At first glance, this place looked like... nothing. A power substation, perhaps? A metal shack with a barbed-wire fence around it and a few parking spots. Dead brush, dead grass, and a few tumble-weeds collected against the north fence forming a wall; aside from that, the only visible thing was a hill rising up into the distance. Most of his time in Afghanistan had been in prettier, livelier places than this. Jason left the panel van behind; if it wasn't safe in the casino parking garage, it wouldn't be safe anywhere. He'd taken the beaten-up old pickup instead; and when he emerged, studied the place closely.

He'd been told to come here just after sunset, bring an appetite, and that he'd be welcomed into the family if he chose. Still. He stretched for a moment. He'd always stretched before a fight. Both the ones he won, and the ones he lost. But always in the past.. he'd had backup. That fight with the cops was the first time he'd really been alone going in.

His hand absently rested over the new tenner; still a 10mm handgun, just with two 20-round clips and a full-auto setting deliberately tuned down so that it would take a couple of seconds to empty both clips; there were versions of this gun that could empty the clip in a quarter-second, and he never liked that nonsense. Frankly... the full-auto feature would probably be more useful for his powers than an actual fight, figuring out just where he needed to shoot.

Deep breath. Just killed the fastest man alive. You can do this.

The helmet went on. The bandage came off, tossed into the truck alongside the cowboy hat.. and the duster.

He looked more like a supervillain now. Black, sleek, body-armored form, shiny chrome helmet... much better than the black leather jacket and bike helmet. He was missing the stupid hand-painted Eyeball decal, but then... he'd get a real artist to make him one later. A deep breath. The air filters activated, just in case.

He walked up to the shack, opened the door... and saw a pair of turrets on either side, pointing at him, protecting a stairway leading down. He could see they weren't going to fire at him... but each was a roughly spherical machine with two gun-barrels sticking out, each a few meters away from the door. High-caliber barrels, from the look of things. He glanced at both of them. They wouldn't fire unless he shot at them... but he didn't want them to be cutting off his escape if something went wrong.

Absently reaching into a pocket, whistling to himself, he started toying with a set of magnetic ball bearings... and started flicking them out, one by one. This angle? No. This angle. Four tossed objects, each no more than a magnetized marble... and now.. if he shot at the turrets, they'd explode with their first return volley. A nod.

He walked over and started down the stairs, knocking on the door; a solid metal barrier that simply slid aside, like a fancy Star-Trek sort of barricade. There were cameras, of course. And he saw... that if he just walked in, that door would slam shut seconds later.

He slid free a Burster grenade; and jammed it into the pathway for the door. If it shut... it would hit the grenade, and, well. It would still partially close, but leave a space he could get out.

This netted a response from the room's occupants; two men; both large, powerfully built, with sidearms at their hips, approaching. "Ey! What the fuck do you think you're doing?"

Jason turned to them... if he shot... Ahh. Interesting. He pulled his handgun out, and aimed it at a spot where nothing appeared to be... but where, if he shot, the bullets would stop before they hit the wall, and blood would spray everywhere. "Is this what you call a friendly meeting? Ambushing me with an invisible man, trapping me in a box?"

The two men stopped. The invisible form moved abruptly... but Jason tracked it perfectly. He almost lost it when it went to the ceiling. Was it a damn spider? "Dance all you want. But if you come any closer... or if one of your friends pulls a gun... you die first. I'd feel a bit more comfortable with this meeting if you either became much more visible, or a lot less -here-."

The digitized voice was emotionless; but the two men were clearly frightened... "Really, this is a friendly chat. The boss would have our asses if you got hurt. This is just precautions."

The second handgun... the double-barreled 40mm grenade launcher; emerged, leveled on the two henchmen, while the tenner stayed focused on the invisible... reptile, apparently. The figure appeared, clinging to the ceiling, after a few seconds, and then dropped to the floor; a blue lizardman wearing red and black athletic shorts and shirt. He gave a nod. "That's true. I'm supposed to just watch from the shadows. Be backup. Not here to fight."

Jason shifted his gaze between the three. Even if he had his weapons away, he would see them drawing before they even decided to... and he could easily kill all three in that amount of time. He slid the weapons back into place; his powers saving him from looking clumsy by helping him adjust the angle a bit to keep from missing the holster for the 40mm.

"I'm not here to fight either.. but I know how dangerous your boss and his people are. Lead the way."

The next doorway was more simple; no sliding gadgets or tricks. Just a nice wooden door, one of several on the far wall; the other two led to hallways. This one... led to a bar?

The room was paneled with dark wood, walls, ceiling, and floor. Well lit, with booths surrounding a central table, a bar.. and at least a dozen people. He checked it out before entering. Well, hell. Any hostile move had made in there and twenty people would be on him in seconds. He'd run out of bullets before he ran out of targets; some of those people would take multiple grenades to kill.

The atmosphere was friendly enough; but everyone was either wearing a proper suit, or a classic supervillain outfit; he fit in perfectly. The two men who'd been outside to greet him stepped through, as did the reptilian.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

At first, the boss at the central table gave an irate glance at the reptile; but a quick whisper brought a startled glance between the scaled figure and Jason.

"Well, well, well! A man of many talents, it seems. Have a seat at my table, mister Eyeball. A substantial paycheck awaits, and talks of work to come."

Suddenly, he saw it. A blue-clad fist emerging from his chest as if it had passed clean through; broken fingers, brutally destroyed, but still, having killed him in the process of destroying that limb; he spun, pistol coming out, hand gripping the pin of a custom Shroud grenade... the image vanished.

Instead... a young woman appeared in front of him. Short, dark-skinned, an athletic build of the sort he'd admired in some of his fellow soldiers.. wearing blue tights with a black dagger. If he hit the shroud grenade, he could kill her. If not, she could dodge the bullet.

The friendly conversation around the bar had died off. Hands were reaching for guns. The woman's face and hair were covered by the blue outfit. She broke the silence. "So... that one of the grenades that took out Lightning?"

Jason kept his eyes on her. If he moved, or spoke, the wrong way, she'd be on him. He could kill her, but she might kill him at the same time. "Yes. A better version, actually. Wouldn't save my life, but it would kill you and quite a few folks in this room."

Things seemed to settle down. The woman relaxed. Jason slowly put his pistol away... and conversation started back up as everyone tried to pretend death hadn't just passed through the room. She walked around the table, smiling, and planted a kiss on the boss's cheek. "Sorry, I didn't find him, Daddy. Looks like he found us."

Jason sat at the table.. the girl pulled her mask back, letting it dangle down behind her; revealing a cute face, probably early 20s, with bright pink hair, black starting to show at its roots; tied into a pony-tail beneath the mask.

"Don't worry, Swiftblade. Tops found him for us, sent him our way." Russo turned to Jason. "I'm Don Nicolo Russo. My friends and family call me Nicky. If you take off that helmet and shake my hand, you can call me Nicky."

Jason thought for a moment... and gently slid the helmet off, placing it on the table. A bit of make-up smoothed over his third eye so long as he kept it shut... but the bandage and cowboy hat had worn it away a bit; anyone looking could tell there was something out of place. Setting it down, he extended his hand. "Jason... Byrne, for now. You can call me Jason when it comes to dinner, and when it comes to work you can call me Eyeball."

A soft chuckle, as Nicolo raised a hand. This strange scene; a blend between a classic bar and a fine dining establishment... all in an underground bunker.. was made stranger by the appearance of a waiter, delivering a bottle of wine and four plates to the table; as another figure sat on Nicky's other side.Tall, lean, blonde, and with a look that wouldn't be out of place on a Nazi recruitment poster, he extended his own hand. "Paul Russo. Nicky's right-hand man."

The blue-suited girl gave a malicious grin. Her hand seemed to vibrate gently as she extended her own. "Penelope Russo. Swiftblade. Top enforcer." He was careful shaking her hand. He knew if he did it just wrong, she'd vibrate it so hard she could shatter the bones in his hand... or even just stab a blade through it before he could blink. The only thing he could do would be to use a suicide grenade to clear the whole table.

As the waiter poured each of them a glass, Jason admired the food; the fish looked delicious, and he had no idea what sort of pasta it was; but it looked amazing as well. Nicky raised a glass. "To new friends. And new business opportunities." Jason took a sip in time with the others.. and after a moment's pause, concerned about possible poison... he started to eat. Poison would be the perfect way to kill him. Something slow; by the time he saw it coming, he would already be dead. Should've traded plates, or something.

The food tasted every bit as good as it looked. The three made small-talk; talking about how terrible the weather was in Nevada in the winter, how the food was cooked, how old the wine was; all of them studiously avoided talk of business until the plates had been set aside; with Penelope surprisingly prim and proper with her utensils for her prior attitude.

Finally, Nicky rested his arms on the table, and met Jason's eyes. "Now. Eyeball. I set a bounty on this man, Lightning. Ten million dollars. And I wanted a memento." He nodded at the bar. Hanging over it were.. a pair of chrome handguns from the Silver Ranger, mounted to a plaque. A single hand from the Shadow Blade; with only the name on the plaque to recognize it by. The skull of, apparently, the Northlander. And a distinctly alien skull with a name below it Jason couldn't read properly.

"I want something to mount on the bar up there. To mark my little victory over Lightning."

Jason calmly slid a bag from his pocket, setting it on the table. Nicky opened it gently, reverently; examining the mask, its streaked pattern, the bloodstains. Nicky glanced up. "This is his blood, right?"

"Of course. Put a bullet in each eye. There's a little on the outside of the mask, but the inside is covered with it."

For a moment, Nicky just held it in his hands. Beside him, Penelope seemed... angry? Sad? She was suffering from a blend of emotions equally intense and antagonistic, seeming to barely hold them together.

He turned to Penelope. "Sweetheart. Could you put this up there for me? And for yourself?"

The woman took hold of the mask, staring at it for a moment. Vibrating so intensely that Jason was concerned it might fall apart in her hands... before she stepped over, and gently pressed a few pins into the mask; holding it in place on its new plaque on the wall. At the bottom, it read; 'Lightning' 'Mark Maxwell' 'Titan'.

When she returned to the table, Nicky smiled, and threw an arm over her shoulder. "Finally over with, that bit. Eyeball, I can get you the cash right now if you want us to load it into that crappy truck of yours, or I can have Tops handle things for you. Hopefully, we'll have plenty of business to deal with together in the future. Once we get the bounty settled, though, there's one piece of business unfortunately we won't really have much choice in putting on top of the list. I'm gonna need to send you out to Spring Hills Gulch... to deal with Valkyrie."

At that response, Jason's brain froze. Valkyrie was the most powerful, and famous, supervillain on earth. She was literally invulnerable, and her strength was as infinite as Lightning's speed; she could literally crush coal into diamonds if she put her mind to it. The only person with more destructive potential was Lightning; or maybe Spike, the government's pet density-changer, now that Lightning was dead.

She literally triggered nuclear detonations in the palms of her hand without a scratch to show for it, and this man expected Jason to deal with her?

Across the table, Nicky, Paul, and Penelope all started laughing almost simultaneously. The look on his face, the dropped jaw, must have been obvious. "No, no. After you took out Lightning, she sent a message out to all the bosses she could reach, that if we met the Titanslayer she had some work she needed him to do. I've got some things in mind for the future, but for now, we need to get you paid.. and I'd recommend going to see her. Fairly soon. She is not a woman you want to keep waiting."