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Some TMNT stuff was always meant for grownups. |
King Cobra is an underworld gang boss who operates the biker club hangout Snake Pit. He is considered to be an urban myth, a man who wears a mask, for his mutant face is too terrifying to look upon.
History[]
Shredder's search for the Mourner and the explosives she is bringing into the city, leads him to the Snake Pit, a lower east side biker bar. Once inside, he asks for King Cobra, but the bartender pretends she has no idea what he's talking about. After a fight with a group of bikers, Shredder manages to reach King Cobra's inner sanctum. There he addresses King Cobra himself.
King Cobra tells his men to hold their fire. He states he is almost inclined to believe this is Shredder, since he managed to find him. He goes on to tell Shredder that it must be embarrassing for him to discover that King Cobra has been operating right under his nose the entire time he led the Foot Clan. Shredder replies that he sits on a throne of trash, facilitating the flow of narcotics and counterfeit goods into New York.
King Cobra says that Shredder’s organization was ostentatious, but that he’s sculpted his legend more artfully. King Cobra brags that they are camouflaged; unseen like a snake in the grass and people fear what they can’t see. They go about their business as these people tell themselves they are not there at all. Shredder walks closer, saying that he always knew they were there. He kept that knowledge to himself, on the off chance he might someday find it useful. He says that it would have been so easy to take all that was King Cobra’s.
In response, King Cobra says that this is where Shredder finds himself now, without backup or financing, coming to beg him for scraps. Shredder says all he seeks today is information. There is a woman calling herself the Mourner and he believes she’s bringing explosives into the city in such a large quantity that it would be difficult to go unnoticed unless… King Cobra finishes the sentence by saying unless she was paying to use his network. Shredder says that he needs to know what the components of her weapon and who is supplying them.
King Cobra replies that Shredder has no idea what his protégé is doing and how she is about to make him a footnote in his clan’s history. He says that it’s a shame, as not long ago an alliance between Shredder and King Cobra would have had the underworld trembling. However, things have changed and Shredder is thought to be dead. His reputation doesn’t hold the weight it once did. He begins walking away and with a wave of his hand, gives the order to go ahead.
Cobra’s men lift their guns to open fire, but before they can pull the triggers, Shredder throws a handful of kunai, unerringly hitting the men in their heads. He leaps over them as they are falling and lands on a surprised King Cobra, dropping him to the ground before straddling his chest. Peering down at him, Shredder says he will gaze upon the man’s terrible visage and rips his mask off, despite King Cobra’s pleadings.
King Cobra is no mutant, merely a man wearing a disguise. He begs Shredder not to hurt him. Shredder proceeds to slash his face, removing his nose and then splitting his tongue. He takes his time cutting off King Cobra's lips, leaving him alive but now with a real reason to wear a mask. Before he took King Cobra's tongue, Shredder got the information he came for.