tunnel continues and gradually curves and as he is about to come out of the turn, he stops, hearing music coming from ahead and smells the smell of cooking bacon.

Levitating up off the floor of the small pipe, so as to hide his approach, Lightning Bullet glides forward quietly and spots Pack Rat, wearing an apron, cooking himself breakfast on a large gas camp stove. Multiple concrete pipes of various size go off from this, what would usually be a large space, but it is crammed to the 10' ceiling with all sorts of items and goods that Pack Rat has collected over the past months. The items don't seem to be in any sort of order, just crammed in willy nilly, with various small suitcases partially open holding even more goods, such as his ships in bottles, that he came after.

Lightning Bullet slips behind a pile of goods and waits as he doesn't want to start a battle with an open bottle of propane spilling out. Pack Rat eventually finishes cooking his meal and turns off the stove and brings his plate of food to a small table. Lightning Bullet realizes that Pack Rat must have hacked into the power grid as there are a few 25 and 40 Watt lamps around to provide some dim lighting for the small thief.

As the thief takes a bite of his meal, Lightning Bullet steps out and makes his presence known. "Hello Pack Rat, hope you enjoyed that bite as it is the last one you get as a free man."

"Wha ...?"

"W-Who are you?"

"I call myself Lightning Bullet as you will see why shortly. Surrender now you fiend or face the consequences!"

"As if I will listen to a shorty with a bad sense of fashion," the small thief snarls, hurtling his fork at the Diminutive Hero.

Lightning Bullet ducks and the fight is on!

Pack Rat upends the table towards Lightning Bullet and dives to the side.
Lightning Bullet dives to the same side and tries to punch the small villain but he manages to duck the blow ... barely
Pack Rat demonstrates that he is no slouch when it comes to fighting by attempting kick Lightning Bullet but he misses as well ... barely.
Again Lightning Bullet tries to land his lightning touch on Pack Rat but fails to touch him as Pack Rat picks up a baseball bat to ward off the attacks and to return the favor.
Back and forth the two clash until seeing that he will have problems, Lightning Bullet releases his second attack - FLASH!
Due to the unexpected attack and the dim lighting, Pack Rat is blinded by the bright light given off by the Diminutive Hero. Taking advantage of this, Lightning Bullet is finally able to land a couple of quick touch lightning attacks, knocking the villain unconscious.

Tying up the villain, Lightning Bullet explores the place, finding a few other exits and taking one to the surface, finds a payphone and calls the police. He tells them who he is, though they don't know him from Adam at this time, and that he has captured Pack Rat. He gives them directions to the largest of the exits to Pack Rat's Lair that he could find.

Returning to Pack Rat's Lair, he returns in time to see the small villain is awake and in the process of slipping out of his bonds.

"So I was right," he says as he approaches, "you are a contortionist as well as an escape artist. Let's put you back to sleep, big boy!"

Lightning Bullet shocks him back into unconsciousness and reties him, adding more clothesline rope that he found as well as three handcuffs that were stuffed away. Hearing the sirens, he goes back to the surface and waves at the approaching police cars.



Identifying himself and explaining, with some editing, how he followed and captured Pack Rat, he leads the shortest officers down into Pack Rat's Lair where they find the villain and his stolen swag. They call in more units and paddy wagons to gather up all the stolen loot.

Pack Rat revives, watches as his goods are taken away from him and curses Lightning Bullet, swearing that he will get out of this and will make it his mission in life to take away anything and everything that Lightning Bullet wants for himself.

Warning them that Pack Rat seems to be both an escape artist and contortionist so extra precautions are needed to make sure he makes it to the Police Station, the Diminutive Hero flies off into the soon to be rising dawn.

Once home, he changes back into Max Dane and calls the police to tell him that he had been robbed and just now managed to get out of the bolo-type weapon Pack Rat had wrapped him up in. Then he sat and waited for the police to arrive, listening to the early morning news on the radio and one of the first confirmed sightings of Lightning Bullet by the police.

Taking the idea of how the Batcave was seen in the 1940s and using it for The Think Tank, the elaborate hidden HQ for our Atomic Heroes.
Ignore all the Trophy Room stuff, mainly its the two ways the Think Tank can be accessed.


Guess one of the first things we have to do is figure out a name for the group in our first adventure.
This is from a 1948 issues of Batman



Caves are not all that natural in Southern California, so the house will be built on the side of a hill where he had construction done to build a combination lab/wine cellar/bomb shelter and he did some work on his own, all to create the Think Tank.