Story: At a junkyard, Duke meets up with an old childhood friend of his, Lance "Clutch" Steinberg and Duke explains the events from last issue to him. Clutch helps Duke by cleaning up and bandaging his wounds and then looks at the device Dr. Adele Burkhart had left him and is able to activate, which shows a map with a glowing dot. After that happens, Destro, sitting in his office, is notified of something. Before Duke and Clutch can leave, they are fired upon by Craig "Rock 'N Roll" McConnel, who uses drones to lead them to Lonzo "Stalker" Wilkinson (which Duke is aware of both men). Duke and Clutch are captured and held in "The Pit", an old decommissioned base, where another prisoner (with a female with glasses and long, black hair) mentions that maybe the three of them can work together.
Writing: I like how this story is going. Duke knows, by reputation, who some of these (assumed to be future) G.I. Joe members are. After all, the G.I. Joe team is made up of the best the armed forces have to offer. We also get a bit of history tossed in when he visits Clutch (hinting that Clutch is a mechanical genius and Duke isn't so good at taking care of fast cars). Another thing I enjoy is that, while these guys may end up all working together in the future, right now they aren't friends, they aren't teammates, they are working against each other. Then there's the Destro and Baroness questions in the issue as well. Once again, we do get a few easter eggs in the writing (Duke's younger brother (aka Lt. Falcon) is mentioned, though not by name and Stalker knows a high kick he learned from "an old friend"). However, I have a hard time believing that Rock 'N Roll would just open fire at two people (when one is a civilian) in a junk yard unless he knew 100% that the place didn't have anyone else there (and we did see someone leave Clutch's trailer earlier).
Art: Can't argue too much with the art. It still looks good. My biggest complaint would be that Clutch looks a lot like Torch (from the Dreadnoks) in the first few panels (especially with the shades on); at first that's who I thought it was! The vehicle they get away in is the classic VAMP Multi-Purpose Attack Vehicle (minus the gun) which is really cool.
Overall: Another solid issue in the series, moving the plot forward while still keeping us interested in what's going to happen next. Where is that location on the map? What's up with Destro? Is that the Baroness? And why is she in prison and how are they going to get out! Some nice Easter eggs are included and the art is really nice (and I like seeing some of the classic vehicles they've given us so far!).
