Young Allies #4 (1942)

This story is continued from Captain America Comics Vol 1 16... As Captain America and the Red Skull battle it out on the top of a plane, the Skull is knocked off and seemingly falls to his death.. Or so that is what Captain America and Bucky are led to believe. In reality, the Skull manages to save his life with a hidden parachute and lands safely on the ground. Not wanting to be captured, the Skull kills a farmer and trades clothing, leaving Cap and Bucky to assume that the farmer was really the Red Skull, so that he can continue his plots to destroy America. Sometime later, the Young Allies have gathered once again, this time to see who will win in a boxing match: Bucky or Toro. Bucky appears to have the upper hand until Toro begins using his flame powers. However the bout is abruptly ended when Toro spots a nearby battleship up in flames. The Young Allies rush to it to see what they can do to help. Diving into the water, they find Betty Ross and pull her aboard the ship. There she is revived and she tells the Young Allies that there is a saboteur on the ship. To their surprise it turns out to be the Red Skull who is alive and well. The boys and Betty give the Red Skull a chase through the burning ship, and the Skull traps them in a room aboard the ship in the hopes that they will die of smoke inhalation while he escapes. The boys manage to break free thanks to Jeff's lock picking tools and they swim after the Red Skull. As they give the Red Skull chase, Knuckles is wounded by a shot from the Skull's waterproof Luger. They refuse to give up and follow the Red Skull into his secret underwater base. After a brief scuffle with the Red Skull and his men, the Young Allies and Betty are overpowered and tossed into a room that is slowly filled with water. The Skull tells the boys that he intends to destroy Washington D.C. and retreats once more. Finding an escape hatch that requires someone to operate in order to "torpedo" people to the surface the Young Allies free themselves one by one. With only Bucky and Knuckles left, Knuckles knocks out his leader and sends him off, believing that with his bullet wound he is done for anyway. Shortly thereafter the base explodes leaving the Young Allies to believe that Knuckles had died in the explosion. After a quick search for Knuckles' body turns up nothing, the Young Allies continue their chase of the Red Skull. They send Betty of to get the Human Torch and Captain America to aid them. With their bikes, the Young Allies ride to Washington D.C., the Red Skull and his men are flying over the city in an airplane where they begin to dump slips of paper telling people that it is a test bombing, leaving them unaware that the papers have been chemically treated with an deadly gas that would be unleashed in twelve hours upon touching the ground. As the Human Torch and Captain America are rallied, the Young Allies go after the papers that are dropped on Washington. Taking them back to a lab, Jeff analyses them and learns of the Skull's deadly plot. Seeking to stop the Skull, the Young Allies rush to then nearest airfield where they attempt to talk the military brass there into giving them a plane. This fails, and they are locked in a guard house for causing trouble, but are freed by Knuckles who survived the explosion and was knocked clear of the blast. With the Allies all reunited, they steal a plane and use it to knock the Red Skulls plane out of the sky. With the Skull having parachuted out into the mountains, and Jeff unable to land the plane, the Allies also parachute after the Skull. Landing on the ground, they are soon forced into a cave when the Skull causes an avalanche to fall on the boys heads. Inside the cave, the boys find that there is no way out except for a seemingly bottom less pit. Meanwhile, the Human Torch and Captain America arrive at the airfield where they are told what happened to the Young Allies. The two senior heroes rush to the mountains where they clash with the Red Skull, and the Torch uses his flame powers to melt the debris blocking the cave entrance. Over powered the Red Skull flees into the cave where he pushes the Young Allies down into the pit. The Skull unfortunately looses his footing and falls into the pit as well. The Skull manages to fight free from the Young Allies (who safely landed in water below) and escapes through another opening in the mountain. Finding a road, the Skull then jumps a man in a jeep and uses it to speed after a passing train. The Young Allies, Captain America and Human Torch give the Skull chase, as the villain hops aboard the train. While the Torch and Cap search the locomotive, the Allies follow after in the jeep. The Allies witness as the Skull jumps off the train just as it is passing through a tunnel and enters a secret passage way within. They follow after him and find that this is yet another one of the Skull's secret hideouts and they are swarmed by more of his men. Things are working against the Young Allies until Captain America and the Human Torch join the fray. During the fight the Red Skull attempts to flee, however the Young Allies chase after him. They pile onto the Nazi quickly knocking him off a cliff. Captain America and the Torch arrive just in time to see the Red Skull seemingly fall to his death. With the Skull dead, they have the deadly papers neutralized and the Young Allies are once more hailed as heroes.