For many of the crew off of the ill-fated SS Elbe, they just wanted enough money to get home, and to get the hell out of America. A mixed blend of Russian, African, and one or two oddballs from other nationalities, about twenty just headed out home as soon as they were able to secure passage. And the rest... had been invited for this meeting.

A warehouse on the outskirts of vegas, with various equipment running making the new drug Reflex, piles of various stolen equipment both new and old.. a handful of Nicky's people working the equipment, and now, a small crowd of former crewmen, all freshly showered, cleaned up, and interested in what they'd been told they were gathered here for; a job.

Butcher was here, as well as Emerald; and a few of Clone were there as well, including his heavily tanned, somewhat modified 'Sergei' copy that had been among the crew.

Jason walked into the room in full armor and gear; rifle strapped to his back, freshly repaired helmet gleaming with its red LED eyes. Everyone here had seen his face, but sometimes image mattered. Presentation.

"You may know me as Eyeball. Or Titanslayer. Or just the lunatic that came onto your ship, slaughtered all of the men who were forcing you to work at gunpoint with ease, and then gave you a ride home when your ship died. All of you who wanted to go home are already gone; the money we looted out of the Elbe and its cargo was more than enough to get you wherever you wanted to be. So if you're here, its because you want a job. And I'm offering."

He stepped up to one of the pieces of equipment; one running the long, slow process of converting a complex blend of chemicals into the Reflex substance. "This equipment here is used to make a drug... called Reflex. We've only been selling it for a few days, and its already being sought out all over, by supervillains, cartels... everybody wants some. The process is automated; just need to make sure all the right chemicals are in the right places, the power stays on, steady, and uninterrupted for the whole timespan. Other than that, its just a matter of moving things from one machine to another, and keeping the finished product cold. We can show you what you need to do, how to do it. We have all the documents from the lab that made it."

He smiled as he patted the equipment. "And the best part is? The drug, so far, is perfectly legal. The only part of this that's illegal is that we have this equipment and not the lab that paid for it. So if the feds catch you with a pocket full of it? They can't do jack. So here's the deal. I'm not setting up a new business here in Vegas; this is Nicky's territory. But up north, in Colorado, Wyoming? All the families, gangs, got taken out by Lightning. Who I killed. Nobody dared to move in while he had the place. Now? Wide open. We're going to start with Reflex. Make it up there, ship some down here to sell, ship it anywhere we can find buyers. I need people to run machines, drive trucks, and hold guns while guarding the buildings."

The men seemed interested so far; which was good. He hadn't started talking about pay. "Now... I own a fair amount of property with a mining company up there. We're going to be setting up off the grid, using solar, water, everything off-side. Officially, you're going to be working for a mining company up there at the slow process of pulling out rare earth minerals. Officially, you'll get sixty grand a year, and a cabin to stay in, and your pay will come from the company. Unofficially, you'll get the same amount off the books. Ten grand a month."

He patted his own handguns. "I handle the bloody work myself. If anyone tries to interfere, just keep them busy til I can get there. For now, we'll have the Butcher on the payroll as well as Emerald here to help handle things. If any of you know how to handle yourself in a fight, show me, and we'll talk raises."

"So... Who's interested?"

None of the men backed out. The... Was he going to call it the Eyeball gang? Good lord, that sounded terrible. Not that Eyeball Cartel sounded any better. He'd need to come up with a name, soon. For the moment, they'd simply be employees of Prosperity Mining. Well. Time to get everything moving north... and to hash things out with Nicky.

***

"What you do up there? None of my business. But I gotta warn you... the cartel is already starting to move in. They haven't made too much progress; everybody was scared shitless of working up there with Lightning so nobody knows which cops can be paid off, who are the rats, who we can work with."

Jason nodded, leaning back in his chair. "Just to be clear... no love lost between you two?"

Nicky shook his head. "If the whole damned cartel died off tomorrow, I'd celebrate. But. They got thousands of people, and the one we're talking about is so secure down in mexico they don't have to hide. The local cops are on their payroll, the mexican version of our FBI don't have what they need to take em out... "

"...Huh. Alright. Give me what you've got on this cartel. I think I'm gonna make a trip south for a few days, make sure they understand who they're dealing with."

Nicky blinked. "...Seriously? You go walking into his compound, you're talking hundreds of armed guards, probably a few dozen metas, all sorts of crazy shit. Enough to take on an army."

"That's what he has now. Next week, he won't have so much. If he's still alive. We'll see what he says when we chat."

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Nicky laughed, slapping the counter. "If it were anybody else, I'd call it bullshit and see if I could get life insurance on you. And honestly, I probably should. Maybe you're the titanslayer. But I think this guy is setup well enough even Lightning couldn't have taken him out without icing the whole village he's next door to."

"Just give me the information. I'll gear up, head down tomorrow, and probably kill him in a couple of days. We'll see."

***

Jason left a very confused Clone in charge of moving the equipment north, and gave him enough of an operating budget to get started. In the unlucky event the... 'Salada Cartel' killed him. Granted, he was just going into this with the assumption that he could kill hundreds of people on his own. This seemed, on the face of it, insane.. but hey. He was the Titanslayer. Taking a page from his assault on the Wayson complex, he brought a pile of metal pipes, mortar shells... though this time he went for fragmentation and incendiary, and invested in some direct rockets as well. He wasn't trying to break some stairwells from fairly close positions in the forest nearby... he was trying to cause some serious damage from the desert.

He was going to put those poor Cartel morons through hell.

***

The name of the cartel might have been simply for salt; but more likely it was a reference to Laguna Salada; the vast dry lake that their compound was beside. Tourists came to the lake all the time, and a small village nearby catered to both the Cartel compound as well as renting vehicles to tourists that chose to come and race around through the long-dry lakebed; the compound, concrete walls fifteen feet high, guard towers, surrounding a mansion complete with a helicopter pad and a warehouse for trucks to part at; was massive, heavily guarded, and had cameras and turrets in every direction; actual, illegal, machine-gun turrets of the same sort he'd seen in Nicky's establishment.

The place looked intimidating. Like a fortress with an army of guards; and the idea of tourists driving near it all the time seemed insane; as did the idea of anyone willingly living nearby. Posing as a foolish tourist in his jeans and cowboy hat ensemble, Jason wandered the Ville Salada, buying a few trinkets, trying out a delicious meal at a small cafe less than three hundred yards from his target... and generally getting the idea that not only could any mistakes in targetting the compound hit the village as well.. but that plenty of the people in the village were also armed thugs on the Cartel's payroll.

When night fell, he left... and of course, simply parked offroad. There would be no burying mortars everywhere to have them come in from every direction here; the compound brushed up against the lakebed, and in three directions had a clear view for miles; and, undoubtedly, night-vision cameras. Unfortunately, while he could predict a projectile with pinpoint accuracy, mortars simply took too long to land for that to work unless they were direct-fired like a standard gun. Indirect fire would be great for general chaos and damage; but he'd need something faster to hit precise targets. Rockets could make up the difference, allowing him to directly strike a guard tower at range very swiftly; but at the same time, they required a direct line of sight. Which, of course, meant an elevated position.

Sitting beside one of the rock formations close enough for the mortars to reach the compound, he started mounting the tubes; loading the shells; and carefully aiming them, finger on the trigger. Then he made a laborious and irritating climb to the top of the rock formation; amusingly enough, his power was actually helpful at knowing which hand-holds would or would not collapse under his weight; driving climbing spikes into the stone and mounting rockets; modified RPG projectiles that would top out over a kilometer in range. Granted... from what he could see, it would take longer than he could predict to strike a couple of the further-out guard towers. Some of the towers, he could virtually guarantee a precise hit on. Others... He might just miss, even if the rocket was lined up just right. Soon enough, he had it all lined up as best he could. These would hit the guard towers. These would hit the warehouse. These would land on the mansion itself. These, the trucks. He nodded, syncing them all up to his detonator; one tap of the button... and they would all launch at once. If there were more rock formations, he could have spent time sneaking around,

He checked out his armor. His handguns. His rifle. Making sure everything was clean, in proper working order. His grenades, his spare clips... good. Time to go say hello.

***

Guard duty at the door was normally pretty boring. Nobody dared to fuck with the cartel; the cops were too scared, the other cartels had their own territories to worry about. But an informant from the americas had warned them that some lunatic... supposedly the one who killed that american idiot Lightning.. was coming down to attack.

As stupid as that idea was, the compound was on alert. Snipers in all the guard towers. Twelve guards at the gate, including, always, one of the Metas in the cartel's employ; at the moment, EH; Espada de Hierro, the iron sword. What they knew about Titanslayer is that he mostly used guns, was simply very good at it; so having the completely bulletproof meta on guard duty, with his dark grey skin and powerful build, seemed optimal. Even armor-piercing tank rounds would simply be absorbed into his flesh, and make him stronger, so whatever the american carried would be worthless.

He'd lit up another cigarette, leaning back against the wall, when he saw two pinpricks of red light in the darkness; and got a call over the radio. "Gate, this is tower two. We have a man on foot on our night vision camera, approaching the front gate. Take him."

He shrugged. Some stupid tourist picked the wrong time to go wandering. He glanced back at EH.. and then turned, a few of his fellow guards coming with him as they stepped out to grab the idiot. And slowed to a stop as they drew closer, and saw the shiny metal helmet, the glowing red eyes. And heard the digitized voice.

"I need to speak with your boss. He's making a move on the territory I took from Lightning. Have him come out to the gate." Jason could see that if he made the wrong move, one of the snipers would fire. Not fast enough that Jason couldn't get behind cover, but they'd give it a shot.

"Put down your guns, and you might get to leave alive... just with a few less pieces."

Jason gave a slow nod... "Well doesn't that just sound like a terrible idea." His helmet picked up the trigger phrase... and half a mile away, a long series of rockets and mortars detonated almost simultaneously. All of the eyes that had been on Jason were suddenly on the pinpoints of light in the air, descending towards the compound; and the brighter, vivid streaks of the rockets moving even faster; slamming into the guard towers.

"I don't suppose that uniform the cartel gave you is fireproof? It'll come in handy, in just a second."