There was a ripping sound, and then there was a roar of hatred that set the cows to screaming. A dead white fist thundered out of nowhere and caught Deadshot in the back of the head, sending him sprawling. He rolled through the dust, limp and unconscious.

Clock King and Cluemaster whirled. Double Dare was already in motion, twin forms darting towards the hulking, swamp-stink shrouded shape that towered over them.

"Is that-" Cluemaster began. Clock King nodded.

"Yes."

"BORN ON A MONDAY!" Solomon Grundy roared, raising his fists to the sky, red eyes blazing. The Key turned slightly at the sound.

"I almost have the door open. Keep him busy, yes?"

"Keep him busy?" Cluemaster shrieked. "Who do you think we are, the Justice League?"

"You have two minutes, four seconds," Clock King said. "Before he kills us."

"I can do it in one," the Key said.

"Bet?" Cluemaster said.

"You're on, my sneaky friend," the Key laughed. He turned back to his task as the others went on the offensive. The twin-thieves, Double Dare, used their agility to good effect, launching lightning-fast kicks and punches into Grundy's mass. The giant swiped at them, narrowly missing each time. The young women spun and dodged, leading the creature away from the Key.

"Lawton's out," Cluemaster said. Clock King didn't reply. "Hey, I said-"

"I heard you. Please be quiet."

"What-"

"I'm calculating."

"On?"

"Keep him distracted."

"You-" Cluemaster began, then sighed. "Yeah, yeah." He started towards the fight, fingers clutching convulsively at the gas pellets on his harness. Which one to use? Which one?

"Ah, who gives a crap," Cluemaster said, grabbing a handful of pellets at random and tossing them at Solomon Grundy. "Eat gas, big-n-tall!"

The Scavenger watched with growing frustration as the intruders continued their assault on his privacy. He'd hoped his newest acquisition would have been enough to distract them, but such was not to be. He tapped his fingers nervously, humming to himself.

No help for it, he supposed. He'd have to prepare for the worst. His chair spun slowly, bringing him around to a bank of control panels. He cracked his knuckles and set to work.

He had numerous defenses in place, few of which had been tested under actual battlefield conditions. It was as good a time as any. His fingers tripped across the buttons, bringing different sections of his base to life. Tricks and traps, as his mother had said.

Tricks and traps.

"Mon dieu!" one of the twins gagged, falling to her knees amidst the cloud of gas. Grundy's foot caught her in the belly and hurled her up and into Cluemaster. They fell in a tangle. The other twin scrambled back towards her sister, protectively.

"Idiot," she hissed, in English, hauling her sister to her feet and leveling a kick at Cluemaster, who rolled out of the way.

"Not even close," Cluemaster said, pointing. Grundy staggered, clutching at his throat, bellowing harshly. He patted his vest. "Never fails."

Grundy fell to his knees, long arms lashing out blindly. Clock King was moving even as the giant fell to all fours, eyes blinded by tears, nose full of smoke. The thin man circled the monster and leapt forward, hands clawing for the back of Grundy's head. Grundy reared back and Clock King, perched on the brute's shoulders, said, "Little help?"

"Do you one better," Deadshot grunted. He was up, if wobbly, and he extended his arms. The wrist magnums burped and Grundy went rigid, brackish blood oozing from the holes in his head. He sank to his knees and his upper body sagged, but didn't fall.

"Is he-" Cluemaster began. Deadshot shrugged.

"Never can tell with him."

"He's not," Clock King said. He stepped gingerly off of the brute and held up bloody hands. "He wasn't alive to begin with." Something that looked like clockwork vomit rested in his palms.

"What the hell is that?" Deadshot stepped back. Clock King examined it like a proud parent. The substance glittered and chimed as he rolled it across his palms.

"This, my gun-toting friend, is a clockwork helix. A gear-shift ganglion. Basically, simply, intrinsically a control device. I saw it beeping on the back of his skull."

"Control device? Someone is-" one of the twins began.

"Controlling this beast?" the other finished. She glanced back at Grundy, frowning. "He's watching us."

"Indeed. Through the beast's eyes, no doubt," Clock King said. "But, it's a simple matter to re-shift the clockwork, to get it running to my time…" he trailed off, intent on the glistening device in his hands. Something clicked.

Grundy stood with a violent motion, his dead eyes rolling in their sockets.

"Monday?" he said.

"Damnation and hellfire!" the Scavenger roared, battering his control consol. How had that imbecile figured out-

"No. Never mind. Foolish to waste energy." He spun his chair, activating the defenses closest to the besieged area. They were simply buffoons. Of little consequence. He could see the game being played here-his nemesis at work. Guiding fools and criminals to test his defenses. But he had more than the beast knew. More…

"HaHA!" the Key shouted, capering in an ungraceful circle. He clicked his fingernails together and spun to face the others. "Viola!"

The air groaned and invisible gears screeched and then, with a fart of displaced air, the door opened and wide. It revealed a space extending into emptiness, steel-sheathed walls that telescoped back into unimagined corridors. Spreading back into forever and within the foyer, sizzling beams of crimson rotated at odd angles.

"Well? No manifestations of gratitude?" the Key said expectantly. "No profuse and diverse thanks?"

"Thank you?" Cluemaster said. The Key bowed with florid abandon.

"You are quite welcome, I'm sure."

"Do your thing," Deadshot said, looking at Clock King. Clock King, followed by Grundy, stepped towards the doorway.

"Time in between or time of?" Clock King said.

"Girls?" Deadshot looked at Double Dare. The twins shrugged.

"Either-" one said.

"Or," the other finished.

"Both then, just to be thorough," Clock King said, hands behind his back. Grundy mimicked the action, looming over the thin man. Deadshot looked at Cluemaster.

"He going to keep that thing?"

"No idea. He's gotten weird."

"Only it smells."

"You don't have to tell me."

"Talk to him?"

"Do I look like his keeper?"

"Yes," Deadshot looked at the Key. "Feel like hanging around?"

"Quite. More locks?"

"Probably."

"Heh," the Key said, flashing his unusual teeth.

"What are we-"

"Supposed to do when-"

"We get through?" the twins said. Deadshot made a pistol with his fingers and pointed at Cluemaster.

"System looks like a what, Brown?"

Cluemaster squatted on his haunches and glared at the lasers. "Intergang salvage, definitely. So there should be a kill-panel at the other end. Otherwise how would he get out?"

"Maybe he-"

"Doesn't use the door?" the twins said. Cluemaster laughed.

"Then why have one to begin with?"

"Six point six, both ways," Clock King said. He looked at the twins. "Think you can make it?"

"That's why I hired them," Deadshot said. "Get to it." Without a word of reply, the two acrobats leapt to work, nimbly diving and rolling through the sea of coruscating lasers. Soon they were lost from sight. After a few minutes, Cluemaster looked at the others.

"Think they bought it?"

The lasers flickered and faded. Cluemaster smiled beneath his mask. "Kill-switch. Just like I said."

"Quiet you," Deadshot said, as he stepped through the doorway. "Let's go."

Double Dare was waiting for them at the other end, mirror-expressions of smugness decorating each woman's face.

"Kill switch?" Cluemaster said.

"Hidden in-"

"Plain sight, practically."

"Whoot!" Cluemaster did a little jig.

The Key was crouched in front of the next door. It was a clockwork monstrosity. Interlocking rings with no visible handles or keys. Nothing on them, save for oddly shaped engravings. He frowned.

"Unusual design."

"Brown?" Deadshot said. Cluemaster leaned forward. He sniffed.

"Themiscryian puzzle vault."

The others looked at him. He shrugged.

"Embassy job. It's either constellations or something to do with the-"

"Got it," the Key said. The rings shifted at his deft touches, sliding into new positions with a soft hiss. The door moaned and rolled aside. The next section of corridor spread beyond, gleaming metal, ill-lit and quiet.

"No lasers," the Key said.

Clock King toyed with the device in his hand and Grundy lunged forward, loping through the doorway. Something hissed and green vapor began filling the corridor.

"Damn it! Shut the door!" Deadshot said. The Key began fiddling with the rings,but to no avail. The door remained open.

"It's not-"

"Try the opposite-" Cluemaster yelped, trying to push him aside. Clock King's fingers moved swiftly around the circumfrence of his toy, calibrating Grundy's mental clockwork. The pale giant wheeled about, big fists flying. Heedless of the poison that coiled around him, He began battering the walls, crushing the hidden dispensers. Deadshot, realizing what Clock King was up to, began firing through the doorway, his wrist magnums chewing up the walls opposite Grundy. The gas slowly began to dissipate.

"Lasers, gas, what next? Ninjas?" Cluemaster said, peering through the doorway. "I mean honestly, is there a reason you can't just call this guy?"

"Radio signals won't penetrate into 4space," Clock King said. "Obviously."

"Oh, right. Because everybody knows that."

"We-"

"Did."

"I did as well," the Key said.Cluemaster looked at Deadshot. Lawton shrugged.

"I don't get paid to think."

"I hate all of you on so many levels it's not funny in the least."

"Noted and ignored," Deadshot said. "Let's go. According to the blueprints we got sixty more feet of corridor."

"Before?" the Key said. Deadshot turned.

"Before things get dangerous."

The Scavenger watched his automatic defenses crumble one by one and raged. His citadel began to twist and fold like a rubik's cube at his command, rooms and passageways sliding aside. He threw himself back into his chair and brought up the controls for his personal defensive systems. His 'bodyguards', for lack of a better term. Solomon Grundy had been but the newest addition to that group.

Hulking shapes moved out of the darkness. Leftovers from other battles, junk and scrap that no one missed. But junk could be repaired. With a little work, it could even be made better than before.

The Scavenger smiled, a thrill coursing through him. He raised his hand, laughing at himself. A little melodrama never hurt anyone, he thought. "Come forth my servants…my LEGION OF THE UNLIVING!"

TO BE CONTINUED

Next issue: Who or what is the Legion of the Unliving? And will the Secret Six survive long enough to find out? Be here in thirty for 'TRICK AND TREAT'!