This issue mostly focused on a new character, who was introduced in the final page of the previous issue. There was a female scientist named Dr. Morrigan (we’re not given her first name). Beginning with a flashback to 15 years ago, we see that Dr. Morrigan has spent over 10 years attempting to find away to preserve human consciousness, the very soul, in computerized form, after death. She’s approached by executives from Cyber-Data (the first time the name of the company has actually been mentioned in this series) who hire her to continue her work, but for them. They want her to create artificial life. But flash forward two years and the doctor has not made any progress, and Cyber-Data becomes more demanding. During this time, Dr. Morrigan has begun a relationship with a woman named Emily, and one day Emily is taken and shot to death right in front of Dr. Morrigan, as punishment for not succeeding faster. Eventually the doctor decides to sacrifice herself by uploading her consciousness into a new artificial body, which will trick Cyber-Data into thinking this is a new artificial life form. This new body, in the form of a woman with green eyes and green hair, calls herself Aphrodite, but appears to not have the full memories of Dr. Morrigan. This body has been locked way since then, but is now being let free to team up with Morgan Stryker in his hunt for the armored terrorist who caused the incident which cost Stryker his arm. The story then cuts to the armored terrorist, who explains her motivations to Killjoy, with quite a surprising cliffhanger.

Once again, a solid issue. I did find the story of Dr. Morrigan to be intriguing, with just the right amount of tragedy to make her sympathetic. The only real complaint I have is that once again I find that co-writers Matt Hawkins and Bryan Edward Hill are counting on readers being familiar with the original versions of the characters from previous series, and that includes this Aphrodite character, whom I know has been published in several previous comics by Top Cow, but I never read any of those. They really need to work on being a tad more accessible in how they provide information. But Atilio Rojo continues to do great work on the art.

Chacebook rating: FOUR STARS

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