(Target Comics v1 006, 1940)
Grebo is a simple guy, even if he is a Mercurian. He's on Venus with his pal Gogg hunting a lost stash of Mercurian platinum that was spirited away by the losing side of a long ago war in which Rogg and Grebo's ancestors were the victors. And heck, that'd be simple treasure hunting if the underwater city that the swag was in were uninhabited, right?
Sadly, it turns out that the defeated Mercurians (or the Draxions, as they call themselves) are very much in residence, having adapted to a watery existence as a way to hide from their ancient enemies. And it seems that their caution was entirely justified, as Grebo's first response to discovering that the platinum might in fact not be up for grabs is to shoot Draxion leader Tuok.
This little demonstration ensures that Grebo and Rogg have little trouble with the remainder of the peaceful Draxions, and they make their way to the platinum vault with little trouble. At which point Grebo makes some trouble, by murdering Rogg rather than split the loot with him. Classic villain stuff!
All good things must come to an end, however, and that includes reigns of terror: having been summoned by his friends the Draxions, Spacehawk soon arrives and sends Grebo rocketing into space to his doom. Would Grebo have survived the encounter if he had, say, a second person to back him up? Probably not, but it surely couldn't have hurt his chances.
I have to say that the real star of this story were the Draxions. The contrast between their goofy Wolverton faces and the deadly action is surprisingly evocative. Googly-eyed weirdos can have hopes and aspirations too, after all.
Once the danger is over, Spacehawk helps the Draxions re-adapt to land dwelling forms and I can't choose between the goofy pointy-headed aquatic Draxions and the more businesslike clearly-enjoying-all-the-air-breathing land Draxions. I love them both dearly.
Shout out as well to Grebo's ship full of different types of Mercurians (plus some Saturnian pilots), not only for being great little designs but for (intentionally or not) preemptively shutting down any nit-picking about alien designs not being consistent between Spacehawk adventures. It's because there are all kinds of different phenotypes, losers!
(the crew panics when Spacehawk shows up and ends up flying the ship into a mountain, if you were wondering where they were during that final confrontation)
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