Pulling Johnny's head down to avoid a low-hanging tunnel light, a light trail of sparks lit the ceiling as Johnny's hair scraped to the side, just missing the bulb. Twisting around in her own seat, Velma finally managed to get her feet on the foot as she plopped down on the cushion, making sure they were both safely seated before the next interval of light.
"There's barely enough room in this tunnel to fit the carts, let alone us riding one. Next time try looking ahead before jumping into a situation like that," said Velma.
"My bad darling," said Johnny, needing to turn slightly to his side to fit into the small cart.
"I appreciate a good surprise as much as the next girl, but the last thing we need are terminal head injuries," said Velma.
"With my luck, it's more likely that those lights would break on my hair," said Johnny.
Making a mental note to double-check the recipe of Johnny's hair gel, Velma turned her attention to the tunnel, where up ahead a station loomed in the darkness. Looking around for the controls, she pulled back a lever which began to slow down the cart and brought them to a stop in a stretch of shadows just in-between two of the overhead lanterns.
"Might not be a good idea to walk in through the front door, let's hop out here and see if there's a service entrance or another way in," said Velma.
"Your call," said Johnny, squeezing out of his side of the cart and following close behind.
Feeling ahead along the side, Velma tried to divide her focus between making sure there was nobody ahead at the station looking in their direction while feeling the wall for any indications of a hidden doorway. However, it was not her hands, but her feet which found what she was looking for.
"The floor is starting to get a little wider at this point, a narrow service walkway perhaps," said Velma. Pulling out her magnifying lens, the ground seemed to lightly illuminate a series of comically drawn footsteps that led towards a small recess in the side of the tunnel. While the rest of the wall was rough-hewn bedrock, there was a tall, vertical panel that was metallic. But without any sign of keypad or lock, it seemed unlikely they would make their way in through this point.
With little thought to their situation, Johnny began to knock against the wall in a sequence of five quick taps. After the third time, Velma realized what he was doing.
"Are you seriously doing 'shave and a haircut'?" asked Velma.
"What? You'd honestly be surprised how often it works… oh, never mind," said Johnny.
"If you want to be helpful, try feeling around the wall for some hidden control panel or card reader. I might be able to hack into something," said Velma.
"This the hidden door?" asked Johnny, feeling up the metal panel. "You know, all the years I spent club hopping, I learned a little trick to getting in through the back door after being turned away at the front."
Pulling out his comb, Johnny twirled it in his hand and slid it into a small gap along the side of the door. Raising his eyebrow and furrowing his brow in concentration, he slowly moved it up and down as though it was a credit card looking to pick a lock.
'There's no way that's going to work,' thought Velma, but the strange shadowy hand of Johnny's Stand appeared beside him and seemed to be agitating the bristles of the comb as it guided the comb to a specific spot of the door. With a click and a push, the comb fit into a secret slot and the door opened vertically.
"Works every time," said Johnny, blowing the tip of the comb-like a gun, spinning it in his hands, and running it through his hair before returning it to his pocket.
"I'm not sure whether I should be concerned or not that I'm getting used to your antics again," said Velma, chuckling as she shook her head.
"I better come up with new ones to keep you entertained then,' said Johnny with a smile.
The door led into a hallway which was something out of 1970s science fiction that was itself made by repurposing a 1960s fallout shelter. Military retro with modern lighting and electrics that only showcased how badly old brown pigments aged was not the most impressive aesthetic. Blissfully, the hallway was quiet, leading past old, unused rooms filled with cabinets, desks, and stale dust. Poking his head into one of the offices, Johnny looked up and spotted something on the wall.
"Old military maps of LA. Invasion projections. Whoa mana, the Nike missile defense systems. This is some gnarly stuff," said Johnny.
"Nike missiles… weren't those the nuclear rockets meant to destroy incoming invasion fleets?" asked Velma. "How do you know about those?"
"Let's just say I learned a lot in the month I spent in the Foreign Legion," said Johnny.
Ducking into the room to avoid the sounds of voices walking nearby, Velma peeked back out once they had passed only to realize she had pressed herself into Johnny's chiseled abdomen. Part out of shock, part out of embarrassment, she pulled away, but she let one hand slowly drift along his side as she did. Shaking her head to focus, she led Johnny back into the hall and followed the voices.
One man walking seemed to be in a gray smelter's outfit, while the other seemed to be a green ape with a brain-dome helmet. Before Velma could place either of them, they turned and entered a room farther down the corridor and were out of sight.
"Through here," said Johnny, pulling Velma into a room with an unlocked glass sliding door, which shut behind them as they entered.
The room they had entered seemed part computer laboratory, part observation deck which overlooked a large meeting room below them. Peeking over the edge of a desk, Velma and Johnny looked down onto what seemed like a large gathering of people. In other corners of the room there were maps, holographic simulations of dna strands, blueprints and mechanical testing of car engines, and overhead, instead of a chandelier, there were dozens of pieces of mechanical bronze castings which were eerily reminiscent of the strange gear they had gotten from Jebidissa.
"Now I know where I recognized those two," said Velma, able to see the rogue's gallery sitting around the meeting table. "The one in the gray suit is Moltar, a lava alien if I recall. And the green monkey is Mojo Jojo, a villain out of Townsville."
"The creep in the red mask, I've seen him on the news. Tiger Shark, think he's one of those Gotham flunkies Batman put away," said Johnny, seemingly proud of himself for reading a newspaper once.
At the head of the table, a woman sat, partly hidden by shadows who placed her hands down before turning slightly to a large, red-skinned man at her left. As this man stood up, Velma saw various tubes around his body, and a green gas seemed to emit from him as he moved.
"I doubt many of you are familiar with me. At this point, it is hard to say whether my battle with Superman still exists in this timeline or if it has been wiped from living memory – but no matter. I'll reintroduce myself. My name is Bloodthirst, and I am an immortal warrior who has been involved at the heart of most human tragedies throughout history," said Bloodthirst.
"Another immortal who makes wild claims and is overly full of himself? I already do business with Vandal Savage," said a man wearing a brown overcoat over a blue jumpsuit.
Walking over to where the man was seated, Bloodthirst towered over him and gently placed his large hand on the man's shoulder.
"Well Mr. Dodger, I could throw out the line my long experience with Savage is that he is the vulture, picking at the scraps of my orchestrations, but you might find a line like that pretentious and say something like how we're all wasting our time here, and then I'd vaporize you where you stand to make a point to everyone else seated here, but I'd rather like to avoid that," said Bloodthirst.
"Lame, I would have liked to see that. There are few things I love better than villainous posturing and wasting disposable goons," a shrill, acrid voice called out from the other side of the table, where a human-sized, green insectoid alien sat.
"I'm sure you would, given how you are a connoisseur of energy blasts," said Bloodthirst.
"Ha, roasted. He got you good Zorak," chuckled Moltar.
"Shut up lava boy," said Zorak, sitting back and pouting.
"We are not here to waste your time," said a feminine voice from the end of the table, Johnny leaned forward in recognition. "We're just seeking a few collaborators to finish a project thousands of years in the making. You don't need to believe in all of the goals we're working towards, but we've reached the stage of our plans where we need stronger coordination in order to get what we're after."
Standing up from her chair, which slid into the floor under her feet as she walked away, the woman went towards a display board along the back wall, which flipped over to reveal the words, "Operation Northern Passage".
"That's Joyce Bravo, my aunt," said Johnny, as the woman's face was lit was perfectly framed in the spotlight.
"Quiet Johnny, she's about to reveal her plan," said Velma, pulling out her notepad to write down every detail she was seeing.
"Authorization accepted, welcome back system administrator – Susan Astronomonov," said a computer over the room's intercom.
"Lousy profile settings never fully reset, this is why I hate working with amateur programmers. Computer – memo to Joyce about scheduling overtime work to reset system settings after I finish the new metagenetic algorithms she asked for," said Susan.
Walking just past them, Susan stopped at the door leading into the lab next door, then took a quarter step in their direction. Looking over the two of them, the young man fixed his glasses and raised his fist to his mouth to clear his throat.
"Velma Dinkley, if I recall correctly," said Susan.
"It's been a long time… Mandark," said Velma, gritting her teeth at the sight of the infuriating young man.
"It has been exactly eight-hundred, sixty-one days since our last encounter at Star Labs, which you just turned down an internship if I recall. I am pleased to see that neither you nor your large cohort here did not make a pointless effort to hide – partly because of the swiftness of my entry gave you no time, and partly because the glass furniture of this room gives little cover, but mostly because my bio-thermal scanners informed me of your presence exactly forty-eight seconds before entering this room," said Mandark.
"Yeah, I don't understand a word you just said, but I'd say that's our cue to leave," said Johnny, rushing for the door only to find Mandark had reached it first and was blocking their way.
"Operational protocols require me to detain unauthorized persons, by force if necessary. Not a preferable outcome, but a role I'll gladly play should you so choose," said Mandark.
Standing up to Mandark, Johnny took a moment to size up the shorter man.
"You don't much have the look of a fighter, but looks are deceiving," said Johnny.
"Strange, I was about to way you didn't have the look of a thinker, yet you were smart enough to not throw the first punch," said Mandark.
"Velma, see if there's a way out through the lab, I'll cover you," said Johnny, calling forth his stand.
"You have guts, but you're out of your weight class," said Mandark, and every light in the world seemed to collect around him, focusing together in a single beam, which shot through Johnny's chest.