JLA: Year One #4 - April 1998

"While You Were Out..." by Mark Waid, Brian Augustyn, and Barry Kitson.

The newly-formed Justice League, in the middle of a squabble that passes for a meeting, discover what they think is an intruder:

We follow each of the JLAers in their civilian identities, starting with Hal "Green Lantern" Jordan, who gets caught by Carol Ferris flirting with another woman. Meanwhile, at the local Ocean World exhibit:

But there's some grim stuff brewing: we're also following the travails of the original Blue Beetle, who is being pursued by two mysterious baddies. They catch up to him, beat him up, and drag him into their van.

Barry "The Flash" Allen tries to keep a dinner date with his fiancee Iris, Dinah "Black Canary" Lance attends a party hosted by her mother's former JSA compatriots, and J'onn Jonzz (in his human form) continues his work as a police detective.

Meanwhile, at a secret location, we see that Blue Beetle is undergoing horrific experiments by his kidnappers. They are joined by another set of baddies, ones we're all more familiar with: 

...U-oh! To be continued!

After's last issue being almost entirely character-centric, it only made sense for this fourth installment to ramp up the story in several ways. Though I have to say, I wish these uniformed thugs would kidnap Snapper Carr and torture him. Then again, no one would care, so I guess it makes sense for Mark Waid to make the victim a legendary hero.

Aquaman continues to be kind of a d-bag in this series, but it makes sense in context; it's no wonder he had such a bad reputation in the post-Crisis, pre-New 52 DCU.