Justice League of America #7.1

Issue Details

Synopsis

POINT AND SHOOT Floyd Lawton used to suffer from survivor's guilt, but eventually, he gave up looking for the reason that he had lived, and instead just decided to wait for that reason to find him.   Long ago, Floyd had lived with his family in the Narrows neighborhood of Gotham City. They were very poor, and struggled as his father had gone from job to job, trying to find ways to make ends meet. His father had only just got a job on the construction of an Ace Chemical warehouse, and his mother hoped against hope that it would provide enough to support their children Floyd, Jr. and Jenny.   On the night that haunts Floyd's memory, a pair of thugs in an adjacent apartment had been the target of a mob-hit, and the more than sixty rounds that were fired passed through their thin walls, striking and killing his parents in the kitchen, and passing further through the kitchen to his bed-room, where his sister was hit and killed as well. Only Floyd, Jr. had survived, and he couldn't imagine why not one bullet had found him.   Floyd rushed down the stairs and caught a glimpse of his family's killers' faces, burning it into his memory. That night, he went back to the junkies' apartment and retrieved one of their guns, and learned to shoot it. Several jobs and years later, Floyd had become quite good with a gun, and was mastering the art of it in the service of his mission for vengeance. His intent was never to miss a shot, with bullets guided by anger, hate, and despair.   Having grown up as a needy child, and having seen his parents and sister die for nothing, Floyd decided never to take an assassination job for free, and never to waste a single bullet - as the murderers of his family had - by missing his shot.   Now, Floyd Lawton is Deadshot, and he has been a member of Amanda Waller's Suicide Squad for some time - until he saw to it that the squad was disbanded. Now, ever mission he takes is his alone.   This time, he has tasked himself with killing the man who used to run Ace Chemical before he went crazy and began using the company's chemicals to fuel some kind of impenetrable armored suit - impenetrable by regular bullets, anyway. Floyd has designed his own. The first bullet will compromise the armor. The second - which must pass through the same bullet hole as the first, will finish the job. Deadshot pulls it off with grace - even while free-falling from a mile up. His death completes the cycle. He is the man who hired the two thugs to make the hit on the junkies that also took his family down. Unfortunately, he is unaware that the man's son, Bobby, is nearby and watching. As far as Deadshot is concerned, the last thing the world needs is more people like him, so he shoots the boy dead.   Despite finally getting revenge, Deadshot feels nothing; it was just another mission. A phone call comes for him from Waller, who promises to pay him if he helps her. She wants him to get the Squad back together and save her from the ruins of Belle Reve. Within seconds, he receives 10 million dollars from the government, and he considers his next mission paid for.