Las Vegas.

The circus had never been on Floyd Lawton's list of entertainments. The colors, the music, the raw noise that permeated everything only served to give him a migraine. He slouched low on his bench, an illicit cigarette clenched between his lips. Unlit, as yet. He'd just wanted the taste of nicotine on his lips.

He tapped the com-bead in his ear. "You sure about this?" he said quietly, not particularly caring if anyone heard him. With the noise the crowd was making he was sure no one was listening.

"Of course. They will be perfect," the distorted voice of Mockingbird echoed in his ear. "As will the others. You will need them to gain access to your target."

"Yeah, about that..."

"Our decision is made, Lawton. He is perfect-"

"He's a maniac," Deadshot said without rancor. “So’s the Black Manta too, for that matter.”

“And your opinion of Kobra?”

“Crazier than a brewery house rat.”

“As ever, your forthrightness is appreciated, Lawton.” Mockingbird sounded amused, if that was possible. “Only crazy men can joust with gods.”

“Yeah. Whatever. Fine. I’ll contact the Frenchies and then we’ll find Tockman and his buddy.” Deadshot fished a lighter out of his coat and lit up, sucking in smoke gratefully. “Who’s the sixth?”

“The Key.”

“Cra-hazy.”

“True. But useful.”

“Depends on your definition...” Deadshot muttered. In the center ring, the ringmaster was announcing the next act. He pulled on his mask and sighed. Slipping out of his coat, he stood and fired off a protracted burst that got the crowd moving and screaming. Another burst and the circus folks were running too.

All except for two of them. The women were moving fast, clad in yellow tights.

Deadshot stepped into center ring, wrist magnums smoking.

“Double Trouble, I presume. Ladies, have I got a deal for you...”

DIRTY DEALS
Issue #9
FIND ME A LOCKSMITH, FIND ME A THIEF

Metropolis.

William Tockman arrived at therapy on time, down to the second. Never early, never late, always on time.

It annoyed his therapist to no end.

"This obsession with time-"

"I'm not obsessed." Tockman's voice was flat. Emotionless. Another thing that grated on his therapist. “Obsession is a type of disordered thinking. My thoughts are perfectly ordered. I conduct three self-examinations a day to ensure this. Thirty minutes, twelve seconds.”

“What?”

“The amount of time we have left. Thirty minutes, eight seconds.”

“William-”

“Five seconds,” Tockman said. His therapist resisted the urge to scream.

“We need to talk about-”

“Twenty-nine minutes, fifty seconds.”

“William, I have the authority to sedate you,” the therapist said, her voice icy. Tockman cocked his head.

“Ah,” he said.

“That’s all you have to say?”

“I look forward to the nap.”

“I have the feeling that you aren’t taking this seriously.” She was a year out of the graduate program and paying her way via fifty-six hours a week at the Metropolis Mental Health Facility. Tockman was her thirteenth session of the day, and the first of two shipped up from Strykers. The other was sitting out in the waiting room, no doubt amusing himself in his usual fashion.

Of the two, she preferred Tockman. At least he kept his eyes off of her chest. Brown made leering an art.

“Let’s talk about your sister,” she said, finally. Tockman shifted uncomfortably.

“Twenty-eight minutes.”

Outside, in the waiting room, Abner Brown, better known as Cluemaster, tried to stare a hole in the armored visor of his guard. He and Clock-King rated a guard each, for what that was worth.

“Stop staring, Brown,” the guard said. Cluemaster shrugged and leaned back in his chair.

“Fine. I’ll just be bored then.”

“Good.”

“Good,” Cluemaster mimicked. The guard sighed.

“Brown, behave.”

“Make me,” Cluemaster said, crossing his arms. The guard shifted and Brown lifted his hands and grinned sheepishly. “Okay, okay, cool. We’re cool.”

"You sure? Because I'm just looking for a reason to taser you, Brown,” the other guard said, stepping away from where he stood beside the door. “You’ve been asking for it since-”

Poom.

The sound was quiet, barely more than an exhalation of air. The second guard, who had moved in front of the waiting room’s only window, spun around with a strangled squawk and toppled, a crater the size of a baseball in the center of his ceramite chest-plate.

Brown hit the floor, covering his head. The guard was still alive, but probably hurt. The armor was built to handle worse. The other guard was already in motion, rifle up and spitting blind out the shattered window.

Cluemaster calculated the odds, then went with his gut. He grabbed a chair and swung it up and then brought it down on the guard’s head. The armored figure staggered, the rifle swinging towards Brown, who yelped and dove aside as a burst of super-heated plasma carved a chunk out of the wall behind him.

“You sonnuva-”

Poom.

The guard’s helmet exploded. The body toppled atop Brown and he screamed, kicking it away.

The second guard was trying to sit up even as two lithe figures dove into the waiting room through the window. They hit the floor and rolled upright and two shapely legs, one from either figure, slammed into the guard’s faceplate. The guard flopped backwards, unconscious or dead.

The two women rose to their feet, clad in yellow, reddish hair coiled in long, thick plaits. They looked down at Brown, their expressions hidden behind their masks.

“Friend or foe?” Brown asked hesitantly.

In the office, the therapist had risen to her feet and was staring in shock towards the door. Tockman stood as well, his face calm.

“We’re ending early today,” he said. His therapist looked at him, the blood draining from her face.

"You can't-"

Tockman took her hands gently in his and led her towards the broom closet. "Doctor, I must say, I have truly enjoyed our sessions. It grieves me that we must cut them short, but anon, adieu and so forth," he said, opening the door and shoving her inside. He shut the door and wedged a chair under the knob. He leaned close to the door and said, "Now, how does that make you feel?"

Bogotá.

The Key had twelve senses and at the moment, seven of them were focused on the space-time aperture that hovered in the air behind him. Long gray fingers played with the skein of reality and his eyes narrowed from behind a greasy curtain of long white hair.

He was being paid a tidy sum by persons unknown to transfer a number of individuals from point alpha to point beta in a dash of time therein. He had been contacted by a random composition of digital molecules that spoke in a legion of automated voices. With his heightened senses, he had easily penetrated the ruse, but saw little reason to mention it. None of his business, after all.

Time flexed and flared between his fingers and he licked his lips.

“Time is my bitch.”

“Never heard anyone say that, hope to never hear it again.”

The Key turned slowly. “But it’s the truth and what is a key but that which unlocks truth? That was Diogenes, by the by.”

“I know who it was,” Deadshot said, as he stepped out of the aperture, followed by the others. “What about you, Brown?”

“I prefer modern literature. Fitzgerald is good,” Cluemaster said, adjusting his prison jumpsuit. “I need a costume.”

“Patience is-” one of the twins began.

“The soul of discretion,” the other finished. Brown looked at them and winked.

“Speaking of discretion-”

“I doubt we have time for that,” Clock King said. “I would like a costume as well.”

“Wouldn’t we all,” the Key said, clapping his hands. “Now, about my payment-”

“Need a favor first.” Deadshot gestured. “A little B’n’E, how about it?”

“I think not. I am no mere ’second story’ man!” the Key said. He rattled his harness and smiled. “Things to do, you know, doors to unlock.”

“I got a door for you,” Deadshot said, reaching into his belt and pulling out a miniature holographic projector. He tossed it to the Key. “Biggest damn door in the world.”

“Oh really?”

“Bet on it.”

“Hrm.” The Key activated the projector. A blueprint shimmered to life above the device and the white-headed criminal cocked his head. “That looks familiar...Intergang?”

“Apokalips.”

“Oh my,” the Key said. “Oh my, my, my.”

“Whoa, whoa! I’m not going to Apokalips!” Cluemaster barked. Deadshot swung an arm up, the muzzle of his wrist-gun resting against Brown’s forehead.

“You go where I tell you to go, Cluemeister.”

“But-but-”

“It’s not Apokalips. It’s merely...apokaliptian, yes?” the Key interjected. “I see several technologies, including some of my own devising-”

“The lair of a packrat,” the Clock King said. “How intriguing. Puzzlers, prisoners and...” He trailed off and glanced at the twins in yellow. “Huhm.”

“Acrobats,” one of the twins supplied.

“Professionals,” the other added.

“Thieves, too,” Cluemaster said. “I’ve heard the chatter.”

“I sense a theme,” the Key said, still examining the hologram. “And what, exactly, is the reason for this larcenous enterprise?”

“Got to have a chat with someone,” Deadshot said, lighting a cigarette. “Only he don’t like to chat. Don’t like visitors, see?”

“And our job is to get you in?” the Clock King said. “How much time do we have to work with?”

Somewhere else.

“Magnificent,” the old man said, looking up at the face of the being that stood before him. His newest acquisition, a fully functional Amazo android, with a full catalogue of abilities to draw on. The old man ran loving fingers over the automaton’s face. “Simply magnificent.”

He had discovered the machine in an abandoned HIVE base, along with several dozen clone-tanks. All in all a good haul.

The Scavenger swept his cloak up around him and turned away, his thoughts already moving towards his next acquisitions. He walked through his base, letting his gaze linger on alcoves of weapons and equipment the likes of which the majority of the world governments would love to get their hands on.

Here, a Shaggy Man stood silent vigil. There, an Intergang exo-harness. Working copies of the gear of various heroes including Batman, the Tarantula and the Sandman lined metal shelves, all within easy reach.

Weapons of war.

He shivered. The thought of the future always made him slightly queasy. It was fast approaching, he knew. The day of reckoning.

When HE would come back to finish the job he had started. The Scavenger rubbed the cybernetic device that replaced his left eye. How long had it been? Decades, certainly. Maybe more.

Heroes lived forever.

The Scavenger shivered again and pulled his cloak tighter about himself. He looked around at his sanctum. If-when-HE came back, he would find no cowering victim awaiting his ‘justice’. No, he would find the greatest assemblage of weaponry ever gathered aimed straight at his heart.

A sudden beeping filled the air, the sound of his automated search engine. The Scavenger smiled. It seemed he had yet one more item to add to that arsenal...

TO BE CONTINUED

Next issue: The Secret Six arrive just in time to get involved in a test of the Scavenger’s latest acquisition...no, not Amazo...be here in thirty for ’SON OF MONDAY’!