Realizing that sending the villains to AIM’s headquarters without an attack plan would be stupid, Valeria has thought up an idea: she’ll split them up, and has three different objectives for them. She explains what they are.
Sabretooth and Vulture will infiltrate the midtown offices of Koenig & Strey, a front for AIM, and their task is to procure a detailed layout of the AIM base in upper Manhattan where the Identity Disc is currently held. However, the trick will be to so without alerting AIM itself of their presence. Deadpool and Bullseye are to head to the Brooklyn Institute of Technology. They have to obtain from the Institute’s lab an experimental, prototype computer chip that has the ability to bypass even the most intricate security code on any kind of program ever made. It’s kind of a digital skeleton key.
Juggernaut will proceed to the AIM base itself, and make note of any external security measures that may need to be factored into the villain’s approach. Valeria ends the briefing, and makes it clear that they have to report back to her by midnight. She tells the villains to move, as Silver isn’t paying them by the hour.
Avatar 2: “So this Valeria Merrick wasn’t one to waste time.”
Avatar 1: “No. And after what happened to Sandman, no one felt much like arguing with her. The teams split up immediately and went to work…”
Later, Vulture and Sabretooth arrive at the AIM building. Vulture mocks Sabretooth’s obvious clothes, as he’s wearing an orange jacket with a cowboy head. Creed doesn’t care, since he isn’t the one going behind the scenes. He warns the Vulture not to mess things up. They split up, and Creed enters the building. He and another man who works at the building enter the elevator. The kind man asks Creed at what floor he wants to be. Sarcastically, Creed responds “the 43th.” The man realizes that something’s wrong, as there are only 40 stages in the building, however, it comes too late. The elevator closes, and Sabretooth brutally slaughters the man.
After killing the man, Creed puts his Sabretooth costume on, breaks out of the elevator and climbs up the airshaft. He enters the top floor, and immediately growls, ready for action. Security is called, who warn the other staff to evacuate the building. Everyone leaves, unaware that they now give the Vulture to do his part. He cuts the windows open, and enters the computer room. He goes to sit by one, and activate it. He claims there’s no need for pointless hacking when he’s got blind panic on his side. Since the staff left in a hurry, the system’s are still open, and the Vulture can just take what he needs. Despite his arthritis, Adrian moves as fast as he can to save the files he needs.
Meanwhile, Sabretooth goes on a rampage, and murders everyone in his sight. Suddenly, he takes a look on the clock nearby him, and escapes through the elevator shaft.
Avatar 1: “Of course, they never found him. Sabretooth has all the stealth of his namesake. But as far as they were concerned, he didn’t get whatever he came for. By the time they discovered the data theft – if they ever did -, it was too late.”
Avatar 2: “And the others?”
Avatar 1: “As I understand it, things went pretty routinely for the Juggernaut…”
Juggernaut is guarding the AIM building in his civilian clothes, acting casually and reading a newspaper. He reports all that goes on outside the building, namely vans driving in and out, and is bored by it. He even thinks about skipping the job, as he’s certain he’s innocent and wants to go get someone to help him fight the murder he has been charged with. After all, he’s the only one of the gathered villains who has tried to make an effort to keep his nose clean lately. However, Cain changes his mind, and moves on with the job, and continues reporting to Valeria.
Avatar 2: “And Bullseye and Deadpool?”
Avatar 1: “As you might expect, that went a little different…”
Deadpool and Bullseye have arrived at the University, but hide in a tree and wait until it’s dark to make their move. Wade jokes when he sees all the students, and claims that he could have made a great one and wished he had stayed in school when he was a kid. Now, seeing all this, Wade kind of regrets the mercenary life he has chosen to live. Wade stops talking, and wants to blow up something.
A cool Bullseye remembers him to wait till sunset. Wade thinks about selling the skeleton key Valeria told them about, and maybe also the Identity Disk once they have it. Bullseye doesn’t thinks so, as he understands that it’s all still a prototype, and can only be used once and not be reprogrammed. Plus Valeria also mentioned that the feds are suing for taking over the project, so they’re just in time to snap the Disk before they take it.
Wade understands. Though he’s tired of the waiting, and asks when sunset will be. Bullseye explains that it’ll take an hour or so. Wade wants to pass time, and asks Bullseye what Valeria used to blackmail him. For Wade, it’s his first wife, Gretchen. He has almost run out of women to obsess about, and he never got any kind of closure from Gretchen. Unless you count a restraining order, but Wade believes that Gretchen just meant that as a tease. Anyway, Valeria promised Wade to help find her. He changes the subject, and asks Bullseye why he’s in for, but he doesn’t want to tell.
However, Wade whines about it and, to make him shut up, Bullseye agrees to spill it. He explains that his problem is the double-dipping. He went on a retainer for two opposing syndicates, simultaneously. He took two jobs, figured they’d never compare notes. Though, they did and suddenly Bullseye is in the crosshairs from both sides. He had a couple close calls, realized he might have bitten off more than he could chew. Suddenly, Valeria drops in out of nowhere, and she knew everything, and offered to smooth it over for him, so Bullseye accepted to do the job for her. He trusts Valeria… for now.
An hour later, sunset falls. It’s time for Bullseye and Deadpool to rock and roll. Deadpool shoots the door’s lock, and they enter the hallways. They get spotted by a security guard, but Bullseye quickly knocks him out. They enter an office and find a safe. Bullseye concentrates his eye on it, and notices the safe’s door lock. He fixates on the lock, and throws a small ball against it, and manages to get it open. Bullseye takes the key, and wants to leave. However Deadpool cries for not having got any “rock and roll” and won’t leave before he had any. He takes out his guns, and shoots the safe into pieces.
Avatar 2: “Typical. So, what then? Everyone reconvened at midnight?”
Avatar 1: “Not exactly…”
Deadpool enters the warehouse alone, and the others have already gathered. Valeria is a little angry with him for being late, but Wade claims that traffic was murder. He makes up by throwing the key to Valeria, who congratulates them for a job well done. But, she wants to know where Bullseye is. Wade goes to sit next to a growling Sabretooth, and informs Valeria that Bullseye took off, and just said he had something to do, but didn’t told him what.
Bullseye is at a bar, asking the customers information about Silver, but they only know rumors. All claim to have known someone who claims to have seen the guy once. The other villains arrive at the bar and notice Bullseye. Juggernaut realizes what he has been up to, and tells Bullseye that it wasn’t clever to do and asks him if he’s pulling out. Bullseye hesitates, but answers that he won’t. At least, not for a little while. He further explains that, before going deeper into this, he prefers to know who they’re really dealing with, and doesn’t really believe Valeria on her word and doesn’t want to be played.
Sabretooth feels it doesn’t matter, since Valeria knows how to blackmail them, so they have no choice. Still, Deadpool feels that, if Silver isn’t real, they might get something better out of this job. The bartender can’t help but overhear the villains discussing Silver, and wants to tell them a true story he has heard about the man, back from the early days when Silver first started out.
It begins in Small Burg in central Europe. Silver spent years building up an organization there. Violence, extortion, protectionism… he did it all. Finally, he owned the town and everyone in it. He decided he could now expand his influence. But that’s just what the people of the town had been expecting. They ambushed Silver’s party and slaughtered his men. Silver, however, they couldn’t kill. It was all they could do to bring him down. They threw him in a jail and left him to rot. Spent the rest of the day congratulating themselves.
Two days later, the town fathers woke up… alone! Somehow, during the night, all of their wives had been taken. They were just… gone. Not a trace or clue was left. Markets were left empty. Kitchens unattended. Children left motherless. Though the last was only temporarily, because, two days later, the children were gone as well! And two days after that, the servants as well. Though it’s possible they just packed their things and left without telling.
By this time, the burghers had figured out Silver was behind it. Fearing for their lives, they decided better let him go. Silver anticipated that they might strike against him. And so, months earlier, he’d set up this counterstrike. Just to have one, in case of. Next, he single-handedly slew all the burghers and razed the town to the ground. Then he made his fellow prisoners his new gang and moved on. No trace of the missing townspeople was ever found. This was when the world first learned that you never, ever cross Tristram Silver.
That’s it for Bullseye: he’s out. The Vulture doesn’t understand, and asks the hitman if he didn’t heard the story. He did already, and that’s why Bullseye wants out before things can get any deeper. Realizing that Valeria only offered him protection, Bullseye has other resources to go and thanks Deadpool for giving him the idea of selling the key chip. Deadpool is confused, as he already gave Valeria the chip. Bullseye smiles, and explains that he acted fast and replaced the chip with a falls one, which is the one Deadpool gave to her.
Sabretooth gets angry and won’t let Bullseye ruin things for the rest of them. Juggernaut, Vulture, Deadpool and Sabretooth surround Bullseye and want to stop him. Unimpressed, Bullseye quickly picks up some toothpickers from his table, and throws them real fast towards the villain’s heads. While they protect themselves, Bullseye makes a run for it. With the Vulture, for some reason, staying back, the others go after him and beat him up.
Valeria enters, and orders them to stop. They all do, and Vulture asks Valeria how she found them. She just responds that she didn’t found them: she knew where they were because she works for Tristram Silver. Bullseye hands her over the real chip, and she thanks him for it. She smiles, and tells the other villains that she has moved up the timetable, and that the operation begins immediately.
