Shot, Water Back
Issues 4 - 5

In a seedy bar, two old men called Arnie and Pete argue about Pete's wife Marilyn. The argument turns into a fight. Behind the bar, Lee Dolan takes bets on the outcome. The fight ends suddenly when Marilyn smashes a glass over Arnie's head. As this scene comes to an end, a man enters the bar carrying an attaché case.  He orders a vodka and shows Dolan a picture of a young, blonde woman. He tells Dolan that the woman is Megan Dietrich, and it is she that ruined Dolan's life. Dolan was a successful restaurateur with a wife and two kids until Megan ruined him. Now he's divorced, bankrupt and tending bar. Dolan was busted by the FBI for possession and supply of child pornography. He didn't know how the material came to be on his computer and was later acquitted, but by then it was too late, the media had ruined him. Graves explains that Megan Dietrich was the one who framed him, then offers Dolan the attaché and the proof. He also tells Dolan that Megan will be in this bar tonight with her yuppie friends, slumming it on a rich kids' birthday pub crawl. Dolan ponders what Graves has told him. After agreeing to work an extra shift that night, he goes to see his son Jerry, but Jerry doesn't want to know his paedophile father. Dolan then heads to a peep show, where he often goes to watch Connie, one of the dancers. They talk for a while, then Dolan returns to the bar for a drink before the yuppie party arrives.

Soon the rich kids show themselves, flashing their money and delighting in the squalor. Dolan spots Megan across the room, and imagines himself putting a bullet through her head. In reality he doesn't have the chance to kill her. He waits outside as she uses the toilet, but is interrupted by a less than romantic liaison. Back inside, the party are preparing to leave. Dolan offers to buy the birthday girl and all her friends a drink. Megan accepts and proposes a toast to him. As Megan picks up her coat, Dolan steals an insignia brooch from it, in order that he might see her again somewhere a little more private.

A week later Dolan is still in the bar with the same old men. He calls jerry to try and arrange a meeting, hoping his son will come by the bar and listen to the truth. Jerry reluctantly agrees. He then drops into the peep show and talks to Connie before going to visit Megan at her offices in the Dietrich Securities Corporation. Gaining an audience despite the best efforts of security, he returns the brooch. Megan offers a reward, and seems to have no idea who Lee Dolan is. Dolan pulls out the gun, telling Megan how she ruined him. He decides to kill her but she tries to buy him off, offering him money to put his life back together, a new identity, a new social security number, money for his kids. She explains that ruining him wasn't personal. She came across the child porn on the net with some friends, and decided that she'd send it to sixty-nine random e-mail accounts registered to men. Because Dolan was online, he received the pictures, which was just bad luck, as was the FBI tracing them. She ruined his life for a joke. Dolan is raging, and is about to pull the trigger when Megan asks how he found her. He tells her about the man and the attaché case. Megan offers Dolan money once more, saying that the man with the case is an old enemy. She offers to put Dolan's son through medical school at Stanford, saying that her death will only bring revenge, but she can offer so much more if she is alive. Dolan accepts, and lowers the gun. Megan asks for it, saying it is her only lead to the man who put Dolan up to this. Dolan reluctantly agrees, only to have Megan put a bullet between his eyes as he attempts to leave. Security burst in, but Megan is unworried, deleting the money she put into Dolan's account along with the rest of his life. She then makes a call to an unknown man, wearing the same insignia on a signet ring. It's "disturbing news...Graves isn't dead."

Back at the bar, Connie and Jerry both arrive to meet Dolan only to hear the third degree from Bob, the owner, about the loser not showing for work again. Behind the action at Megan's offices we are anonymously introduced to another major player. As Megan and Dolan deal, we see events taking place in another nearby building, which involve a helicopter, a lot of bullets and a lot of death. These events will reveal their significance at a later date.

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