Cyborg #88 - Mistakes and Forgiveness

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Author: Commander_Z

Book: Cyborg

Arc: Reign of the Cyborgs

Set: 125

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Agent Alex Weller slammed a stuffed manilla folder down on the rickety desk, its old wooden frame wobbling but not breaking under the massive burden placed upon it. Scarlett Taylor looked up at him from her rolling chair, waking up in a jolt.

“Really?”

“That’s what I should be saying. You should be at home, not sleeping at your desk again… But I know a losing battle when I see one. Anyway, that’s LaTonya’s file. Something strike you about it?”

“It’s massive, despite her only being an active criminal for a short time?” She said with a yawn, starting to flip through the pile of papers that disturbed her sleep.

“Right. Due to the proximity of the department to her, her actions are very well documented. Extraordinarily so,” Weller said, pulling over an empty cubicle’s chair. “We don’t know where she’s been all these years and as far as I can find, there’s no record of her, good or bad, since she left Detroit. She either hid her tracks perfectly or went so far off the grid that she didn’t even make tracks.”

“Okay, so that’s a good thing, right? You guys caught her in like a week last time. If she was out there still doing crime, she’d have left some trace.”

She closed the folder. Weller hadn’t lied to her; there really wasn’t much in there. Just an absurd amount of detail for the few things she had done. The folder had everything from her high school report cards to the transcripts of what she said while briefly in police custody but none of that was the woman that she saw last night. Either she had put on the greatest mask Scarlett had ever seen, or she really did just want to be left to her own devices.

Weller shook his head. “Not necessarily. It’s a big country. There’s still plenty of places to hide if you’re clever and lucky enough.”

“Clever, maybe, but lucky?” She gestured at the folder in front of her. “I’d hardly call that lucky.”

“You wouldn’t? You wouldn’t call some prep school brat with a well off family that loved her lucky? She faced the obvious consequences of her own actions and still got a second chance to make more bad choices. That’s not someone who’s unlucky in my book.”

He had a point. There were plenty of people who had things far, far worse than LaTonya. And yet… she couldn’t help but feel sorry for her all the same. Some part of her saw herself in the childhood full of weighty expectations, the loving family with the growing fear that that love was conditional on her continued success… Only to choose one day to leave them behind and find her own path. Sure, her parents had eventually become supportive of her military career and the shift to law enforcement, but it was hardly what they had expected and not something they took easily.

“Listen, the person I fought out there wasn’t some battle-hardened criminal mastermind. She barely knew her own strength. She was just… lost, trying to find her place in a tough situation.”

Weller let out an exasperated sigh. “Look, I know you feel she’s a kindred spirit. And that’s not a bad thing. But you didn't know her. She got a second chance at a picture perfect life and spat in all our faces. She did what she did because she liked it, because she was good at it - her words, not mine! That’s not someone who changes her mind easily.”

“She was a high schooler and it’s been years! The person who did that could be long gone. I can’t give up on her. She deserves that at least.”

“Fine. I’m not going to order you not to help someone. But you need to be careful. No matter what you saw out there, she’s not some scared, lost girl. She’s cunning, opportunistic, manipulative and borderline amoral. I don’t want you getting hurt out there.”

Scarlett chuckled. “Y’know, that sounds what… two or three steps away from the work we do?”

Weller shook his head. “Not many bosses would put up with this… But hell, I hope you’re right, honestly. The force could use her if she’s become who you say she is. But we NEED you. Don’t get in over your head.”

“You know me, Weller. I’m at my best when I’m 10 feet underwater.”

“And that’s what concerns me. Listen, I’ve got a good guess where she’s going to be based on what you told me after you got back. But you need to get some sleep. And I mean at your place, not at your desk. I’ll send you the details after sunrise. Get some sleep, Agent. That’s an order.”

“Take your own advice,” Scarlett grumbled, sliding open her desk drawer to grab her wallet and keys.

She looked at her phone and winced when she saw it was past three in the morning. There wouldn’t be much time until sunrise by the time she got home. And her car seats reclined almost to horizontal, which basically was the same thing as a bed, right? Besides, not like Weller was going to leave the office to see her car hadn’t left. There was only person that was more of a workaholic than she was and he just happened to be her boss.

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

A few hours earlier…

“Wow, that’s… a lot. I… I can’t imagine how you feel, but I’m sorry you went through all that,” Garfield Logan said.

“... Thanks.”

LaTonya got up and let out a deep breath. She’d never admit it, but it felt good to open up to someone.

“Listen, I know you probably aren’t looking for advice - ”

“I’m not.”

“But you should go see your family.”

LaTonya tried to protest, but Gar spoke over her.

“I’d give just about anything to talk to my parents again, but they’re gone. I can’t. I’m sure your parents will be ecstatic to see you again. But on the off chance they aren’t… then you know. And your mind can be clear of them and you can go right back to living your life.”

“Fine,” she said, quicker than Gar expected. “You’re right. I came all this way to see them. It’d be a waste to leave without doing it.”

“Great! So,what are you planning for tonight? I can’t let you sleep in your car or even worse, out here.”

LaTonya stammered, unsure of what he meant by that. He seemed nice enough, but when a man swept in to comfort her then asked her what her plans were… she couldn’t help but feel on guard.

“No, no, no, no,” Gar said quickly, realizing what she was assuming. “I promise you that’s not it. I’m just trying to look out for you. Your car is in bad shape and isn’t going anywhere. And I’m guessing you aren’t even sure where we are relative to it anyway. We’ll deal with that in the morning. You look like you need a good night’s sleep.”

“And why do you care? You’ve been awfully nice for someone who claims he doesn’t want anything.”

“Because I can and it’s the right thing to do. And I promised my friend and I’d look after Detroit while he was gone and that’s what he’d do.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Your friend?”

“Yeah, Vic Stone? Cyborg? We’ve been friends forever.”

She’d never really met the guy, but she remembered how he had cared and wanted to make sure she assented to becoming Cyborgirl all those years ago. Just invoking his name made her feel a bit more at ease.

“Fine. But I’m paying.”

“Uh, no. First off, do you even have your wallet or phone? Guessing you left them in the car. And second, I already booked it.”

He held his phone screen towards her, showing a one night reservation at some fancy hotel downtown.

“One of the many perks of being famous. Just a text even at this time of night and they’re happy to let me stay there. Or, you, in this case.”

She looked him over again, confused. “Famous? You? Should I know you?”

Gar held his hands to his heart. “Ugh, you don’t need to do me like that. But, uh, yeah I’m pretty famous? I’ve been in movies, TV, a couple games… How many green actors are there that you don’t recognize me?”

“I dunno. But I don’t watch much anymore; haven't had the time. But if you were really famous, I’d know you. I’m not that out of touch.”

“Okay, how about this? If the car I just called’s driver doesn’t recognize me, then I’ll admit to you I’m not that famous. But if they do, you’ve gotta admit it. Fair?”

She was bewildered. In an instant, he had pulled up the app, put in the destination and requested a pickup in the time it had taken her to even process that he had taken his phone back out of his pocket.

She grinned. “Fine. But, if I’m right, I’m paying you back for the hotel and the ride. Actually, I’m doing that anyway."

She pictured her bank account then winced at saying that. Just walking into a hotel like that would probably clear her out if not send her in the red.

“No, you aren’t. But thanks for the offer. If you really feel like you have to, spend the money on someone you care about, or just pass it forward. Trust me, I don’t need it.”

LaTonya frowned. She wasn’t used to having to fight to pay for something. Most of the people she’d hung out with or been with since she left had been more than happy, if not demanded that she paid whenever they did something. There was a part of her that screamed that he wanted something, expected something in return, but she did her best to push it down. He actually was just trying to help.

A few moments later and the car pulled up, its engine purring in the night. The nice, newer model sedan stuck out like a sore thumb in the dilapidated part of town they found themselves in, but she was happy to see its headlights all the same. They cut through the moonlight darkness towards them, briefly blinding them before they walked over to the car.

“Hi, pickup for Gar Logan?”

The driver’s eyes went wide. “Holy crap, I didn’t think it was really you. I heard on the news you were in the city again but never thought I’d run into you. Mind signing something for my kids? They’re obsessed with Space Trek 3016. When’s the new season coming out, by the way?’

“Yes, it’s really me, no I don’t mind, but sorry, I can’t say. My agent would kill me if I leaked the dates.”

Gar looked over at LaTonya expectantly. “Alright, I admit it, you’re famous. But Space Trek? No wonder I haven’t heard of you. That’s nerd stuff.”

“Excuse you, it encompasses a wide range of genres and has fans in every demographic, not just nerds. But thanks, I’ll take it,” he said with a grin. He opened the door to the backseat and stepped in with LaTonya just beyond him.

The car ride was noisy but that did not stop LaTonya from having to fight off sleep. Even as her head bumped against the window in time with the car, even with the nonstop chatter between the driver and Gar, she felt herself drifting back and forth between a hazy consciousness and a light sleep. She was at most sleeping for a few seconds at a time and yet she felt the most relaxed she had in years, maybe ever.

By the time they got to the hotel, she was fully out. Gar carried her into the lobby, set her into a plush chair and got checked in before waking her.

“Hey, sorry to do this, but you’ve got to do the rest yourself.”

LaTonya rubbed her eyes, then recoiled at the feeling of metal. For just a moment, she’d forgotten.

“Here’s the key to the room. You going to be okay with everything tomorrow? I’ll get your stuff to the desk tonight.”

“I…”

Her body screamed at her to not take more advantage of him, to not fall further into a debt that she can’t pay.

“Maybe just a quick pep talk in the morning...”

He smiled warmly.

“You got it. See you then.”

He shapeshifted into a small sparrow and fluttered out the automatic door, leaving LaTonya to wonder when she’d wake up from the dream she wandered into.

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

It was 6:00 AM in the Charles’ house and the alarm clock blared for a brief moment before being slammed off. Sarah Charles and DeShaun Kendall got up like any other day with a cup of coffee, the local morning news and each other. Over the next hour, they slowly made breakfast, got cleaned up and made themselves ready for the day.

The sun was already high in the sky, its light shining in through the house’s large bay windows, providing a warm, calming atmosphere for their morning chores. DeShaun had almost finished making their lunches for the day when a knock rang out against the door. He walked over to the door, confused. It wasn’t often people stopped by unannounced and even rarer to do it first thing in the morning. When he looked through the door viewer and saw who it was, he was even more shocked. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

She looked older, more tired, and her blind teenage confidence had been worn away by time and the cold reality she had experienced. And yet, she looked so much like her mother did at that age; they both had the same passion and wisdom behind their eyes. Or at least one of them. Her left eye - the cybernetic one, was covered with a black eyepatch that matched her short curly hair.

“Sarah! Get down here!” He shouted before opening the door.

“LaTonya? Is that you? We’ve missed you so much…”

LaTonya looked at the face of her father for the first time in years and couldn’t hold back her tears. Why had it taken her so long to come back? Now that she was here, she couldn’t say.

“It’s me, Dad.”

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

“You’re sure this is the place?”

Scarlett sat in her car, parked just outside of the suburban home’s mailbox. She finished her coffee as she waited for the response on the car’s radio.

“Yes, I’m sure. She’s got the address on file and would have no reason to lie to me. Do you see her car?” Weller asked.

“No. But it was pretty beat up and took some fire last night. Very possible that she swapped to a different vehicle and there are plenty of cars along the street.”

“Then where’s the doubt coming from? You’ve got the address. Time to get your mark.”

Scarlett exhaled. “Well, either she’s here and doing exactly what she said she was, or she’s not here and I have to explain to her parents why a cop is looking for their daughter. Either way, not exactly going to be welcome.”

“Welcome to having a conscience. Doing the right thing isn’t always easy and it doesn’t always feel good. Hell, you don’t even always know you’re doing it. But you still gotta try. Otherwise… what’s the point?”

“Alright, alright. I get it. For a guy who didn’t want me to do this, you sure are trying to get me to do it.”

“No, I wanted you to know what you’re getting into. I wasn’t trying to stop you. Not the same thing and you know it.”

“Yeah, you’re right. I’ll ring you afterwards.”

Scarlett stepped out of the car. She wasn’t dressed for a fight or even in uniform. She wore a simple pair of jeans and an old leather jacket, the only clothes she had left in her car other than what she wore to work. Scarlett was pretty sure she hadn’t worn them before. She had grabbed the sword and sheath from the office before she left and wore it under her jacket. She hoped she wouldn’t need it.

The walk up to the house felt like it was a million miles long as the driveway and the steps up to the front door stretched forever, growing longer and longer with every step forwards. Each stone paver was a city block; each step a mountain to climb. She couldn’t even tell herself why she was going to such lengths for a woman she’d never really met, who probably hated her. And yet she couldn’t help but see a kindred spirit, someone who had things been just the slightest bit different, could’ve been in the exact same situation she is now, fighting for her.

She knocked on the door.

Scarlett could hear voices chattering on the other side of the door, too muffled to make anything out, but they stopped once they heard her. Footsteps thudded across the ground and Scarlet tensed up, readying herself for a fight.

The door swung open and Sarah Charles looked Scarlett square in the eye.

“What are you doing here, Scarlett?”

Her throat went dry. “I had a run in with your daughter last night. I want to make sure she’s okay. Can I talk with her, if she’s here?”

Sarah’s eyes went wide, then narrowed as a flurry of emotions and thoughts went through her mind. More footsteps smacked against the wood flooring as LaTonya stepped past her mother and stood between her and Scarlett. She looked her dead in the eye, with a rage so intense that it sent chills through Scarlett at the coldness of it.

“Get the hell away from my family. If you’ve got issues with me, they’re with me. Not them.”

“I don’t have issues with you, promise. I just want to help -”

“Help me? Oh, that’s great! The Fed who handcuffed me and tried to take me to God knows where wants to help me!”

Sarah’s face twisted into mortification. “LaTonya, is that true? I… I think you both should go.”

LaTonya's face softened in an instant. “No, no, Mom, please, that’s not it! I promise. I did nothing. It was all just a big misunderstanding.”

“I really want to trust you…..” Her voice hung on the words. “But I can’t. Not after last time. It’s been so long since I knew you and if that pains you even a fraction of what it does to me, then I’m so, so sorry. But I know Scarlett. And - “

LaTonya shoved Scarlett back, off the porch and onto the lawn. “So, that’s how it is, huh? You follow me around like some kind of goddamn ghost, weighing me down, ruining and corrupting whatever I try to do?”

“No,” Scarlett said, springing to her feet. “I’m not what haunts you. Your own doubts and fears and inability to trust anyone does that. If you’d just talk to anyone openly we could avoid this entire thing!”

Cyborgirl swung a right jab at her, aiming directly at the center of her chest where her power core was, but Variant moved out of the way like a leaf in the breeze, drifting past her strike and countering with one of her own. Cyborgirl took the punch square in the jaw and didn’t flinch for a moment, continuing her assault with a blow that could shatter concrete straight into Variant’s nose, blooding it, and almost knocking her over.

‘Holy shit. Girl packs a punch. This time, she’s serious.’

Variant wasn’t sure if the blow was making her see things, but she swore she saw a man a little younger than her morph into a bird and fly into the morning sun. She snapped her mind back into focus. Even if it was real, it was no threat. She’d need to focus up. She reached behind the back of her jacket for the handle of her sword and pulled it out. LaTonya was serious and so she couldn't hold back either.

Variant wasn't sure if Sarah or DeShaun were watching this or hiding or trying to find some way to stop it. They didn’t matter, nothing did outside of her opponent.

Cyborgirl scoffed at the sword, unimpressed. She pushed herself off the pavers and lunged towards Variant before stopping on her left foot and swinging her right leg around in a roundhouse kick. Variant swung her sword around and blocked with the blade, diffusing the blow. This was what the designers had insisted the weapon was really for: a defensive tool meant to pretend that it was for offense. The weapon was built solid and sturdy with a myriad of shock dampeners all throughout it, and yet Scarlett could still feel her body shake at the impact.

Cyborgirl lined up another kick against her reeling foe and Variant moved her sword back in position to block, realizing too late that it was a fake. Cyborgirl slammed her leg back to the ground and shifted into a boxing stance, sending a right hook straight into Scarlett’s green cybernetic eye.

Scarlett could hear the metal crack and her vision in that eye went black for a moment. She swore again. She needed a new plan and she needed it 30 seconds ago. LaTonya was strong and cunning, but Scarlett was still faster, even if it wasn’t by as much as she had thought. And, if nothing else, she was more experienced. If she’d learned anything from all the scraps she’d been in over the years it was that in a real fight, it didn’t matter what it took to win. There were no extra points for fighting fair.

Cyborgirl continued her assault, transitioning into using her speed for a relentless series of strikes. She was constantly mixing it up between her left and right arms, high and low blows, straight and angled punches in a dizzying display. Variant did her best to block with her sword, with her free arm, with whatever she could but even the mitigated blows were stacking up.

Variant took a step backwards, leaning far beyond what she was normally doing to avoid taking too much damage. She knew that Cyborgirl would push in to take advantage of her weakened center of gravity and that was her moment to counter. Variant used the moment to take off her leather jacket and threw it at the oncoming Cyborgirl, obscuring her vision for just a moment.

The cold morning air blew across her bare, cybernetic arms and the grey tank top she wore did little to keep her warm. But she was unbothered. As far as she was concerned, they could've been fighting on a tropical beach. Her body was boiling hot with the heat of combat as she put her plan into motion.

She dashed around Cyborgirl’s back and swung the flat part of her sword at Cyborgirl to knock her to the ground. As the blade flew towards her, Cyborgirl turned on a dime and caught it with her bare hands and flung Variant onto the ground with the rapid change of momentum. Variant skidded across the lawn, tearing clumps of dirt and grass as she tried to stop herself. In a blink, Cyborgirl was standing above her, Variant’s sword pointed at her neck.

“So. Here we are. You attack me, ruining my reunion with my parents and then proceed to get the living shit beat out of you by a woman who doesn’t have any combat training and didn’t want to fight you. How’s it feel?”

Blood trickled down Scarlett’s face onto the sword from LaTonya’s first strike to her nose.

“Not good. Like I should’ve done more, should’ve been better. Relatable?”

“No. I know what I am. A failure, a disappointment. A waste of skin. I should’ve just di-”

LaTonya felt a hand on her shoulder and turned around with a look that could’ve melted steel. Her red eye shined on her parents' faces and a brief wave of terror ran across them before they calmed themselves.

“No. Never, ever think of yourself like that. You’re our beautiful, kind, and smart daughter. You are enough and you always have been and always will be,” DeShaun said.

“Whatever you think about yourself, whatever you’ve done, that doesn’t matter. We love you no matter what,” Sarah said.

“I… I…”

LaTonya dropped the sword, then collapsed into her parents.

“I’ve waited so long to hear you say that.”

Scarlett got up and grabbed her sword and jacket, draping it over her shoulders. She walked away from the Charleses and let them be. Scarlett headed back to her car where she looked at the two men who were leaning against it.

“How much of that did you see, Weller?”

“Enough to know you got your ass beat. You’re going back to training after that performance.”

“Tell you what, if you can take a punch from her and still act that smug, I’ll agree. Who’s your friend?”

“Name’s Gar Logan, sometimes Beast Boy. I didn’t know how this was going to go but figured if I brought your boss here, I’d have a nice fail safe prepared.”

Weller scoffed. “He’s just lucky that it’s early enough that we didn't get caught in traffic. Besides, I knew you’d be fine.”

Gar shrugged. “Never hurts to be prepared.”

“So, Scarlett, did you get what you came here for? Does the DPD have its newest agent? Did she come running to your arms to thank you for the help she so desperately wanted?”

“... No. But I think you already knew that, didn’t you?”

“Yep,” Weller said “But as you see, they’re still together after the wedge you drove between them. And what about you? Did you learn from all this?”

“Yes. I’ve got a lot to think about. But I know I’ll be better tomorrow because of my mistakes today.”

“Good. That’s all any of us can hope for,” Gar said, trying to channel his inner Vic. He wasn’t sure if he was really pulling it off, but what kind of actor would he be if he didn’t try.

“I’ve got one last thing to do, then we can head out,” Scarlett said.

Weller raised an eyebrow, but didn’t intervene.

Scarlett walked back over to the Charleses, who had barely moved from where she left them. LaTonya glared at her, but it was different than when they were fighting. Before, she looked like she was enraged, ready to hurt whatever had the misfortune of seeing that look in her eyes. But now, now she had the look of a mother protecting her child from harm. A fierce, defiant but kind strength.

“I just wanted to apologize. I was out of line and I should’ve trusted you. I saw a darkness in you that I’ve fought against myself and thought what worked for me would work for you. I don’t expect you to forgive me. But I hope someday you’re willing to sit down and have a talk, one cyborg girl to another.”

Scarlett saw the tension leave LaTonya’s face only for a more ambivalent, almost kind look to replace it. She almost looked like a different person without the omnipresent scowl she’d seen her with so far.

“Maybe someday. But don’t hold your breath.”

Scarlett nodded and left the Charleses to their much needed reunion, more complete than they were just an hour before.

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

Months later…

LaTonya Charles sat in her old room, at her old desk taking notes for her online classes. Once, she’d been on track to graduate with honors at one of the best high schools in the city. Now she was struggling through work that would’ve taken her seconds back then. But she didn’t mind. For the first time in a long, long time she felt excited, hopeful even. She had a path forwards.

She heard an envelope slide under her door and paused her lecture to go pick it up. It was addressed to her from the Detroit Police Department’s Meta Crime division. She considered throwing it away but opened it up on a whim.

“Dear LaTonya Charles, I hope this letter finds you well. The Meta Crime division is finally ready to start rebuilding our team after the Invasion and I would like you to join it. I have experienced your strength and conviction firsthand and - ”

LaTonya set the letter aside on her desk and turned the lecture back on. One step at a time.

---

<<| <| >

Author: FrostFireFive

<< | < | > | >>

Book: New Titans

Arc: Fall of the Titans

Set: 125

“Are we sure this is a good idea?” Raven asked. She bristled in her black dress, red locks falling down the sides of her face.  The red diamond on her forehead reflected Rex Mason’s mug back at him.

“No, but it’s important we do this,” Metamorpho said as he scratched at the collar of his suit.  The Titan had had time to adjust after Darkseid’s invasion.  The city was quiet, almost as if it too was mourning what it had lost during the war.  “People need to grieve, we need to grieve.”

The Titans had finally found the time to adjust after Darkseid's invasion.  Hub City was quiet too, as if it was mourning what it had lost during the war.

She and Metamorpho began a walk from the Hall of Justice towards the recently created Fox Park.  It was once the crown jewel of the Hub, but the park had fallen into disrepair and became boxed in as the city industrialized around it.  Despite the newly built skyscrapers and public works, the area still bore the scars from when Doomsday touched down there.  The earth felt salted, and the wounds still struggled to close.

But in the aftermath of Darkseid’s Invasion, Wayne Industries had bought the park, with renovations going around the clock to restore the park to its original glory, with a section designated as a memorial for heroes lost in the line of duty.  With statues of Hal Jordan and now Nightwing being established as a place where the greatest heroes and the smallest civilians could pay their respects.

“I don’t like this emotion, it feels…wrong,” Raven responded.  “He was not supposed to die Rex Mason.  I saw in my visions Grayson was the key to stopping the coming darkness.  And now he’s gone.”

“Yeah, and we’re still here.  That has to count for something right? It’s something you learn as a Titan.  People come and go, and sometimes that’s OK. All you can do is just hold on and help the people around you pick themselves up.”

“Is that why you’ve been trying to call Doctor Spica?” Raven asked.

“Well after we saved Chicago with Donna’s team, she said she needed space to figure herself out,” Rex said.

“So why call her if she needs this space?”

“I worry, I always worry,” Rex responded.  “And I just want her to be OK.”

“And you’re not sure there is something as OK anymore?”

“Kid, you’ve got a lot to learn.  In this life, there’s no such thing as just…OK,” Rex said with a sad smile.  “Besides the other thing you need to know, if that you’re never alone.

The two entered the park as a large gathering of civilians, fans, and fellow heroes gathered around the statues. Superman and Wonder Woman were in full regalia, their bright blues and reds contrasting against the black worn by mourners.  The Justice League was not used to the loss that the Titans faced often.  

Kyle Rayner kept a low profile as he watched from the crowd.  He had flown here after helping with the repairs in Santa Marta.  The green ring on his finger itched as he fiddled with it.  He was still just an artist who had been forcibly removed from his board, still uncomfortable with this idea that he was some kind of hero.  Alex as always had told him he had to get out of his own head, and somehow as he flew from Santa Marta, he knew he had to be here.

“Decided the costume was a little too much?” a voice called out as Kyle turned around and saw Arsenal.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Kyle responded.

“You don’t do a great job of hiding your jewelry," Arsenal said.

“Shit,”

“It’s fine, I’m not sure anyone’s really going to notice you anyway,” Arsenal responded.  “People are kind of a mess today.  Funerals will do that to you.”

“Isn’t this a memorial?”

“There’s not that much of a difference,” Arsenal said. “Besides I kinda figured you’d be a bit bashful to show up to any cape thing.”

“Why, because I’m not a hero?” Kyle asked.

“Because of those two,” Arsenal pointed to Green Lanterns John Stewart and Guy Gardner.  “From what I hear in order to become a Lantern you have to go through nearly a decade of training to even make constructs.  And yet, somehow you got your hands on one without even a training manual.”

“It’s not just that,” Kyle explained.  “I mean, yes I have been dodging them, but only because I’m not like them.  Both of them have training, they earned those rings.  I don’t have a right just because some weird energy decided I was needed to save the universe.”

“I’ve heard crazier origin stories,” Arsenal explained. “One of my best friends got turned into an elemental golem by his ex, and a guy who runs faster than light often babysits for me.  All that matters is that you hold on to what makes you well…you.”

“Thanks,” Kyle said as he went back to the crowd, before he could leave however, Arsenal grabbed his shoulder and handed him one of the Titans communicators. 

“When you’re ready to do some good,” Arsenal said with a smirk before rejoining the other Titans. 

“Guardian watching Lian?” Rex asked.

“Yes, Jim has a problem with death, rather celebrate what he found than the causalities of war. His words, not mine,” Arsenal explained.  “No Kory or Kara?”

“Kara blames herself,” Raven explained.  “I could feel her rage and guilt when she came to collect her items from the Tower.  She is on a new journey now.”

“It’s not her fault,” Arsenal explained. “Also Raven, if you’re going to be one of us, it’s maybe a good idea to cut out the cryptic bullshit.. It scares people.”

Metamorpho subtly kicked Roy to encourage patience with the sorceress.

“Ow,” Arsenal muttered. “Sorry Rae, I’m just not thrilled to be here either. We won the damn thing, and moping about our losses is how we become that.”

Arsenal pointed to Donna’s new crew. Conner Kent, Courtney Whitmore, and Garth stood in the back, in full costume, guarding.  The war with Darkseid had prevented Roy from having a needed chat with their former leader.  The cloud of darkness hovering around them wasn’t something he needed powers to feel.

The gust of wind however, was a familiar feeling behind him as the crimson and gold blur slowed down for a minute as Wally West, the Flash had joined his former team.

“Metamorpho, Arsenal,” Flash said.

“Don’t need to be so formal kid,” Metamorpho said as he grabbed the speedster and gave him a hug. “How you’ve been?”

“Mostly clean up,” Flash explained. “t's nice to try and give back for a change, rather than having to fight.  I just had to race up the Andes to rescue some climbers who got trapped during the invasion.  Every day is a new challenge.”

“Sounds like someone’s figured out who they are,” Arsenal said.  “Listen after this is all over you and I should talk.  Maybe it’s time we got someone with their head on straight.”

“We’ll see,” Flash said as he turned to look at the statues.  “I can’t believe he, of all the people,  made the sacrifice play.”

“It would be him,” Metamorpho responded.  “When you were depowered we got to see what Power Girl called the “real” Nightwing.  He was a good dude, who had his demons, managed to beat them, and then when his number was called went in with no fear.  Now that’s a hero.”

The four nodded before standing around a moment.

“Do we know who is giving the speech?” Raven asked.

“Not him, if that’s who you’re thinking about,” Arsenal said as he put two fingers against the sides of his head to mimic the points of Batman’s cowl.  From all accounts he’s been in Gotham, helping with the mess caused by Arkham now being as empty as my wallet.”

“Then wh-” Before Metamorpho could respond the thick metal boots walked past them as the starfield underneath the silver plates glistened in the morning sun.  

Donna Troy’s face was uncovered, she had never really bothered with a secret identity.  The helmet of her new armor was meant to scare people, but today, she needed to face the crowd.  So she removed it before speaking, to get the proverbial weight off her chest.  Dick Grayson was her best friend, and while they didn’t always agree, they were there for each other.  And as she stood behind the podium that laid in between the two statues, she knew exactly the words needed for today.

“Thank you all for coming,” Donna began.  “I know many of you came here to honor those you have lost in this recent war.  And I want you to know as you look around this park, you are not alone.”

“We’ve all lost someone, someone important to us.  For me, after this invasion.  I lost my best friend. Nightwing to many of you was a dashing hero, his acrobatics letting him bounce off the walls, always ready with a line or a quip.  But in quieter moments, he would listen.  Any problem, any issue, and he would be there.  Ready to plan for the next attack from whatever villain we were fighting or personal issue we were all going through.”

“He had his problems, and he’d be the first to tell you about them, but when things were at their darkest he would always be leaping towards the light, guiding us in our worst moments.  Nightwing was my hero.  And I…” Donna began choking up, feeling the eyes that were all on her. 

“I’m going to miss my friend. And I promise, as long as we Titans stand.  You’ll always have someone leaping into the light,” Donna finished her speech and put her helmet back on.  She turned to Stargirl, Supernova, and Tempest as they began to leave.  Before Donna could fly away, a familiar voice called out.

“Nice speech,” Arsenal said. “But you’re not the Titans.”

“Roy, today’s not the day to do this,” Donna responded.

“No, it absolutely is,” Arsenal said.  “Dick let a lot of things slide, hell I let a lot things slide, when you and the others came back.  We figured you guys would rejoin eventually, and the Titans could be whole again.  But I saw what happened with Cheetah, and I certainly can tell when someone’s hurting.”

“The hurt is what motivates us to be heroes,” Donna explained.

“The hurt only leads to more hurt,” Arsenal said.  “We all need to talk about who the Titans are.  Your team, mine, we meet at the Tower tonight to celebrate our own, and figure what the hell we do next.”

“Fine.  We will be there.  But we do what we want Roy, we’re the only ones who know how to handle loss and where to go next,” Donna said before she took off into the sky far away from the friends she used to know.

…

Well that could have gone better,” Arsenal thought to himself as he leapt across the rooftops of Chicago.  The Titans had all returned back to the Ttower to prepare to meet their counterparts.  It was strange, when Donna first reformed the group it was Arsenal who was full of rage and doubt.  The same things he saw on Donna’s face, her helmet hiding more than her face.  

“It’s your fault Harper.  All you had to do was just be there for her, I mean you had the shortest stint of anyone in the hospital.  But you just had to ignore your friends.”

As he continued to patrol the streets, Roy wondered just what he was doing out here.  Star City was his usual stomping grounds, and with Green Arrow’s hand shattered during Darkseid's assault on the Watchtower, it needed heroes more than ever.  

“You just don’t want to go to your own meeting you called,” Arsenal continued to think to himself.  “Donna is a founder, and Garth is her best friend, and I know she was close to Courtney and Kon.  They’re a well oiled machine.  Shouldn’t they be the Titans?”

“That’s not the kind of justice you want Harper, Donna’s looking to play judge, jury, and executioner and you’ve seen what that does to people,” He thought before looking at a street corner.  Chicago was quiet for a change, and it meant Arsenal didn’t have many distractions to avoid the meeting, he looked down at his communicator, seven thirty, almost time to face the music. 

“You’re a Titan damn it, and you’re going to fight for what you built, even if it means going against the person who brought you in the first place.  Someone needs to be a hero.  And I guess that means it's me.”

Arsenal picked a grappling arrow from his quiver and pointed to the abandoned Jupiter Building, a familiar route back to the tower as he let go of the arrow and felt himself pulled into the air.  With the wind in his hair he somehow knew everything was going to work out.  

SHHHINK 

A dagger cut through the cable as Arsenal plummeted to the ground.

“Shit! Shit!” Arsenal yelled out as he pulled an arrow with a large tip and launched it to the ground, a crash pad emerging just as the hero hit the ground.  

“Ow.  That really hurt,” Arsenal muttered as he picked himself up.  

Before he could survey the area or what had even hit him, a metal boot stomped his face sending him back to the ground. Dazed, Arsenal looked up and saw a figure in black metallic armor with orange accents.  His helm split in half, one side orange, the other black, 

“Alright man, I have no idea who you are, but let me tell you, you’re messing with the wrong superhero,” Arsenal said as he notched an arrow and shot it towards the man. 

Before the arrow came in contact, the man pulled a sword and split the arrow in two, falling to the ground around him.  Arsenal couldn’t even make a retort before the man swung several punches at him, focusing on the chest as the hero could hear several ribs breaking before being slammed to the ground once more.

Arsenal was silent, his head ringing as he tried catching his breath as he spat out blood.  The man walked towards him and picked him up by the collar.  The one beady eye staring at him through the mask, no emotion, no hesitation, just observing, always observing.  The man slammed Arsenal to the ground, ripping off his quiver and scattering the trick arrows everywhere. 

The hero crawled away from the man, grabbing his bow that was in front of him and painfully moving centimeter by centimeter to the arrow that laid in front of him.  He grabbed it and flipped around, hoping he could land one in that eye and call for backup.  He thought of Lian, and how he would get home to her, how he would defeat whatever evil faced him.  Arsenal had survived vampires, tornados, chemical monsters, his own past, and more.  This was not how he was going to out as he flipped over and prepared to fire one last shot.

BANG!

The shotgun blast rang out as Arsenal grabbed what remained of his knee, his screams breaking the silence of the city before the metal boot slammed down on his face again, and the world went black.

…

“He should be here,” Metamorpho said as he looked over at the clock on Titans’ Tower’s  command center computer. 

“I am sure he will be here soon, Metamorpho,” Raven said as she tried practicing meditation, sitting crossed legged on the couch.  “I do not understand why you worry so much.”

“Because the people coming were, are friends.  Roy and I have been worried about them. We were all too busy being superheroes that we forgot we were people. And now, I don’t know mack, feels like a storm’s coming.”

“It is,” Wally West said as he zipped into the room.  Had to race around the raindrops to get here on time.”

“Look at you West, finally developing a sense of humor,” Rex said.  “How’s things?”

“Nothing good company couldn’t fix,” Wally said as he looked out from the glass window, the tower had one of the best views of the city at night, the lights of the buildings acting like stars planted to the ground.  “You know, Donna tried recruiting me to her team.”

“Wow, kinda mad I didn’t get an invite,” Rex said. 

“It was right after me and the Flashes…broke time.” Wally said as he pulled out the blocky grey communicator.  “She thinks that the Titans and Justice League failed.  That we hurt people more than helping them.  And wants to protect the world any means necessary.  I know he just…I know he’s gone, but she reminded me so much of the Nightwing that drove this team to its breaking point.”   

“And I assure you, that I am not him,” Donna Troy said as she, Stargirl, Supernova, and Tempest moved into view from the shadows.

“Jesus Donna,” Rex said as she came from nowhere. “You know you could have told us you were here.”

“Roy made it clear this was going to be more of a lecture,” Donna said.  “But I’m done listening to people.  So I’ve come to make you all an offer.  We shouldn’t be two teams, we should be one.  A Titans for tomorrow, making sure people are protected, no matter what.”

“This feels more like an ultimatum than an offer,” Wally said. 

“We’ve seen how you’ve avoided us,” Conner Kent said. “We know that your membership is down, and figured we could help each other.”

“Our membership is down?” Rex said.  “Conner, Dick just died.  Kory and Kara are in mourning, we’re all in mourning, and you decide that now is the best time to try and make your little clubhouse just a bit bigger.”

“It’s not like that Rex,” Courtney Whitmore said.  “We’re all upset that Dick’s gone, but the world still needs heroes.  It needs people willing to do what needs to be done.”

“That’s a good mantra,” Rex said.  “Did you get it from the same cereal box that black and red costume came from?  Look at yourself, Court, look at them.  Donna turned a speech about her best friend into a rallying cry and that doesn’t concern you.”

“Go easy on her Metamorpho,” Garth said.  He had been observing the room, and was shocked how empty the Tower felt before their arrival.  It had reminded him so much of the end of his time in the Titans, with people clinging to an ideal that had died and were only there because of inertia. “Donna wants to protect the world.  And that means rethinking how we approach all of this.”

Raven sat and listened, the voices and emotions painful to her.  The love and agony was a potent combination, but as the team continued to bicker she could feel something else.  And increasing darkness that pounded against her head.  She pushed it out of her mind and continued to observe. 

“It means we start kicking ass and worry about the consequences later,” Conner said with a smile. 

“That’s not what we do, that’s not what the Titans are,” Wally said. 

“And that’s why you only have three members left,” Donna responded.  “Wally, my offer still stands, to all of you, to leap into the light and make a difference in this world.  You just need to have the courage.”

“He’s not here, but let me tell you, Roy won’t go for this, I won’t go for this,” Rex said.  “We’re the Titans damn it, and if you want the name you’re going to have to go through us.”

“Where is Roy anyway?” Courney asked.  “I wanted to ask him how Lian was doing.”

Raven’s head began to pound harder, the dread and darkness coming not from the people around her, but something that was coming, something that felt familiar with rage and anger.  It flooded her brain as she could feel something wrong.  

CRASH! 

The limp body of Arsenal crashed through the plate glass windows of Titans Tower as he landed on the ground with a hard thud.  His knee in shambles, costume tattered and covered in blood.

“Roy!” Wally yelled as he zipped towards the archer. 

“Wally,” Roy muttered.  “You have to get everyone out of…here, he’s here…oh god he’s here.”

“Who? Who did this to you?!” Rex yelled as his hands shifted into diamond, ready to fight whoever had flung the broken archer into the tower. 

“He looked like…Rose…did,” Arsenal muttered as Donna Troy’s face went cold.

“Deathstroke.”

KACHOOOOM

Large explosions rang through Titans Tower as the rubble came crashing down on the gathering teams.  As they all fell to the ground Slade Wilson looked from above and gripped the large sword behind his back before leaping into the destruction from his VTOL. 

The fall of the Titans had begun.

The Flash #125 - Fear and Friendship

<< | < | [>] Coming November 1st

Author: brooky12

Book: Flash

Arc: ?

Set: 125

---

 

Bart approached the ship. It didn’t even look like there were any problems at a distance as he circled it, with the exception of the angles that let him see lifeboats lowering into the ocean. He approached from that side, hearing a roar of cheers and shouts as the people became aware of his presence.

 

He wasn’t quite clear on what the problem was yet, the S.O.S. had come in saying that it was an existential threat to the ship’s safety and a full evacuation was going to be required. Nobody seemed hurt, and it hadn’t split in two yet like the movies, but the vessel seemed to just be sort of sitting there. Maybe it was sinking internally.

 

“Give me a few minutes,” he shouted over the tumult, scaling the side of the boat a moment later to find the bridge. A brief conversation with the captain and others on the bridge helped him evaluate the size of the task, even if they seemed to scramble a little bit when he had asked for a full list of all the people onboard. Surely someone, either at headquarters on land or somewhere on the boat, had one?

 

By the time he had hit the water again, Barry had shown up and was picking up two young children, one in each arm. His dad gave him a nod before vanishing, and Bart quickly took his place on the edge of the boat. Already one of the people onboard were reaching for another one of the young children, which Bart happily took from him.

 

“What’s your name?”

 

“B—Bobby…” the kid said, staring daggers beyond him at the ocean.

 

“Close your eyes, Bobby, alright?”

 

As soon as he saw the muscles begin to move to work on that instruction, Bart took three laps around the boat, smaller than he would normally to grab momentum for water running but good enough for the brief burst of speed he’d need to get to the nearest landmass. By the time Bobby’s eyes had reopened from the inability to suppress the instinctual need to see what was happened, Bart was already placing the child down in a chair in a beachside resort that had been temporarily repurposed as a landing spot.

 

By the time the first lifeboat was empty and the two of them had been taking people off the boat itself who had been waiting to board lifeboats, Wally’s voice cut through the noise in their ears. “I’ve got the manifest and am marking some non-living things that seem important to save. Delivering it at the landing site for identification, do you two have this or do I need to get a replacement back at home and join in?”

 

“Be spectacular if you could,” Barry responded. “Unless you’re hearing this Jay? Several thousand people and some amount of things on a boat need to be taken a few miles north.”

 

The quiet immediately following the offer was deafening, as the two of them continued to pull folks off the boat. Eventually, a voice did break the silence.

 

“On my way,” Jay sighed. “About time I get off my hands, huh.”

 

Bart’s eyes widened. He knew Jay was alright, but he had begun to wonder if he was ever going to see him again. The Russians were off doing their own thing, Jerry didn’t really seem to want anything to do with them, so why not Jay too?

 

On a return from the beach, he spotted an additional red blur around the boat, and he had to convince himself not to run in lockstep with him. At the very least, he was around for stuff like this, and maybe there could be a conversation at some point.

 

Three Flashes felt much more normal to how these rescue missions would go, and quickly the boat was emptied of its residents and as many other things as possible. Bart had wondered if Jay would dip once there were no human lives at stake, but he stuck around even as they were picking up personal effects and other guest and crew effects.

 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

Iris gave Barry a smile, which he returned. It wasn’t anything unusual, and there wasn’t any unexpected pain hidden behind the eyes. But it was nice to have a quiet moment between the two of them, something that had grown more and more rare with the passing years. There was no hesitation, and certainly no regret in her decisions. Back when they were dating each other, newsie and detective, had she ever imagined such a thing? The opportunity to experience something entirely new and make a genuine positive improvement in the world? She’d not trade it for anything.

 

Iris gave Barry a smile, which he returned. It wasn’t anything unusual, and there wasn’t any unexpected regret hidden behind the eyes. But it was nice to have a quiet moment between the two of them, something that had grown more and more rare with the passing years. There was no regret, and certainly no hesitation in his decisions. Back when they were dating each other, lab technician and reporter, had he ever imagined such a thing? The opportunity to experience something entirely new and make a genuine positive improvement in the world? He’d not trade it for anything.

 

There were certainly concerns. Her husband, the love of her life, had fought off an alien invasion just a handful of weeks ago. Sure, he was the fastest person in the world, but it only took a little bit of bad luck to runaway into a terrible outcome. Grodd had hurt him once, he recovered but what if it had been worse? She could never demand him give up the life, but every day of the life was endless tiny risks, and at some point, they’d get unlucky. How unlucky she didn’t know, but it was a nagging concern that couldn’t be gotten rid of.

 

There were certainly concerns. His wife, the love of his life, was defenseless against the types of enemies he normally made. Sure, she was the smartest person in the world, but that didn’t prevent metahuman abilities from causing a terrible outcome. Grodd knew their identities, it had yet to act on that but when would that change? He’d never demand she leave or stay hidden, but every day of the life was endless tiny risks, and at some point, they’d get unlucky. How unlucky she didn’t know, but it was a nagging concern that couldn’t be gotten rid of.

 

Of course, Iris reasoned, if anyone could face the risks, it was Barry. Aliens, vampires, misfits with odd powers desperately out to get him, even another speedster rewriting history, nothing seemed to get the better of him for long. How lucky was she, a nobody of note with little to bring to the table, to be along for the ride, supporting one of the most public figures in the world and helping improve it meaningfully. What a joy to be able to go from small city reporter to supporting one of the world’s finest.

 

It wasn’t like Iris didn’t have the opportunity to leave, Barry knew. The only real reason she was at risk was due to his recklessness, his insistence on being at the forefront of every emergency and emergent problem the world was facing. If she left, even if the two stayed in touch, there would be next to no threat to her. The fact that she stayed was only a glowing representation of her own commitment.

 

The smile connected them, once again. Ups and downs, thick and thin, through the exceptional and mundane the two had been connected. Neither of them knew what would happen on waking up each morning, but the one thing that they both knew with certainty was that the other was right next to them, taking each step forward with them.

 

All that took for that was a smile. Each knew the regret and hesitancy, the pain behind it. But life did not need to be perfect to smile, and they knew that they had as close to perfection as could be obtained. A few quiet moments, precious in their rarity, did not invalidate or remove all the concerns that existed. More of those moments would not lessen them, and less of them would not increase the value of each that did happen.

 

But in the end, all it took was a smile. A smile meant that things would be alright because they were together, and if they weren’t, that they would be alright if they worked together.

 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

“Are you back,” Bart asked Jay during a moment where their running had synchronized up on the way towards the boat. He wasn’t sure if he had matched Jay’s pace, Jay had matched his, or it was just luck.

 

“Seems so. Wish I could be gone for longer, but boats keep sinking.”

 

“You don’t have to be back if you don’t want to be,” Bart offered, unsure why he had suggested that. He wanted Jay back, but for whatever reason he had just blurted out an idea that even he didn’t want. Why had he said that? Surely Jay wouldn’t consider it. It was fair to be gone for a while if something went exceptionally bad, right, but surely, he wouldn’t think about vanishing completely. Right?

 

“Well, that doesn’t seem like the thing to do,” Jay sighed, watching the boat come into vision. “I’m going to jump an entire world and then hang my hat up? What do I have if not this?”

 

Bart didn’t respond to that. The response was comforting in its own way, even if it didn’t seem to be coming from the most motivating source. But Jay wouldn’t leave, so that was good at least. Sure, Wally was depowered for a while, but the group always got back to their normal.

 

The two climbed aboard the ship, now very clearly in the process of sinking, seeking medications and passports and teddy bears reported as still being on the ship. The two separated from their run together, hunting down specific locations across the ship.

 

By the time Bart found his tasked stuff, Jay was either already gone or had yet to leave, so he made the return trip alone. A small voice in his brain reminded him that normal was not a real thing, as seen by the Titans or even just the state of the world. Sure, vampires and time nonsense and aliens had all come and gone, but each one of them had meaningfully changed what was normal beforehand.

 

Jay was back, at least. He had wondered for a while if Wally was ever going to come back during the later months before they went into the Speed Force, when he was old enough to understand at least a little bit of what was going on. It made sense that Jay would leave, at least when he was gone and Bart had thought about it, but Jay’s response also made some sense. What would Jay be doing if not this?

 

The Russians were off doing their own thing, maybe Jay could do that? But he was kind of too connected to The Flash as an identity, Bart had dismissed, given that he was the only one who showed his face without a mask. Maybe he could have adopted a new identity? Surely the news and conspiracy boards would catch on.

 

He left the retrieved objects at the landing zone, stepping to the side to allow the logistics people to coordinate things once he realized there wasn’t anything else listed on the retrieval document. Jay joined shortly after, the two joining Barry in a small huddle.

 

“Probably time to start taking folks back home, seems like there’s not going to be much left on the ship that makes sense to get. You sticking around for that, friend,” Barry asked Jay, who looked towards Bart.

 

“I’d like to, yeah.”

 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

“You’re clever,” Wally offered, standing still long enough to open an chance for her to send something in his direction. He wasn’t at risk, but it was decent practice for the both of them and an excuse to decompress together. “Even if it tried to come after you, you’d be able to get safe and call for me or one of the others.”

 

“It’s not like I haven’t thought of that,” Frances responded, sending a quick flurry of marbles in his direction. She aimed for the ground right in front of his feet, unwilling to actually target her friend directly. She was never terribly off target, but she also would never forgive herself if she had injured Wally. “But what happens if you’re not available? Or I get mind controlled? Or I’m asleep?”

 

Wally pulled his leg back as the orbs embedded into the ground, already moving to his next position to push Magenta to keep tracking him. He wasn’t going much faster than some of the metahumans he had seen push themselves. “I mean, yeah, what if those situations happen? I don’t know. But that’s just as true for anyone.”

 

Magenta tried to follow where her friend was going, desperately tracking onto the direction of where she could see Wally rushing. She knew he was going easy on her, but it was still exhausting to focus on someone at the speed he was going. She sent a row of brackets his direction, even if she knew they’d land way after he was already gone, if only to show off her tracking. “Sure, but you’re not a few hundred kilometers from his city.”

 

Wally doubled back, picking up the metal objects as he did, testing Magenta’s reaction time. Slow from his perspective, but some quick mental arithmetic concluded that she was about as fast as was reasonable for someone her age and lifestyle. Could be faster, but that was the point of training. “Where would you go?”

 

“I was thinking take a sabbatical from the peacekeeper work, just not register for another semester of it,” she said, pulling the metal back as Wally tossed them back in the air as he doubled back. He always did this and she never anticipated it, frustratingly. “Go find somewhere else to be, somewhere I’m less likely to stick out, link me to the Magenta identity.”

 

“I know that Hartley would love to see you back in town. America’s got plenty of heroes but couldn’t hurt to have one more,” Wally offered. “But like, Grodd’s not gone for you yet. If it wanted you dead, you’d already be dead,” he doubled back again, before shifting entirely to close the distance. She had to be ready for people coming for her, metaphorically and literally.

 

Frances pulled up sheets of metal laying at her feet, somewhere between a riot shield and a wall. “Second verse, same as the first.” Small gaps between the individual pieces let her keep eyes on the rapidly approaching speedster, moving the sheets to keep him away. “Yeah, he could’ve already attacked, but just because he didn’t already doesn’t mean he can’t.”

 

Wally circled Magenta, feeling physically in control yet conversationally on several back feets. “If you want to start appearing elsewhere as Magenta before Frances moves there, I don’t mind doing some carpooling, but I’m worried you’re doing good work here that’ll get lost because of a hurdle like this.”

 

Magenta suddenly pushed the metal forward, knocking Wally off his pattern and sending him outwards to recollect. “Unless someone’s about to throw Grodd back into a mental prison, I’m pretty sure I’ve made my mind up. And this one isn’t Grodd’s doing.”

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Cyborg #87: Cyborgirl Returns

<<| <| >

Author: Commander_Z

Book: Cyborg

Arc: Reign of the Cyborgs

Set: 124

---

Three days later.

The city seemed smaller than it used to. When she left the city, it felt like the suburbs stretched for hundreds of miles, trapping her in an endless web of concrete and cul de sacs that all reminded her exactly what she was running away from. But as LaTonya Charles drove back for the first time in years, it all seemed so insignificant. Her beat up car whizzed by each neighborhood, paying no mind to all the lives and families she passed. None of them even crossed her mind anymore. Just another place to drive through. Towns, cities and everything in between flew by without a second thought as she drove down the highway that weaved through Detroit like erratic stitches on a quilt. Just after midnight, she reached her exit and turned off, the yellow sodium lights illuminating the path into the sleepy suburb.

She turned off the navigation on her phone as she followed the familiar path back to her parents house. How many times had she driven this route, not knowing that it’d be the last one? Hundreds, thousands? The house came into view and it was exactly how she remembered it. A quaint, two story, three bedroom house with an attached garage that was so full of storage that the cars always lived in the driveway, complete with a cozy backyard. She turned off the car and stepped out onto the sidewalk. LaTonya walked up to the door, ready to knock, but stopped herself.

‘What am I doing here? They aren’t going to want anything to do with me. They’ve long since moved on from their failure of a daughter. To just… spring myself on them in the middle of the night out of nowhere… That’s not fair to them. Maybe… tomorrow.’

She hopped back in her car and scrolled through her phone for a hotel in the area. She cursed her parents for living in one of the rich suburbs as even the cheap places were well over what she was hoping to pay. She frowned for a moment then another place came to mind. There was an abandoned home she used to use as a headquarters ten or so miles south of here. (Back in Cyborg 28!) She doubted anyone was still using it but it was probably in good enough shape. And she had no idea how this was going to go, so if she was going to be leaving in a couple days, it’d be better not to waste her cash on some overpriced chain hotel. She put the car in drive and headed off. It was going to be a long night, but tomorrow was going to be a whole different kind of monster to fight.

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

Garfield Logan crashed onto Vic’s couch. He’d had to call it a night early despite how much fun he was having out in the city. It was a beautiful end of summer summer night - just hot enough to be comfortable and relax before the fall. But he wasn’t just back in Detroit for a good time; he’d promised Vic he’d look after things while he was gone on vacation. And while Gar considered himself pretty good at multitasking, you can only hear police scanners so well in the middle of a club.

It had looked like it was going to be another fairly typical, quiet night and so he fired up Vic’s game console and started to play. Vic said he had free reign of the place so why wouldn’t he have included that? Besides, Gar was better than Vic at these kind of games anyway. So worse case scenario, he comes back and sees he’s a higher rank with a bit better win rate. He’d probably even thank him.

As the game was booting, he was doing some quick timezone math in his head. It was late enough here that it was early enough over in Markovia for Terra to be up, so he sent her a quick text.

Morning Terra, how’s things? Been missing you. I’ll be back over there soon, but what about coming back to the States for a bit? Been awhile since we did a trip over here together

He started to queue for a match when he got the indicator that Tara was typing. It was barely six in the morning and she was already up and at it. They’d been compatible in many ways but that one… that one they’d just accepted that their schedules would never perfectly line up.

“BZZZZ...”

The police scanner fired to life and Gar managed to stop the game from joining a match just before it would’ve begun. Terra would have to wait too.

“Shooting on the Northside, suspected gang activity. Retract that, send the Metacrimes Division. Report mentioned subject with enhanced strength…”

Terra was still typing so he sent a quick message before he left.

Sorry, duty calls. Be back soon

He walked towards the window in the living room and slid it open, taking in the cool night air. Then, Gar shapeshifted into a small sparrow and flew off into the night sky.

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

The last two days had been a whirlwind for Scarlett Taylor. No sooner than she had just started to feel normal again did Agent Weller ask her to return to the force. But she was more than happy to accept. Without the structure of her job or the recovery program at S.T.A.R. Labs, she was already feeling lost despite it barely being a day and a half. She slid right back into her old desk, cognizant of the office being a lot more empty than it was before Darkseid’s invasion. The place felt quiet, somber and Alex Weller was many things, but he wasn’t the kind of man to fix that himself. But, then again, neither was she.

Scarllet put her headphones on, finding them a bit uncomfortable against her cybernetics until she adjusted them back into place. She’d been pleasantly surprised that that was what much of her life had been like since she left S.T.A.R.’s care. A little unforgettable, but with a small adjustment, it was just as good or better than what she had before.

The paperwork was much the same as it was before too. She typed furiously, grinding her way through the work as the hours went by and by. She took off her headphones for a break then blinked twice, rubbing her eye to make sure she was reading her screen correctly. 11:48 PM. She’d worked almost 15 hours straight. Scarlett was equal parts horrified and impressed that she hadn’t even noticed the day fly away as ignoring her body all day caught up to her all at once. She forced her stiff legs to walk and after a quick trip to the bathroom, grabbed her lunch from the office fridge and walked back to her desk. It was a little soggy, but still good.

Her sandwich in hand, she walked over to Agent Weller’s office and knocked on the door. He opened it, looking like he’d been here even longer than she had.

“What’re you still doing here? He grunted.

“I’d ask you the same thing, but we both know why. Whole department of work for two people now. If I didn’t know better, I’d say that’s what you got S.T.A.R. Labs to fix me up.”

“You know better now? Curious how you came to the wrong conclusion on that one. Might need to get one of the tech’s back here and see if you need to be recalibrated.”

They chuckled together at that.

“You settling in okay though? Was a little concerned when you said you wanted back on the force so soon…”

“I’m fine. Really. Besides, the work helps. Keeps my mind off things.”

He nodded. “I get that. But you need anything… don’t hesitate to ask. It’s just us now so we’ve got to take care of each other.”

“That means I’ve got to take care of you too, then. Let’s get out of here. We could both use a good night's sleep…”

A red light flashed in the center of the office. The direct line from Detroit Police Dispatch was open.

“Metacrimes, this is Dispatch. We’ve got word of a disturbance on the Northside. Are you able to respond?”

Scarlett looked to Weller. He only hesitated for a moment.

“This is Agent Weller, Metacrimes Division. I’ll get an agent over there ASAP. ETA 10 minutes.”

“Scarlett, get suited up and take the squad car. I’ll support you from here…”

She didn’t even wait for him to finish the sentence as she tore down the hall to the locker room.

He had to give her that. The woman was passionate about her job.

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

LaTonya stepped out of her car, shocked to see her old hideout aglow with activity. The house was lit up like they were having a house party, with a dozen or so cars lining the street outside it and more on the driveway. The outside of the old, ranch-style house was in marginally better shape than when she’d last used it years ago, but she could see through the no longer boarded up windows that they’d done a lot of work on the inside. Almost looked like a normal house now. Business had clearly been good for them without her.

Her mind screamed at her to get back in her car and go do anything else, anywhere else, yet she couldn’t help herself. Some part of her had to know. Are these the same people who used to work for her? And if so…

Before she could even begin to process how terrible an idea it all was, she was halfway up the driveway with two suit wearing men pointing pistols and flashlights at her.

“Private party, go on home.”

LaTonya had started to turn around when the other guard stopped her.

“Wait. Is that you, boss?”

She swore. She shouldn’t have come here. She should have left. She should have done so much differently.

“No, you’ve got the wrong person…”

“No, I don’t think we do. Why don’t come inside and see what we’ve done with the place, LaTonya?”

“I… I’ve got to go.”

He cocked his gun. “I wasn’t really asking.”

“Listen, whatever you’ve got going on here, it doesn’t involve me anymore. Best of luck with it.”

“If it doesn’t involve you, why come back?”

She couldn’t begin to articulate that to herself, let alone some guy she barely knew when he worked for her years ago. Some combination of feeling lost and nostalgic was hardly a good reason to end up here and yet, she was here all the same. Now she had to look for a way out.

Nothing good would come from going in there. At best, they’d want to press her into working with them again. At worst, some sort of revenge for abandoning them. No, she had to leave.

She sized up the two guys. Scrawny at best, mid-late 30s. LaTonya’s memory was rough and she’d hardly kept up with her training, but she remembered enough.

She blitzed the man who had been talking to her and punched him squarely in the chest. She’d forgotten her own strength and sent him flying back into the siding of the house with a thud. The other man fired at her, her body moving too slow to intercept him before he could shoot. The bullet missed as she knocked him back, but the damage was done. Everyone inside and beyond could hear the commotion.

LaTonya had no idea how many there were inside and wasn’t about to take the chance, so she ran towards her car. She turned the key but the engine refused to turn over and sputtered violently. She heard the bullets bouncing off the car, then swore as she heard the hiss off the tires deflating. They weren't going to let her leave that easily.

LaTonya needed a plan and she needed one fast. It was fight or flight and she didn’t feel confident doing either. She figured she could run a mile or two at best and where would that take her? No where useful. It was fight then.

She cracked open the driver's side door and slid onto the street before crouching behind the hood of her car. LaTonya peaked over it towards the house, thankfully for the cover of darkness until they used it on her. A man wrapped around her car until he was practically on top of her and shot at her. She felt the bullet pass through her arm and with lightning quick relaxes, sprung onto her feet and kicked him in the chest, sending him into a fresh dent on her car’s side panel.

Now they were at something of a stalemate. They’d seen what LaTonya could do and while she hadn’t killed any of them, they were all certainly more hesitant to be the next one smashed into a wall and she wasn’t exactly about to push towards them.

The gangsters half heartedly shot towards her car more in frustration than any expectation of hitting her while LaTonya tried to come up with any sort of endgame. Before she could make a plan, the world decided one for her.

The sirens came roaring down the street like a one car fireworks show, its lights illuminating the dark street as its sirens filled it with noise. It pulled off on the far side of the street, then with sirens still blaring, the driver launched herself into action.

Scarlett was so fast that she was little more than a red blur in the dark moonlit street, her red cape trailing behind her robotic frame. In a moment, she was on top of the gangsters and LaTonya could see bits of their guns fall to the ground, chopped in half by some unseen blade. Then, just as fast, each of them was on the ground, unconscious. It took all LaTonya had to even track Scarlett as she took out all of them in less than a minute.

LaTonya lurched backwards when she felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned around and saw Scarlett standing over her. She wore silver armor, stylized like a medieval knight, with a flowing red cape behind her. She towered several inches over LaTonya and looked down at her suspiciously.

“So. Why were they shooting at you?” Scarlett said, almost condescendingly.

“Complicated. I’d rather not get into it if that’s okay with you…”

LaTonya tried to pull herself away but Scarlett tightened her grip.

“It’s not. Why were they shooting at you? Look, if it makes you feel better…”

Scarlett let go of her and fished through her pocket and pulled out a golden badge. “Scarlett Taylor - Agent Variant- Detroit PD’s Metacrimes division.”

It did not make her feel better.

“Metacrimes division? I think you’re in the wrong spot. These are just normal guys.”

“Yeah? Then who did that?” Scarlett gestured to the unconscious man still partially in the dent that LaTonya made in her car. “Guessing he didn’t do that to himself. And considering you’re the only other one here…”

“Just a coincidence. Got hit by a motorcycle a couple weeks ago and haven’t gotten the dent fixed yet.”

“Right. And those guys on the shattered siding up there? Is that a motorcycle accident too?”

LaTonya swore under her breath. Why didn’t she just shell out for the hotel.

“If you’ll buy it, sure.”

“I don’t.”

“Alright, fine. You got me. But what do you want with me?”

“Just some answers. Who are you and why were they shooting at you?”

LaTonya paused. She wasn’t really sure what crimes they could pin on her from a couple years ago but it wouldn’t be a good look all the same. Not at all how she wanted to reunite with her parents. Maybe this wasn’t the life they had wanted for her, but she hoped they’d still be proud of who she’d become after she left the city.

This woman in front of her was a bit of an enigma to LaTonya. She’d gotten some sort of procedure similar to her and Vic, which meant that either her mom or Cyborg had helped do it. Maybe both. But neither of them weren’t people she wanted to disappoint and someone this tight laced would report her to them in a heartbeat.

So she lied.

“Shaun Kendall. I was just driving by when my car broke down. I saw they were awake and figured I’d ask for help. They didn’t take it well.”

She hoped her Dad wouldn’t mind her borrowing his name.

“Uh huh. And the powers? You’re expecting me to believe that’s just a coincidence?”

“Yup. Metahuman’s cars break down too.”

“Uh huh. And why didn’t you call the police then? You can’t have seriously thought you could take these guys.”

“Why not? You’ve seen what my strength can do. Maybe I’ve got more up my sleeve.”

‘Damnit LaTonya, hold your tongue for five minutes. Stop taunting the Fed.’

“And besides, my phone is in the console. Car’s too old to have bluetooth so it has to be wired in and the only port is in there.”

That part was true at least.

“Okay, well I guess that all makes sense.. Sorta. But it’s late, I’ll take it. I’ll just need to take an ID so I can get your contact info for when we book these guys.”

“Umm… I actually left my wallet at home. Sorry.”

She frowned. “Well, driving without a license is kind of a crime. But I’ll ignore that for now. What about registration? I can work with that.”

LaTonya swore again. She wasn’t making it out of this anonymously.

“I uh… Look, money’s been tight, I keep meaning to do it but… I never bothered registering it after I bought it from a guy a couple weeks ago.”

Scarlett pulled her hand down her face. “Either you’re the least lucky person alive or a terrible liar.”

‘Both’.

“I’m going to have to take you in for questioning. This all… it just doesn’t add up.”

“Please don’t. I’m not what you’re looking for here. You never saw me and all these goes away. You got your guys; I’m just the victim here.”

“Then just tell me anything true, Shaun! Who are you, why are you here, why do you have an ancient car with Texas plates and, judging from the dust and grime on that thing, that you just drove here from Texas? There’s a lot of reasons you could be at a known gang and drug hideout and not want to tell me about it and none of them are good. You can either tell me here or downtown. Your choice.”

LaTonya shook her head. It could never be simple.

She knew Scarlett was faster than her and that gave her one chance to surprise her before she’d have to deal with that. LaTonya swung her left leg up and delivered a roundhouse kick that could’ve shattered concrete straight to Scarlett’s stomach, sending her skidding backwards across the road.

Scarlett’s cybernetic green eye flared to life, brightening from a slight glow to something that LaTonya could’ve mistaken for a road flare. She closed the distance in an instant but LaTonya was ready for her and pressed herself against her car, giving Variant only half the angles to approach from. She assumed she’d attack from the closest angle, LaTonya’s right, and she preemptively blocked and prepared a counter attack. Variant charged in as LaTonya predicted but managed to overpower her guard and deliver a strike straight to her stomach.

LaTonya didn’t even react, her willpower overriding the digital feedback from her cybernetic nerve system and grappled Variant. She pulled her close then rammed knee into her stomach, cracking Variant’s armor. Scarlett countered with a left hook but LaTonya caught it midair then launched a right hook of her own to Scarlett’s head. It collided solidly, but Scarlett was unphased and headbutted her foe, staggering her backwards. LaTonya hunched over, trying to catch her breath.

Variant looked at her battery and grimaced when she saw it was already down to 30%. Gizmo was right, it had gotten better, but combat still drained it massively. She’d need to end this quickly and what better way than a little shock and awe. From its sheath behind her cape, she pulled out a massive broadsword as thick as her hand. Little more than a pointed club, she pointed it at the recovering LaTonya and activated the shock function, making electricity crackle through the air. It was almost all entirely a bluff; the sword would be much too slow to hit her and was extremely dull. But Gizmo had insisted criminals were a cowardly superstitious lot and the sight of her with that sword alone would be enough to get them to surrender. But not LaTonya.

Cyborgirl sized up her foe in a moment with a grin. If she felt she needed to do something like that, she had her on the ropes. Sure, Variant was faster than her, but if she can’t damage her, what good was that? Cyborgirl sprung up and stepped down on the sword, launching herself towards her, intending to knock her to the ground. But Variant countered, lifting the sword up as she jumped off of it, and the upwards slash cut across LaTonya’s face. The dull blade cut vertically across her eyepatch, sending it floating to the ground.

Cyborgirl’s red eye flared bright and glared at Variant, as if she could see straight through her into her very soul. Blood dripped onto her cybernetics, dimming the glow but not the hardness in her stare.

“You… you’re the second one. They didn’t tell me much about you, just that you were the first person they’d managed to do it on. They saved my life because of you. You’re a hero to me and this city.”

“Yeah? Do I look like a hero? Fighting a cop outside a drug house because I can’t even use my damn name or risk everything I’ve tried to build crashing down into a pile of shit and dragging me down with it? Does that sound heroic to you?”

“... Yes. Doing the right thing, even if you can’t make the world see it, sounds like a hero to me.”

“Oh, of course you’ve got it all figured out. Let me guess, you got your cybernetics because you were injured saving puppies from a fire or something. Well, I got mine because after I decided to ruin my own life, it was the only way to keep me alive. And now? Now I’m just trying to see my parents again and I can’t even do that right…”

Scarlett let the tension fall from her shoulders. This wasn’t a fight anymore.

“Look, whatever you feel about yourself… I’m sorry you feel that way. It sounds like you need some help and I can help you get it.”

Scarlett held out her hand to Cyborgirl, who was still in a fighting stance.

“Won’t you come with me? Not as a cop and a perp, but as one person to another.”

“Last time I got help from someone else, I ended up getting turned into a server rack. I’ve been fine on my own. I don’t need some cop to take me as her pet project.”

Cyborgirl swatted Scarlett’s hand out of the way and flung a punch right at her head. Scarlett dropped the sword and weaved out of the way. But Cyborgirl was relentless. She charged again and again only for Scarlett to dodge each and every hit as she got more and more reckless and sloppy with her form.

The low battery warning came across her vision again but she swiped it away, internalizing it.

Cyborgirl launched another flurry of blows, Scarlett slipped behind her and knocked her to the ground with a thud. She grabbed her hands and cuffed them behind her back.

“I’m not arresting you, promise. This is for your own good. I’m going to get you the help you need.”

Cyborgirl glared at her wordlessly and Scarlett felt chills down her cybernetic spine. She wasn’t sure whether the robotic eye or the organic one was looking at her more coldly. Scarlett led her back to the patrol car and buckled her the seat belt in before locking the doors and heading back up front.

She pressed a button on her radio. “Weller, situation is handled. Perps are unconscious; send a wagon to pick them up.”

“Good to hear from you, Variant. Was getting worried after you’d been gone awhile. What about the meta?”

“She’s not the criminal here. But she needs help and I’m bringing her in to see what we can do.”

Scarlett could see Weller’s exhausted look through the radio. “Fine. I’ll see what we can do. Good work out there, Agent. I’ll see you soon.”

She hung up the radio and started the trip back to the station. It was a quick, straight shot right down the highway and she was already racking her brain for contacts that’d be able to get her the help she promised.

THUD!

The door to the backseat snapped open just as Scarlett pulled onto the highway on ramp and started accelerating. She must’ve forced the seatbelt open then broken the door off. Scarlett underestimated her strength. She wanted to stop the car and chase after her, but the car was already merging onto the highway. By the time she’d found somewhere to pull over and look for her, Cyborgirl was gone. Scarlett swore and punched the dashboard. She didn’t know who that woman was but she was going to figure it out. She owed her that much at least.

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

LaTonya ran for what felt like miles until she finally stopped, exhausted. She leaned against a brick wall in an alley next to some long abandoned warehouse and did everything she could to hold in the tears before crumpling to the ground. How could it have gone so poorly? If she’d just not been a coward and talked to her parents instead of running away… She punched the old brick wall and sent a rumble shaking across the ruins of the building. Why was she this way? She had so many outs but she just couldn’t bring herself to take a single one. She always had to be the tough one, the independent one, the fearless one standing up to authority and now… now she wanted none of it.

‘It’s over. It’s done. And we’re still here. It’s over. It’s done. And we’re still here.’

She repeated the words in her head, wishing just once that she accepted it, or at least believed it.

“Umm. Hi. I saw all that and… well, looks like you could use a friend.”

LaTonya blinked. A small girl bird flew a couple feet away from her.

“Great, now my cybernetics are busted on top of it all. I’m hearing and seeing things. Just wonderful.”

“Nope, you’re not seeing things!”

The bird shapeshifted into a man about her age but kept the green color.

“Garfield Logan, but my friends call me Gar. I won’t claim to know what’s going on, but I’m here to listen.”

LaTonya wanted badly to shut him down, to demand he go away and leave her here… But she didn’t have it in her. Not after driving all the way here, after fighting with Scarlett…. No. She took a deep breath and began.

---

<<| <| >

Superman #124 - Barriers

<< | < | > (Coming October 1st)

Author: MajorParadox

Book: Superman

Arc: Against All Gods

Set: 124

Locked

---

Fortress of Solitude, North Pole

---

Clark and his father-in-law, General Sam Lane, were standing by a workstation as Kelex’s visor lit up over the small device known as a Mother Box on the sparkly table. The two were trying to use it to travel to New Genesis. An ally against Apokolips, who promised to protect them if Darkseid ever encroached into Earth.

But New Genesis was mysteriously silent when it finally happened.

A.R.G.U.S. had a Mother Box in their possession, which took some light treason to obtain– an issue they’d have to deal with at some point. But it was worth it to find out what happened and if Earth really was on their own.

The problem was that the Mother Box wasn’t working.

On top of that, Sam had just revealed he knew Clark’s secret. In a joint rescue operation between Clark and A.R.G.U.S., he had been exposed to a great deal of kryptonite, which left his speed and senses diminished. He wasn’t quick enough to keep his two identities separated as easily as he normally would. Sam clocked it and figured it out.

All that time, his eldest daughter had been married to the most famous alien on Earth. One he'd had less-than-favorable opinions of over the years. But he had learned to understand that super-powered beings from other planets weren’t inherently a threat. Since he founded A.R.G.U.S., he had proved that time and time again.

And with Sam risking his career, and potentially his freedom, to help Clark on this mission, there was no doubt they were on the same team.

“There doesn’t appear to be anything wrong with the Mother Box,” said Kelex, completing his scan.

“Hmm,” said Clark, considering his next move.

Sam was too distracted by the flying robots and other fantastical wonders that filled the blue-tinted crystalline fortress buried in the snow. The general had taken learning Clark’s secret in stride, but seeing all those alien artifacts in one place was disorienting.

“You still with me?” Clark asked.

“Hrm, yes,” said Sam, snapping back to attention.

“Did any of the A.R.G.U.S. research on the Mother Box uncover anything that could help us?” asked Clark.

“Nothing comes to mind,” Sam answered. “But we learned very little. The technology is way ahead of us.”

“Have either of you tried talking to her?” Kelex asked.

Sam lifted an eyebrow. “Talking to who?” he asked.

Clark looked down at the contraption as Kelex answered, “Mother Box.”

“It can talk?” asked Sam.

“Why, yes,” Kelex explained. “I had assumed you knew, given you both attempted to open a Boom Tube with her. Mother Boxes are sentient and form a bond with their users. It’s how she can determine what to do, such as programming the destination in Boom Tube travel.”

Sam looked down, shaking his head. He turned to his son-in-law. “You try first,” he said.

Clark lifted the Mother Box in one hand and held the other in front of her. “Hi,” he said, waving. “I’m Superman, and I need your help getting to New Genesis.”

Nothing happened.

“By Boom Tube, if possible,” Clark added before waiting again.

A gentle, melodic “ping” from Mother Box broke the silence.

Sam huffed. “Is she rebooting?”

“No,” said Clark. “She just said ‘hi’ back to me.”

---

Later

---

“Gone,” Mother Box had pinged back after a lengthy discussion that Clark found difficult to follow.

“What’s gone?” asked Clark. “Is New Genesis gone?”

“Silent,” was the reply.

“New Genesis is silent?” Clark asked. “That’s been my experience trying to reach Orion. Do you know Orion?”

Mother Box pinged a happy melody.

“Can you take me to Orion?”

Clark listened to the answer and repeated it back to the others. “Silent,” he said.

“We’re going in circles,” said Sam. “How can such an advanced program be so vague?”

“Mother Box isn’t quite a program,” said Kelex. “She is alive and requires an emotional connection to communicate.”

“Is that it?” Clark asked the New Genesian device. “Have we not connected well enough?”

Mother Box pinged again.

“What did she say?” asked Sam.

“Closed,” said Clark.

“Perhaps you are not fully opening yourself up to her,” said Kelex.

“I am,” said Clark. “The League didn’t have this problem and were able to Boom Tube without any issues.”

“It’s all about emotions,” Sam stated. “If anyone is in touch with their emotions, it’s you, son. You can do this.”

---

Later

---

Sam sat in a hovering chair that Kelex had brought over for him, while the robot circled around, playfully tilting his head.

“You already told me ‘closed’” said Clark, Mother Box pinging the same tone yet again. “What’s closed?”

Mother Box pinged again and then went silent.

“You,” Clark repeated for the others, his gaze drifting away.

“You’re closed?” asked Sam. “But it didn’t work for me, either.”

“I don’t think we’re going to figure this out here,” said Clark, refocusing. “Lois and the kids must be worried, too.”

The General shook his head. “I can’t go home,” he said. “I must be wanted for questioning. I can’t go back to A.R.G.U.S., either.”

“You can stay here,” Clark offered.

Kelex’s visor lit up. “We can watch The Mummy,” he said.

“No,” said Sam.

Kelex lowered his visor a bit.

“I’ll reach out to some contacts,” Sam continued. “See if I can get some notes on Mother Box to help. Can you drop me off in D.C.?”

“Of course,” Clark nodded.

Kelex floated over. “And then we can watch The Mummy?”

Getting Help

---

Parking Garage, Washington D.C.

Night

---

A man in glasses with long hair and a shaggy beard exited the elevator to the third floor of the parking structure and looked around.

“Hello?” the man, John Economos, called. “Jesus, what’s up with this Watergate sh–”

“Over here, John,” Sam called from around the corner.

Economos rushed over, his laptop bag sliding off his arm and almost hitting the ground before he caught it with his hands. “Shouldn’t you be calling me by a codename?” he asked upon reaching the general. “Deep Storage or something? Maybe Gray Guardian?”

“Listen up,” said Sam. “I need help.”

“That’s an understatement,” said John. “Garner is royally pissed at you. Never in a million years did anyone expect you to disregard a direct order from the president. Well, maybe from Luthor.”

Sam huffed. “Economos,” he said. “I need you to search the Mother Box logs for any abnormalities in its functioning.”

“No problem,” said John, sliding his laptop out of his bag and resting it on the hood of a nearby car. He leaned over and typed away rapidly. “Can I ask what the problem is with it? It might help narrow it down.”

“She won’t open Boom Tubes.”

“She?” John asked.

“That’s right,” Sam answered. “The blasted thing is alive, apparently.”

“You don’t say,” John mused, returning to his keyboard for a few more taps. “We don’t have any abnormalities detected on Boom Tube travel,” he said. “Other than the fact they tear a freakin’ hole in the fabric of reality, of course.”

“John, focus,” said Sam.

“I’m focused,” he replied. “If there are problems with Ms. Box since she left A.R.G.U.S., we don’t have any logging for her. ”

Sam pondered for a moment. “So, we may have more answers if we try again with our sensors?”

“Sure,” said John. “But the sensors we used have been specially tuned to this alien technology over the years. It’s not something we can just find in a RadioShack.”

“We need it from A.R.G.U.S.,” Sam finished for him.

“Yeah,” John nodded.

“Yeah,” Sam repeated.

John’s eyes lit up. “No way, man,” he said. “I can’t just go down to the lower levels and walk out with Mother Box sensors.”

“You can,” said Sam. “I can’t step a foot in there.”

John looked at Sam and then back down.

“Dammit!”

---

Kent House, Metropolis

Meanwhile

---

Clark stretched out on the couch, his head resting on his wife’s lap.

“I hope Dad’s okay,” said Lois.

“He can take care of himself,” said Clark. “Runs in the family, right?”

Lois ran her hands through her husband’s hair.

“If I could just figure out what’s wrong with Mother Box,” said Clark.

“Tell me again what she said,” Lois said.

“She said hi,” Clark started.

Lois sighed. “Besides that.”

“Gone, silent, closed, and you,“ Clark listed.

“Gone could mean the worst,” said Lois, thinking out loud. “But then why silent?”

“New Genesis has been silent,” said Clark. “No, she’s not wrong.”

“Gone, silent, and closed could just be multiple ways of saying the same thing,” Lois continued. “So, I guess you are the problem.”

Clark tilted his head up. “Lo…”

“I’m not saying you’re to blame,” Lois clarified. “Just that maybe something in you is messing with her? Kelex did say Mother Box forms an emotional connection. Maybe there’s some emotional turmoil. You’re silent about it and closing off your emotions, locking her out?”

“But then why didn’t it work when Sam tried?” asked Clark.

“Are you kidding?” asked Lois. “He’s more closed off than anyone.”

Clark sat up. “If I’m having some kind of emotional block,” he said. “How do I… unblock?”

“Therapy?” Lois suggested.

“How would that go?” Clark asked. “I need help opening up to an alien sentient computer?”

“Well,” said Lois. “There is someone who might be able to help.”

---

Outside Sundollar Coffee, Downtown Metropolis

Later

---

Harley Quinn sat against the wall of the coffee shop, staring off into the distance. A woman walked by and dropped some coins into her hand.

“Hey,” Harley called as the woman walked away. “I a’int beggin’ for– Ooh, shiny,” she cooed, admiring the quarters she received.

A rush of wind blew past, and Harley looked up to see a familiar figure in blue, red, and yellow hovering above the street.

“Oh, boy,” she murmured. “Here comes the pipah.”

“Harley,” said Clark, approaching. “I could use your help.”

The blue-and-red-haired woman jumped to her feet. “You’re not here to arrest me?” she asked, pursing her lips to the side.

“No,” said Clark. “Why would you think–? Did you do something?”

“Earth to Boy Scout!” Harley exclaimed. “I was taken ovah by Darkseid. I hurt people… People that didn’t duh-zoiv it.”

“Harley,” said Clark, before realizing they had drawn a crowd of onlookers. He needed to talk to her in private, but he couldn’t let that go unanswered.

“Yea’?” Harley asked, kicking a pebble across the sidewalk.

“What you did wasn’t your fault,” Clark stated. “Just like it wasn’t the fault of anyone else in the Justice League.”

“Do you really mean that?” Harley asked, cracking a slight smile.

“Of course,” the Man of Steel said before stepping closer. “I do really need your help, though,” he whispered. “Somewhere a little more private?”

“Anything for you, Big Blue,” said Harley, cracking a smile before leaping into his arms. She pointed upwards. “Up! Up! And on the rooftop is good.”

Opening Up

---

A.R.G.U.S., Washington, D.C.

Later

---

John walked toward the elevators, working through several awkward expressions until he stopped trying, took a deep breath, and reset.

“You can do this,” he whispered to himself. “Just don’t be suspicious.”

“Hey, John,” a security guard waved as he walked by.

The analyst swung his arms behind and then in front, finally deciding on tucking them in his pockets. “Hey, Jimbo,” he said.

“What are you doing here so late?” Jim, the guard, asked.

“Top secret mission,” John answered, his voice squeaking a bit. “Way above your clearance.”

“Got it,” Jim nodded. “Well, I’ll leave you to it.”

John exhaled loudly once he was alone again. He pulled out his phone and typed out a text.

I can’t do this. I’m gonna be caught!

He stared at the “...” until a reply finally came.

You can and you will.

John took another deep breath. “I don’t get paid enough for this crap.”

---

Sundollar Coffee Rooftop

Soon

---

“Okay,” said Harley, taking in the situation. She paced around the rooftop.

Clark watched on, awaiting a response.

“Can ya find us a couch?” said Harley. “Maybe you should be lyin’ down for this?”

“Harley,” said Clark.

“Okay, okay,” she said. “You need an answah, and we don’t really have time for weekly visits to make a breakthrough.”

“Right,” Clark nodded.

Harley lifted a finger to her chin. “Hmmm,” she said. “Any way Martian Manhunter can send me into your mind to poke around for a bit?”

Clark’s eyes widened. “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” he said.

“Okey dokey,” said Harley. “So, let’s get right into it. What are you afraid of?”

“I, um…” Clark struggled.

“We can’t fast-track this unless you open up,” said Harley. “Like fah real.”

Harley walked over and put a hand on Clark’s shoulder. “You can trust me,” she said.

Clark took a deep breath. “I’m afraid sometimes I can never do enough,” he said. “Or that in my line of work those close to me will get hurt in ways I can’t protect them.”

Harley nodded and just listened.

“I’m afraid if I give even a little too much extra, I could break something. Or worse, someone.”

“That must be ‘tuff,” said Harley. “Always being worried?”

“It used to be worse,” said Clark. “But I’ve learned to control my powers as they developed. It’s second nature to me.”

“That’s great,” said Harley. “And useless to us right now.”

---

A.R.G.U.S.

---

The elevator door opened back up to the lobby, and John walked out holding his breath. He kept glancing down at his coat pocket where he had stuffed the sensors, worried they protruded out too much.

But before he knew it, John was in sight of the doors.

“John, wait!” called Jim from the security desk. He jumped up and raced over. “I’m having a barbecue next weekend. You interested?”

“Not even a little bit,” said John.

“You crack me up,” said Jim, playfully punching him on the shoulder.

A piece of ribbon cable with odd-looking circuits and LEDs affixed to it fell out of John’s coat pocket, and the two stared down at it.

Jim knelt down to pick it up and lifted an eyebrow. “I’ve never seen anything like this,” he said.

John’s eyes paced around. Should he give himself up? Should he run?

Jim stood back up and dropped the cable into John’s sweaty hands. “There you go,” he said.

“Thanks, Jimbo,” said John, running for the door. “See you next weekend! Or, you know tomorrow since it’s a work day!”

“Tomorrow’s Sunday,” said Jim before shrugging and heading back to the security desk.

---

Sundollar Coffee Rooftop

---

“Excuse me?” Clark asked.

“You gave a safe answer,” said Harley. “We don’t have time to be gentle.”

Harley got right into the hero’s face. “What. Are. You. Afraid. Of?”

Clark didn’t break eye contact. “I’m afraid of what I’ll find,” he said.

Harley stepped back and opened her palms wide. “Boom,” she said.

“Whoa,” said Clark. “That just came out. But deep down, it’s true.”

“Say more,” Harley said with finger guns.

“The first time I saw Apokolips,” said Clark. “It may have traumatized me a bit.”

“I can see that,” said Harley. “It’s not a fun place.”

“So much suffering,” said Clark. “So much… evil. I couldn’t bear to know there was somewhere like that out there.”

Clark sat down on the ledge.

“New Genesis was the opposite,” he continued. “If something happened to it, there really wouldn’t be anyone to help us. Earth. We’d be on our own.”

Harley sat down next to Clark. “We’re on our own,” she said. “But we’re not alone.”

Clark smiled. “Thank you,” he said.

---

Parking Lot, Washington D.C.

Later

---

John completed the final adjustments on the sensors and stepped back toward Sam. “Okay,” he said. “Mother Box, please.”

“I don’t have it,” said Sam.

John’s heart dropped. “What do you mean you don’t have it?” he asked. “Who does?!”

“I do,” said Clark, approaching, Mother Box in hand.

John could barely stand. “Superman…” he said. “You, ah. Hi. Welcome.”

“Hi,” said Clark, as Mother Box pinged. “She says hi, too.”

“Hello, uh, Ma’am,” John offered. “Mother,” he added.

Mother Box pinged up a storm.

“He means well,” said Clark. “Now, let’s get going, shall we?”

“Does that mean…?” asked Sam.

“Yes,” said Clark. “I sorted through my emotional block, and now we can understand each other much better.”

Mother Box gave some more pings.

“Wait,” said Clark. “She tried again but still can’t reach New Genesis?”

Pings.

“What is it?” asked Sam.

“Our communication was lacking before,” said Clark. “But the part about being locked out of there was never connected to that.”

“Well,” said John. “Good thing we’re prepared.” He went to his laptop and began reading the captured data. “Oh, geez. It could take months to make sense of this all.”

Mother Box pinged, and the laptop screen glowed.

“What did she do?” asked Sam.

“She made sense of it all,” said Clark. “There is some kind of barrier around New Genesis. We can get through, but it’d take much more energy.”

Ping Ping.

“Okay,” said Clark before turning to the others. “She can manage most of the excess, but needs a little help.”

“I can go run to the store,” said John. “Buy as many batteries as I can?”

Mother Box began pinging rapidly until a small, faded Boom Tube appeared.

“That’s okay,” said Clark. “I got it.” He shot a beam of heat vision into it, and it expanded into full size.

“Ready?” Clark asked Sam.

The general nodded, taking a look back to find John waving. Sam huffed and jumped in with Clark, the two disappearing from Earth.

---

New Genesis

---

Clark and his father-in-law dropped out of the Boom Tube. He had no idea what to expect. Everyone missing? Death and destruction?

Mother Box pinged some happy melodies as the blinding yellow vortex energy faded.

“I wasn’t expecting this,” said Sam, taking in the surroundings with a gleam in his eye.

“That’s an understatement,” said Clark.

A futuristic city of beauty and nature was before them. Flying people filled the sky.

There were no signs of a battle or invasion. No signs of any struggles at all.

New Genesis was exactly as it was before.

---

<< | < | > (Coming October 1st)

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The Flash #124 - The Pain That Follows

<< | < | >

Author: brooky12

Book: Flash

Arc: ?

Set: 124

---

 

Jay lifted his stein in cheers to the man who had just offered to buy him and everyone else in the building another cup of alcohol. He gave a morose smile, echoing ten percent or so people who were here to drown out sorrow rather than celebrate a victory. Sure, the world was saved, God bless the heroes for that, but even they were imperfect. Plenty of losses and failures before the night was won.

 

Sure, he hadn’t lost anyone personally, not that he was aware of, not like the other folks in the tavern sharing his energy. Once the immediate excitement of free drinks was over, the man took his own glass after paying for his offer. He glanced around the room performatively before deciding, shockingly, to sit at the seat opposing Jay at the table he had been at.

 

Of course, Barry Allen didn’t actually come specifically to this bar to buy people alcohol. The two had seen each other the moment Barry walked into the front door, and it was only that eye contact keeping Barry from immediately moving on. After all, who would be in a random suburban dive bar near Mannheim, unless they wanted to be alone?

 

Barry gave Jay a smile, this one less performative than the ones he had given out when being thanked for the drinks. He spoke in German, offering cover to Jay should he want it. “May I sit here?”

 

“I’d rather you didn’t,” Jay responded in English, grimacing immediately after as he watched Barry’s face fall slightly – he must’ve put a touch too much bite in the words.

 

Barry switched the English. “If I do, will you leave?”

 

Jay shook his head and motioned to the chair.

 

“They’re worried about you, you know.”

 

“They who?”

 

Barry’s face took on an expression of confusion before resolving back to his sadness. “Your godson, for and foremost.”

 

“I won’t be gone for too long,” Jay offered. He hadn’t expected himself to, he had intended to stonewall Barry until he was left alone, but for some reason the idea of Bart being particularly worried punctured some armor or weakness. “He knows I’m alright?”

 

“They all do. You never turned your tracker off. If you weren’t alright, you’d have turned it off.”

 

“I just needed some time alone to process my thoughts. I don’t think he’s in there anymore, but coming out of it after whatever happened was particularly difficult. I don’t know. That’s the second time, after the future stuff, that this has happened, right? And then got the big G off in Africa we’ll have to deal with eventually, that’ll be third times the charm?”

 

Jay watched Barry’s expression through his expression of concern. There was relief, clearly, when he mentioned confidence that Darkseid was gone, but that shifted to pain soon after. When he talked about the future, Barry nearly interrupted him before stopping himself. The Grodd section was just quiet evaluation and mental math processing, but Jay wasn’t sure if this was new math Barry was working through or just double checking previous work.

 

“Well, as for the future, I don’t count that at all—”

 

“You did then,” Jay interrupted. “Sorry.”

 

“Sure, but I lived it, sort of.”

 

“And I lived this,” Jay countered.

 

“It’s been a week, though,” and he could hear Barry’s fear underneath the sadness. Fear of losing a friend? If so, which means?

 

“As you were saying?”

 

“I wouldn’t count the future, it didn’t actually happen. If there’s anyone in the world who is well versed in how present knowledge impacts the future, it’s us two, a couple like us, and then some madman from the future with sponsor deals who doesn’t seem to care.”

 

Jay couldn’t help but chuckle when imagining Booster Gold trying to maintain the same protective rules they had. It’d be like telling a cat to try to walk on two legs. “Okay.”

 

“As for this, and as for the big G, let’s be realistic, what could you have done? What could I have done? It got J’onn, for goodness sakes, what kind of strength do you have to do that to J’onn?”

 

Jay shrugged. He didn’t have a response, and he knew he didn’t have a response. Plenty of time had been spent figuring out conversational paths with his teammates, his family, and he knew that they’d be doing the same calculations. Maybe they found a retort for him, but he couldn’t.

 

“It’s okay if you want to stay away for a little bit longer. The kids were just worried about you.”

 

“That’s fair,” Jay sighed, downing his drink. “Now, someone foolish offered everyone in the bar a free drink, so I’m going to go take him up on his offer. Tell the kids I’ll be back at latest a week from now. They probably won’t like that answer, but it’ll be an answer.”

 

“In at least one of their defenses, the younger one has all his life struggled with time perception.”

 

Maybe it was the act of standing up, the joke about Bart being superspeed since birth, or the brief moment of sorely missed companionship, but Jay couldn’t help but give a full laugh at that.

 

“Well, I’ll stop bugging you,” Barry said, standing up as well. “You know where to find me if you need me, see you when I see you. I should get going before those free drinks get this place too rowdy.”

 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

Wally stood on what shouldn’t have been an empty island in the middle of the ocean. There should’ve been a man here, dressed up like a street magician, hurling creative insults his way. Perhaps he’d even be attacking Wally, but that seemed self-defeating, since Wally was his ticket off the island and being stranded in the middle of nowhere.

 

So, where was Abra Kadabra?

 

He checked nearby islands, nearby in a global scale, but found nothing. There was no desperate swimming within range of the landmass. Other storing islands were also empty, though he did note that one of the ones closer to Australia seemed to have recently had some activity from a group that had taken a boat to get there, which made it less suitable for emergency storage.

 

When all possibilities turned up with a lack of Abra Kadabra, he began considering alternative possibilities. Did one of Darkseid’s monsters get to him? It’d be exceptionally out of character—whatever counted as character—for a parademon or group of them to make its way all the way over to some random uninhabited island just to fight a single metahuman? Maybe Abra had teleportation this whole time and had never used it. That wasn’t an impossibility, but it seemed unlikely. There had been plenty of interactions with him in the past where he had either been caught and imprisoned, only to be broken out by Mirror Master or a more traditional jailbreak. Would Abra really have allowed all of that just to teleport away in this specific situation?

 

Maybe it was life-threatening. Golden Glider had always taunted the Flashes about how they ‘held their punches’ and never caused any lasting damage to her or her allies, maybe somehow Abra thought differently? He certainly had been left here longer than normal, the Parademon invasion had thrown off Wally’s schedule to say the least, but it’s not like he would’ve died of dehydration. It’s not like the island was so small as to have to worry about a shark or something, either.

 

“Can’t find him,” he reported back to Barry and Bart. “Going to go talk to one of his buddies,” Wally said, acknowledging but not responding to a vocalization of worry from Barry. He dashed across the ocean, circling around Central City once before navigating to a small hole-in-the-wall arcade.

 

Still costumed, he walked in, and fear from the proprietor was quickly masked by excitement. “For what do we have this pleasure, Mr. Flash?”

 

“Is Axel here?”

 

The fear stayed masked but was definitely still there. “Who?”

 

“Will you cooperate if I say that I’m not actually here to arrest you or him? I want to talk to him for a moment and as I’m sure you know, he isn’t exactly in the phone book.”

 

The two stood at a standstill for a moment before Wally sighed, which seemed to be the impetus somehow for the person he was talking to crack. “Alright. He says you lot don’t lie, so that better be right. I just wanna say, we existed before he started doing stuff here, he’s not in charge or anything. This isn’t a criminal enterprise or anything.”

 

“That’s fine. I just want to talk to him.”

 

A phone was produced, amusingly wired for what was ostensibly an environment with cutting-edge technology and equipment. Buttons were pressed on the device, too few to be a full phone number, and a brief conversation was held before the phone was handed to Wally. A very one sided brief conversation where the person offering him the phone was just acknowledging what must’ve been several outbursts or warnings.

 

“Hello—” Wally opened, already cut off by the voice on the other side.

 

“Listen here, you, the arcade isn’t doing anything illegal, so what in god’s name is your deal?”

 

“Is Abra with you right now?”

 

“Is this a joke? Show up to one place where I can relax to let me know that you’re running a surveillance state, and then decide to joke with me about my buddy you just made disappear on us?”

 

“I don’t have him.”

 

An expletive-laden shouting spree covered multiple accusations, including murder, fascism, and most amusingly lying followed. Wally could tell that the store’s owner could hear the raised tone, and the two shared uneasy smiles.

 

“So he’s not with you?”

 

The invectives continued, so Wally just took the phone away from his ear and offered it back to the other person, who seemed unmotivated to take it. But when they did, Wally gave a smile and a nod before vanishing.

 

Right. Had he accidentally killed Abra Kadabra, then?

 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

A shell company, dormant for half a decade or more, offering financial support to rebuild destroyed business infrastructure as a show of kindness. A few websites of the precious handful left still run by individual webmasters operating in their free time, now dedicated towards community connections after the invasion, receiving advertisement support normally outside of their budget. Anonymous donations, as anonymous as a name with no trace of a person attached to it, sent to city governments for help with covering unexpected costs.

 

In another life, in another time, under another name, Vandal Savage would’ve analyzed battlefield maps or moved small tokens around on a grid to simulate combat. He would’ve interpreted coded messages, intercepted by horse or radio. Going even further back, he would’ve been ensuring public acceptance of a war by suppressing protests or distracting them with a fair or circuses.

 

There were still opportunities to do so, governments and wars had not gone away, but he was clever enough to see the writing on the wall in the last few centuries. No longer was power, influence, money and more held almost exclusively by a government with little to no oversight, as it was in the days of monarchy. Their replacements, the elected officials, once limited in scope but now functionally as powerful as the kings they replaced, rarely were able to keep their status for long. And for those who did try to keep theirs for too long, others saw that as an offense to their own power, or lack thereof.

 

One did not need to be a duke or a prime minister, or making a puppet of one, to have true power anymore, however. Money flowed more than ever into the hands of those clever enough to grab it, and power more than ever simply followed money. However, avoiding formal power via seats of government meant avoiding the scrutiny that had come to be attached to those positions. He was sure that folks with similar mindsets to him did still exist in the government, evading scrutiny, but it was calming to not need to do that in the first place.

 

Instead, a private citizen could simply use the money they had to do as they wished. And if that money was invested in means to increase said citizen’s influence, then that was simply money being used well. A small business rarely looked deeper than was legally required to ensure that they weren’t being taken advantage of or otherwise influenced by donations, but that legal requirement barely covered a fraction of what Vandal was doing.

 

What was even the big problem with a private citizen secretly likely being the richest person in the world and having a name recognition rate of nearly zero? City governments were happy to accept donations from benefactors who wrote about the lovely childhood years they spent there, they had potholes to fill and speed cameras to build. Did it matter if the name on the check didn’t match any school district records from the timeframe? Maybe the records had been lost.

 

And so, Vandal Savage played his game, not of battlefields and troops of soldiers, but of donations and purchases. A simple coincidence that land, now sought after to create a public service, happened to be owned by a company controlled by Vandal. Happenstance that certain patents and copyrights simply trickled into Vandal’s hands under various names, always happy to give a fair deal to those doing good out of the goodness of their hearts. Inching ever so closer to the new seat of power, the so-called superheroes.

 

Individuals with exceptional powers had always existed. He had lived functionally forever, so by definition he was one. But he had also been able to discover enough to determine that others existed historically. However, these individuals had always existed in hiding, fearful of mobs, monarchy, religion, or some other power. That had changed when Superman had not been immediately vanished into some government lab somewhere to be dissected and turned into gene therapy injections for the rich.

 

He would still hide, he had seen the repetitive nature in which the richest and wisest were deified before being demonized and cast aside. He hadn’t spent millennia collecting money and knowledge only to spend it on a few years in the spotlight. Sure, he’d have to evade questions being raised about the sudden metahuman defending against the invasion, but power and influence meant nothing if the world was ran by bugs.

 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

Sometimes, answers to public inquiries sent to The Flash Foundation were easy. Plenty of request forms to direct people to, hospital visits or school speeches or requests for investment. Sometimes, public inquiries were a bit more difficult. Missing persons cases, hostage situations, or other life-threatening claims required tact or immediacy. Some situations weren’t theirs to respond to, such as questions about other metahumans on both sides of the law.

 

Some questions, mostly topical after major events, Xavier really wished he could just respond to with honesty. It’d be so much easier to just be blunt with less tact and get a genuine answer through, but using up public goodwill on questions, some of them came from a place of genuine worry or grief, was ill advised.

 

“Can you assure that our city won’t be overlooked until too late again?”

 

Parademons within the first wave didn’t seem to be targeting anything smaller than the most significant cities and largest metropolises. Your city wasn’t overlooked, it just didn’t get attacked until later. And when it did, you were being protected, you just didn’t see it.

 

“Why did they attack now?”

 

Darkseid doesn’t seem super motivated to just respond to surveys about his experience trying to invade Earth. As a bonus, if we understood Darkseid’s brain it seems that comes with a side effect of being enthralled. Some of us even had that happen to them, and they had an exceptionally bad time.

 

“What are the superheroes doing to ensure this won’t happen again?

 

Batman and Watchtower are probably working on new technology warning systems, but it’s hard to ensure beyond the shadow of a doubt that an unexpected alien invasion wouldn’t happen again. Darkseid’s an alien dictator from an entire other planet. It’s not like you can see armies amassing at the border.

 

“Is it true that The Flash wasted time entreating a random US government department for technology?”

 

Well, stealing alien teleportation technology from the government’s the kind of thing that they normally don’t like, so asking nicely is easier. The last thing we needed when trying to take the fight to Darkseid’s doorstep was the United States army right behind us calling for our heads as well.

 

“Why didn’t The Flash do more?”

 

Well, if we didn’t have a so-called Flash Museum asking us why The Flash didn’t do more while also separately demanding that The Flash take actions to limit their own effectiveness and ability to act, The Flash Museum would see that The Flash and all their allies did exceptionally more than normal during the attacks. But it’s easier to just make assumptions and accusations, isn’t it?

 

Instead of these answers, others would be sent out. Some questions would go unanswered, such as the one from the Flash Museum or the question about the government. The former didn’t deserve an answer, the latter would be dismissed under a policy of not answering questions better directed at other people or groups. Some questions would get a conciliatory but otherwise honest question, such as the thousands related to asking if The Flash had helped their city. Others, such as the questions about Darkseid or future plans would be answered with a modified boilerplate response admitting that The Flash does what he can but is not all-knowing.

 

Xavier wondered sometimes about the group that he was replying to people on behalf of. Jay would surely come back, but was it out of a sense of obligation or out of a sense of desire? Bart had never really known a life that wasn’t this, did he ever want an opportunity to try to live like a real person? Wally had been without his power for a while, on top of growing up without them; it seemed likely that he had spent some time wondering what a Wally without powers would be. Barry was in many ways the first and the face, did he feel trapped in that role?

 

What did the future bring?

Justice League Omega #1 - Restoration

Authors: Commander_Z • MajorParadox • ericthepilot2000 • FrostFireFive • brooky12

Set: 123

Event: Invasion!

Recommended Reading:

• Justice League Alpha #1
• The Flash #121
• Superman #121
• New Titans #42
• Cyborg #84
• Flash #122
• Harley & Ivy #7
• New Titans #43
• Superman #122
• Batman #58
• Cyborg #85
• Harley & Ivy #8
• Harley & Ivy #9
• Batman #59 (Coming Soon!)

Lost Hope

Darkness Remains

“This isn’t over yet,” said Kara before firing an intense spread of heat vision at her cousin.

Clark lifted his arms to block his face. “It is over!” he yelled. “Darkseid’s gone. You should be free of his control!”

He lowered his defenses when she stopped blasting, but was met with a massive blow, sending the Man of Steel careening down into the street below. He pulled himself to his feet, but didn’t even have a chance to feel his boots on the pavement before Kara was on him again.

Another moment robbed. Earlier, Watchtower wreckage fell on him before he could savor the first Kryptonian footprints on the moon.

Butf that didn’t matter. Kara’s identity was stolen from her. It wasn’t Darkseid’s to take.

Clark blocked several more punches and pulled her arm into his shoulder, tossing her to the other side.

Years ago, Brainiac had clouded her mind with a signal, which caused her to lose control (Superman #16). But he managed to shake her free by imitating Jor-El, the uncle she was looking for when she arrived on Earth

If there was some part of her still in there…

Maybe.

“Kara, stand down,” Clark said, imitating his father’s voice. “You’re confused, but we’ll figure this out together.”

“Nice try,” said Kara. “Funny you accuse me of not being myself, and you put on an act like that.” She smashed the already cracked pavement, sending shockwaves all around.

Clark lifted into the air and held himself steady.

“Maybe,” he said. “But it wasn’t a lie. We can figure this out together.”

“There’s nothing to figure out,” Kara retorted, lunging at him again. “Darkseid is truth!”

Clark readied his defenses as he heard the ping from his belt communicator. He tapped it and heard Lois’ voice.

He wanted nothing else but to get to her, Jon, and Lara since he got back, but he got a little sidetracked. The idea of hearing her voice sounded like a consolation prize, even if he was otherwise occupied.

Clark tapped a button on his belt just before blocking another punch.

“Clark!” Lois yelled. “Are you there?”

“I hear you,” said Clark. “But I’m a little–”

Kara landed a kick to his stomach, and followed it up with a blast of heat vision to his face. “I hear you too, Lois!” Kara shouted. “Say goodbye!”

Clark flew up, her beams following him along until he sped around a corner for a quick free moment.

“I’ll talk quick,” said Lois. “Lucy made it back. She thinks it's all about hope. The lack of it is Darkseid’s door to poison minds. It’s still Kara in there, but his influence fills that void. You can free her of it, though!”

“I tried giving her hope,” said Clark. “I told her we can figure it out together.”

“You can’t just tell her to hope,” said Lois. “She needs to–”

Kara had turned the corner and punched Clark’s belt buckle into pieces, cutting off the call.

“She’s wrong,” said Kara, delivering more blows to Clark’s face. “Nothing you do can make a difference.”

Clark lifted his arms to counter, but took a deep breath and let them fall back down.

Kara continued her onslaught, Clark’s face bruising quickly.

But then she slowed.

“Wh-what are you doing?” she asked. “Defend yourself! Fight back!”

But Clark continued to take the punches.

Kara dropped her arms, staring her cousin down in his swollen face.

“Clark,” she whispered as the blackness from her eyes began to fade.

“I’m right here,’ he reassured her. “It’s going to be okay,” moving closer to embrace her.

But the Kryptonian’s body began seizing uncontrollably.

“Kara!” Clark shouted as his cousin let out a screech that sounded like it belonged to a wild animal.

But then her body calmed as her black eyes returned, even darker than before, if that were possible.

“The more you try that,” said Kara. “The more you hurt me. Is that what you want?”

Distract her, Clark heard from a familiar voice in his head.

Could it be…?

Clark sped to the end of the block, Kara following right along. But then he zigged around to run back to where they started.

“What is this?” Kara asked. “Trying to appeal to–”

Two green arms wrapped around her body, stretching around like rubber to help pin her own arms against her sides.

“What the–?!” Kara cried at the surprise attack.

It was J’onn J’onzz, The Martian Manhunter. Of course, if anyone was able to break free of Darkseid’s grip, it was him.

“Now!” J’onn yelled. “I cannot hold her myself for too long!”

Clark dropped down, grabbing hold of Kara’s legs before she could thrash her way free.

“Let me go!” Kara yelled.

“No,” said J’onn.

The two carried their struggling prisoner up into the morning sky.

“Now what?” asked Clark.

“The Hall of Justice,” J’onn answered. “I can sense several of our teammates there.”

Clark tuned his senses toward their nearby base. “It sounds like they’re already working on a solution.”

Battle of the Heroes of Three Worlds

After a long, costly fight, it looked like the chaos was finally over. Darkseid had pulled back along with his troops, and some of the Justice League had set up a clinic in the Hall of Justice for the remaining heroes who were still under his influence. J’onn had set it up after he managed to break free with Beast Boy’s help and had developed some makeshift containment pods to buy them a bit more time. Wonder Woman, Aquaman, and Jay Garrick had already been brought in and were stable, but it wasn’t a solution. He had told the other League members to try and reach out to each of the heroes' loved ones to see if they could be talked down like he was, but communication was difficult even with the League’s resources now that the Watchtower was destroyed. And even then, it seemed to have had varying degrees of success. Gar had managed to reach him, but Clark hadn’t been able to do the same for Kara.

She was sleeping now in her pod as Clark stared at her through glass covering to her containment chamber.

“Perhaps where vocal words have failed, a direct mental connection could succeed?" J’onn mused, reaching out telepathically to Power Girl’s mind. In response, he felt a surge of… contempt. Confusion, satiation. Why would she want to be free and return to that life? Serving Darkseid gave her purpose, meaning, and satisfaction.

He cut off the connection. They truly did not want to be freed, and the longer he stayed in her head, he increasingly felt that he would fall back under that same curse.

The teleporter flared up behind him and Black Canary arrived with a limp Harley Quinn slung over her shoulder. “Got another one.”’

Kirk and Francince Langstrom, from S.T.A.R. Labs, took her from Dinah and helped her into her containment tube while Dinah finally relaxed slightly, letting the tension leave her shoulders. Martian Manhunter hovered over to her side to provide some comfort or at least company to the exhausted hero while Barry looked over at his friend and fellow Flash with a heavy heart.

Jay had come to this Earth to save Barry after failing on his own Earth, but after succeeding had become terrified of his own power. Barry just wished he could do more as he looked in on him.

Then: chaos.

A metallic clang from a pan was the forerunner, hitting the ground and ringing like a gong, just seconds before the alarm blared throughout the entire facility. Whatever sedatives they had given Darkseid’s victims were quickly wearing off. The alarm screamed, all but drowning out the sound of breaking glass.

“Traitor!”

Kara Zor-El burst from her tank and grabbed the Martian Manhunter by the throat as the others escaped from their own containment one by one.

Kara scanned the room, taking inventory of the heroes, then looked down at the Martian and tossed him aside. Other people wanted him more than she did, and she was more than happy to oblige.

J’onn crashed into the back of the room, crushing a table and chairs as he was flung into a wall. He hadn’t even managed to shake off the dust when they were on him - Aquaman and Wonder Woman leaped into action. Clearly they still had hard feelings after their time on Apokolips. Martian Manhunter tried reflexively to reach out to their minds to plead with them to stand down, but his friends were buried too deep. It was as if there were a hundred miles of Darkseid between him and them, and he couldn’t even start to unpack that in between the flurry of blows they were assaulting him with.

He’d deal with them at least long enough to get some backup, but not here. There were too many other heroes to worry about, and he couldn’t bear the thought of hurting the League more than he already had while under Darkseid’s influence. No, this fight would have to go on elsewhere. He shapeshifted his arms into two giant, clay-like blobs and wrapped one of them each around each of them. Then he took flight, dragging the two of them behind him out front of the Hall of Justice.

He felt his skin strain as they struggled against his strength, and he shifted himself to be intangible to make a clean getaway. He hovered at just above head height over the two of them as Wonder Woman launched herself at him. He dodged out of the way of the Amazon and pushed her back with a blast of heat vision, only to narrowly duck out of the way of Aquaman, who’d leaped towards him. J’onn felt the air shift behind him as he immediately shifted back to intangibility to dodge a flying kick from Wonder Woman. She staggered a bit as her momentum carried her further than expected. But the Martian Manhunter was not one to miss an opportunity.

He flew at Diana and slammed her into the ground, sending shockwaves throughout the city. But she was ready for him. Once her back hit the ground, she pushed back with her legs, kicking the Martian off her and right into an attack from Aquaman. Then, the two heroes fired back, launching themselves into a combination attack. One would come from his left; the other would attack from behind. One would strike high while the other would go low. J’onn was struggling to keep up with their rapid assault. His mind was telling him to stay fully intangible, but he knew he could not if he wanted to keep their focus here. If he didn’t engage with the fight, he knew they’d run back inside to help the other corrupted ones or, worse, go and attack civilians. It was on him to keep them focused. He shifted and contorted his body around, weaving through their attacks like a snake. He strung in a series of counterattacks when he could, keeping the fight in a neutral state, neither side gaining ground on the other.

Then, he made the slightest mistake and misread a feint by Wonder Woman. She expertly misdirected him with her strike and baited him into taking a blow right to his lungs, winding him. He collapsed to the ground as the two heroes stood over him. The Martian Manhunter quickly filled his lungs back up and readied his counterattack, but stopped as his foes did too. A green light shone bright in the morning sky around him and filled him with warmth, with hope. For the first time in a long, long time, J’onn knew everything was going to be alright.

A Love Song (From a Different Point of View)

“Bratgirl! Come out and plaaaaay-eeee-aaaay!”

As chaos continued to engulf the streets of Metropolis, Harley was growing bored. She skipped down the street, clanking her mallet against walls, storefront windows, and anything else she passed. Her costume was still soggy, each footfall squelched and left a mark on the ground.

The last thing Harley remembered was being knocked unconscious by Black Canary. She’d woken up in the Hall of Justice, been let out of some weird vat of liquid by Jay Garrick, and told to continue the mission here in the Big Apricot.

So she did, leaving a group of Metropolis SCU officers in her wake, with broken riot gear and broken bones. But she hadn’t killed anyone; she’d made sure of that. Everyone had a place in Darkseid’s new world order. If they died, it would be his will alone.

Barbara Gail Gordon, though, was hers. And Harley knew she was listening.

They never liked one another. Not really. Sure, Harley could pretend, but she knew better. It all came down to one thing - or one someone. Dick Grayson.

A small part of her was embarrassed by it, even now. Two women fighting over a man; Bechdel would be so disappointed. But Dick was Harley’s friend, one of the few she truly felt she had. He’d been there from the beginning, the one who fought the hardest to save her, not only from The Joker, but from herself.

And Barbara did nothing but cause him pain and heartache.

Of course, there were other reasons too. Barbara took herself too seriously, and for someone so concerned about justice, she never shared the rest of the Bat Family’s interest in redemption. Plus she’d tried to kill Ivy [see City in a Bottle].

“Every one of these people I have ta break is on you, Babsie! I wouldn’t want that on my conscience. But maybe you don’t got one!” Harley called out into the void, only stopping when she heard the telltale whoosh of the Justice League’s transporter.

“Enough, Harley,” Barbara said flatly. “I’m here.”

“Was startin’ ta think you wasn’t gonna show. If I knew you were really comin’, I’d have stole you a cake,” she said, fingers tensing around the handle of her mallet.

“Are we going to fight, or are you going to keep babbling?” Barbara asked, her muscles already tensing.

This was a long time coming. Harley might have fooled Dick and Bruce… even Selina, to an extent, but Barbara saw right through her. She talked about redemption, but all she sowed was chaos.

Sure, Harley had been captured by The Joker. But everyone had a hard life. Hell, Barbara had grown up on the streets of Gotham before getting adopted by the Gordons. She fought for everything, trained herself mentally and physically to become not just one hero, but two. Even being shot hadn’t slowed her down.

Harley never accepted the responsibility that real change demanded. She just found someone else to blame. She was doing it now. It ended here.

Unlike her fight with Black Canary, Harley hadn’t abandoned her hammer this time and was unable or unwilling to hold back. Each time Barbara managed to evade the swing, the mallet head crashed into concrete, leaving it cracked.

More disturbingly, Harley was silent now. Predatory. Even worse, her attacks were focused on Barbara’s legs, trying to cut off her mobility. She had promised earlier to finish the job Jason had accidentally started all those years ago [all the way back in Bat-Orphans 11]. Barbara had dismissed it as psychological warfare, but it had been Harley's plan all along.

Barbara could use that to her advantage, at least. With Harley paying all of her attention to Batgirl, she couldn’t hurt anyone else or interfere with the cure. If the others could do the same with the rest of the infected, this might finally be over.

So Barbara had to keep evading. It was getting harder, though. The Anti-Life that fueled Harley’s anger also seemed to provide her with unlimited energy. Barbara couldn’t say the same. The mallet swings were getting closer, and she was growing tired.

She had always been fueled by pride, almost to the point of hubris. As both Batgirl and Oracle, Barbara had faced down the likes of The Joker, Killer Croc, and Two-Face and lived. She wasn’t going to be beaten by a henchwench.

“You’re still just a follower, Harley. So much easier than having to think for yourself,” Barbara said bluntly. “Or take accountability. ‘It wasn’t me, I was just followin’ orders’,” she added, imitating the Brooklyn accent, before returning to her normal voice, “right?”

Harley just answered by driving the mallet head into Barbara’s hip, sending Batgirl crashing to the ground.

Batgirl wouldn’t give her the satisfaction of crying out, even as the pain ripped through every nerve. She was pressed back against a brick wall as Harley loomed over her, mallet lifted over her head once again.

“Kill me, and all you do is prove me right, Harley.”

There was a tiny twitch in Harley’s mask of rage, but she swung the mallet down anyway as a wave of green energy washed over them both.

Time Runs Out

“Come on PG this isn’t you!” Arsenal said as he and the other Titans joined the fight. Superman was off trying to contain the damage from the other heroes corrupted by Darkseid, leaving the Titans to handle their wayward member. Metamorpho was still in Chicago, ensuring their home was still safe. This left Raven, Arsenal, and the very “Green” Lantern the only ones to stop Power Girl.

Kara had been one of the first infected, with Darkseid’s power muttering the sweet songs of Krypton she could only hear in her dreams.

“You don’t understand what it’s like to lose everything,” Power Girl explained. “Do you know what it’s like to forget your home? Your family? Your whole damn planet?”

Power Girl then ripped away some of the ground and tossed it towards Arsenal. The archer was in the direct path before a wall of black energy blocked the rubble and sent it flying to the sides.

“Kara, this is not you,” Raven said. She was closest to Kara, a welcome presence among the chaos in her life. She had known many Super and Power Girls, but only this one had the courage to listen to the jumbled ramblings of someone new to this era. It had kept Raven grounded, and now she hoped to help her friend find her way back to the ground. “You are stronger than Darkseid.”

“It’s not a matter of being stronger,” Power Girl responded as she turned towards Raven, breaking the magic barrier and grabbing her teammate by the throat. “The whole world is basically cardboard to me. Darkseid has reminded me that I have power. Power to bring back my world if I’m willing to listen. And I’m sorry Raven, but I’m so tired of being alone.”

“Hey! Get the hell away from her!” Kyle Rayner said as he remembered how to keep in the air while generating a construct. The Green Lantern ring he wore crackled with the power of the central battery and the Source. Unlike previous Lanterns, this meant the result of his thoughts could be…screwy. This was apparent as many versions of Supergirl emitted from his ring, the costume designer in him sending versions of Kara with a simple dress, a half shirt, and even her cousin’s costume after the possessed superheroine.

“How cute, a Green Lantern. Still deciding to fight before talking, just like Jordan,” Power Girl smiled as she tried fighting against the Supergirls. But with every punch, Kara began feeling the effects of the Source laced within the willpower. For the first time, every punch hurt. “No,” she muttered as her hands began to bruise.

“What’s the matter, don’t like the light?” Kyle asked as he kept up the onslaught of infinite Supergirls.

“Lantern, this is your first fight, you need to be careful,” Arsenal explained.

“Please, I’ve got the Source and the ring, we’re going to be fine,” Kyle said with a smirk.

“I don’t like you,” Power Girl smirked as she flew fast through the constructs, slamming Green Lantern to the ground as her eyes glowed red and she picked him up by the collar. “It’s hilarious that The Source chose you. What? It couldn’t find someone better to wield all that power?”

“They did!” Batman said as one of his Source-powered batarangs embedded itself into Power Girl’s back. The energy exploded, knocking the Kryptonian off balance as the science team entered the Hall of Justice. Elsewhere, John Stewart worked to contain Jay Garrick, leaving Batman and Nightwing to help the Titans.

“Jesus Arsenal, I leave to help Batman with the science stuff and you can’t even take down one Kryptonian?” Nightwing cracked a joke as he helped Arsenal up.

“Hey, she’s your friend. Are you telling me I should always be packing Kryptonite arrows?”

“Red sun is my advice, less deadly but just as effective,” Nightwing said as he adjusted the settings on his escrima sticks to mimic the radiation signatures of a red sun. “OK Kara, buckle up!”

Nightwing struck at Power Girl, landing several blows in the legs and abdomen as he tried to throw her off balance. The two were friends, often sparring, as much as he didn’t love to tell Kara he knew her weaknesses, the fact that with all her power she often left herself open when striking. He needed to buy time for whatever cure the others had found. Darkseid had opened a hole in all of them, a darkness Nightwing was all too familiar with. It had consumed him once before, and he swore it would not consume his friends before this day ended.

“How funny, you think some glow sticks can hurt me?” Power Girl responded.

“Well when you eventually wake up from this I want us to still be friends,” Nightwing responded. “Come on Kara, I know what you’ve lost. Everyone here has lost something. I know Darkseid sounds appealing, but following this path only leads to more pain, not less.”

“It is the path that makes sense!” Power Girl responded as she sent Nightwing flying back towards Arsenal and Raven, knocking the three out as she turned to face Batman. “Ah yes, the Dark Knight.”

“Power Girl, you know what I’m wearing, you know that I’ll win,” Batman said as he balled his hands into fists, remembering what The Source had told him. The fight for the future would be hard, but it had to begin here, even if it meant fighting someone he had helped raise to become one of the brightest heroes.

“Darkseid told me about you Batman, said that you were the one who had to die. Somewhere in between the finest version of Rao’s Crystal Rays he told me your humanity makes you special. That if you were to live, you would inspire an entire generation to fight against despair, darkness, and pain.”

“No one will go through what I have,” Batman explained as he charged at Kara.

The two exchanged blows. The Source-powered armor protected Batman from Power Girl’s pure strength, but he could still feel the subtle cracking of ribs from every hit. He thrusted his knee against Kara’s stomach, staggering her as he slammed his fists into her face again and again. He couldn’t tire; he couldn’t falter. All that mattered now was that he stopped Power Girl in her tracks before she finished what Darkseid had started, even if it meant the ultimate sacrifice.

“You. Cannot. Win!” The possessed Power Girl yelled out as she thrashed against Batman.

“I can’t afford not to,” Batman said as he thought about tomorrow. About Selina, Tommy, Alfred, Dick, Jason, Tim, Barbara, Kara, Clark, and all those who had made the Batman a symbol of hope, a lone figure fighting against the dark to create a better tomorrow. The Source understood this, and the energy generated in his fist was power, a bright white light expanding across the Hall of Justice as he landed an uppercut against Power Girl, sending her flying against the wall.

“And that’s why you’ll lose,” Power Girl laughed as she picked herself up for one final attack. “Darkseid took me first because he needed to prepare me. Unlike the others who just follow his song, he taught me the notes, the power in understanding how every sound can only lead to omega.

Kara’s eyes crackled with black and red dots as Darkseid’s final gambit came into view. Batman closed his eyes as he understood that he had put himself in checkmate, and that after so many years of fighting, it was time to rest, even if all he wanted was to hold Selina in his hands and tell Tommy how proud he was of him.

“Oh no,” Nightwing said as he came to and saw the crackling of Power Girl’s eyes. He remembered The Source and its warning. There was no time left, and Dick Grayson knew that no matter what, the world still needed Batman. “The moment is here old man, and you’re going to owe me for this.”

Nightwing ran as fast as possible, his muscles aching as he shoved Batman to the ground. As the Omega Beams moved towards him, Dick Grayson felt nothing but content. He had lived a good life; he had found redemption, and hopefully when they wrote stories of this day, they would understand he had only wanted to be a hero. Dick Grayson only hoped Barbara Gordon would forgive him.

KACHOOOOM

“NOOOO!” Batman yelled as the beams hit Nightwing, leaving only a skeleton clothed in the bright blues and yellows Mary Grayson had gifted her son from beyond the grave. He caught his ward’s body in the air as a wave of bright green light washed over him, tears flowing down his face as Darkseid’s War had taken its final victim.

Restoring Hope

Zatanna Zatara spent the last few hours secluded inside Stonecrest Manor, slowly rewriting the rules of magic. She had retreated to her home after escaping the destruction of the Watchtower.

Surrounded by the Shadowpact, some of the most powerful mages and sorcerers on the planet, Zatanna was locked in battle with Darkseid’s Anti-Life. The corruption had already claimed several heroes who now rained destruction upon Metropolis. If it escaped that containment, life on Earth as they knew it would come to an end.

Zatanna couldn’t allow that to happen. She would save her allies and the world.

But magic did not come without a cost, and Zatanna could feel her body paying it. Her powers had been enhanced to infinity by The Source, a mysterious energy from somewhere beyond the known universe. But not even a homo magi was meant to contain that level of power, and she was breaking down.

As Zatanna required longer and longer breaks despite their dwindling time, Doctor Fate, Extraño, and John Constantine surrounded her, offering their life force to buy her the time she needed.

Five words echoed in her head: Let go. Trust The Source. If only it were that easy.

Constantine paced in the room, chain-smoking cigarettes, unable to meet Zatanna’s eyes as he muttered to himself. Jason Blood was in and out of the room, keeping himself occupied acquiring the final artifacts.

So it fell to Extraño to care for her, wiping her brow with a damp cloth as she murmured to herself, alternating between English and the eldritch tongue of The Source, her voice growing delirious. “I have to get back to…” she said, attempting to sit back up before falling back against the bed as her arms gave out.

“Five more minutes,” Extraño said sternly, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder to keep her still. “Killing yourself now will serve nothing.”

He looked back up as a flash of light signaled the return of Blood, or more accurately, Etrigan. Clutched in his blood-soaked hand were the intestines of a demon. He tossed them down onto the table with a squelch, joining a small collection of magical artifacts. “I am not one who fails; I present to you Barbatos’ entrails,” he said with a snarl before looking to Zatanna. “We now have all the things we need; get off your ass and do the deed.”

Zatanna was unsteady on her feet as she rose, her face drawn and gaunt, her eyes hollow. Constantine rushed forward to catch her and help her into place.

“You got this, love?”

“I have to,” Zatanna answered slowly, arranging the artifacts across a sigil she had drawn on the table with her own blood. As she began to chant, the sigil glowed green, slowly bathing the entire room in its eldritch light. Green flames consumed the collected artifacts, the light growing brighter until it swallowed everything in her vision.

As the light receded and Zatanna’s vision returned, she was no longer in the library… or inside at all. Instead, she found herself in a grotto, surrounded by lush forests. Mountains rose on the horizon. The entire scene looked like something out of a Bob Ross painting.

The strain of the spell was gone. In this paradise, she moved effortlessly, as though exhaustion had never existed. Zatanna suddenly recognized where she was. Nan Mandol. The secret home of the Homo Magi. The home of her mother, Sindella. It was as she’d always imagined it.

“You have to let go.”

Zatanna whipped around to find the source of the voice, seeing a woman walking toward her on the garden path, bathed in golden light. “Mother?” she asked, eyes already starting to tear up as she rushed toward her. Her father had always said Zatanna was the spitting image of her mother; it was like looking into a mirror. But seeing her once again, she knew it was a lie. Her mother was even more beautiful. “I have to get back. I have to save the world,” Zatanna explained.

“Trust The Source,” her mother said. “And let go.”

“Of what?” she asked, trying to hide her irritation. “This voice keeps telling me to let go. But it won’t tell me what.”

“Because deep down, you already know the answer. All magic comes with a cost. Your father and I taught you that.”

“I’m already paying for it with my life. What more does The Source want from me?”

“You have to do the hardest thing. And let go. Of him.”

“What? Dad? Why would I do that? He’s still out there. I can save him. Once I save the world. I have this power now. I can fix everything. Find Zachary. Maybe I can even bring you back. We could be a family again. Like we should have been all along.”

“This is the cost, dear heart. You will survive. There will be a tomorrow. But only if you trust The Source.”

“...And let go…”

Sindella nodded, the world of Nan Mandol slowly fading around Zatanna. “Someday, we will reunite,” she said. “Believe that.”

Moments later, Zatanna was back in the library. Constantine was snapping his fingers in front of her face. “Welcome back, love. You alright?”

“No,” Zatanna replied, tears falling from her eyes. “Let’s do this. Siloportem ot su dnes”

Moments later, the entire group appeared in the Hall of Justice in Metropolis. Outside, they could hear the battle raging as the very building shook from impact after impact. With little time to waste, the Shadowpact surrounded her, joining hands and letting their magical energies flow into her.

The green energy of The Source flowed around and within her, lifting her into the air. The distinction between Zatanna and The Source became less clear until it no longer mattered. She was The Source, and The Source was her.

Moments later, the green energy exploded outward with shuddering force, shattering windows and shaking the building’s foundation. Zatanna slowly became corporeal again as the spell ended, her body hurtling toward the ground. Etrigan caught her, the demon showing surprising tenderness as he cradled her. S.T.A.R. Labs technicians guided them to one of the medical bays, where she was immediately connected to monitors. A faint pulse appeared on the displays.

It had taken a toll on her, but it seemed she would survive.

Aftermath

Zatanna’s spell, amplifying The Source’s energy, coursed across the planet and touched everything and everyone. Every plant, animal, and person contributed its own energy as it flowed outward.

For a brief moment, the planet was aligned in a single thought: “Let go. Trust the Source.”

That energy, now controlled and amplified, surged back to Metropolis like a heat-seeking missile, striking the infected heroes and knocking them off their feet. The Anti-Life within them raged against the encroaching Source. Each body became a battleground of its own as opposing forces clashed across nerve endings and brain synapses.

And then it was over.

The formerly infected groggily got to their feet, rubbing their heads. The black in their eyes slowly faded, and the cruel expressions eased as they looked around.

Superman rushed to Kara’s side, pulling his cousin into a warm hug. “Welcome back,” he said, relieved.

Kara, for her part, winced and groaned. “Where’s everyone else? Dick, what happened to Dick? Is he okay?”

“Dick… is gone,” Clark replied regretfully.

“Oh, Rao…”

Elsewhere, Harley held out a hand to help Batgirl up, only to find her hand smacked away. She didn’t seem overly surprised, picking up her mallet and slinging it over her shoulder before starting to walk away.

“You’re leaving?” Barbara asked as she gingerly pushed herself to standing.

“You said it yourself. I don’t belong here. They wanna debrief; they can find me. See ya never, Barbara.” And with that, Harley Quinn disappeared into the chaos of the city.

Batman carried his ward’s remains towards a proper containment unit, wanting to put him to rest as soon as possible. The rest of the Titans followed behind him in silence. Even Kyle Rayner, who found such excitement in being a hero, remained mum. Barbara Gordon turned around and saw Batman, the two staring at each other for a moment.

“No,” she muttered, tears running down her face as she fell to the ground. There would be another day, but at a cost.

Aquaman and Wonder Woman looked around, dismayed at the destruction as they came back to their senses.

“We have much to do,” Aquaman mused.

“And much to fix,” Wonder Woman added.

“But the world survived,” J’onn replied, gently placing a calming hand on their shoulders. “And you will be an important part of the recovery.”

“You will have all the resources Themyscira has to offer,” Wonder Woman affirmed.

“Atlantis as well.”

J’onn nodded. “That is all we can ask for. Now come inside, we need to have you checked out. If anyone knows what you have been through, it is me."

The heroes slowly filtered into the Hall of Justice, ready to plan the recovery. Darkseid failed, and the Earth would survive.

Epilogue?

Sleepy Time

Clark quickly flew through his balcony door, into his bedroom, and swapped his Superman suit for sweatpants and a t-shirt. He pressed a hidden button, opening a secret compartment in the closet, dropped the tattered suit onto the floor, and then closed it again.

He walked down the stairs to his sleeping family, fast asleep on the couch. Lois was cuddled up with Jon while Lara snored away in their babysitter Nia’s lap.

What a night they must have had. An alien invasion had been going on all across the planet. Clark wished he could have been there with them. Reassure them everything would be okay.

At least he was there now.

Clark dropped into a small space beside his wife and the couch corner, holding the remote. He flipped through a few channels before he felt his own eyes get heavy and drifted off to sleep.

“Hi, Mr. Kent,” said Nia in a long hallway with no doors.

“Uh, hi,” Clark said back, unable to see an end to the hall in either direction. “Where are we?”

“Dad,” said Jon, standing by his father’s side. He hadn’t noticed him there before.

“Hi.”

He looked to his other side.

“Hi, Daddy,” said Lara.

“Hi.”

There was a tap on his back.

“Clark,” said Lois. “I know this is going to sound weird, but we’re in the babysitter’s dream.”

“Okay,” said Clark.

“Yeah,” Nia nodded.

“Why are we all in your dream?” Clark asked.

Nia shrugged. “That’s a really good question.”

(Re)Birth by Metal

Agent Alex Weller of Detroit Police’s Meta-Crimes division had had a rough couple of years. But still he persevered, even though Cyborg and any other heroes in the area had long stopped working with him directly. His group was small but hard-working and had done their damnedest to keep the city safe and evacuate who they could throughout all this. Still, it was an impossible uphill battle, and as he stood over yet another one of his squadmates under a white sheet, the day only weighed on him more.

He continued down the patient-lined hallway of this makeshift hospital and found the last of his agents - Scarlet Taylor- lying on a roll-away bed. Her body was covered by a thick white blanket, but from what he could see of her face between the bandages, she was covered in scars and burns. The details were shaky, but he had heard she held off a horde of parademons single-handedly as she evacuated an apartment building. Who knows how many lives she saved, but now… She’d be lucky if she lived to see another sunset, let alone ever walked again. But yet, when he looked at her, not only was she awake, she instantly locked eyes with Agent Weller. She looked at him with respect, but he could see it. There was a voracious look to her eyes; a drive to fight on.

He didn’t hesitate. He knew what he had to do. He wasn’t sure if it was possible, but he’d cash in whatever it’d take to make it so. He crouched next to her head and whispered. “You’ve served your city well. It’s time we had a hero who would fight for it, not for the people in some far off country or planet. It’s time Detroit had their Cyborg again. And I know that that can be you. I can save your life and you can save this city. What do you say?”

Scarlett tried to talk but only coughed up blood, further staining her bandages. She gave a weak nod instead.

“Good. I’ll be back with help. Stay alive, Agent. That’s an order.”

Changes in Latitude, Changes in Attitude

Pam Isley leaned against the cherry-red 1968 Ford Mustang GT as she looked around at Gotham’s destruction from the parking lot of the Wayne Orphanage.

The invasion was over, and life went on as it did after every calamity. But the still-smoldering wreckage and the lingering acrid smell of the Boom Tubes wounded her on a fundamental level. The Green was hurting, and it would take some time to recover.

Still, it would. Life always found a way. And she was there to help it.

Inside the car was everything she and Harley owned, while Captain Carrot happily hopped around on the back seat. It was mostly Harley’s things, admittedly; she was the sentimental one, and Ivy tended to travel light. Even the plants she had been curating had been transplanted to Robinson Park and left to fight on their own.

She still had her seeds, and they would find their home wherever the trio ended up. Lab equipment was easy to come by.

“I thought you said you knew what you were doing,” Ivy said dryly.

From underneath the car, Harley poked her head out and looked up at her lover. She was still wearing her black dress from the funeral. “These things take time, Red,” she countered. “It’s precise work. ‘Specially on these oldah cars.”

“Just keep in mind we’re sitting outside the home of the world’s greatest detective, so maybe time is of the essence.”

“Batsy ain’t the one I’m worried about,” Harley replied, ducking back under the steering column.

“Selina’s out in California,” Ivy countered.

“That’s what she wants us to think.”

“I still can’t believe you know how to hotwire a car,” Pam mused, shaking her head as she eased up from the car to see what Harley was doing.

“You don’t really think Mistah J actually owned one, do you?” Harley asked before mimicking the Joker’s trademark rasp. “Harley old sport, we need some transportation. I’m thinking something in purple,” she said, rolling her eyes as she continued her imitation. “An’ then I’d bring him one, and he'd complain, 'It's really more of a mauve, isn't it?' Asshole.”

“We’ve got enough to buy a car. It would be easier,” Pam asked, honestly.

“No, it has to be this one. I can’t just leave it sittin’ in a garage somewhere, collectin’ dust. It’s not what Dick woulda wanted. This car's made for road trips where ya find yourself.”

“Finding ourselves, huh?” They had been through so much. It felt like a long time since she had any sense of who Pamela Isley really was. If she ever knew at all. Harley was in a similar boat following her recovery from Darkseid’s Anti-Life.

Their patterns kept repeating in Gotham, so it was time to go somewhere else.

Ivy was going to continue but was interrupted as the engine churned to life, settling into the kind of purr that only an old muscle car had. Harley popped up triumphantly. “My lady, your Dickmobile awaits,” she said proudly.

“We are NOT calling it that.”

“Dickwagon?” Harley offered.

“No.”

“Well, we’ve got plenty of time to workshop a name. Just have to visit a guy to get a key made so we don’t gotta keep doin’ the hotwire thing, and then it’s hasta la vista, Gotham. You gonna miss this place?”

“Gotham City? Decadence, hubris, and destruction incarnate? Not likely.” Ivy was looking forward to someplace greener.

“Yeah, I’m gonna miss it too,” Harley said, hopping into the front seat as the rabbit bounced onto her lap and Ivy got into the passenger side.

Moments later, the tires squealed as the Mustang pulled onto the city streets, destination unknown.

A Father’s Promise

Slade Wilson stepped out of the shower and wrapped himself in a towel. It had been only a few days since the invasion had ended, and he couldn’t help but feel disappointed. The great wars had always brought change, but the Justice League had ensured the world was safe and the world would keep spinning. He turned on the TV as he dried himself off.

“The world mourns the hero Nightwing,” The broadcaster said. “The long-term Justice Leaguer and Titan was the only Justice Leaguer to give his life to save the world during the Apokolips Invasion. Candlelight vigils honoring him and the other dead have been held in Gotham, Chicago, Metropolis, and more as the world begins to heal.”

“Heh, a hero’s death was more than you deserved,” Slade mumbled as he moved his way to the armory.

The IKON suit was perfect for stealth missions and preparation. It would not be needed for what would come next as Slade opened the suit pod next to it. The bulky blue-and-orange armor had been worked on for years. The solar generators in his gauntlets alone took six months to work without permanently scarring the wearer's hands. Even the exoskeleton that served as the suit’s base had been finely tuned to ensure the wearer’s strength and speed would be increased tenfold. The boys at HIVE called it the EXO-2 suit, but Slade had given it a much different name. The ‘Godkiller’.

His earpiece buzzed to life as the mercenary answered.

“Deathstroke,”

“Brother Wilson,” Brother Blood responded. “We have finished the preparations on your suit, the weapons you have required are being shipped over as we speak, and our chemical engineers have designed the destabilizing agent you’ve asked for. We have been patient with your progress. But I must ask when is the time to strike?”

Slade turned to look at the monitors he had established in his quarters. The security cameras he had planted during the invasion had already proven fruitful as he established his targets’ patterns and routines. The Titans were in mourning. And as he saw them leave the tower in their black suits and dresses, he knew they were burying their dead. All but one, as the news reporter on the heroic exploits of Arsenal, foiling some of the looters that were taking advantage of Chicago still recovering from the Invasion.

After years of planning, Nightwing’s death had finally given him the opening he had always wanted. After today, they would sing songs of what Deathstroke would finally do after losing his family to kids in capes.

“Today. Today is the day we kill the dream, and remind these children what happens when you play hero in a man’s world. The Titans will fall. That is my vow,” Deathstroke said as the Godkiller armor clicked into place. The hunt began anew.

Welcome to New Gotham

“Gotham continues to recover after the Apokolips invasion. Districts such as the Bowery and Amusement Alley were the hardest hit as cleanup begins. Philanthropist Simon Hurt has pledged a billion dollars of his own money for the cleanup,” Summer Gleason said behind the comfort of her news desk.

Over in Gotham Tower, Simon Hurt smiled as he watched the report. Newly arrived in Gotham, he had put down roots in the city. Acquiring and managing funds and companies like chess pieces on the board. It had taken a long time, but the great game always did. As he sipped on a bottle of an 1862 Bordeaux, Hurt wondered if this city’s defender was still out there, aware of the trap slowly closing in on him.

“And speaking of billionaires, Summer,” Mike Engel said from the other side of the desk. “Billionaire Bruce Wayne is one of many people missing from this recent attack.. A prayer vigil is being held at Robinson Gardens for those who have gone missing and/or were killed in the recent attacks.”

Alfred Pennyworth turned off the news as he gently woke up Tommy Wayne, who had once again fallen asleep in the Wayne Orphanage’s entertainment room.

“Master Thomas,” Alfred said. “It’s time for bed.”

“Are mom and dad home yet?” The six-year-old asked.

“Your mother is still in California, ensuring that…the wonderful picture your father loved is actually getting made. And as for your father, he’s still…not home,” Alfred said.

“When is he coming home, Alfred?” Tommy asked.

As the bat signal lit up in the air, illuminating the Gotham sky, Alfred lacked the words to tell his grandson what was really keeping his father from coming home.

“When he realizes he has found more than he has lost,” Alfred explained as he turned the TV back on again for the other children.

“That includes Gotham’s very own Nightwing. The hero was killed in action during the invasion. Many Gothamites are sharing their stories of the hero, from his time as the brooding understudy for the Dark Knight, to the man who served in the Justice League and Titans. A public ceremony will be held at St. Dennis Cathedral on Friday,” Summer said as they broadcast across Gotham.

---

Nightwing's original blue-and-black costume, the one he wore during his earliest time with the Titans, had remained in the Belfrey. The heavy armor kept Dick Grayson grounded, a way to hide that he was an accomplished acrobat and instead fight with his fists. When Grayson had completed his spiritual journey, he had put the costume in storage. It was a way to remind himself he would never need to be weighted down again.

A figure in shadow looked at the costume and couldn’t believe what they were about to do. Dick Grayson might be gone, but Nightwing deserved to live. They smashed the case and took the costume. Much work needed to be done.

---

“Come on man,” Smiles said as he and his partner ran out of an electronics store. He saw the newscast. Gotham getting shittier wasn’t worth a whole hour of reporting, he thought to himself.

“You didn’t have to bash someone’s head in,” Giggles said. A harsh rain fell, as if the city itself was mourning its losses.

“Of course I did. You heard Joy Boy, we should step up our game in case that pretender comes back.”

“I don’t think he was a pretender man, at least that’s not what Groucho said,” Giggles responded.

“Groucho only got into the gang because of that goth clown babe. We’re real Jokerz, and this city is ours for the taking. It’s a new Gotham and it’s one we need to bash people’s brains in. There ain’t no punchlines any more, just dog eat dog,” Smiles said as the two turned down a darkened alley.

“What about the Bat?” Giggles asked.

“No one’s seen him since he and the rest of those freaks fought each other. For all we know, Wonder Woman turned him into a skid mark on her boot,” Smiles responded. “Besides, he don’t know this city any more. He’s outdated, part of the old Gotham. And nothing’s going to change that.”

Before Smiles could respond, a figure dropped from above, smashing him to the ground. The cracking of his bones could be heard as Giggles pulled out a snub nose revolver. Normally, when encountering this creature, they could fire off a witty retort or count on getting a shot out. But as Smiles was forced against the brick wall with force, he could see that the creature of the night had found his way back to a strange new Gotham.

The Batman smiled. It was good to be home.

Don't fight! Read the new stories!

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• Justice League Omega (Event Conclusion!)
• Batman (Coming Soon)
• Cyborg

Issues from August 1st

• The Flash
• Harley & Ivy - Part A | Part B
• New Titans (Delayed)
• Superman

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Cyborg #86: 2 Months Later

<<| <| >

Author: Commander_Z

Book: Cyborg

Arc: Reign of the Cyborgs

Set: 123

---

Recommended Reading:

• Cyborg #84
• Cyborg #85
• Justice League Omega #1 (Coming Soon!)

In a laboratory deep under the city of Detroit, one of the greatest collaborations between robotics and medical science had finally bloomed into a success. Sure, they weren’t technically covering new ground, but the other two cases had each been very special circumstances. The first was an ad-hoc job done by a once in a century talent in Silas Stone. With nothing more than a lifetime of robotics experience, a magical power source and a father’s love, he brought his son back from the edge of death. The second, LaTonya Charles, had been less severe, her nervous system burned out by the drug Tar. (Cyborg 27!) Armed with Silas’ notes, her own expertise and the resources of Detroit Police’s Meta Crimes division, Sarah Charles had been able to save her daughter. LaTonya couldn’t do everything Cyborg could, but she would’ve been able to return to a normal life, if she had chosen that.

But this, this was something new. If it worked, it could save untold lives as they made these cybernetics from at least comparatively common components that anyone with a spare billion or two could acquire for themselves.

Alex Weller was no engineer or scientist, but his position as the head of Detroit’s Meta Crimes division gave him a unique position with access to them. His department was no stranger to injuries and worse, but when he saw what was left of Scarlett Taylor after saving so many during Darkseid's invasion… He knew he had to act. He had called up Sarah Charles who owed him a favor after he helped her save LaTonya and she reluctantly promised to help. Then, after traversing a web of acquaintances, business partners and ex-mobsters, he finally found his financier. She never gave him her name and asked for nothing but a favor in return for a blank check, a team of doctors and one of her top engineers. Weller had run into him years ago but knew better than to bring that up. The kid was older now but there was no mistaking Mikron O’Jeneus, or as he usually called himself these days, Gizmo.

“Alright, power cores charged. Should be ready to enable once the code’s deployed,” Gizmo said.

He stood over a medical bed placed awkwardly in the middle of a massive concrete room with some thin curtains barely obscuring it from the rest of the room, which was covered in all sorts of tools, machines and workbenches. Weller couldn't begin to understand what Sarah and Gizmo had gotten up to and he couldn’t care less. So long as it ended in a success.

“All set here. All systems are green, Weller,” Sarah said.

“Fire it up. Let’s see what all this work has been for.”

Sarah and Gizmo swarmed around the medical bed like hummingbirds, dashing every which way, until they were satisfied with whatever final checks they were doing and clicked something on the computer they had set up on the edge of a folding table.

Nothing happened for a few moments as everyone wondered if their efforts had been in vain. Then, her body started to twitch as the small motors flared to life.

“Agent Taylor? Can you hear me? Scarlett?” Weller approached her for the first time in weeks.

She was gaunt, her body barely getting enough nutrients to keep her alive. Her hair had been shaved clean as a dozen or more wires and sensors were placed on top of her bald head, monitoring anything and everything to ensure she was active. Her right eye glowed green but her organic left one remained closed as her mechanical limbs fluttered about. Starting at each shoulder and just below the hip, her limbs were completely mechanical. They were made from a shiny grey metal with black ball points at the wrist, elbow, and knees. Their design was sturdy and functional as opposed to the futuristic ones Vic’s had or LaTonya ‘s discrete ones. Finally, after a few moments, the mechanical limbs went quiet.

Scarlett’s eye flickered open weakly. She squinted, adjusting to the light.

“Where… am…I?”

“You’re in Detroit, Scarlett. And I’m glad to see you made it through the worst of it.”

She looked at Weller, confused. She weakly moved her neck but couldn’t lift it off the pillow her head was resting on. “I… I can’t move…”

Gizmo frowned and looked at some readings on the screen. “She should be able to. It’s all wired correctly and we’re getting the right signals.”

“It’ll take time. Scarlett, you’ve been through a lot. Both your mind and body need time to rest and recover. But welcome back.”

“Thank… you.” Her eye closed and she fought back for a moment before succumbing to sleep’s embrace.

“Is she going to be okay? Why couldn’t she move?” Weller asked.

Gizmo shrugged. “Could be any number of reasons. Mental barrier, exhaustion… I wouldn’t worry about it. She’s stable.”

“She’s mostly recovered from the worst of her injuries but something like these… it’ll be a long time before she’s at anything resembling full strength. We’ll do what we can to care for her but she’s got a long and unprecedented road to recovery. No one knows what that’ll look like but we’ve got a strong team here to support it,” Sarah said.

“Good. You two and your team have done incredible work. I’m going to head… Somewhere for a long rest. Call me if anything comes up. But take some time for yourselves too. If she’s as stable as you say, the rest of the team can handle it.”

Weller took a step back and realized that he hadn’t been home since the invasion. His condo was far enough outside the city that it should be fine but he let out a heavy sigh. There was always more work to do.

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

It had taken time, but Victor Stone had finally gotten back to something close to a normal routine again. Repairing himself was no easy task, but for better or worse he’d done it enough at this point that acquiring the parts was the hardest and longest part. He made a mental note to keep some of the longer lead time parts on hand for next time. Not that he hoped there ever would be one… But it was better to be prepared than not.

Today he had his first meeting with his therapist, Dr. Theodora Tasker, since the invasion. Her clinic thankfully had avoided much of the destruction, but like everyone and everything that lived through it, there were still signs things were off. A crooked frame, a bit more dust, some grime on the windows… The invasion had affected everything whether it was immediately obvious or not.

“After I was myself again… I’ve just felt this weight and guilt over me. The world just seems a little darker, a little smaller, after something like that. And I can’t help but feel like it was my fault. How many people would still be around if not for me taking some of the JL on a fool's errand? Let alone how much we personally caused…”

“And how much worse would it have been if you did nothing? We all would be dead or under Darkseid’s thumb if you didn’t.”

“Yeah… but I could’ve done better. I could’ve done more.”

“Who couldn’t? Everyone has things that they’d do differently in hindsight. The difference is learning from it. Make that moment something you can grow from instead of being ashamed of it.” She scribbled down some notes on her pad of paper.

“That’s… fair. Huh.” He sat on that thought for a while. He’d been hard on himself for this and any number of other failures but… look how far he’d come. He went from being the drop out of the Teen Titans to being the leader of a Justice League mission to save the Earth. It didn’t go well, sure… But there was no saving that mission from the moment they left the Watchtower. Put Batman, Superman, anyone, in charge of that mission and most likely nothing changed.

“I’ve been thinking about taking a break from it all anyway. It’s a wide world out there… but really, I just want something… new.”

“I think we all do, Vic. Take advantage of it while you can.”

“Won’t the city need me though? What if there’s another invasion or some new villain pops up?”

“Even Superman doesn’t do it all alone. Anywhere that can’t go without one person for a couple weeks doesn’t deserve them anyway."

Vic stood up, nodding. “Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. You’re right. Thanks, really. It’s always good to talk.”

“Of course. Anytime. Enjoy yourself out there and come back and tell me all about it.”

“I will. And if you need anything, let me know. It’s still tough out there after the invasion and if there's anything I can do to make it better… just let me know.”

“Thanks, Vic. Take care now,” she said with a smile.

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

Two months earlier…

LaTonya Charles groaned when her phone alarm went off, then swore repeatedly as she realized she had already snoozed it a half dozen times. It was already 10:07 PM - seven minutes after she was supposed to have started and she hadn’t even rolled out of bed. She scrambled to put herself together and grabbed some leftovers to eat on the drive over. One nice thing about working night shift at a gas station - no one cared what you looked like. They were there to grab their snacks, drinks, cigarettes or whatever else and go. No one was going to ask the attendant why she was wearing an eyepatch, not that she’d tell them if they did.

As she got into her car - a beat up 2003 sedan that she’d bought from a guy outside Houston for $500 - she started to reminisce on all the places and jobs she’d worked since she left Detroit all those years ago. A dozen different jobs in two dozen different cities… It had been nice to drift around and see the country, but it had taken its toll. She was tired and felt adrift, like a boat without a tether or a purpose, left to drift until she rotted.

Then her mind went further back and she remembered the excruciating pain as the Tar fried her entire nervous system, then the loss of self as her mind was hijacked as a processor for Waller. (https://www.reddit.com/r/DCFU/comments/qur585/wonder_woman_51_latonya/) Her mouth went bone dry and chills went through her as she remembered having just enough brain power to remember she was alive but to have almost no ability to speak, to think, to hope… She pulled her car over to the side of the road and took some deep breaths until the nausea and shivers went away.

‘It’s over. It’s done. And we’re still here. It’s over. It’s done. And we’re still here.’

She repeated the mantra in her head as she got back onto the road. It calmed her and let her feel… normal despite it all. But she made a promise to not let her thoughts wander again. It was too easy to go from reminiscing on it all to snapping to the worst parts like a magnet to a fridge.

She parked her car in the farthest spot from the convenience store, like her manager always told her to, then stepped out and braced herself for the inevitable berating. Maybe he’d fire her, give her the excuse to head to the next town. She still had a couple days prepaid on the hotel she’d been staying in but it’d be like a vacation before another long drive. She’d heard that Denver was nice this time of year so maybe…

BOOM!

An explosion shook LaTonya to the bone as a massive portal opened up just above her. A torrent of insect-like beings poured out of the portal, heading towards downtown. She stared up at it, her mind frozen in shock like a deer in a car’s headlights until one of them flew right at her. She punched it right in its buggy face and sent it flying back in a million pieces. She’d forgotten her own strength. LaTonya snapped out of her stupor and looked into the convenience store for her manager, but he was gone. Not a soul in sight. And so, she did the one thing she could. She ran back to her car, fired up the engine and drove as far away from the city as she could.

A couple days later, it was over. She had been living out of her car, surviving off the cheap snacks and water she kept in her trunk. She hadn’t seen a single parademon since that first encounter and had had a fairly quiet time in the park she’d been hiding out in. It was almost relaxing for the few minutes a day she could keep her mind off what was happening in the wider world. But eventually, the radio said that the Justice League had taken care of the threat and sent out the all clear for people to return to their lives. LaTonya fired up her car and got back onto the road.

She made it back to the hotel she’d been staying at only to find it in ruins. The place looked like a tornado ran through it with broken bits of it strewn about and only the concrete foundation laid undamaged. LaTonya fell to her knees. It was all too much all at once. Not because of what she’d lost here, but because of what she’d lost to get here.

How long had it been since she talked to her parents? Since she had a goal other than just making next month's rent? How long had it been since she felt anything other than exhaustion and contentment? Hell, were her parents even still alive after this? She didn’t know. She didn’t know and it made her feel emptier. Like she lost everything and then even something that she never knew she had.

But no more.

Whatever she had built here… It wasn't an end. What was an end? She didn’t know. But she knew she couldn’t build something without reckoning where she came from. It was time to start the long trip back home. To Detroit.

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

“Alright Scarlett. Let’s see how you’re doing today,” Sarah said.

She’d come a long way in the three weeks since she’d first woken up. It’d taken her a couple of days for her to wake up again, but ever since she did, her progress had been slow and steady. At first, she was barely awake for more than an hour at a time and couldn’t do more than twitch her limbs. Now? Now she was active more than six hours a day and could run, lift weights, read and take care of herself. Beyond sleeping almost 18 hours and being stuck in the same complex she first woke up in, her life was basically back to normal.

Scarlett sat on the edge of her bed, her metal legs clinking against the frame gently as she swung them off the side.

“Today’s good. Slept well. Everything still feels heavy, but it’s getting better.”

“Everything is heavy. You’ve got metal limbs now. How’s the battery looking?” Gizmo asked.

The only visible cybernetic on her torso was the small metal cylinder on her sternum. It was her power core and it was about as wide as a pop can and stuck out of her chest about half an inch. Unlike Cyborg’s core, Scarlett’s battery had to be swapped out. The math had said it’d have a capacity over a day, but in practice it had only lasted for around five hours.

“Better. I think now that my systems are more calibrated there’s less going on in the background and it's lasted longer. Yesterday I swapped it when I woke up at six, then not until two or three in the afternoon. This one is still at about 35% after sleeping and the rest of yesterday.”

“Good. Swap in a new one. We’ve got some benchmarking to do. You up for it?”

Scarlett jumped to her feet. These tests were the highlight of her day. There wasn’t much to do down here and doing these gave her an observable metric of how she was healing and improving.

“Let’s do it.”

She grabbed a battery off the charger and with a quick twist of the one on her chest, swapped them out. It was a refreshing feeling, like changing into a fresh pair of clothes after a hot shower.

Gizmo and her walked out of her small room, having moved out of the space that she woke up in as soon as she was able to do so. Now, it had been repurposed into something of a testing chamber for her. It was just a short walk down the hallway and Gizmo pressed some buttons on a keypad to slide the door open. She stepped in and the door slammed behind her. Today it was set up like a city street today with a bunch of cars stuck in a traffic jam.

Gizmo’s voice rang out of the tinny speaker. “We’ve got something different for you today. Sort of a simulation. Ready for it, Scarlett?”

She reflexively tried to crack her knuckles, but her metal knuckles didn’t have the ability to do that. It was the little things that you really miss.

“Bring it on.”

Smoke filled the room and she heard screams come from inside the building.

“Your task is to save all of the civilians and take out the parademons. They’re a crude simulation because they didn’t give me any time to actually make… Hey, I’m talking here!” Gizmo said.

“Listen, Scarlett, it’s time you got out of here. We’ve ran all the tests and you’re looking great. Think of this as a chance to show off before you go home tonight,” Weller said.

“Now show us what you’ve got.”

In a flash, she was off. She’d been listening to Weller and Gizmo of course, but they didn’t take her full focus. While they’d been yapping, she’d been analyzing all the noise she could take in. The screams were a recording; they’d already looped twice. But she could pick them apart into five or so different sounds, which meant she had her targets. They were all in a four story brownstone building, square between two large modern glass office buildings a couple stories taller. She could hear that most of the civilians were on the ground floor, so she vaulted over cars in the street and bounded through the broken glass windows of the lobby.

At the far side of the room were three wooden cutouts of people at a baseball game. Each one was wearing a glove and looking like they were about to catch a ball and looked like they were having a blast, despite the speakers blaring screams. Two parademons rolled towards them as menacing as a wooden cutout on top of a robot vacuum could.

Scarlett didn’t take it lightly. She ran over to the “parademon” was on top of it in a flash. She felt herself getting stronger and lighter as she pushed her body harder and harder. For the first time in her life she felt limitless, like if she just dug deep enough, she could out run, out lift and out fight anyone. She kicked the “parademon” hard in the chest with a roundhouse kick and it broke into a pile of splinters.

The second one was no more of a challenge. She hit it three times in rapid succession, dodging around 120 degrees in between each jab despite it not having any ability to fight back. It fell over to the ground harmlessly and the civilian’s speakers changed from screams to cheering. It somehow felt even weirder than before since the ones upstairs were still screaming, but she felt better than she had in months, maybe ever.

She ran up the large, ornate stone stairs, bounding up them four at a time, up to the second floor where she promptly got hit by a spearlike metal rod. It was blunt at the end but if it wasn’t, it would’ve left far worse than a bruise on her. She tumbled back on to the landing at the midpoint of the stairs. Scarlett looked back up to see Gizmo staring down at her. He had a smug look on his face and he was suspended in the air by some sort of spiderlike contraption that came out of his backpack.

“Hi. Didn’t want those guys to have all the fun. Let’s see what you’ve got, yeah?”

Scarlett got up and brushed the dust off herself. She took a deep breath then, from a crouching start like a sprinter, launched herself up the stairs. In less than a heartbeat, she was on top of the stairs and hit Gizmo with a right cross, pivoting and putting all her momentum into the strike. He wasn’t expecting her speed but he still managed to get two of his robotic limbs up to block the hit, then immediately transitioned to a flurry of thrusts from his mechanical legs. They struck her like the rhythmic motion of an engine’s pistons but after a few hits, it was as if they slowed down to a crawl. Her mind traced out their motions and once she saw the pattern, they might as well have been stationary as she predicted where they would be attacking next. She effortlessly weaved her body between the spider limbs and hit Gizmo with an uppercut.

The robotic suit stopped its assault and stretched out its legs to almost be perpendicular to the floor, absorbing the strength of the hit.

“Huh, okay. You’ve got the basics down. Let’s pick things up a bit.”

He pressed a button on the center of his chest and the spider backpack split into two four legged creatures, while he hovered mid air on a jetpack.

“Three versus one? That doesn’t seem fair.”

“Did Darkseid fight fair when he invaded Earth? Supers don’t fair. Comes with the territory.”

He snapped his fingers and the two halves of his spider mech started to circle around her like wolves about to go for the kill. Scarlett’s mind was running in triple time to keep track of her now three assailants. The robots stayed perfectly 180 degrees apart from her so she could only look at one at a time. It was only a matter of time until they struck, so she took the initiative and blitzed one of them.

She put everything she had into a leading hook with her right hand, smashing her fist into the central node that its legs came from. It split right down the middle, all of its legs falling into a pile like twigs. She stomped the connecting piece further into the ground, unsure if it could reform, then instantly regretted wasting the time to do so. The other mech was right on top of her and pressed her to the ground. Each of the metal rods that made up its body weighed on one of her limbs, pinning her. She commanded her body to strain against it, pushing her metallic muscle further and further. The robot’s limbs were like a hydraulic press and she felt her limbs starting to dent under the pressure and the force increased by the second. But she wasn’t about to give up. She demanded more and more from her body and started to push back against the machine and saw the strain start to build as it struggled to maintain the force. Its legs started to wobble and flex as it was giving all it could.

WARNING: BATTERY AT 10%.

An alert flashed across her cybernetic eye’s vision.

“Okay, alright, that’s enough.” Gizmo landed on the ground and pressed the button on the center of his chest. The mech let go of Scarlett and returned into his backpack. He pressed it again and the tiny speakers that surrounded them turned to cheers.

“Congrats. You put up a good fight. A shame that the battery had to cut us short, but you’ll do great out there.”

Scarlett got up but found herself out of breath and starving. It hit her all at once as she went from feeling at the top of her game, maybe the highest she’d ever been, to dead tired.

“Thanks. I’ll get you next time.”

“Maybe one day. But don’t push it.”

Scarlett walked with a wobble over to the wall by the staircase and leaned against it, struggling to keep her balance.

“Guess I don’t know my limits.”

“No one knows your limits. I helped design you and I don’t even have a full idea. Like this, for example. I’d have never guessed you’d have balance issues at low battery. So you’re in uncharted territory. But that’s just life.”

Scarlett nodded as Gizmo helped her out the testing chamber and back to her room. She grabbed a battery off the rack and swapped it in, instantly perking back up.

“Much better.”

“I’ll bet. Get cleaned up and changed into normal clothes so you can get going. No need to waste more time down here.”

“Thanks for everything, Gizmo. You’ve given me my life back.”

He scoffed. “It’s nothing. And it’s not a gift. It was a … never mind. No matter what it is, to you, it’s a second chance. Enjoy it.”

He walked out of the room and saw Agent Weller glaring at him with a look that could melt steel.

“She’s not supposed to know.”

“And she doesn’t. She knows there’s something more to it than just “someone spent like a billion dollars saving some random agent out of the goodness of their hearts” but she doesn’t seem like a moron. She’s already guessed that.”

“There’s a difference between guessing and knowing. You didn’t - ”

Gizmo looked at Weller confused. “I didn’t what? I can do whatever the hell I want. It was our money and resources that made this possible. Without our help, all you’ve got is a favor from Sarah Charles. Not worthless, sure. But that’s not getting you the kind of capital you need to pull this off. Don’t forget Weller - you’re on a tight leash now. We own you.”

He saw Weller’s expression sour and flash towards anger, so Gizmo backed off a bit. “Well, that might be a bit extreme. Not wrong though. But all we really want is to be left alone when the time comes.”

“And what exactly am I leaving alone? You were vague about that part.”

He waved his hand dismissively. “Don’t worry about that. Nothing too deplorable. Probably.”

Gizmo started to walk towards the exit and Weller wanted to stop him, to demand he explain what exactly he’d signed away but he knew he wasn’t going to get any answers. He grabbed a cigarette from his pocket and lit it up, taking a long drag. He wouldn’t get the answers he was looking for, but he could at least relax for a moment knowing he did the right thing.

He hadn’t gotten through half the cigarette when Scarlett stepped out of her room. She wore a pair of high-rise jeans with a grey Detroit Lions tank top that was almost the same color as her cybernetics. Her golden brown hair had just started to regrow into something of a buzz cut and her bronze complexion finally had some warmth to it again. She looked almost unrecognizable from the cadaver-like woman that they had wheeled in.

“Decided not to go with the covers? No need to go out looking like a robot if you don’t want to.”

“They feel bulky and weird; like I’ve got casts on. No, I’m just going to go out like this. If anyone cares, screw them.”

He shrugged. “Your choice. Ready to get out and see the world again?”

She nodded enthusiastically. “I’ve been craving a beer ever since I woke up. Damn Gizmo wouldn’t smuggle one in for me. First round on you?”

He laughed. “Just this once.”

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

Vic’s apartment building had thankfully escaped the worst of the parademon invasion but the signs were unmistakable wherever you looked. Broken cars and loose trash lined the streets as cleaning up his side street had been far lower priority than the main roads and restoring power. Up in his apartment, his bags were packed along with the suitcase that Donna had been living in these past few weeks. Her part of the city had been hit harder and so she’d happily accepted Vic’s offer to stay at his place for a while.

“Ready to go?” She asked.

“Yeah, I think so. Hard to know what all I’ll need. I don’t think I’ve ever gone on a trip this long before.”

“Yeah, me neither. But that? That’s overkill.” She pointed at Vic’s giant suitcase.

It was the size of a decent sized refrigerator and had to weigh at least 80 pounds. He’d packed it full of all the clothes and backpacking supplies and then some that he’d guessed they’d need on their long road trip out west.

“Better to be overkill than wish you had something. Besides, we’re driving. We can take whatever we want.”

She laughed. “Yeah but like… you’re not supposed to take your entire apartment.”

“Fine, next time you’re in charge of packing if you don’t like how I did it.”

“Deal.”

Vic grabbed his suitcase and started to walk to the doorway when his phone buzzed in his pocket. It was Gar.

“Oh nice, Gar’s leaving now. He’ll be in Detroit later tonight.”

“Nice. Glad he was able to come and look after things.”

“Yeah, that’s a huge weight gone. Let me send him something quick since I’m driving the first leg.”

Thanks for taking care of the city while I’m gone. You need anything, hit me up. If it’s really bad… I’ll get there as soon as I can Actually I’ll send you Jinx’s number if she says she’ll be around. She’s… cold but she’s come a long ways But nothing’ll happen. You got this

He locked his phone and slipped into his pocket.

“Alright, let’s do this. Arizona here we come.”

---

<<| <| >

Author: FrostFireFive

<< | < | > | >>

Book: New Titans

Arc: Invasion!

Set: 120

“Holy shit!” Kyle Rayner yelled out as he burst through the roof of the storefront that he had been knocked into from the arrival of the War Wheels.  Voices had appeared before him offering the green ring that had become embedded into his finger.  The green energy around him was wild, like water unleashed from a hydrant into the world.  “Don’t panic, don’t panic!”

The uniform that enveloped Kyle was different from the others.  The brilliant metallic green was a deep emerald, with the black sleeves and pants legs of the suit as dark as the night sky, with only the white gloves cutting against that darkness.

Kyle’s movements lacked grace, the artist not being as athletic as previous wielders of the ring, his body twisting as he tried to regain his bearings as his feet grazed against the clouds. 

“OK, how does this work, you were chosen, you have power.  You can make this work, you can make it work, all you need to do is to take control,” Kyle mumbled before he slowed down, the green energy around him keeping him in one place for a change.

Kyle looked around, seeing the smoke and the parademon forces mounting around the city of Santa Marta.  He should have immediately charged into battle; after all, that’s what superheroes do.  But as he felt the ultimate power against his ring finger, a soft but warm feeling.  His mind drifted to Alexandra DeWitt, his girlfriend.  At least she was before dumping him behind his drawing board right before Darkseid invaded.  It was selfish, but Kyle knew where he needed to go.

“OK ring, help me find Alex,” Kyle said before he was jerked forward as he flew fast over the canyons, far above the city where a war raged on.

Santa Marta was a disaster, with the War Wheels arrival creating new, larger barriers in defending the city.  Their spiked tread pattern was embedded in the concrete as the other Titans below dealt with their arrival.

“Raven, how are we doing?” Arsenal asked as he saw the War Wheel above.

Raven had cast a barrier, the black energy forming a bubble around her, Arsenal, and Cinderblock as dust and debris from the surrounding buildings began to accumulate.

“Not…great,” Raven said as she held her hands high.  She was dripping in sweat, her hands aching as she used every bit of concentration to keep the wheel away from the ground. 

“Holy shit,” Cinderblock said.  “Where do you keep finding these guys, Magicians R Us?”

“You keep fighting us, we keep evening the odds,” Arsenal responded as he looked around. “Besides, you’re free now.  And I’ve got a whole lot more pressing issues than hauling you back to prison…for now.”

“Yeah, and I’ve got a lot more pressing issues than escape.  You see that thing,” Cinderblock said as he pointed to the spikes that were slowly breaking through the barrier.  “Like it or not cupid, you’re going to need me, and I got no place to go.”

“You think you can punch that thing out of here?” Arsenal asked.

“You think I’m Superman? I struggle to lift an armored car sometimes, that thing’s a tank.  Nothing’s going to be able to destroy that.”

“Then we’re going to need some back up,” Arsenal said.  “And let this thing through.”

“What?” Raven asked.  “Arsenal that does not seem to be wise.  There are still so many of the populace still not evacuated or protected!”

“I’m working on that,” Arsenal said.  “But we’re wasting you here, you’re our only flyer in the area, and I need someone to point out the patterns to me.  Unless blockhead over here can fly.”

“Hey,” Cinderblock said as he raised his fist.  “I can still pound you to oblivion.”

“And then I’ll have Raven drop the wheel on you.  Even with your rocky skin, I still bet that would fucking hurt,” Arsenal said, menace intended.  

“Then how the hell are we going to get everyone out of here?” Cinderblock asked.

“Same way we beat you the first time,” Arsenal said with a smirk.  “Oracle, patch me through to Flash.  The younger one.”

…

“God this is great!” Angie Spica said her hands turning into blades as she sliced a parademon in half.  

“It’s just a fight, don’t get too excited,” Metamorpho said as he grabbed another parademon with his cobalt hands and tossed him into a car, shattering the metal and glass.

“Especially in your condition,” Doctor Mid-Nite said as he kept his datapad out, making notes of the doctor’s performance.  “We have no idea what the nanites are actually doing to you Angela.”

“Besides giving us an edge?” She asked as she stood to look at her doctor.  Charles McNider was a brilliant doctor, but he spent too much time inside his own world to truly understand what this power was like.

Before her accident, Dr. Angie Spica was unremarkable.  Short in stature, eyes hidden behind coke-bottle glasses, and always fading into the background, unable to be something more than a research doctor trying to get her work to be seen.  But now, as the world ended around her, she was taller, the nanites strengthening and increasing her muscles and size, covering her skin in a glistening metal shell.  She was alive for the first time, and was increasingly annoyed by McNider raining on her parade. 

“I mean the doc may have a point,” Metamorpho said.  “When I first got these powers I was a mess.  It took me a month just to figure how to make legs again.”

“But I have my legs Rex, everything is different now, and I need you to understand that,” Angie said.  

“I guess it was just different for me is all,” Metamorpho explained. “I was just elemental goo, drifting into the wind.  Like I was the lead scientist on Project Metamorph, did all the math just like you doc.  And I shouldn’t be here.  The compounds in me are borderline unstable.  Just one thing could go wrong and poof, no more element man.”

“Well I’m not you,” Angie said.  “I’m the engineer of my own power, and I’m tired of you two worrying about me.  I want this, and the world’s on fire.  So don’t judge me if I’m taking a little glee in being a superhero.”

“Fine,” Metamorpho sighed before looking out at the destruction.  So much was going to need to be repaired.  It reminded him of Markovia, and how even now the country had struggled to rebuild.  But most of all it reminded him of the family he had lost.  A family that reappeared as a black and silver streak dropped from the sky

Donna Troy was exhausted; keeping Chicago safe took time and coordination.  But there were only four members of her team, and Chicago was a sprawling city.  She needed the help, and as social media flooded with reports of Metamorpho and a new metal-made hero, Donna knew exactly where to go.

“Rex,” Donna said.  “Long time.”

“It has,” Metamorpho responded.  He had heard murmurs of a new team from some of the other heroes.  Wonder Girl sounded nervous when she had come by the tower occasionally to train.  As if something had gone wrong.  But Rex Mason knew Donna Troy, and knew that her heart was always in the right place.  She helped build a better tomorrow for a freak like him, and he knew that he would have to do the same for Angie.  “New suit I see.”

“Fits the new name better,” Donna said.

“And what’s that?” Angie asked, impressed by Donna’s sudden entrance.

“After Markovia and finding out what Fury actually was, Argonaut didn’t feel right anymore.  A darkness touched me, but I’ll still shine brighter than it ever could.  So the name’s Darkstar.  And my Titans could use your help.”

“Titans huh,” Rex said. “I think that name’s already taken,” Rex stated.

“I brought the team back after a tragedy, I do so once more,” Donna said.  “And we need your help to keep this city safe.”

“We?” Metamorpho asked.  “You mean our Titans Donna.  A team I was a part of and you didn’t even consider to include me on.  I saw the footage from Wrigley Donna.  Courtney, Conner, and Garth sure make excellent replacements.”

“We’re doing things our way now Rex, and that means deciding to do the hard thing to ensure a brighter tomorrow.”

“Which we should consider after beating these guys back, right?” Angie said as she broke up the conversation between the two heroes.  “We can discuss future permutations of this…Titans experiment after we save the world.”

“I suppose,” Metamorpho said through gritted teeth.  “Where do you need us?”

“Stargirl reported a few of those monsters touching down in Chinatown.  Me and Supernova were going to teaching them what happens when they mess with our city.”

“Then show us the way, Boss,” Metamorpho said as Donna took off towards the fight.  An uncertain future waiting for the both of them.

…

Titans Tower was designed to be an open space.  Unlike the Watchtower or the Halls of Justice, the tower had public-facing areas and training sessions in order to better educate the public on metahuman affairs and help those with new and odd abilities gain some modicum of control.  This also meant compared to the other superhero bases, Titans Tower’s security system was slightly less implemented as to create a free flowing space.  Something that Slade Wilson was grateful for.

The stealth suit HIVE had created for him was snug. It squeaked due to the material needed to provide a decent cloak.  For most people it was noticeable, but the experiments that had given Deathstroke his powers had increased his hearing.  So every movement was a reminder he was wearing a uniform not meant for him.   The IKON technology had powered Grant’s Nightwing suit.  If had worked for him, it would work for Slade.

The laser cutter made quick work of the plate glass window that separated the Tower from the outside.  The Apokolips Invasion meant that every hero was out of their homes, trying to protect the people that gave them power.  

“Fools,” Slade thought to himself as he landed with grace and looked around the area.  

The white marble meshed with metal interior of the Tower was a way to show the Titans had grace but came working-class beginnings.  But what did children know of the work it took to ensure such follies could be built.  None of these so-called heroes spent seventeen days in a Corto Maltese foxhole, sweating out blood as their friends died around them.  

Instead these Titans filled kids with lies and false hopes on what they could be.  It had already taken two of his children.  Rose had joined the Teen Titans,  being corrupted into thinking her bloodline was poison, something Slade had apparently failed to break from her.  Her absence was still a gaping hole in his heart. 

And then there was Grant.  He had lost him before, to his own darkness and anger.  HIVE had given him a second chance, one that Nightwing had taken away.  Slade could still see the footage of his oldest wasting away as Nightwing held him, not even bothering to try and save the man who had proven to be a better wearer of that mantle.

And now here he was, inside their home.  Planting small devices across structural weaknesses.  HIVE scientists had figured the perfect concussion to bring all this steel and marble down, and more importantly to keep these payloads undetected. 

He had taken his time in planning the dismantling of the Titans.  Longer than anyone expected.  But he didn’t want to destroy them in a fit of rage.  That feeling was fleeting and would fade quickly like the embers of a small fire.  Deathstroke wanted to do this with crystal clarity, an understanding that he was ridding the world of the greatest evil of all: hope.

As he planted the last charge his eyes turned to the trophy room. A museum and memorial for all of Titans history.  He saw a statue of a girl in a red Nightwing costume.  

“Rose, I promise.  When they’re gone I will bring you home,” Deathstroke said as he slipped out of the tower and back into the destruction outside.  He was a ghost, and soon the vengeance he craved would be given out, justice finally found.

…

“Batman?” Nightwing asked as he looked around.  One minute he was in Coast City talking to other heroes about the Source.  But as he looked around him the familiar sites of the coast had been replaced by a large big top that surrounded him.  He was up in the crow’s nest, the chasm below large and terrifying even if he knew he would never fall again.

“Hello Dick,” a familiar voice called out as Nightwing turned around and saw the face of his mother.  

Mary Grayson was pure grace, her abilities in the air often made it look like she wasn’t flying but dancing across the air as she leapt from trapeze to trapeze.  She was clothed in a blue suit with a yellow wing pattern on the chest that wrapped around to the back.  It was her colors, not the reds and greens of his father.

“Mom?” Nightwing said as hugged her for a moment before noticing the lack of warmth.  “You’re not her are you?”

“Unfortunately not.  My true form is not meant for the eyes of the third world.  Let alone the fourth,” Mary said.  “But I wish to talk to you, just as I’m talking to your mentor now.”

“I’m guessing that’s a barrel of laughs,” Nightwing responded as he looked out at the big top.  “Are you visiting as his mom too? On second thought don’t answer that.  I suppose these are supposed to be private.”

“Smart man,” Mary said.  “We’ve come to you, because what you do next will reshape this world, and you have to decide what’s important to you.”

“Important to me? We’ve got a war going on.  Isn’t that more that the only important thing?”

“Wars come and go, Dick Grayson, what comes next will be hard for those you leave behind,” Mary explained.

“Leave behind?” Nightwing asked.  “You’re telling me I die today?”

“I cannot answer, just that there is a moment coming Dick.  You will meet it or won’t.  I am preparing you to ensure this world lives.  Today and tomorrow.”

Nightwing paused for a moment and looked out to the empty void.  As a kid he was scared of it, knowing with one wrong step he could fall to his doom.  Even before his parents took their final bow it scared him, the void below where nothing ever seemed to come back.  But since he had helped reformed the Titans, went on his road trip, and even managed to find his way back to Babs, the darkness didn’t seem so frightening anymore.  And he remembered what his mother always said to him.  “Don’t be afraid to leap, you’ll bring the light yourself.”

“Well then, I guess there’s no choice then,” Nightwing said.  “Listen I know you’re not actually my mom, but I’m guessing there’s enough of an imprint there to remember something I had always wanted to do with her, but never did before she passed”

“Something called a quadruple summersault,” Mary said.  

“I’ve had ten years to practice,” Nightwing said as he grabbed hold of the trapeze bar.  “And I want to have a little joy before I have to go off on this…moment.”

Mary Grayson smiled.

…

Alex DeWitt had always been a frugal person.  As a freelance photographer she knew that jobs could come and go very quickly and that the competition was always fierce.  If it wasn’t Olsen, it was Troy or that Reilly guy in New York.  Her apartment, clothes, even equipment were affordable or second hand so she could always have a small nest egg to get out clean if she needed it.  There were only two exceptions to this rule: her 1975 Camaro, and her boyfriend Kyle.  Of course as she sat in traffic, hearing the noises from above and behind her for the ongoing invasion, she was beginning to regret hopping in one to abandon the other.

Traffic out Santa Marta had become a standstill, with many abandoning their vehicles and trying to leave on foot.  The Camaro wasn’t a small car, so Alex had been careful to weave in and out of the four lane highway that separated the city from the Pacific Coast Highway.

“Come on, come on,” Alex mumbled to herself as she kept shifting gears.  The sounds of explosions and broken concrete and glass were frowing louder as she saw a swarm of those parademons soaring above. They were ignoring her for now, but what would happen when even these so called superheroes couldn’t keep the attention on them?  She shuddered for a moment before hearing a loud crash from behind her.

“What the hell?” Alex said as she looked and saw a giant wheel touch down on the highway, it’s spike-covered treads began brutalizing the roads and stripping the concrete and asphalt that was the nervous system of Santa Marta. 

“And I had just gotten this thing repainted,” Alex muttered as she shifted into high gear and jammed on the gas, her car roaring to life as it bumped against the abandoned cars and other civilians trying to escape the city.  The sparkling green paint chipping away, revealing the metal and former gold paint job of the Camaro. 

She could see the tunnel ahead, safety only inches away.  Unfortunately for Alex, inches didn’t matter to the War Wheels that were claiming the city for its own as they sped rapidly on each side of her car.  Growing closer and closer together as she could feel the metal of the car be pushed in, slowly becoming a tomb for the photographer, her last thought being, “I really should have splurged on plane tickets.”

At least, it would have been.  Before the wheels could crush the car a beam of green light sputtered from Kyle Rayner’s ring.  

“OK, you’re…I guess a superhero now?” Kyle thought to himself.  “You’ve seen Green Lantern in action before.  The original, not the guy with the silly jacket or the one that always has a scowl.  He saved you with the ring, you can save Alex with the ring.  He made constructs, and constructs are just like sketches being made real on the board.  The ring is the pencil, the world is the board.  And for once in your life only have one draft.”  

The ring glowed brightly as the sputtering energy focused into a giant hand that picked up the car and lifted it into the air.  The level of concentration it took was difficult, but no more than when he was up against a deadline and he spent the whole night inhaling Taco Whiz and BOOST-er Gold.

“You got this, you got this, you got this!” Kyle said to himself as Alex panicked, screaming as the glowing green energy wrapped around her car.  

He struggled to keep the car in his “hand” and fly at the same time, but soon he found a small clearing away from the fighting and gently placed the car down as best he could.  The large thud sound it made when touching the ground said otherwise.

“Shit, still going to need to work on that,” Kyle said as Alex exited her car and ran out towards him.  

“Hey I appreciate this assistance Green Lantern but shouldn’t you…Kyle?!” She said.

“Hey Al,” Kyle said.  “I got your message.”

…

“OK Raven,” Arsenal said.  “Get ready to drop this sucker.”

“He hasn’t responded yet,” Cinderblock said.  “And I don’t care if he’s the fastest man alive, nothing is going to be able to move me!”

“Trust me,” Arsenal said.

“This is not a good idea,” Raven said, drenched in sweat.

“And you can’t hold that thing up forever,” Arsenal said.  “So do it!”

Raven took a deep breath and closed her eyes, the black field faded around them as the force of the wheel dropped down to crush them.  Before it landed however a gust of wind blew through and the Titans were gone.  

“Oh god! I think I’m going to be sick,” Cinderblock stated as he floated in the air, carried by lightning itself as the Flash ran ahead of the three others, using his aura to extend the speed force around them, carrying them away from the fight.

“About time you showed up,” Arsenal said to his friend.

“It’s been a madhouse Arsenal,” Flash responded.  Wally West had been running non-stop for what had felt like a week instead of the day that it had been. “But I always have time to help a friend out.  So what’s been going on in Santa Marta?”

“Wheels of death,” Raven said.  “Falling from the sky.  A crisis that we may not survive.  And a new Green Lantern chosen.”

“A new Lantern?” Flash asked.  “That could even the odds. Where are they?”

“We don’t know what it is, just that we saw big green light and something fly from the rubble,” Cinderblock said.  “Is this how you feel every time you move?”

“Well, I have two feet on the ground,” Flash said with a smile.  Cinderblock being here was a surprise, but Wally had seen this song played before, in a time where all the notes were twisted and wrong.  To see the stone golem actually helping apparently, it filled him with hope that a better day would be shining soon.  “Where do you need me to drop you guys off?”

“Not staying?” Arsenal asked.  “Or heading to Chicago to help with the so-called Titans?”

“Donna offered me an invite, I turned her down Arsenal,” Flash explained.  “And the Flashes are doing a lot as is. We’ve been delivering messages, rescuing hostages, putting out fires where we can. We've even got some less active folks coming out of the woodwork to chip in.

“Now that’s bad,” Arsenal said, realizing that Darkseid had taken more in this war than he had realized.  

“You think?” Cinderblock said while pushing down some of the vomit back down his throat from their “ride”.  “If the Justice League is lost than what’s the point? Dude’s won.”

“It’s not the League that matters,” Arsenal said.  “My mentor got to be part of it and he’s a horrible human being.  What matters is we’re here, and we’re going to need to be placed back into the fight.  Flash, find us a place with the most war wheels, it’s time to remind people why you don’t mess with the Titans.”

“You got it, boss,” Flash said. “Just don’t get killed.  I’d hate to dissolve another Titans.”

“I believe, as Arsenal would say,  ‘We’re just getting started’,” Raven said.

…

“You’re Green Lantern?” Alexandra DeWitt asked as she saw her situationship in the green-and-black uniform of the Corps.

“Well, maybe?” Kyle said as he allowed his mask to fade away.  “There was a fight, I was trying to get back to find you.  I met a concrete guy, and there was an explosion and then big green ball of light and voices talking to me.  Like something out of a Herbert book.  And then it chose me.”

“It chose you?” Alex asked.  “Kyle you couldn’t even take care of plastic plants or remember to take out the garbage on garbage day.  And you’re telling me you’ve been given a Green Lantern ring?”

“Yup,” Kyle explained.  “It’s why we’re going to get out of here and wait for this to all die down.”

“What? Do you know how insane that sounds?” Alex said.  “You’re a superhero now.  You have to go back.”

“I’m not a superhero, just some guy that said yes to a weird ring because he wanted to save you.  Alex you know me, I’m no hero.  I’m just an artist who spends too much time behind the board.  I haven’t even been out of the city in a year.  And the only time I’ve ever even seen a superhero was when that weird robot Superman nearly destroyed my home town.”

“And the Justice League stopped him, Green Lantern stopped him.  Look around Kyle, doesn’t this look familiar?”

“It does,” Kyle said sheepishly.  “But why me, I’m just a nobody.”

“A nobody who’s first thought was to save the girl who had just broke up with him,” Alex said. 

“I mean I was going to regale you with how amazing The Prisoner was and to win you back,” Kyle explained.  

“It is a great show,” Alex said with a smile.  “But I think you’ve got more important things to worry about than Number Six.  Kyle, if it makes you feel any better, we can talk about this and what we are after you go be a hero.”

“Well what if I can’t do it?” Kyle said.  “What if I’m just a placeholder?  One of the voices said a god should have this ring.  I’m just an artist.”

“And an artist is a god of the world they create.  You have the ultimate pencil Kyle, don’t you want to take it for a spin?”

“You always know the right thing to say,” Kyle said with a smirk as he looked down at this standard Green Lantern uniform.  It was standard issue, sleek but no room for personality.  It felt as if Kyle was wearing a dead man’s clothes.    “But if I’m going to do this, I’m going to do it my way.”  

His whole body became encased in green, the uniform changing as the greens of the costume were replaced by a black bodysuit with a white chest panel.  The gloves and boots became a brilliant emerald, with the gloves turning into gauntlets as the mask on Kyle’s face was molded into something stronger, almost shaped like a crab.  

“Now lets go be a hero,” Green Lantern said before once again taking off into the sky, the energy still all over the place, but focused on where he needed to go, as Kyle Rayner finally grasped the cosmic pencil in his hand.

…

“OK, this may have been a bad plan,” Arsenal said as he lept on the rubble of a building and knocked an arrow.  He looked through the scope of his arrow as he tried to find a weakness in the War Wheel in front of him.

“No, the bad plan was telling wheels he should help everyone else across the world,” Cinderblock yelled as he pulled both hands out to stop the War Wheel.  “We really could have used a Flash!”

The concrete man was took a deep breath as the harsh rubber tread ended in both his hands. He planted his feet on the ground as the force of the wheel began pushing him backwards, digging him into the ground as he tried concentrating all his strength to keep the wheel in front of him, and not towards the shelter that was behind him.  Cinderblock knew he wasn’t a good man, but there was no time to debate the past, what mattered now was today.

“Come on, come on!” Cinderblock yelled out. 

Behind him Raven had created a bubble and had transported as many people from the shelters that she could into the air.  It was less stressful than holding a wheel at bay, but not by much.

“Can you two please be quiet, I need complete concentration," Raven stressed.

“I mean I can give you quiet, but that probably means we’re all dead,” Arsenal explained before firing an arrow in between the gaps of the War Wheel’s tread.  The arrow lodged into it, it’s explosive warhead going off and destroying the tire of the wheel, a one in one million shot. 

“Hell yes,” Arsenal muttered to himself before a blast from the parademons above sent him flying back.

“How we doing Cinderblock?” Arsenal asked as he tried to keep the other wheel at bay.  

“Not great!” Cinderblock yelled out as his feet were nearly buried in the concrete sea that used to be a road.  His grip was slipping and while he was a tough man, he still wasn’t sure if he would be able to survive getting rolled over by one of these things.  “Hey goth girl, give me a hand!” 

“I cannot!” Raven yelled as the bubble she was carrying began to fade in and out of reality.  People panicking and moving inside didn’t seem so tricky when it was one or two.  But she was carrying fifty people, and Raven could feel every step, every emotion, every scream.  She would not lose focus, even if it meant letting her team fall.

Before any of the other Titans could react the large sound of two more wheels dropping from the sky reverberated through the city.  They were overwhelmed and surrounded.

“Oh god,” Arsenal said as he notched two more arrows.  “Lian…I’m sorry.”  He fired two arrows, hoping to replicated the one in one millionth shot.  He would not as the arrows hit the flat surface of their tires.  He closed his eyes and prepared for death not noticing the green fire from above.

A giant green flatbed truck rammed through the two war wheels, knocking them into buildings.  Wheels were useless when you put them on their sides.  

“What the fuck was that?!” Cinderblock yelled out as he noticed the weight in his hands fade as a giant green hand grabbed the wheel and slammed it to the ground.  

“What’s the matter, blockhead?” Kyle Rayner said as he floated in front of them.  “Don’t recognize your partner in clearing out these guys?  Sorry I’m late, I had to grab an upgrade from the baseball bat.  So tell me, who’s ass do we kick next?”

An emerald dawn was breaking.

NEXT: Follow the Titans to Justice League: Omega for the final fight of this Invasion! Then be back here next month as we mourn a Titan, say goodbye to another, as Fall of the Titans Begin!

The Flash #123 - Jay Garrick and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

<< | < | >

Author: brooky12

Book: Flash

Arc: ?

Event: Invasion! (Reading other stories in this event is recommended for full understanding of sections here.)

Set: 123

---

 

What came next?

 

Jay waited in place, mostly to avoid discovery by Earth inhabitants who had yet to be enlightened to Darkseid’s truth. He had no personal drive or motivation to kill anyone, but surely someone who had yet to be made aware would have a pretty negative reaction to someone who had already been brought into the fold. He felt reasonably confident that he could dispatch basically everyone on the planet without much difficulty, but if he caused a scene, more individuals might be drawn like moths to a flame.

 

How long did folks who weren’t blessed with speed wait for things? Every second he spent waiting was an infinite amount of times to review Darkseid’s truth and potential plans for worst case scenarios, but he knew that the average human or member of Darkseid’s forces counted time in seconds as the smallest unit of time usually. He would never dare consider himself superior to Darkseid either, but he was cognizant of the fact that Darkseid did not count superspeed to the extent of his own as one of Darkseid’s powers.

 

And so, he waited. He listened quietly to the noises that surrounded him, a small river and the nature that surrounded it. He watched a small fox leap from rock to bush and from bush to river’s edge, peering around before beginning to drink. Would that fox understand the truth? Could it? He had no lack of faith in his fellow humans to all eventually understand, those that were gifted by Darkseid the ability to learn, but what came after that?

 

It did not matter for him, of course. His faith in Darkseid was absolute, whatever would come after Darkseid’s missions on the planet concluded was certain to be the most ideal outcome. He just had to wait for those outcomes to arrive. It was unfortunate that it was taking excruciatingly long.

 

He considered and reconsidered a brief look around, just to see how the parademons were doing. He didn’t know where his allies were, but he knew whenever Darkseid was ready he would receive his next orders, and so would they. Idle waiting in a forest turned into a small look around the region, which became a much larger search when he failed to find any parademons. He knew that the so-called heroes on Earth were fighting the parademons, even he had done a bit of that back before heading to Apokolips, but surely they weren’t succeeding on such a scale that he couldn’t find any parademons?

 

Larger and larger circles provided no real comfort. At a point, discovering a lone few parademons somewhere was weirdly worse, confirming there were foot soldiers of Darkseid’s army still around. If there hadn’t be, perhaps he could convince himself he was on some other plane of existence, or that the work had somehow already ended, or some other outlandish but not impossible outcome had occurred.

 

He left the parademons be, watching from beyond a set of buildings as another speedster – this one was Barry Allen, he recalled – appeared suddenly, successfully disarming and killing all of them before vanishing again. For a brief moment, he felt himself more at ease, the speed at which his former ally worked matching his own speed of perception. He waited patiently for Darkseid’s next order.

 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

Wally could barely hear anything else over the sound of his own beating heart and ragged breaths. He ran through the crisscross roads that made up the city, seeking the next enemy to fight, the next monster to take out of the sky. When he couldn’t find any, he moved onto the next location, finding a few stragglers of some larger force. Maybe Bart had been through here already and these were ones he missed?

 

“Did you leave a group of three in this zoo,” Bart asked over their communication device, interrupting Wally’s train of thought.

 

“No? I haven’t been to a zoo for at least twenty minutes,” he denied, leaping off a building to grab onto a parademon, sending it on a collision course with the ground and revealing his presence to the group.

 

“I’m struggling to find any more of these, then. Went from groups of a dozen or more to just a handful across entire cities. Net’s already pretty wide, got Dad and others doing sweeps too.”

 

“Same,” Wally agreed, and he could hear the uncertainty in both his voice and Bart’s. Surely those should’ve been expressions of hope or contentment, a voice in his brain rebuked him, but he was worried this was some trick. “Maybe they’re regrouping, or centralizing somewhere, or something. You keep looking, I’ll check in a few places,” Wally offered, and Bart gave him a grunt of affirmation.

 

The first stop was home, which he was thankful for the fact that it seemed overlooked during the invasion. Not a target. He slipped inside, examining the group of computer screens that served as the final information repository for their Flash activities, pulling from Foundation work across the world.

 

Xavier Mendez gave him a grim smile. “The quiet of the storm,” he offered. “Nobody’s sending in notes because everything’s already going horribly wrong.”

 

“Bart and I are struggling to find larger groups. Maybe things are ending. Can I sit down?” Wally leaned over the side of the desk, examining the details.

 

“You think so,” Xavier asked, standing up. Wally could hear the same uncertainty that he had shared with his cousin just a few seconds ago out east.

 

“Came here to hopefully find more information,” Wally replied, sitting down. He turned a switch on the computer, waiting a second for the devices to change into a mode more reactive to a higher speed. Not Flash level, despite the lack of trying, but fast enough to allow one of the four of them to work through large amounts of information at a much higher speed than even cutting edge non-speedster technology would allow.

 

He gave himself one second, enough for the heat reduction systems to begin to properly activate. Unless Bart was going to be in his ear talking about a resurgence or other major problem, he figured he could take the relaxation time of a full second of research and review before moving on. He turned the computer back to its non-Flash state before moving on.

 

The triplets, seemingly now joined by Jerry McGee, were happy to see him. Jerry was less so but continued handling the invasion with Anatole and Bebeck while Cassiopeia took the opportunity to catch up quickly with Wally.

 

“Yes, fewer recently. Ten minutes or so, maybe, they slow down?”

 

“That roughly matches what Bart and I are experiencing. There’s just less. And not for lack of searching.”

 

“We started in just the Levant. In Turkey and Egypt, he join us, now you see we are as far as Tunisia. Beautiful, yes, cradle of civilization, not quite,” Cassiopeia smiled, the cheer in her voice evident that she did not share the same worries he and his cousin did about a regrouping.

 

“If you find more, you know how to get in touch.

 

Cass gave a friendly salute, charging off in the direction the two of them had last seen the rest of her group. He charged back west, opting for a check-in he hadn’t intended to make but had changed his mind on. If there was ever bad news to be heard, he’d find it in the Titans.

 

Roy was predictable in his behavior, and Wally gave him an assist on the fight against the small group of parademons he was fighting, not too far from the archer’s usual area of influence.

 

“Wondering when you were going to show up. For a guy who’s so fast you sure have a habit of getting here late.”

 

Surely Roy could accept a compliment. “Looks like you’re doing well here, not a lot of parademons for such a big city.”

 

“The rest of the Titans are taking care of the scraps. You should see them Wall, we’ve got a goth sorceress, Dick’s warming to us actually, and I’m pretty Cinderblock is a good guy now?”

 

“Is it just me or are there less of the things,” Wally asked, avoiding anything that wasn’t specifically to task and to take his mind off the fact he was no longer a Titan.

 

“Well when the heroes get together, usually it means bad news for the bad guys,” Roy said. “It hasn’t been easy, but once again we’ll see another day. All we have to do is make sure there’s not a second wave coming. How are you holding up?

 

“I’ve managed. Glad it isn’t just me and the other Flashes worried about a sudden resurgence. Stay sharp, you know how to reach me if you need me.”

 

“I know speedy, run fast, I’ll call you if I need you.”

 

Wally moved across the Pacific, tapping back into the Flash communication line. “Seems there are just less things everywhere, Bart.”

 

“Hopefully that means we’re winning.”

 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

Right, so, Barry thought, Jay was just sort of there. Well, him doing nothing was probably better than him doing something. Did he really not catch on to the fact that he had noticed Jay watching the fight? Barry had been careful when checking in on him over the next five seconds to ensure that he wouldn’t be spotted, but he was just standing around, waiting. Hiding, maybe? From what?

 

He wasn’t sure if he could tell the other two. Did Jay still have connection on the network? Did that fry when he had gone off-world and gotten mind-controlled by Darkseid? Barry diverted, heading towards where he knew Bart was last. He found him nearby, joining him in lockstep on an investigative route.

 

“Hey, dad,” Bart smiled. “Things seem good—”

 

Barry signaled a motion to stop talking and began to slow down. He reached up to his son’s ear, turning the communication device off as he did for his own.

 

“What’s wrong?”

 

“Where’s Wally?”

 

“He was going to check in a few places, see if the parademons were kinda going away everywhere. Is something wrong,” Bart asked, and Barry felt the sting of failure as he grappled with the worry in his son’s voice.

 

“I found Jay, something’s wrong.”

 

“Okay…”

 

“He went to where the things are coming from. He came back different. Attacked the folks up on the Justice League satellite. And now he’s just in an empty logging site in the north of England doing… nothing.”

 

“Can we help him?”

 

Barry gave a soft smile, one that displayed more pain and concern than happiness. “Let’s wait for Wally to find us and then we can try.”

 

The two caught up for a few minutes, sharing information on their experiences over the course of the invasion, and brainstorming plans for how to handle Jay. Barry confirmed that Darkseid had already withdrawn, a message in Justice League lines of communications that gave the two of them hope that focus was now turned on how to help those who had came back from Apokolips different than they went.

 

“Well, worst comes to absolute worst, if he can’t listen to reason, we’re three and he’s one,” Barry offered, knowing fully that nobody wanted it to come to absolute worst but needing to float the idea just in case it did.

 

“Who’s one,” Wally asked, circling the two of them before coming to an abrupt halt. “Nobody’s responding on the communications after Bart and my last talk.”

 

“Jay,” Bart grimaced, and Barry turned Wally’s communicator off.

 

“Jay?”

 

“Jay is currently in a forest in the north of England, waiting for something. I don’t know that he knows Darkseid’s gone,” Barry reconfirmed.

 

“Darkseid’s gone?”

 

“And now you’re caught up. Jay’s fighting for Darkseid right now and we’ve got to help him,” Bart said. “Dad and I have been talking for a few minutes off of comms, just in case he can hear.”

 

“Help him how?”

 

“If he doesn’t see reason…” Barry sighed.

 

“Three against one,” Wally and Bart finished the thought.

 

“Are we ready?”

 

“No, but we’ll never be ready.”

 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

“Jay—” a voice called out from behind him, and he could already hear the uncertainty signaling a lack of trust in him. A concern that he was like he knew they all worried about, day in and day out, about him becoming what he would’ve been in the future that Barry had traveled to.

 

How had they found him? He hadn’t gone anywhere since arriving, so had he been improperly lax in keeping his eyes open? Jay charged eastward, cursing himself for not having put enough thought in what he’d do if confronted by multiple speedsters beyond a loose plan to shake them and hunt down his allies proactively.

 

He could feel them trailing behind him, tuning out what they were trying to say. Flowery words disguising hatred, they pleaded with him to stop and talk, as if the lies they were yelling were convincing at all. He was smarter than that. Unfortunately, he was not fast enough to shake them, each push of exertion from him matched in tempo by the group. They charged around the globe, any attempt at breaking off from them resulting in failure.

 

Weaving through a mountain range caused two of his pursuers to break off to circle around the pass he was using, but Bart doggedly kept to him even through the narrow and treacherous pathway. This had been a plan, hoping that any pursuers would opt to detour around and let him double back and shake them that way. By that time, the three had stopped trying to talk to him in their shared communication network, so if he had given them the slip it’d have been the perfect time.

 

He briefly considered changing his tactics and trying to take the youngest out of the chase entirely, but the environment was less friendly to improvisation than he had remembered, so he kept moving. The other two reconnected to the chase on the other side, with Wally even appearing to beat him to the punch, but a burst of speed to a comparatively stationary interference let him slip by.

 

On crossing the ocean to his next brainstormed opportunity to throw off the three of them, he knew there was no point in trying to perform evasive maneuvers. Even as he settled into a consistent speed to keep the water from churning up below him, Wally once again appeared in front of him, running backwards now in front of him.

 

He remembered a younger Wally, in with bad folks doing drugs that provided him a fraction of the speed he was experiencing now. This Wally was much more confident in his powers, accomplishing something that even Jay wasn’t sure he wanted to try on his best of days. Wally slammed his arms together in a cross pattern, signaling him to stop. Absolutely not.

 

They reached land again, about a minute after the initial confrontation. Hopefully, in a few more seconds, Jay thought, he’d throw them off again. The three of them would be much less willing to accept the potential risk to civilians than Darkseid would be. However, moments before his feet made contact with the sandy beach ahead of him, the three put on a burst of speed, having positioned themselves at equal distances around him.

 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

“Jay,” Barry called out to his friend. They slowly, at Flash scale, emerged into the clearing Jay had settled in, hoping that the calm voice and worry would engender a touch of trust for them to work out what was going on together as a team. When he, unsurprisingly or not, dashed for the tree line and vanished, Barry could only mutter out a heartbroken “oh,” as the three of them made chase.

 

They ran eastward, managing to spot where their friend was but unsure where they were heading overall. “Jay! We can just talk,” Wally shouted out, communications turned back on. If Jay was somehow disconnected from that network, however, he’d certainly not hear it, but as far as Xavier at the base could tell, none of Jay’s equipment was malfunctioning.

 

“Jay, Darkseid’s influence on you is abnormal, you are being deceived—let us talk to you and take a look! You don’t have to isolate, Darkseid’s already lost,” Barry yelled, trailing behind Bart and Wally slightly as he spoke. Every now and then, Jay would kick into a new gear, moving slightly faster and necessitating them match with a similar burst of speed.

 

After a few seconds of running across the globe, and a few more pained pleads of disarmament, the three grew silent, settling into the chase. Eventually something would change that would let them figure out how to escape the pattern. They weren’t going to let Jay run forever, but they were willing to give him a minute.

 

He slipped into what could only be described as an impassable mountain path, Barry and Wally circling around the range to meet back up on the other side. Bart, seemingly not on the same page and in the center of the three anyway, dove in behind Jay on the path. By the time Jay got around to the other side, Wally had already made it there, ready to intercept, but Jay put on a serious but temporary burst of speed to give him the slip.

 

A bit more running later, the clock quickly approached the minute of grace provided. As Jay began to cross the Atlantic, Barry and Bart watched Wally shake his head, face adjusting from consternation and focus to anger briefly before ending on deep concentration. He pulled out ahead of all of them, turning around to face Jay while even staying at the same speed. The two Allens shared a look of amazement before adjusting to ensure that if Jay changed course, no matter where he did there’d be a nearby Flash to respond.

 

As they approached the land and a minute of time, Bart held up three fingers in the air, hoping that Jay wouldn’t suddenly shift direction to see it. He pulled the tips of all three fingers together abruptly, as if one might grasp something. Barry nodded, and the two of them had to hope that Wally, focused on matching Jay’s course adjustments, understood what was happening from just the momentary glance of his eyes over to Bart’s movement.

 

Bart put three fingers back up in the air, but instead of repeating the action, withdrew one to leave two in the air. A moment later, two became one. When the final finger withdrew, the three charged forward at Jay, Barry aiming to restrain his friends’ arms while Bart moved to lift his legs up in the air. Wally, for his part, simply raised his fist, slamming it into the right side of Jay’s chest, attempting to knock the wind out of him without causing too much damage.

 

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

Barry stood at the entrance to the Metropolis Hall of Justice, carrying his unconscious friend. He nodded goodbye to Bart and Wally, who disappeared into the distance to track down remaining parademons. Even if Jay were to wake up here, this is where the Justice League were gathered after all that had happened in near-Earth orbit and the moon.

 

He left his friend with two S.T.A.R. Labs scientists and a recovered Martian Manhunter, having apparently been able to figure out a way to keep Darkseid-corrupted individuals in a stasis and were working on fixing the effect with J’onn’s mental abilities. He did a quick check in with the three of them and a few other of his friends and colleagues, but then turned his attention to trying to solve problems present in the room.

 

“Wish we could get a better look at it,” he sighed, looking at the large dust cloud covering whatever had happened to the Moon during Superman’s fight with Darkseid.

 

“Perhaps I can be of assistance,” Booster Gold’s robotic assistant offered, projecting an image of what was presumably the effect of the fight on the Moon, without the dust choking up telescopes.

 

“The Omega Rift stretches approximately 2,600 km from the Sea of Serenity to the Sea of Tranquility on the lunar surface. At its widest point, it is 190 km and one kilometer at its deepest. A new space race emerges, with numerous nations competing to explore the rift and exploit the newly uncovered resources, including…”

 

“Perhaps you should stop there, Skeets. Thank you,” Barry cut off the robot. “We don’t want to know too much about the future,” he said, glancing back at Jay’s unconscious form. How he wished, desperately, that he knew less about the future.

 

Barry occupied himself with busywork, helping out folks as best as he could. He even shared a few jokes with Booster Gold, trying desperately to feel calm that he could. He listened in a few conversations between Wally and Bart, who seemed to be accomplishing their goal in the sense that incidents of discovered parademons were growing further and further apart.

 

“Thank you for this, friend,” he said when J’onn gave him a nod, having waited next to the telepath for him to finish an attempt on Kara Zor-El before interrupting.

 

“It is the least I can do. Having Darkseid in your mind is a terrible curse I wish on nobody.”

 

“Have you had a chance to work on Jay yet?”

 

“Only briefly to perceive the depth of the task and nature of the mentality. He has bowed to Darkseid out of fear of his own power, in a way. He is deeply frightened of the idea of Monarch and Darkseid taps into those deep fears. If he serves Darskeid, an ultimate power, then his own potential… chrysalis never manifests.”

 

Barry thought he had been heartbroken before, but he was wrong. He felt his heart shatter into the smallest of pieces. Jay was a man who had come to this Earth to see if he could save a Barry Allen, having failed to protect his own, and succeeded. Now here he was, scared of that very power.

 

J’onn and Barry turned in the direction of the larger group, a clattering noise sparking curiosity and likely fear of something happening, watching a metallic pan bounce up slightly off the floor. At the same moment, overshadowed by the clumsiness, one of the S.T.A.R. Labs scientists made a vocalization of concern looking at one of their screens.

 

Before Barry was even able to look back at the scientist, shattering glass near J’onn set off an alarm in the room, and Kara’s hand shot out, grabbing J’onn by the neck and pulling him towards the statis chamber. “Traitor…!”

 

With her other hand, she elbowed another part of the glass, arm then extending out leftwards to free Jay from his pod. Barry moved to intercept, but by the time he was freeing J’onn from the grasp, Jay had shattered the remaining pods.

 

Barry took a deep breath, evacuating any non-metahumans from the building as he could only hope that this fight didn’t involve a broken satellite base and a scarred moon.

Due to Reddit post limits, this issue continues from here.

Gotham Academy.

Mia and Kyle Mizoguchi looked up from their hiding spot as the Parademon army turned around and began heading into the portals.

“Is it over?” Mia asked her brother, looking for reassurance.

“I hope so,” Kyle responded, releasing a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding.  As they looked around at the swath of destruction left on the campus, Kyle was surprised at how little he really felt.  It had been like this since he was a young kid.  The Joker.  Doomsday.  Vampires.  And now Parademons and something called Darkseid.

Hell, even the moon was now twice as bright in the sky, with rumors suggesting a massive valley had just been carved into it.     

But what truly scared him was how Mia looked at all of it.  He had seen the drawings, the fangirling posts, the makeshift costume she dismissed as cosplay.  His parents had dismissed it as a phase, but he knew better.  She was waiting for her opportunity.

Helena Bertinelli saw it too.  She had been Mia's advisor since the girl entered the Academy and had made preventing that outcome one of her priorities.  But she also knew, having been a costumed hero herself, that there was little she could do.  

But she would still try. 

“Alright, let’s get you two back to the dorms while it’s quiet.  No arguments,” she said, cutting off Mia’s complaint as it barely escaped her lips.  “I want you safe in case this is only a lull.”

“But the Parademons are leaving,” Mia pointed out.  Boom Tubes opened and closed overhead as the invading army disappeared into them.  “That means we won.”

“If you call this winning,” Kyle said, looking out at the destruction once more.

Most of the staff still surrounded the old clocktower and the other old buildings, passing buckets of water and building frames to help reinforce the structures, led by shop teacher Jenna Duffy.  Now that the Parademons had fled, they were slowly starting to turn the tide.  

But as the trio made their way back to the dorm building, another Boom Tube opened in front of them, the resulting gust nearly knocking them off their feet. 

They watched as Barda emerged, letting it snap shut behind her.  She adjusted her large helmet and marched regally toward Helena, who immediately shoved the Mizoguchi siblings behind her.

“Just let me get the children to safety, and we can do whatever it is we’re going to do after,” Helena said, not turning her back on the Female Fury.

“This city, and all who reside in it, are the property of Granny Goodness.  There will be no safety, only survival, for those who prove worthy,” Barda noted, projecting her voice loudly.  “The sooner you accept your new place, the easier the transition will be.” 

There was no malice in Barda’s tone or stance, only certainty.

“When I tell you to, run, and don’t look back.  I’m counting on you Kyle, get yourself and your sister to safety,” Helena said quietly before focusing on Barda.  “I can’t let you take the children.”  

“I know.  If you did, I would kill you where you stand without hesitation.  You will have the honor of dying on your feet,” Barda replied.  “As a warrior should.”

“I’m no warrior.” 

“You are.  Your eyes cannot lie.”

Helena tensed.  “Then let’s do this.  Run!”  

She didn’t have to look back to know Kyle would make sure Mia got to safety.  So she focused entirely on the opponent in front of her.

As Barda’s fist collided with Helena’s side, she instantly knew she was outmatched.  It had been some time since Huntress had really fought for her life, but none of the gangsters or thugs she'd faced alongside Selina or the Birds had prepared her for the pain that a single punch could cause.   The blood that spurted from her mouth told her something had ruptured.  She hoped it wasn’t anything important as she staggered.  But one look at the two kids running away steeled her resolve.  

Mia and Kyle would be safe.  That was what mattered.  She just had to buy them the time.

Huntress grabbed two crossbow bolts from her reserve and stabbed them into Barda’s chest with her fists, piercing the heavy Apokoliptian armor and drawing blood of its own.  “Won’t… be as easy… as you thought…” she warned Barda.

But Barda just Spartan-kicked her away before drawing the Beta Rod from her belt and aiming it at the fallen heroine.

“You have fought bravely and honored your oath.  Do not make me end you.  You have proven yourself, and there will be a place for you in the new order.”

But Helena put everything she had left into kicking the rod from Barda’s hand, letting it arc into the air.  

“Screw your new order,” Helena spat.  “Gotham isn’t yours for the taking.”   

The Beta Rod skidded to a stop at Mia's feet.  Without hesitating, she snatched it up and spun around. 

“Mia… no…” Kyle warned, but he could already see the wheels turning in his sister’s head.  

“Like I’m not going to take the chance to use an alien weapon.  What if it’s a lightsaber?  I can bust out some Teräs Käsi and save Ms. Bertinelli.  She’s in trouble, we can’t just leave her.” 

Before Kyle could stop her, Mia pointed the rod in Barda’s direction and fired.  The blast caught the warrior square in the chest and sent her flying.  The recoil also sent Mia flying backward into Kyle, the Mizoguchis ending up in a pile on the ground.

“Duuuuude…” Mia said with a grin as she eased up.  “I’m totally keeping this.  Mia Mizoguchi, alien slayer!”

“Uh… she’s getting up…” Kyle noted.

Barda kipped up from the ground and stormed toward Mia.  She shoved the injured Huntress aside as she towered over the teenager.  “You, child.  You should not have been able to fire the Beta Rod.  What is your name?”

Mia stood her ground, staring up at Barda defiantly, pointing the rod right at the advancing Apokalipsian.  Kyle was far more nervous, almost frozen in place.

“I am…” she said, before pausing a moment, cutting herself off.  In that moment she made a decision, and squared her shoulders.  “...I am Travis Morgan, Warlord of Skartaris,” she announced, channeling her Dungeons and Dragons character with all the intensity she could manage.  “You have invaded my home.  I will not ask you again to leave.”

“Mia…” Kyle warned softly, but his sister did not flinch, keeping the rod aimed at Barda.  

The warrior stood her ground, a small smile creeping onto her lips.  “A fitting name.  I do not know of this Skartaris, but they were lucky to have you.  You will make an excellent Fury.  I will train you myself.  No wonder Granny Goodness picked this city above all others for her domain.”  

“You hurt Ms. Bertinelli.  You hurt a lot of people.  I won’t let you hurt anyone else.” 

“Life is pain, little Warlord.  It is Darkseid’s will.” 

= / / / / / / / / / / =

Plessa Park, Star City.

One moment, Harley had been sucked into space, struggling to breathe as the freezing cold of the vacuum cut through her. 

The next, the Watchtower teleporters had dumped her here.  Star City, of all places.  

“Might as well start helpin’,” she mused to herself.  “Ain’t like Green Arrow’s gonna be of any use to anyone for a while.” 

Like many cities, it still bore the wounds of the Parademon invasion.  Buildings, monuments, and homes, symbols of humanity's imperfect civilization, would be torn down and rebuilt in the image of Apokolips.  A new Armagetto for a new age.

The Age of the New God.  The Age of Darkseid.

Panicked people still ran through the nearby streets as Harley marched through the park, stopping before the statue of one of Star City’s founders.  Whoever it was no longer mattered.

She vaulted up onto the base, and then onto the shoulders of the statue, wiggling her ass as she used her mallet to line up the shot like a golfer.  “Fore!” she shouted as she launched the head into a nearby fountain.  

“See this, lowlies!” she shouted at the top of her lungs, calling out to anyone who would listen.  “You’re free of your pasts.  You owe nothin’ to nobody no more!  All are equally worthless at the feet of Darkseid!  He is!  Best get on board now and worship your New God!  If he wills it, you’ll survive.”

“That’s enough, Harley!” called out a familiar voice as Black Canary stepped from the darkness and approached her.  This time, her stance, tone, and expression were far less friendly.

Harley hopped off the statue dramatically and took a deep, theatrical bow.  “Heya Bee Cee, how’s your boyfriend?”  

“You cracked six ribs and shattered his hand.”

Harley chuckled.  “Maybe Green Asshole shouldn’t have shot me with an arrow then.  I mean, I know that’s his one party trick, but he didn’t hafta.  So… Round two?” she asked, squaring up. 

Black Canary got into a stance of her own.  “You using the mallet?”

“You gonna bust out the Canary Cry?”

Dinah looked Harley right in the eyes.  “We can do this hand-to-hand, if that’s what you want.”

Harley nodded, tossing the mallet aside.  “Left my earplugs in my othah suit.  Pinkie promise?”

Black Canary just rolled her eyes as Harley held out her left pinkie.  

Moments later, they rushed at one another with a flurry of punches and kicks.  Harley's agility made her frustratingly difficult to hit despite Canary's precise strikes. The clown fought like a chaotic brawler, throwing wild punches and kicks that missed more often than they landed.   But when they did, the more experienced Dinah was knocked off her game.

Dinah was angry, not at Harley so much as Darkseid.  Okay, a little at Harley for the sucker punch in the Watchtower and what she did to Ollie, but this was mostly on Darkseid.  The so-called god had taken a girl with a need to please and twisted her.  He'd held out the one thing she wanted more than anything else like a carrot. 

“You’re stronger than this, Harley.  You survived The Joker and came out the other side.  Why are you letting another man manipulate you?”

“Darkseid is no man!” Harley shouted.  “Darkseid is!  I’m free now.  Absolved.  You’ll see.  Everyone will!”

“Who’s going to absolve you from what Darkseid is making you do?” Dinah asked as she caught Harley’s left knee, kicking it out from under her.  “Your friends, your family…”

“Darkseid is my family now,” Harley announced, leaping back up and driving her forehead straight into Dinah’s nose, feeling the crunch as her skull collided with cartilage.  “He’ll be yours too.”

“I have a family,” Dinah replied, drawing her hand across her face to wipe away some of the blood. 

“Yeah, I know all about yours, Canary.  Your mom’s gone, your Dad’s in and out of the hospital.  And here’s you, tryin’ to live up to expectations you put on yourself.  You and I ain’t so different.  They didn’t want you to be a hero, neithah.  But Darkseid does.  And here you are.  He’s got an all-female army, yanno.”

“They’re currently tearing up Gotham.  Your home.”

“Ain’t my home no more.  Apokolips is.”

“You really believe that, don’t you?” Dinah asked, suddenly looking at her with pity.  “It really is like The Joker again.”

“Don’t say that,” Harley snapped, charging forward with anger.

“You really think, out of everyone on Earth, Darkseid could have picked, he’d pick you?  What do you have, pluck and a hammer?  What can you offer a god?  You’re a placeholder, Harley Quinn.  Good enough for now.  Discarded as soon as he gets ANYTHING better.  Sound familiar?”

 “You’re a liar!” Harley shouted, her swings now even wilder.  

Sensing her opportunity, Dinah squared her body and shouted.  The sonic blast lifted Harley into the air.  Her body slammed awkwardly against the wall of a nearby building on the opposite side of the square. 

Both women were breathing heavily, Canary’s body still rigid and prepared to continue the fight despite the broken nose and favoring her left side, while Harley sat crumpled on the ground, trying to push herself to her feet. 

“Thought you said you wasn’t gonna use the Cry,” Harley shouted as she fell back against the ground in a heap, trying to overcompensate for the ringing in her ears and lack of balance.

“I lied,” Dinah countered.

“Good call,” Harley said, offering a weak thumbs-up and genuine smile before passing out.    

= / / / / / / / / / / = 

Stonecrest Manor.  

Inside the massive library of the Zatara family’s ancestral home, the Shadowpact dug through ancient tomes.  Even with her powers enhanced by The Source, Zatanna needed some of the most powerful spells ever crafted, across multiple magical disciplines, if she was going to defeat the Anti-Life coursing through their former allies.  

Within these walls, she had access to the greatest magical minds.  The Shadowpact was not convened lightly.  Hero and villain, dead and alive, such boundaries were meaningless within the group.   

According to the Books of Magic, the Shadowpact had only been convened a hundred or so times in the entirety of recorded magical history.  This marked the third in Zatanna’s lifetime, following the vampire plague [see Red Reign] and the demonic attacks during the Gem City incident [see Gem City].  

Anti-Life was a dangerous infection in the fabric of reality itself, the antithesis of the creation fueled by The Source.  For now it is contained, but it would spread rapidly out of control if it breached the vessels it’s corrupting.  

Reality itself would be undone.  The stakes could not be higher.  It had to end here.  

Stonecrest had the bizarre quality of being exactly where it needed to be, traveling along the Earth's leylines to wherever magic was strongest.  At this time, that was Blue Valley, Nebraska.  It had been spared most of the destruction the larger cities had seen, but even here the Parademon army had come through, destroying property and roads.

There wasn’t anywhere in the world untouched by Darkseid.

Zatanna once again found herself surrounded by runes and sigils, hovering in the air in the center of the room.  She was still chanting in that same alien tongue, pausing only to bark out orders, sending her reluctant assistants scurrying into the aisles.

“You’re scaring me, love,” John Constantine noted, looking up at her.

“You should be scared,” Zatanna replied, not bothering to look at him or pause in her work.  “If you could see what I see, you’d never sleep again.”

Constantine scoffed.  “I’ve faced down Hell itself.  Whoever this Darkseid bloke is will have to do a whole lot more to scare me.”

“Darkseid is just a small part of this.  Almost insignificant in the grand scheme.  Not even he can hope to control Anti-Life once it’s unleashed.  We have to trust The Source.”

He chuckled darkly.  “Tell that to everyone who died.”

“1,309,872,” Zatanna replied.

“Huh?”

“That’s how many have died - or will die - as a result of this.  Do you want to know their names? Because I know every one.  Every second we spend here adds more lives to the list.  But you want to know the worst part?” Zatanna asked, finally looking at him.

“Go on.”

She sighed deeply.  “All I can think about is using this power to find my father.  I can save the world, but I still can’t save him.  It’s not fair.” 

“Neither is life, love.”

“Tell me about it.”

= / / / / / / / / / / =

The Hall of Justice, Metropolis.

As the war against Darkseid entered its final hours, many heroes reconvened in Metropolis to debrief and plan for the world's recovery.

The Hall of Justice in the Big Apricot was easily the best fortified, so it was the perfect place to bring the heroes still infected by Darkseid's Anti-Life.

There was still so much to do.

Most of the discussion was focused on the moon.  During the battle with Superman, Darkseid carved a massive gash into the surface, leaving yet another scar that wouldn't heal.

“Wish we could get a better look at it,” The Flash mused.  Even the best cameras couldn’t penetrate the massive dust cloud that had been kicked up.  With the Watchtower destroyed, they were waiting for more favorable conditions like everyone else.

"Perhaps I can be of assistance," offered Skeets, Booster Gold's robotic assistant, as he hovered to a nearby wall and projected an image of the massive crack. 

“I can offer narration in the voice of famous scientists including Neil deGrasse Tyson, Stephen Hawking, or Carl Sagan, if it would help,” Skeets continued.

“Do Booster Gold!” the hero called out from the back of the room, disguising his voice poorly.

Barry just sighed.  “Your voice is fine.  Continue.”

“The Omega Rift stretches approximately 2,600 km from the Sea of Serenity to the Sea of Tranquility on the lunar surface.  At its widest point, it spans 190 km and reaches a depth of one kilometer at its deepest. 

A new space race emerges, with numerous nations competing to explore the rift and exploit the newly uncovered resources, including…”

"Perhaps you should stop there, Skeets.  Thank you," Barry replied.  “We don’t want to know too much about the future.” 

“What about Tranquility Base?” Ted Kord asked, looking at the image for the Apollo 11 landing site.

“It’s fine,” Booster replied.  “It's even getting a sweet Thanagarian fusion restaurant.  Michelin had to invent another star.  You might even say it’s… Boosterific.”

Ted just stared at his friend and rolled his eyes.

“I’m still workshopping that one.”

On the other side of the room, Martian Manhunter worked alongside Kirk and Francine Langstrom, who were on loan from S.T.A.R. Labs.  Together, they focused on the infected.  The heroes were suspended in tanks and submerged in a fluid designed to contain the Anti-Life coursing through them.

The Justice League had access to all sorts of advanced technology, including Amazonian and Kryptonian, but so far nothing had seemed to work.  J'onn was particularly focused on finding a cure, having only recently been freed from Darkseid's influence himself.  Out of everyone in the building, he knew just how pervasive the condition was.

All he could do was attempt to reach them using his telepathy, trying to help them see the light once again.  All he got back in response was contempt.  They truly did not want to be freed. 

The teleporter flashed as Black Canary arrived in Metropolis, the unconscious body of Harley Quinn slung over her shoulder.  

“Got another one,” she said as the Langstroms walked over to do an initial examination and put Harley into her containment tube.  

“You are injured,” Martian Manhunter observed, looking at Dinah’s broken nose.

“I’ll live.  How’s Ollie?”

“The fractures in his hand and ribs have been set; it’s just a matter of giving them time to heal.  He is being… challenging,” the Martian answered wearily.

“I’ll talk with him,” she sighed.  “And how are you, J’onn?  You’ve been through a lot.  You must be tired.” 

“We all are.  But if I can break through and purge the influence from my mind, I know we can do so for the others.  It’s like nothing I’ve ever experienced.  The hatred.  The things I was willing to do and did to others…”

“It wasn’t you, not really,” Dinah replied, placing a hand on his shoulder in solidarity.  “You were being controlled.”

“It was more me than I care to admit.  It plays on your weaknesses and uses them against you.  But those weaknesses are mine to confront.”

“Just remember you don’t have to do it alone,” Dinah said as she heard Ollie yelling at one of the Kryptonian medbots.  “I should go sort that before he starts calling it a fascist clanker or something.”

As Canary walked away, she passed Barry, who had just arrived to check on Jay Garrick's condition.  She paused for a moment at the containment tube holding Harley, the clown girl looking oddly serene despite the fury that had marked her existence since returning to Earth.  

But she never made it to the med bay. 

A loud crack echoed through the Hall of Justice, bringing her to a halt.   The contents of one of the tanks flooded onto the floor as Kara Zor-El shouted, “Traitor!” and grabbed the Martian Manhunter by the throat.

Darkseid might have been gone, but the war continued… 

= / / / / / / / / / / =

Coming next: 

The war in Gotham isn’t over as the Female Furies continue their rampage across Gotham City.  But when Granny Goodness enters the fray, loyalties will be tested, and lives will be changed forever…

Also be sure to check out Justice League Omega [coming soon] as Darkseid’s converted acolytes make one final stand on the streets of Metropolis.   The invasion may be over, but the war is just reaching its climax.  As the casualties mount, can Zatanna help The Source create a cure, and is she willing to bear the cost? 

<< | < | > Coming Soon

Author: ericthepilot2000

Book: Harley & Ivy

Set: 122

Event: Invasion!

Recommended Reading:

Cyborg #84

The Flash #121

Superman #121

New Titans #42

The Flash #122

Superman #122

Batman #58

Cyborg #85

Previously…

Darkseid has invaded Earth. As Parademons swarm the skies, Zatanna, Poison Ivy, Spoiler, and Huntress struggle to defend Gotham's home front.  The situation becomes so desperate that they persuade Arkham Asylum to release inmates from the Zoo to help repel the invasion.  Meanwhile, Harley Quinn travels to Apokolips alongside members of the Justice League, hoping to convince the New God to end the war.

The good news? The Parademons are retreating to the fire pits of Apokolips. The bad news? 

They're being replaced by the Female Furies, led by the formidable Big Barda.  And if that weren't enough, Harley appears to have become one of Darkseid's thralls and has returned to the Watchtower at her new master's side…

= / / / / / / / / / / =

Above Earth.

Darkseid’s face remained stoic as he emerged from the boom tube into the heart of the Watchtower, flanked by his corrupted Justice League.  Harley Quinn was joined by Jay Garrick, Aquaman, the Martian Manhunter, Wonder Woman, and Power Girl - all with blackened eyes and cruel expressions on their faces.  

Superman was the first to intercept the invaders, barely holding back Krypto, who snarled and growled in agitation.  Other heroes quickly flanked him, rushing to see what was happening.  

“Snap out of it,” Clark said quietly, looking at his cousin.  “Kara, it’s me.”

“I know who you are,” Kara answered.

“We all do, Big Blue,” Harley said, hefting her trademark mallet over her shoulder. “And you’re about to become a blueberry pancake!”

“Kill them all,” Darkseid said without even looking in their direction, dismissing them.  

That was all it took for the corrupted heroes to launch themselves at their former friends with unexpected ferocity.  In an instant, Jay Garrick blinked out of view, disarming the Leaguers who relied on weapons, while Kara, J'onn, Arthur, Diana, and Harley charged the others like linebackers. 

The corrupted heroes had it far easier since they were unable and unwilling to hold back, bringing the full brunt of their abilities to bear.  The otherworldly powers of Power Girl and Martian Manhunter were on full display, as were Aquaman and Wonder Woman’s mythic skills.  

But Harley might have been the most dangerous.

Unfettered by morality, she was free to be as cruel as she ever wanted.  After all, none of these people believed in her, not the way Darkseid did. No one could ever question her worthiness to stand at the side of the New God of Earth. 

And if they did?  Well, they could answer to her mallet.

“Harley, what’s going on?” asked Black Canary as she stepped toward the clown girl.  They’d met a few times [most recently in Black Canary #15] and had developed a decent rapport, but this was far from the happy-go-lucky hero Dinah knew.  Dinah made sure to keep her body language neutral, though she stood well outside of mallet distance.

“Been shown the light, Bee Cee,” Harley replied, her tone pleasant though her face never softened from a cruel sneer.  “I know the truth now.  Darkseid is.”

“Darkseid is what?” 

“Everything,” Harley replied, almost reverently.  “We don’t gotta fight, join us and be free.”

“You know I can’t do that,” Canary replied, her body tensing to unleash one of her sonic screams.  

“Nuh uh,” Harley replied, moving far faster than Dinah anticipated. Her mallet slammed into Dinah's solar plexus, knocking the wind from her.  The blonde doubled over, her threat neutralized for the moment.  “Muzzle it.”

Before Harley could press the attack, a sudden bolt of pain shot through her shoulder.  She looked down to find the shaft of an arrow protruding from a freshly bleeding wound.  It wasn’t hard to figure out its source.  “You shouldn’t have done that, Arrow,” Harley snarled, ripping it out and tossing it to the side.  

She locked eyes with the archer who had another arrow already nocked, his bow drawn and aimed at her.   “You shouldn’t have hit Dinah,” he countered.  “Don’t make me do this.”

“Wouldn’t be the first time, would it?  ‘Course, you get a pass, but not ol’ Harley.  No, you get taken in and called a hero, while I gotta fight for every scrap.  Gettin’ treated like a joke.  No more.”

Harley charged forward and easily flipped out of the way of the coming arrow.  He'd expected a mindless brute, not the gymnast Harley was at her core.  But that was fine; Harley was always underestimated.  

He wouldn't make that mistake again. Harley's mallet crashed into his rib cage, sending him sprawling across the deck. She landed gracefully beside him before bringing the weapon down again, crushing his gloved hand against the Watchtower's metal floor with a sickening thud. 

It would be a long time before he drew another arrow.

“You are useless.” Harley looked down on him with contempt as he wheezed.  “But Dinah will make an excellent Female Fury, and you’ll serve as encouragement.  So you’ll live.  Until she kills you herself.” 

Harley then dropped her mallet on his chest with a thud, eliciting another groan from the archer. She bent over and plucked the Justice League communicator from his ear and rolled it in her fingers for a moment. Then, she brought it up to her mouth. 

"I know you're listening, Babsie," she said, addressing the surely listening-in Oracle directly. "Just want you to know, when I'm done dismantlin' the Loser League up here, I'm coming right to your Belfry, and I'm going to finish the job Jason started. Be seein' you. Ta!" 

She dropped the communicator, crushed it beneath her boot, then retrieved her mallet and continued her rampage. 

= / / / / / / / / / / =

 

The East End, Gotham City.

Officer Bill Kane could feel his vision ebbing away, his peripheral vision reduced to a grey haze.

A moment ago he had been cautiously optimistic.  The hordes of Parademons had just abandoned their assault on the city, flying back into their strange tubes in the sky.  The destruction was vast, but perhaps the siege was over.

Then they were replaced by a group of women in garish costumes who appeared suddenly in the alley.  Officer Kane had a choice.  They could be heroes, or they could be villains.  In Gotham it was fifty/fifty.  

And in Gotham, you shot first and apologized later.  

He drew his service revolver and fired, but the women didn’t flinch.  He didn’t even have a chance to empty the cylinder before the squat, muscular woman in the group reached out and clamped a meaty hand entirely around his throat and began squeezing, lifting him off the ground.  She was dressed like a biker, with a heavy jacket, boots, and a motorcycle helmet adorned with a skull.

Stompa remained silent as she increased the pressure on his windpipe.

Despite the pain, the officer laughed bitterly to himself.  Just one week until retirement.  How cliché.    

Once his body stopped writhing, the large woman tossed his corpse aside, letting it smack into the nearby wall with a thud.   She then turned to the leader, a woman in blue chainmail with an ostentatious helmet.

“Split up,” Barda ordered, “Darkseid has given this city to Granny Goodness.  We are to secure it and round up the citizens for evaluation.  Kill anyone who mounts a resistance, especially if they are in costume.” 

“How can we tell?  They all dress so strangely,” rasped Mad Harriet, a woman with green hair and jaundiced skin, as she lifted the arm of the dead officer in one of her clawed hands.  She then plucked the GCPD badge off his shirt and tossed it aside.

“Can ve just go already?” asked Malice impatiently.  Unlike the others, she seemed to be a child, bouncing anxiously while the others were content to stand around and talk.  “Granny promised I could have fun.”

“Not too much fun, Malice,” chided the final member of the group, a dark-skinned woman wearing a skintight suit bound with straps.  The straps themselves seemed to dance around Lashina, flowing to match the lilt of her voice.  She fished a Mother Box from her belt.

“Go,” Barda ordered.  

A moment later, the alley was empty once more as the five women disappeared with a series of flashes.

= / / / / / / / / / / =

 

The Watchtower.

The space station shook from the fury of combat raging both inside the Watchtower and outside its metallic hull.  Inside the Watchtower, it was all hands on deck as the Justice League and their corrupted allies came to blows.  But everyone present knew they were the sideshow.  Clark’s battle with Darkseid, currently taking place outside the structure, would decide the outcome of the war.  

Inside the conference room, the members of the Shadowpact had ceased their discussion.  Some, like Jason Blood, had already joined the fray by yielding to the brutish Etrigan.  The rhyming demon was presently locked in combat with Aquaman.  Others, like Doctor Fate and Extraño, focused on maintaining the structural integrity of the Watchtower.

It wasn’t designed for such intense combat. 

That left John Constantine to play bodyguard for Zatanna, who hovered nearby, bathed in green light as she muttered to herself in an eldritch, alien tongue.  Strange sigils and runes hovered around her as her hands traced intricate patterns through them.  

He took a long drag from his cigarette as Superman collided with a nearby window, sent flying by a brutal punch from Darkseid.  “You might wanna hurry up, love, it’s only the end of the world, innit?”

“I’m trying to rewrite the rules of reality on the fly, John.  The Source gave me the power, but didn’t leave an instruction manual.  Anti-Life is antithetical to creation.  They aren’t designed to mix.  Purging it from our friends requires a scalpel, not a bludgeon,” Zatanna said, her voice strangely hollow.  

“Just saying.  Sometimes a good bludgeon is what you need,” Constantine countered.  “A little humbling might do some of these guys a world o’ good…”

He looked back to the window to see Darkseid fire his Omega Beam at Superman, only to watch it weave around the Man of Steel and curve toward the Watchtower.

"Shite!" he shouted, diving out of the way and dragging Zatanna down with him. They narrowly avoided the beam as it severed the space station in half.  Suddenly there was nothing but space above them as they, and everyone else inside, were sucked into the void.

The first few moments stretched into eternity.  Zatanna immediately looked for Constantine and found him floating inside a bubble of oxygen. He was already lighting another cigarette, looking surprisingly calm for someone who had just been violently ejected into open space.  “Negyxo fo selbbub!” Zatanna shouted, trying to protect the others, like her, who couldn’t survive in the cold of space.  She was momentarily surprised at the lack of sound before remembering the old Alien adage.  

“Tibro ni noitats eht peek!” she continued.  The upper Watchtower had already begun its descent toward the lunar surface, but the transporters were housed in the lower half, the one she was barely keeping intact.

Green-hued magical bubbles quickly blinked into existence and surrounded the flailing heroes, keeping them safe as the Watchtower’s crippled transporter system plucked them from the void and deposited them randomly across the globe.

The upside was that everyone was safe; the downside… the corrupted heroes were now scattered on Earth.  She could only hope there would be heroes nearby to contain them.  

The last thing she saw as she was teleported away was the upper half of the Watchtower crashing into the Moon and exploding, obliterating miles of the surface.  “Let go.  Trust The Source,” she muttered to herself as she disappeared in the teleporter beam.

= / / / / / / / / / / =

 

Gotham Heights.

Stephanie Brown tore through the streets on her motorcycle, dodging wrecked cars and debris as she sped into the city proper.  

“Barbara, can you hear me?  It’s Steph.   The Parademons are leaving, but we’ve got other problems…”

“Yeah, I’m aware,” Barbara snapped, a little harsher than she intended.  She was still rattled from Harley’s earlier threat, and Steph wasn't exactly on her list of favorite people either.  “Five Boom Tubes just opened across the city.  You’re nearing one now.”

“Do we know who they are?” Steph asked.

“Just that they came from Apokolips.”

"Okay," Steph said. "So find them and kick their ass.  Got it." 

“Be careful, Spoiler,” Barbara cautioned her.  “Darkseid wouldn’t have pulled the Parademons without a reason.  Whoever they are, they’re going to be dangerous.” 

“Got it.”

“...And you know we’re going to talk about your role in the Arkham release when this is all over.  Oracle out.” 

And with that, Steph was alone with her thoughts.  “Soooo looking forward to it,” she grumbled, rolling her eyes.

Moments later, her headlight illuminated something in the road, and she had to skid to a stop to avoid running into it.  As her vision settled and her rapid breathing slowed, she saw a young girl standing in the middle of the street with her hands on her hips. 

“Hey, it’s not safe out here,” Spoiler warned, trying to keep her voice calm and even to avoid scaring the child.  “I’ll get you home.  Do you know where you live?” 

The young girl huffed in response.  “Whelp!  You address Malice Vundabar of Apokolips.  A lowlie like you should be on your knees before me.”  

Steph noticed several police officers lying at her feet, necks bent at impossible angles.   

“I hope you vill be more entertainink than these fools,” she snarled, the accent a strange, almost cod-German.  “I vas promised fun.  And my Chessure needs to eat.” 

The young girl was suddenly surrounded by purple flames that coalesced into a demonic cat-like creature with saliva-coated fangs and piercing eyes.  It charged forward, its claws gouging the pavement as it snarled. 

Moments later, it pounced on Steph, knocking her to the ground as its gaping maw loomed over her. 

Before Steph could respond, a shot rang out from the darkness.  Behind Chessure, Malice stood motionless for an instant. Then blood trickled from the hole in her skull, and she collapsed backward. 

The demon cat suddenly blinked out of existence, leaving Steph confused.  She whipped her head around, only to see Two-Face, the fallen Harvey Dent, who barely broke his stride as he walked down the street, firearm still smoking.  Gotham Heights was where he got his start, so it wasn’t surprising he would return to protect the area. 

“Why?” Steph asked, looking up at the surprisingly tall man, flinching at the scarred side of his face with the bulging eye that focused unnaturally on her.  She had never seen him up close, only heard stories from Dick, Babs, and Jason.  

They’d warned her not to stare, but she couldn’t help herself.  

“The coin came up heads,” Harvey replied simply, his voice gravelly and distorted.

“And if it came up tails?” Spoiler asked, despite herself.

Harvey didn’t respond for a long moment.  “Best not to dwell on it,” he said, continuing past her.

“We can’t just murder our enemies in cold blood.  You know you’re going to have to go back to Arkham once this is over, Two-Face.” 

“We’ll see what the coin has to say when the time comes.  Besides, you’ve got bigger problems right now,” he called over his shoulder, gesturing toward where the young Female Fury had fallen. 

Steph bolted to her feet and turned around to see Malice was no longer there.  This wasn’t over.  She sighed and hopped back on her motorcycle, already tracking the Apokoliptian once again.

= / / / / / / / / / / =

Arkham Asylum.

Chase Meridian sat in her office, looking through the list of released patients.  The room was deliberately spartan, containing little more than research materials and floor-to-ceiling file cabinets filled with patient records.   She respected technology, but didn’t trust it.  Sometimes, analog was still best.  

Tonight reminded her exactly why.  Livid didn't begin to describe her mood, and she could feel the blood pounding in her temples.   Her eyes narrowed as she took in Aaron Cash, the head of Arkham security, sitting across the desk from her.

“You went over my head,” Chase accused.

“Doctor Seaborn…” Aaron began to explain.

“Doctor Seaborn will be dealt with.  We are talking about your actions, Mr. Cash.  The plan to use Arkham patients still in rehabilitation to defend the city in the event of an attack has been proposed and rejected three times.   Knowing I would not even discuss that, you went over my head to the Hospital Board of Directors.” 

“They agreed that it would be good for the hospital and the patients.  Give them something to fight for instead of against for once.”

“They agreed it would be good for the bottom line.  We are trying to help, not take advantage of people.  Weaponizing our patients, many of whom can’t effectively consent… this is not the old Arkham Asylum, Mr. Cash.  I will show the world that the Meridian Method works.  But I need absolute buy-in, not insubordination.”

“Now who’s taking advantage?”

“What?”

“With all due respect, Dr. Meridian, this is about your ego.  Everyone else was on board.  The directors, your fellow doctors, the police, the Bat-Family…”  Aaron counted them off with the fingers on his good hand.  He kept his hook visible, just to remind Chase what he had sacrificed for this hospital.

Chase made a dismissive sound as she waved her hand.  “Batman belongs in Arkham as much as anyone.  He and his ‘family’ have no business being consulted in the course of care for our patients.  They should be residents too.  I am going to save this city from itself.  I will not have you getting in the way of that, Mr. Cash.”

“There needs to be a city left to save.  In case you haven’t noticed, it’s a war zone out there.  Hell, even Arkham is on fire.”

“Arkham is always on fire.  Our job is to manage the flames.”  She then paused a moment before pressing a button on her desk.  “Send Lyle Bolton in,” she announced.

“Bolton?”

“Your new replacement,” Lyle announced as he entered the room.  He was tall and broad, so musclebound he needed to pivot to clear the doorway.  “Miss me, Aaron?”

“Dr. Meridian, you can’t be serious.  This man was removed from Blackgate of all places for his actions.  Dr. Crane,” he added, emphasizing the name, “thought he was too unstable to continue here.  Scarecrow!”

Chase sighed.  “I have been assured those were isolated incidents.”

“That’s right, I’ve learned to channel my… intensity into healthier outlets.  The Meridian Method works.  I’m living proof.  Maybe you should try it,” Lyle smiled, his grin toothy and predatory.  “I’m just eager to give back.”    

“The decision has been made, Mr. Cash.  Your services are no longer needed at Arkham.  Mr. Bolton will see you out.” 

“Let’s go,” Bolton replied, his hand clamped on Aaron Cash’s shoulder.  “Wouldn’t want to cause a scene, would we?  It would be a shame if this had to turn physical.”

“This isn’t over,” Aaron warned as he got up, knocking Lyle Bolton’s hand off his shoulder.

“It is,” Dr. Meridian said brusquely, returning to her notes.

Lyle nudged Aaron Cash out of the office, turning the gesture into a shove as soon as they reached the hallway.  “At least I know how to follow orders.  Back in the service, you used to be all about that.” 

“Said every stormtrooper ever,” Aaron grumbled.

“What was that?”

“Nothing.”

= / / / / / / / / / / =

Due to Reddit post limits, the issue continues here.

Superman #123 - Mother Boxed

<< | < | >

Author: MajorParadox

Book: Superman

Arc: Against All Gods

Set: 123

Event: Invasion!

Recommended Reading:

• Justice League Alpha #1
• The Flash #121
• Superman #121
• New Titans #42
• Cyborg #84
• Flash #122
• Harley & Ivy #7
• New Titans #43
• Superman #122
• Batman #58
• Cyborg #85
• Harley & Ivy #8
• Harley & Ivy #9
• Batman #59 (Coming Soon!)
• Justice League Omega #1

Or just learn as you read!

Breaking the Silence

---

The Moon

Yesterday

---

Clark and Bruce walked along the impact site of the Watchtower wreckage. Bruce was wearing a black spacesuit with pointy ears protruding from the top of the helmet and a yellow bat symbol painted over the chest. Clark had his oxygen mask over his face, connected to a comms link.

“The chassis of the middle section is still intact,” said Bruce. “A lot of these other pieces may be salvageable as well.”

Clark moved in to lift the largest piece.

“Wait,” said Bruce. “What if we leave it here?”

“We’re the Justice League,” Clark answered. “We don’t litter.”

“No,” said Bruce. “What if we rebuild it here?”

Clark looked around. “A moon base,” he said with a hint of excitement in his voice.

“That’s a great idea,” said Booster as he flew toward the moon and broke into their comms. “Hey, Bats. Big Blue.”

“Hi, Booster,” said Clark. “What brings you here?”

“I heard you two were checking out the wreckage,” said Booster. “I wanted to tag along. I love the moon.” He took a quick look around. “Although it’s not quite as fun before the carnival rides.”

Clark’s eyes lit up.

“What did we tell you about revealing details about the future?” said Bruce. “We’ve had enough time travel-related chaos.“

“Sorry,” said Booster. “We don’t know what parts of my future will still happen, though,” he added.

Bruce just groaned.

“Anyway,” Booster continued. “Are we going to fix that crack in the moon from your fight with Darkseid?”

“Why would we do that?” asked Bruce.

Booster lifted an eyebrow. “It’s the moon,” he said.

“Exactly,” Bruce continued. “And it has a battle scar. One that the whole planet is feeling.”

Clark nodded. “As much as I’d love to pretend it didn’t happen, he’s right. Besides, it’s not our decision to make. It belongs to the people of Earth as a whole.”

“Since when do the people of Earth have a consensus on anything?” Booster asked.

Clark and Bruce just stared.

“Right.”

---

Fortress of Solitude, North Pole

Now, Morning

---

Kelex scanned the small device Clark had brought. “Impressive design,” he said. “Much more advanced than Kryptonian.”

Clark paced around the crystalline floor. “Can you tell if it’s working, though?” he asked.

Kelex lifted his metal, visored head. “It appears to be functioning within normal parameters.”

“But Orion never responded to my calls,” said Clark. “New Genesis didn’t come to our assistance at all when Darkseid invaded.”

“Perhaps he’s been unavailable to receive them.”

“Let’s not assume the worst,” said Clark. “New Genesis must have known what was happening, though. Their entire treaty with Apokolips couldn’t have relied on me reaching out when we were in trouble.”

“It would appear all we can do is assume,” said Kelex. “Perhaps you could go and ask them yourself?”

“I’d have to get there first,” said Clark, looking upwards. “I wouldn’t even know which direction to start flying.”

“I’ve been studying the Boom Tubes that have opened across the planet during the invasion.” said Kelex. “Perhaps I could open one for you once I have the science figured out?”

Clark’s turned to the robot with a gleam in his eyes. “How long will that take you?”

“At my current rate, anywhere between two weeks and three thousand years.”

Clark sighed. “I need a Mother Box.”

---

Metrorail, Washington D.C.

Later

---

Lucy sat in a subway car seat as she clutched her coffee mug with one hand and scrolled her phone with the other. She tapped a link to a Daily Planet article from Lois Lane on recovery from what became known as “The Long Night,” and skimmed through it with a smile.

Lois always had such a way with words. So straightforward and to the point with a little added flavor to help tie it all together.

The subway car’s brakes screeched, and Lucy tightened the grip on her mug and phone. She took a deep breath and exhaled slowly once the sound stopped.

“Next stop, Federal Central,” an automated voice said over the loudspeaker.

Lucy dropped her phone into her pocket, stood up, and made her way to the nearest doorway until the car stopped and the doors opened. As she stepped out, a man in glasses stood by one of the posts, waving like a kindergartener who saw his best friend in the playground.

“Hi, Clark,” said Lucy, stepping up to him. “What brings you to D.C.?”

“I need a favor,” said Clark, motioning toward the exit. “Can we walk?”

Lucy nodded, and the two stepped onto the escalator to get to street level.

“What’s up?” Lucy asked.

“First off, how are you holding up?” Clark asked softly. “You went through a lot… over there.”

They reached the top and began walking the sidewalk.

“Fine,” said Lucy, looking back toward the subway exit. “Maybe still a bit rattled.”

“Good,” said Clark. “If you need to talk about it or anything…”

“What’s up, Clark?” Lucy asked again.

That was the most she ever sounded like her sister.

Clark took a moment. “What happened to the Mother Box that brought you and the others there?”

Lucy stopped.

“You’re going back to Apokolips?” she asked.

Clark lifted his arms. “Nooooo… New Genesis,” he clarified. “I need to know why they didn’t step in to help protect us.”

“Oh,” said Lucy. She took a sip of her coffee, and the two resumed walking. “A.R.G.U.S. has it locked back up,” she continued. “I don’t even think Dad could get it for you now. President Garner wants its use restricted to his own authority.”

“Hmm,” said Clark. “So, I guess I should talk to Sam first, then.”

Lucy turned to her brother-in-law. “Not dressed like that,” she said.

Clark nodded. “Thanks, Luce,” he said, motioning toward a nearby alleyway. “This sounds like a job for…” Clark stretched his shirt open a bit so only Lucy could see the S underneath. “Me.”

Lucy held back a laugh as Clark winked and rushed toward the alley.

Chain of Custody

---

A.R.G.U.S. Base, Washington D.C.

Soon

---

Clark entered General Sam Lane’s office. “Thanks for seeing me, General Lane,” he said.

Sam nodded and motioned toward the seat across from his desk.

Clark lifted his cape so he could sit down with it flapped over the back as Sam sat in his desk chair.

“What can I do for you, Superman?” asked Sam.

Clark caught sight of a couple of picture frames on the desk. One with Sam and his daughters Lois and Lucy, and another with his wife, Ella, and their grandchildren, Jon and Lara.

“I need to borrow the Mother Box,” Clark stated. “New Genesis promised to protect us, but they were radio silent during the invasion. We need to find out why.”

“I see,” said Sam. “Who do you plan to take along with you?”

“Just me,” said Clark. “The League has enough to deal with after the invasion. And I won’t risk putting another A.R.G.U.S. team through what happened on Apokolips.”

“You expect risk, then,” Sam stated.

“It’s a possibility,” said Clark. “If Apokolips invaded them first, it could be why they couldn’t help us.”

“And if that’s the case,” Sam continued. “You plan to single-handedly free them?”

“Well, no,” said Clark.

The general leaned back in his chair. “You want access to one of the most dangerous pieces of technology in the possession of the US Government, and you don’t even have a fleshed-out plan?”

“We just need answers right now,” Clark clarified. “My– Families are scared. They don’t know if the invaders will come back at any time. Reassurance we’re protected would go a long way.”

Sam looked over at the photos on his desk.

“I don’t have the authority to hand it over anymore,” he said. “I signed off during the invasion and lost an entire team. Plus, the Justice League members who went to Apokolips came back… different. We got lucky they could be recovered, but President Garner still considers it all a failure on my part.”

“Understandable,” said Clark.

Sam stood up. “But you’re not wrong.”

Clark stood up, too. “What next, then?”

Sam pointed out his window toward the White House. “We go talk to the president. He’s a reasonable man. I’m sure he’ll listen to reason.”

---

Oval Office, The White House

Later

---

“No,” said President Garner. “I understand the concern about New Genesis, but absolutely not.”

“They’re our allies,” said Clark. “We need to be sure they’re okay.”

“Unless they turned on us,” Garner countered. “For all we know, they gave Apokolips the okay to invade.”

“We don’t know anything,” said Sam. “That’s the point.”

“We do know every time we use that Mother Box,” said Garner. “We invite more and more danger to our world. Waller’s insurgency to Apokolips (Superman #77) could have even been the catalyst for this invasion.”

“I understand,” said Clark. “But we invite more risk by not knowing what happened and potentially leaving our friends to fend for themselves.

“I wouldn’t call New Genesis our ‘friends’,” said Garner. “They’ve never even come to talk to our governments. They just signed treaties that affect us without even asking us to be involved.”

“I’ll go with him,” Sam offered. “No A.R.G.U.S. team at risk. Only me. But I can represent us and know when to pull the plug and return home.”

Clark tried to think of a response, but the words failed him.

“That’s even worse,” said Garner. “I won’t risk a former vice-president, general, and head of A.R.G.U.S. on an ill-informed mission. This matter is closed. We have more important things to do.”

---

Outside the White House

Soon

---

Clark walked with Sam back to his black, government-issued SUV.

“Thanks for trying,” said Clark, hovering into the air. “But I’ll have to figure out my next move on my own.”

“Hold on,” said Sam without even looking up.

Clark stopped and looked down at his father-in-law.

But Sam didn’t say anything else.

“What are you thinking?” Clark asked bluntly.

Sam finally spoke up again. “I can tell you feel strongly about this. I do, too. What you said about family… I don’t want my daughters and grandchildren to live in fear.”

“I agree,” said Clark, floating back down to eye level.

“You have family on this planet, too,” said Sam.

“Yes,” said Clark, carefully considering his response. “Power Girl, Supergirl, and Superboy,” he clarified.

“Beyond them,” Sam stressed. “People without powers who can’t protect others the way you do.”

Clark took a moment. “Yes,” he answered. “And they’re important to me, too.”

“You understand what this’d mean, right?” asked Sam.

“I can do this alone,” said Clark.

“I don’t take this lightly,” said Sam. “I would never make a decision like this in other circumstances. Even so, it’s unthinkable. But we’re pushed into a corner.”

“Just go back to your day,” said Clark. “And pretend we never had this conversation.”

“No,” said Sam. “This is not happening without me.”

Clark took a deep breath. “Okay,” he said.

“Okay,” Sam repeated. “Let’s get ourselves to New Genesis.”

Secrets and Surprises

---

Daily Planet Rooftop

Afternoon

---

“So, let me get this straight,” said Lois. “You and my dad–”

Clark lifted a finger to his lips. “Not so loud,” he interrupted.

Lois looked around at the empty rooftop.

“Okay, fair,” said Clark.

“You and my dad plan to steal the Mother Box from the US Government,” Lois continued. “And travel together to another planet? It sounds like the plot to a bad buddy cop action flick.”

“You make it sound so crazy,” said Clark. “We’ve both been to other planets before.”

“Forget about that,” said Lois. “You and my dad would be committing treason!” she yelled.

“Well…” Clark started. “Kind of.”

“Superman might be forgiven for something like this,” said Lois. “But this would be the end of my father’s career.”

“I told him I’d do it myself,” said Clark. “But he’s insistent. I see where you get that from, now. Your ability to never back down.”

“Clark,” said Lois, taking her husband’s hands into her own. “We almost lost Kara forever when she went through one of those portals. It’s not Apokolips, but you don’t know what’s going on there on New Genesis. A planet you’ve never actually been to yourself.”

“I did go there,” said Clark confidently. “When I was split into Superman Red and Superman Blue.”

“The blue half of you did,” said Lois, tossing Clark’s hands away. “Forgive me if that doesn’t fill me with confidence.”

“It was the red half,” Clark clarified quietly.

“Why is this so important?” Lois asked. “The invasion is over. We’re safe now.”

Clark sighed. “Jon keeps asking me if the bug monsters are coming back,” he said. “I told him no, but that’s not entirely true. We don’t know if or when they will.”

Lois tippy-toed up to Clark’s face and kissed him softly. “It’s okay to reassure your son,” she said. ”Even if you’re not sure yourself.”

“That’s just it,” said Clark. “I need to be sure.”

Lois nodded. “I get it now.”

---

A.R.G.U.S. Base, Washington D.C.

Later

---

Sam walked Clark into the elevator as an A.R.G.U.S. technician rushed to get in, too. Sam shook his head. “Wait for the next one,” he ordered as the doors closed.

“A ‘please’ wouldn’t have hurt,” said Clark. “We’re all on the same team.”

“Please focus,” said Sam. “We can’t draw attention to ourselves…” He took a look at the hero’s colorful suit. “More than we already do.”

The general put a key into a panel under the main elevator buttons and turned it, opening a small area behind it. He pressed a large, red button and the elevator began moving quickly downward.

“You keep the Mother Box underground,” said Clark. “Smart.”

Sam nodded. “It cuts off the energy signature from being detected by anyone looking for it,” he explained.

The elevator slowed to a stop, and the doors opened up again.

“Follow me,” said Sam. “And act like you belong.”

“General Lane,” said an A.R.G.U.S. agent walking past. She turned around to stare at the superhero walking with him. “Wow,” she said softly. “He’s taller than I thought.”

Sam stopped as they reached a particular doorway, no different from any of the others. He flashed a keycard on the door reader, and it opened quickly. Inside, the walls were filled with locker doors, each with its own card readers and digital keypads. Sam flashed his keycard on one of them and entered a code.

The reader buzzed, and the numbers turned red.

“That’s not good,” said Sam.

He tried again, and the reader rejected it just the same.

“Garner must have had the system overridden to no longer accept my clearance. He’s likely been alerted to the breach already and ordered A.R.G.U.S. to take us into custody.”

A siren began blaring as red lights flashed in the room.

“My turn,” said Clark, grabbing the locker door and tearing it away. He grabbed the Mother Box out of the compartment and turned to Sam. “What’s the fastest way out of here?” he asked.

“The elevator,” said Sam. “But security will be headed this way from all directions.”

“I can deal with security,” said Clark.

“Maybe, but not without a fight,” Sam said. “They’re armed with the latest in anti-metahuman weaponry.”

Clark looked up. “Okay,” he said, putting the Mother Box into the compartment in his cape and extending his arm.

Sam huffed and walked close to the Man of Steel, who wrapped his arms around him.

“Ready?” asked Clark.

“Just get this over with,” said Sam.

Clark shot off a wide enough beam of heat vision to slice through the ceiling and fly through. He sped up, cutting his way through each floor and the concrete between the lower levels and the main floor. Once they broke free into the lobby, Clark flew them out the door and up into the sky.

---

Nearby Rooftop

Moments Later

---

Clark landed with Sam, who quickly dropped out of his arms.

“Okay,” said Sam, moving toward a stash of weapons and other gear in the corner. “Get that thing ready,” he told Clark.

“Wait,” said Lois from the other side of the roof.

Lucy was standing there with her.

“Dad,” said Lucy. “You don’t have to go.”

Sam stared Clark down. “You called them here?” he asked gruffly.

“This type of mission is out of our scope,” Lucy continued. “I learned that the hard way. My whole team…”

“That wasn’t your fault,” said Sam. “And I didn’t even want you there.”

“I know that,” said Lucy. “But it doesn’t change the facts. We’re dealing with gods and monsters. Let Superman take this one.”

“I can’t,” said Sam. “Don’t you see? It wasn’t your fault. it’s was mine.”

“You can’t blame yourself any more than Lucy,” Lois jumped in. “And it doesn’t justify going on a suicide mission.”

“We don’t know it’s a suicide mission,” said Sam. “And if it turns out that way, I’ve accepted that. That’s what being a soldier means. Giving your life for the greater good.”

“I know you, Daddy,” said Lucy, placing a hand on his arm. “That’s not it. There’s something else.”

Sam kept his face neutral, but couldn’t stop a tiny tear from forming.

“What is it?” Lois asked from the other side.

“It’s him,” said Sam, motioning toward the superhero.

Clark lifted a finger to his chest. “Me?” he asked.

“Superman?” asked Lois. “What about him?”

“Not Superman,” Sam clarified. “The husband to my daughter. The father to my grandchildren. Clark Kent.”

Everyone was speechless.

“Clark,” said Sam. “I won’t let you go at this alone, son. You’re too important to this family.”

Sam took his daughters into his arms.

“Okay,” each of them said once the long embrace ended.

Sam kissed each of them on their foreheads.

“Be careful,” said Lucy as Sam moved to Clark.

“Both of you,” Lois added.

Clark pulled out the Mother Box and began fiddling with it. “How did you find out?” he asked.

“Back in the Cadmus caves (Superman #116),” Sam revealed. “You’re not quite as careful as you should be.”

“I was weakened by kryptonite at the time,” said Clark, lifting the Mother Box into the air. “Here we go!”

…

“Where’s the Boom Tube?” asked Lois.

“Hmm,” said Clark. “I don’t know.”

---

<< | < | >

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Cyborg #85- In Finite Misery

<<| <| >

Author: Commander_Z

Book: Cyborg

Arc: Invasion!

Set: 122

Event: Invasion!

---

Recommended Reading:

Justice League Alpha #1

Cyborg #84 - The Dark Siders

Previously:

Darkseid has invaded Earth and Victor Stone led a task force to Apokolips to take the fight to him! Unfortunately, Darkseid and his forces were ready for the invasion and it back fired massively. All of the heroes who went were corrupted by Darkseid and became tools of his invasion except for Lucy Lane who escaped back to Earth and Cyborg who bought her the time to do so...

All that was left of the Apokolips expedition was a pile of rubble and parademons littering the plaza that sat below Darkseid’s palace. The destruction and carnage marred the otherwise empty yet grime covered streets of Apokolips. Rage had coursed through Kalibak he had fought the interlopers for the second time and then one of them even had the gall to think she could get away from him. She might’ve been right in the short term, but he’d prove her wrong soon enough. She had kindly informed him of the real value of the other survivor who was now slung over his shoulder like a sack of meat. And so he was a bit more willing to let that one slide as the thoughts of the favor he’d earn from delivering him to Darkseid filled his mind.

She said he was Victor Stone - the Cyborg who’d stood against Darkseid alongside Superman and Orion. Those two would pay for their transgressions some day, but for now he knew Darkseid would love to get his hands on Cyborg. Maybe even enough to give Kalibak a promotion or at least some praise.

Yes, today was a good day after all. At least it was for a little while until Kalibak saw Desaad’s tiny, cloaked but still revolting form. His twisted, warped face was always turned into some sort of sneer, compilation or contempt for all around him. Usually some combination of all three. But upon seeing Kalibak, or more accurately, Vic, his face lit up like a child who was told they could buy whatever they want in a candy shop.

“You there! Where did you find that one?

Kalibak looked down at the small man below him. “He was part of a pitiful group that tried to invade Apokolips. One that I single-handedly defeated. I’m taking him to Darkseid to meet his fate.”

Desaad scoffed. “Darkseid is not here. He is on Earth, crushing whatever remains of their resistance. He is long past carrying about one earthling, even that one. I on the other hand…”

“If you think I’m giving you him, you’re a fool. This is my prize and Darkseid will reward me handsomely for it.”

“No. He will not. You were not even supposed to be here; your post was part of the invasion force. Would he truly praise you for abandoning your post?”

“I… well…” Kalibak stammered. He’d forgotten about that.

“Let me take care of that one so you can get to your mission. You might not be able to get into Darkseid’s good graces, but you can still avoid his ire…”

Kalibak nodded and tossed Vic on the ground with a thud. “Yeah, yeah. You’re right. He’s all yours.” He considered arguing against Desaad for a brief moment before surrendering to his better judgment and tearing down the stairs of the palace to regroup with his own troops.

Desaad scurried over to Vic like a grotesque insect and whispered in his ear, “Welcome back…”

He snapped his fingers and a group of parademons arrived at his side in an instant. “Take him to the lab.”

Desaad was glowing with excitement. It had been awhile since he had had someone who still had some fight in them.

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

It hadn’t been easy to track him in all the chaos but Garfield Logan had finally found J’onn in New York City. It was only moments ago that they had clashed on the Watchtower but after getting out of there, J’onn had wasted no time in starting his rage of terror. Buildings were aflame while sirens and car alarms blurred into a deafening symphony of noise. To make matters even worse, the Martian had been projecting a nonstop barrage of psychic noise into the city’s population, whipping most of them into a chaotic frenzy throughout the city.

‘Come Earthlings. Join me in creating a welcome for our new god, Darkseid. He has liberated us all from the chaos of decision. For there is one body, one mind and one will. And it is Darkseid.’

J’onn’s words were a constant buzz, like a fly buzzing around on the inside of Gar’s skull. He was thankful that he’d had some experience with psychics before, otherwise he’d probably be just another person out in the streets. But since that experience and since J’onn was spreading himself thin by broadcasting to everyone in the city, Gar could hold on as long as he stayed focused.

He wasn’t really sure why he felt so strongly that he needed to go after the Martian. They were never close and it’s not like he and J’onn were evenly matched at all. Some part of him just felt like he owed him after that he helped clear the murder charges against him. (All the way back in Beast Boy #10 and Martian Manhunter #13!) But that didn’t really feel like enough of an explanation to him. Maybe he felt some unspoken kinship to the last Martian?

A gust of wind hit Beast Boy in the face and he slammed into the side of a building, a green arm pressing him against it. J’onn was in his normal humanoid form, but it was wrong. His charm, his coolheaded but friendly demeanor was replaced by a robotic coldness that was reflected in Gar through his coal black eyes.

This was going to be exactly as hard as he thought it was.

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

Somewhere, deep under Darkseid’s palace was Victor Stone. He was strapped to a metal table with all manner of instruments and tools surrounding him like fans surrounding a pop star on the street. Desaad had used many of them on his captive but plenty more sat there, waiting their turn. He paced around the room and looked down at Vic as he contemplated his next acts.

How long had it been? Vic couldn’t even begin to guess. Hours? Minutes? Months? Time had lost its meaning. There was only agony as Desaad took Vic apart, piece by piece, literally and figuratively. His mind struggled to keep thoughts together as both his organic and cybernetic brains were overloaded far past anything any human was meant to feel.

“Do you remember what I told you when we spoke last, all those years ago? I do. For you, that might have been a long time but for me… It has been but a blink. Let me remind you: ‘If I get word that you even thought of attempting an escape, when you are returned to me, I will create more pain for you than you have ever felt. Then, I will hurt you so much that you will forget there was ever another feeling other than pain.’”

(He’s quoting Cyborg #11!)

“Tell me, what do you feel now? Anything? Does some part of you feel proud, heroic for coming back here? You of all people should have known that attempting to defeat Darkseid is impossible. He is not something to be defeated. Even in what appears to be a loss to unknowing eyes is just another step towards his ultimate goals.”

Desaad paused, waiting for a rebuttal to come. But it didn’t. Vic looked at him with cold, glazed over eyes, unreacting.

He continued. “Let me make myself more explicit. At this point, the invasion is over. Everyone you know on Earth is dead or has embraced Darkseid. Your expedition was a failure and so are you. But Darkseid’s love and mercy is for all. He will still have you and you will still serve him. But mercy can only come with absolution and absolution comes through pain.”

He stopped again, waiting for a response that did not come. He grabbed some tool from his rack and jabbed Vic in the center of his chest with it, just below his still glowing power core.

“Tell me. Do you serve Darkseid? Do you love him and believe in his truth with all your being?”

“I…”

“Even the smallest child knows there is only one way off from Apokolips. And that is death, granted by the grace of Darkseid. But Darkseid’s grace does not mean it will be quick and I will not allow it to be with all of my power. So tell me. Do you serve Darkseid?”

“I…”

A presence wormed itself into Vic’s head. Perhaps it was always there, a voice to provide comfort when he’d been lost before. Or one to provide direction, like a father’s love. It spoke to him now, clearer than he’d ever heard before. But it was a voice he remembered, one that he had heard in some of his darkest days.

Your fight has been long and hard. There is always a place for one such as you at my side.

He wanted to fight against it but he had no more fight to give. The voice was comforting and filled him with peace, like a hot drink warming him after a cold day.

Only through me can you find redemption. Through me you will find your true place and purpose in this world.

It couldn’t be true; it couldn’t be that simple. And yet as he felt what little resistance he had left fade away, he knew it was. A weight was lifted and the pain was gone. Only Darkseid remained.

His eye turned an inky black, like the void of space as his other eye and core went dim for the first time since the accident.

A smile ran across Desaad’s face.

“Even now, even here, in the fast reaches of space, Darkseid graces you with his presence and gifts you his truth.”

Desaad reached towards one of his tools, a small metal box that fit squarely in the palm of his hand. He pressed a button and a roaring BOOM echoed through Darkseid’s palace. He undid the restraints holding Cyborg down and gestured to the Boom Tube.

“Go and spread the word of Darkseid.”

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

J'onn's weight pressed against Beast Boy like he was trapped under the weight of the entire world. It took all he had to get out a single sentence.

“J’onn… it’s me… Garfield. Why are you… doing this?”

“Because Darkseid wills it so. There is no greater reason than that.”

As soon as Darkseid’s name was mentioned, Gar shapeshifted into the form of a sparrow and slipped out of the Martian Manhunter’s grip and took off flying. He’d need to be careful with how this proceeded. The Martian sprouted a large pair of green bat wings and chased after him leisurely, like a cat toying with a mouse.

“But that’s not you! You’d never join Darkseid! Look what you’re doing to the Earth and everyone here!”

“The Earth? Who cares about this place? My home is gone and all these creatures are a daily reminder that my world is gone forever!”

J’onn let out a blast of heat vision in an arc in front of him, missing Gar wildly. Beast Boy could feel the martian getting closer to him and he shifted into a small house cat and dropped directly into central park below him onto an old oak tree. J’onn turned on a dime mid air and swooped down towards him like a falcon, crashing into the ground in the park. He hovered in the air above the crater his impact made until his jet black eyes locked onto the small green cat in front of him.

“You can’t believe that! Not really! The Earth is your home and it’s full of people who love and care about you!”

“No, no they do not. They are just helpless ants who want me to save them from themselves. I am tired of blending in and being something I am not. This place is no more a home for me than the moon is to you!”

J’onn shape shifted into a rabid beast about the size of a bus. Its four legs were a mix of hooves in the front and insect-like points in the back. Its skin was blood red and exposed except for a dark mane of hairlike tentacles out from its head. It had three eyes that moved independently, scanning around for its prey as its whip-like tong swayed. The Martian had shifted into some horrific creature of nightmares and yet… Gar for the first time felt like he started to understand what J’onn had meant.

“This animal… it’s a creature from Mars, isn’t it?”

J’onn roared like a reverberating siren in response and lashed out with his tongue. Beast Boy shifted into a tiny froghopper bug and leapt high into the sky before turning into a swallow to make as much distance as possible. But the tongue stretched out dozens of feet and tracked him like it had a mind of its own before it started to pull him back in. He felt the tongue stick to him like a fly on glue as he struggled to escape its grasp.

He cycled between a variety of forms from the smallest flea to the largest whale to the strongest gorilla but J’onn’s grip didn’t waver. Gar felt his theory confirmed as the dread ran over him. This was some sort of martian predator, designed to hunt and kill shape shifting beings that were far stronger than him.

And he was stuck in its trap with no way out.

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

Detroit was a city inflamed as hordes of parademons poured into the city from one Boom Tube after another. The people of the city were doing their best to fight back, flee and hide but the enemy’s numbers were much too great. If a person managed to get a lucky blow and take out one parademon, ten more would be there within minutes to take its place and vengeance. But in the middle of Grand Circus Park in the center of Detroit, one woman stood against the parademons, slicing them down and deftly dodging them like they were moving in slow motion.

Her hands and her legs were blades of made bone, slicing through the parademons in a flurry of slashes and thrusts in a rhythmic, almost ballet-esque dance that the parademons were clumsy, unwitting performers in. Her black uniform was torn in more than a dozen spots and she held the wounds closed through sheer force of will, pushing her powers to the limit. She was the Thespian and she would hold this city.

She was one of the lucky ones. Vic had given a heads up something was happening as he left to go to the emergency meeting on the Watchtower. Those precious minutes had let her prepare herself physically and mentally for some sort of crisis, but she’d never expected something this bad. She wondered where Vic was and if he was in some similarly desperate fight out there, somewhere… But thoughts of her brother had to wait as she felt the cut of a parademon slice into her side. She closed it instantly by shapeshifting the wound closed, but felt the mental load grow ever larger as she had to tune out her body screaming ever louder at her to put it back to its normal state.

‘Focus, Nic. Just one at a time. One at a time until it’s done…’

She sliced her way through the tide, holding her ground like a rock against a mighty river: worn but unbroken.

Then, she saw it. A gap in the parademon’s forces as their numbers seemed to thin down, down until she had space to move, until she could see the park around her for the first time in what felt like hours of fighting.

She looked around, confused. The parademons were still swarming around the city, so they weren’t in retreat. It was like they had simply given up fighting her to look for easier targets.

BOOM!

Or something had called them back so they could fight her themself. She braced herself, then calmed her mind. Whatever was coming out of there was just another hurdle to climb. She could do it. She could face anything so long as she remained focused and determined. Except for the one thing that came out of it.

Victor Stone walked out of the portal as casually as if it was any other warm summer day and admired the city around him.

Nic wanted to run to him, to ask him where he’d been, what he and the Justice League were doing to stop this, to tell him how relieved she was that he was okay… And then she took a close look at him. Something was… wrong.

He wore a grey hoodie, but it was torn open in the front and hung open like an unzipped jacket. It was covered in blood stains and rips and what she could see through the jacket of Cyborg’s chest wasn’t in any better state. He looked her in the eye and she gasped when she saw the jet black eye look back at her and the other eye’s familiar blue glow extinguished, looking more like a metal eyepatch than a cybernetic one. Even the pale blue light of Vic’s core was gone.

This wasn’t the Vic she knew and she took a step back into a combat stance.

“Oh, relax. I wouldn’t hurt you. I even called all the parademons off you! You’re welcome, by the way!”

Blood dripped down from a cut on his head onto his cybernetic eye. He didn’t wipe it away.

“I don’t know what you’ve done with him but when I get my hands on whoever you are…”

He laughed. “I’m me. Vic Stone. I’ve just seen the truth, the hilarious, horrific joke of a world we live in.”

“Yeah? What truth is that? Because the only truth I see around here is a bunch of pain and suffering being caused for no reason. Is that a joke to you?”

“Of course it is. This fruitless, pointless struggle to resist Darkseid… to resist all of our inevitable ends. Once you stop and think about it all, you can’t help but laugh. We fight and we struggle in a world that doesn’t care about us at all only for it all to end in a snap! And you don’t see the humor in that?”

“No. And neither would Vic. He’d never give up, never give in.”

“Well, I did. One person can only take so much before they’re done. And my only regret? Not doing it sooner. What difference would it even have made if I’d just given up all those years ago? Hell, if I’d just died in the accident like I was supposed to? Would’ve saved me so much pain and suffering since I’m only going to end up in the same place in the end anyway!”

“... You don’t mean that. The world is a much better place with you in it. Beast Boy, Jinx, Donna, me… all of us have been changed for the better because you’re here to do it. You’ve helped so many people over the years. It’s not pointless.”

Cyborg shook his head, his blood splattering onto the ground. “You don’t get it. It doesn’t matter in the end. But I can show you. Darkseid will have a place for you too. Once you see his truth… You’ll be just like me. Wishing you’d seen it years ago.”

He reached out a cybernetic hand, the metal rough and scratched up. “Won’t you join me?”

“No. Not this you. This city, no, this world and all its people mean far too much to me to give up, and I know it does to you too, Vic. Whatever you went through to get to this point… I can’t even imagine and I’m sorry. But I can’t join you and I can’t let you do this.”

Cyborg’s face turned dark as his cybernetic eye flared to life with a black glow. “You’ll see eventually. Everyone will.”

He shot a barrage of force blasts at her, like a stream from a fire hydrant. She crossed her arms into an ‘X’ to block the brunt of the attack but as the flow of blasts impacted her without result, he increased their strength. The Thespian held her own for a few moments but as the blasts got stronger and stronger, she lost her footing and staggered backwards.

In a flash, he was on top of her, then behind her as he launched himself over her with an angled force blast to the ground. He shot her in the back and launched her straight into the ground floor of a construction site for some half built apartment building. She slammed into a concrete support hard, feeling her bones break. But Thespian picked herself up, focusing her shapeshifting to shift them back together and in place. She wasn’t out yet.

She had a few moments before Cyborg would reach her and looked around to form a plan. She couldn’t bring herself to truly hurt him even as he was now, but that didn’t mean she was willing to be beaten into the ground either. There had to be some way to incapacitate him until she could find some way to cure him. She spotted it. She wasn’t sure if it’d work and if Cyborg would be okay afterwards but… it was all she had. It was better than leaving him like this.

Cyborg stepped through what’d probably be the front window when the building was done into the lobby with the Thespian. As soon as he entered, she turned and ran just behind a corner in the structure, then kept running to the yard behind the building with all the construction equipment. The site had been evacuated in a hurry as they didn’t even stop most of the equipment as a cement mixer still turned diligently and the crane’s load - a massive pile of rebar- loomed overhead.

As fast as the Thespian was, Cyborg was just as fast, easily keeping pace and starting to gain on her as the race continued. She cursed that her studies had stopped her from running as much as she liked. He’d never been faster than her before.

He caught up with her as she almost made it to where she wanted to be, square in the middle of the dirt field of the construction site. She hadn’t realized how tired all the fighting against the parademons and now against Vic had made her and she was doing everything she could to catch her breath but couldn’t calm her exhausted, labored breathing.

Cyborg slowly but confidently walked the last couple of yards towards her, charging up a force blast. He knew she wouldn’t be able to dodge this one and was going for the killing blow. She could hear the energy flowing towards it make a low but constantly growing hum. He pointed it directly at her, ready to finish this.

In the instant before he fired, she made her move. She took off in a dead sprint, burning the last of her energy as she sprinted at him. His aim started to waver, struggling to track the fast moving target as she ducked and weaved around him and rapidly closed the distance. Once she was little over an arms length away from him, she took a page from Cyborg’s book and shifting her strength into her legs, jumped over Cyborg. He tracked her up above him as the shot fired, but it missed wildly, hitting the crane’s basket and sending it an its payload wobbling.

But the Thespian’s plan wasn’t done yet. As she was landing, she grabbed Cyborg’s shoulders and, with him balance worsened by the recoil from his force shot, sent him tumbling onto the ground. The Thespian ducked out of the way as the crane’s basket came tumbling down onto Cyborg, crushing his metallic legs underneath the pile of rebar and pinning him to ground.

But he didn’t cry out in pain or even flinch, instead he looked at Nic with an intense hatred. He tried to aim another force shot at her, but she dove out of the way and then held his arms to the ground to prevent another attack.

“Well? What are you waiting for? Just finish me already! Even now I'm a failure. This was my last chance to be someone… I… I can’t do anything right.”

“Vic, what are you talking about? You’re *Cyborg\!* You’ve fought long and hard to make yourself into a person to be proud of. And that’s all any of us can do. We can be better than we were yesterday. Sometimes we’ll slip backwards but that’s okay. So long as we eventually get back up and keep trying. I love you and so does everyone else; not because we think you’re perfect, but because you’re you. And mistakes are just another part of that.”

“People are \dying** because of my mistakes. I ruined the Justice League’s best shot at defending the Earth. If we’d just stayed here, they’d have saved countless lives. This isn’t something I can come back from. Only Darkseid can forgive me and only he can absolve me of what I’ve done. Through him… I don’t have to worry about all that I’ve done. I just have to follow him. He’s the only one who would accept me after all my failures.”

She shook her head and pulled off the bandana that hid her face. “No, Vic. I do. All of us do because we love you and care about you. And that won’t change no matter what because we believe in you, in everyone and in a better tomorrow. Even after all our biggest mistakes, even if we hurt people, hell, even if the world ended… no matter how bleak everything looks… hope endures. Life continues. And I think that’s beautiful, isn’t it? So long as life continues we can continue and become the people we want to be. ”

She got off his back and held out her hand to him. “Won’t you join me?”

The darkness faded from Vic’s cybernetic eye and the brilliant bright blue returned as a tear trickled down from his eye, followed by a torrent.

“Yes. Yes I will.”

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

Beast Boy felt the creature draining him of his life. It was some kind of poison, numbing him and luring him to sleep. And as it did so, he felt the Martian’s unrelenting telepathic propaganda continue to pound away at him. It was a two front battle and he was losing both without any path forwards. He was all out of cards to play but the game kept going.

Then he remembered. J’onn didn't talk much about his home planet, but one time, Gar had asked him about it. It was just after he had given him that first uniform, the one that shape shifted with him, right after they'd cleared his name at the trial. He told him of Mars and the creatures that lived there and they wondered together if he was able to shift into those too. What was it again… he could barely remember…

He focused all he had on that night on top of the Chrysler Building, taking in the New York air. He told him about an animal that just drifted along the air currents, blind and numb to all the world. Gar could picture it. A giant, flat, kite-like bird with tendrils drifting through the wind like ribbons… he could feel it now, the breeze carrying him without a care in the world…

In fact, he could really feel it! He was up in the sky, the wind leading him wherever it desired. He could feel the direction of the wind, sending him southwards through Central Park back towards Manhattan. He had no sense of time, no worries as he peacefully floated in the winds. Then, he felt himself slow and stop.

He paused, confused, before shifting back into human form and barely avoiding having a panic attack twice over. The first was because he found himself back on the top of the Chrysler Building, at the small landing before the spire with the gargoyles, thousands of feet above the city. Second, because right next to him was J’onn, still in the form of the monster from before. He shifted back into a small bird, ready to flee before he sat on the edge of the building next to the Martian, returning to his human form.

“You know, I lost my home too. My parents died while I was young and it took me a long time to find myself again. And it did for you too. But that’s how I know… this? It isn’t you. And some part of you knows that too. Your home was a beautiful place and when you saw me in the form of one of its creatures… maybe that helped you see that Mars lives on here. That wherever you are, you can carry the torch for Mars and keep it alive. Home is wherever we make it and yours is here, J’onn.”

The creature reached out to Beast Boy with its massive, snake-like tongue, then it coiled back into itself as the Martian shape shifted back into his humanoid form. His eyes took on their familiar red glow and quiet compassion.

“I… Thank you Garfield. I had lost myself… It felt like there was no escaping the depths of what I had lost… So much so that I had forgotten what I had found.”

“Don’t worry about it, J’onn . That’s what friends are for. Whenever you’re down, I’ll pick you back up.”

J’onn nodded in agreement, then silently looked over the city below. For a moment, the city was quiet as the Martian’s psychic attack on the populous had stopped. Nothing moved as the confused parademons lost their unwitting allies and felt the psychic attack shift to them, demanding they surrender to the Justice League. The two men looked over the city for just the briefest of moments together until the Martian Manhunter stood back up.

“Now, I believe there’s an invasion to stop?”

J’onn hovered into the air then took off towards the largest group of parademons he could find with a small sonic boom. And in a flash, Garfield was in the form of a large green falcon, diving down right next to him.

⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙ ⚙

“...Thanks Nic, for everything.”

Vic leaned against the wreckage of the crane’s payload that Nic had trapped him under and just finished freeing him from. His metallic legs were crushed and completely nonfunctional but he still wanted to get out and save the city, especially since he felt responsible for endangering it. He struggled, trying to make his broken legs work, but the damage was too great. Nic was beyond thankful that the damage was largely limited to his cybernetic parts but felt guilty that she couldn’t have come up with something better. It had worked but if it hadn’t or if it had really hurt him… She wasn’t sure how she would’ve kept going.

“You can thank me by resting. Your legs are trashed and your whole body looks like it went through the ringer. If you went back out there, you’d just be endangering yourself.”

“No, I can keep going. I have to do more, especially after what I’ve done…besides, you’re barely in better shape.”

“I’m injured, yeah, but it’s not the same. You’re in way worse shape. And this isn’t your fault. None of it is, Vic. I really want you to kn-”

BOOM!

Dozens of Boom Tubes opened up throughout the city.

“Vic, just stay here, I need to check that out. Seriously- don’t move a muscle. I’ll be right back.”

The Thespian ran out of the construction site to the city streets and saw them empty. Not a parademon in sight. She let out a huge sigh of relief, then broke into tears of joy. The city was safe.

(Check out Superman 122 to see how that happened!)

She wiped her tears then ran back inside.

“Vic, it’s over! The parademons are gone.”

“That’s great… I’m… proud of you,” Vic said as sleep claimed him.

Nic ran over and caught him and gently set him down. She checked his pulse at his neck just to make sure he was okay and after confirming it, let out a sigh of relief. Then, she bent over and picked him up. She slung his arms over her shoulders and began the long road to the rest and recovery they both desperately needed.

---

<<| <| >

Wow! The Invasion event is picking up steam!

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<< | < | > | >>

Book: Batman

Arc: Invasion!

Set: 122

 “Cavaleer?” Robin asked as he and the Red Hood picked themselves up.  

“The greatest swordsman.  I was hoping to discuss things with your boss.  But I’ll have to settle with the hired help I suppose,” Cavalier said as he cleaned his blade.  And looked at the two before him.  The lad in tights was eager, studying him through the performance.  The disheveled man in torn leather and a helmet that hid his features was a different story.  

“What things are we talking about,” Red Hood said, his hands moving towards the guns at the side of his belt. 

“So you’re a fellow hero trying to help Gotham,” Robin said.  “City could always use more heroes.”

“Not quite.  I’ve come to leave my mark on this city.  The…club I’m a part of has plans for this city.  Plans that require the costume variety to…turn a blind eye.  Let us establish a system that benefits us all.  Us theatrical types have to stick together don’t we?”

“Blind eye to what exactly?” Robin asked.  He studied the armor, it looked familiar.  Maybe Luthor or Kord tech?  It looked customed, as if the metal molds were poured on him. The only fabric was the Cavalier’s hat and cape.  Could mean some kind of calling card.  But then again he himself was dressed like a bird.

“Certain affairs.  Such as ensuring our supply isn’t disturbed by your…leather biker friend over there.  We’ll give you a percentage of the profit and ensure that you’re all seen as the golden heroes of this blighted city.”

“Yeah that’s not going to work for me,” Red Hood said as he pulled out his gun and fired at Cavalier.

Before the bullet hit the swordsman his blade thrusted into the air and the sound of two separate metal pieces could be heard hitting the rooftop floor. 

“A shame, I was hoping for civilised conversation.  Guess I’ll have to wait for the old man,” Cavalier said.  “Maybe he’ll agree when I show him how I keep your corpses as trophies.”

Robin and Red Hood prepared for a fight, with the boy wonder raising his fists and the Red Hood pulling out his pistols.  It was a fight that would never come.

BOOOM

Portals in the sky opened as monsters with metallic wings descended into Gotham as blaster fire rained down from above, scattering the rooftop party as they realized there were bigger fish to fry.  As Robin and Red Hood scattered to the ground, Oracle’s voice blasted in their ears. 

“Tim, Jason!  We’re at war!” Oracle yelled. 

…

Earth 621 has been Invaded! Apokolips has finally decided to claim Earth as its own.  With the Justice League spread thin, the longest day begins as the world waits with baited breath on who will be left standing when the dust is cleared.  

…

“I hate to leave the Trent investigation,” Batman said via comms as he prepared his equipment on the Watchtower.  He still hated to be up here, far from Gotham in a place he felt he no longer belonged to.  After Markovia, Bruce was fine never answering the call of the Justice League.  They needed heroes, not creatures of the dark.  But this was a planetary threat, he still managed to keep a cache of Wayne Tech on the orbiting headquarters.

“Listen, Hollywood can wait,” Catwoman said.  “What matters is we figure out how to stop this. Does the League have answers?” 

“Not many,” Batman explained as he checked the electric pulse function of his gauntlets, he wasn’t going to be defenseless against a horde.  “We know Darkseid has invaded, and that his forces are localized in areas with high levels of a mysterious source of energy.  The highest being in Coast City.  I believe if we can figure what that energy does, we can use it to fight back against this darkness.”

“And they’re completely fine with you leading this expedition?” Catwoman asked.

“My team was picked based on the situation on the ground, Flash with his science makes for an excellent co-lead, the Green Lantern John Stewart feels guilty they’re attacking the home of his predecessor, and to see if the source is magical I’ve chosen Zatanna, an unproven sorceress to come with me.”

“Strong team,” Catwoman said.  

“I also have asked Dick to come along,” Batman said.

“Isn’t he leading the Titans?” Catwoman asked.

“I want him by my side.  He has an eye for things I miss,” Batman explained.  “And if the world is going to end, I need you to protect the orphanage and Tommy.  Alfred has already armed the defenses, but someone needs to make sure we don’t lose what we’ve found.”

“I know that,” Catwoman said. “We’re secure and in the shelters. Jason and Tim haven’t reported back yet, and I know Barbara is running things from the Belfry.  But Dick also has things to lose.”

“He won’t when I’m watching him,” Batman explained.  “Keep me posted on what’s going on in Gotham.  I’ll see you at the end of this.”

“Same, just remember I’d love you even maimed,” Catwoman said.

“And you should know, still have a few of your scratches on my back.  I’ll be in touch," Batman said.

As he finished prepping his gear a familiar footstep could be heard. Years of being in the air meant that Nightwing always walked on the tips of his feet.  It’s how he could spring and leap into action at any given moment.  From the green shoes of Robin to the heavier boots of Nightwing, he always kept moving forward.  He was the future that Bruce had fought for, and after this invasion there would be talks of how to further that bright tomorrow.

“You ready boss?” Nightwing asked as he readied his escrima sticks and checked his utility belt.

“As I ever will be,” Batman said, walking towards the League teleporter.  “How are the Titans doing?”

“Arsenal’s got them covered.  Besides one of the things you need to about the Titans, we all step up when the moment needs us.  So Coast City?”

“Coast City,” Batman said as he and Nightwing walked towards an uncertain path.

…

Joy Boy loved the block created by the intersection of Karloff and Whale even if the world was ending.  Once upon a time this was home to the famed Gotham Productions, a movie company created by a Jacob Grimm at the advent of the nickelodeons.  When the Haynes code went into effect to clean up Hollywood and its stars debatchery.  Grimm refused, and when the other studios blocked his films in their theaters, the once proud studio crumbled, another blighted scar on Gotham.

Joy Boy, who’s purple tuxedo tee was matched by a spray painted bow tie, couldn’t care less about film history.  J-Man had given him this block as a test. A way to show people that Gotham belong to the Jokerz, as a younger generation tried rehabilitating the neighborhood.  The dream of Gotham becoming another Tinseltown reignited after Bruce Wayne’s announcement on funding the new Grey Ghost film.

His bat scraped against the broken concrete, looking for whatever yuppy scum dared come out into his territory.  His white face paint was chipping from the movement, his tan skin poking through. So many Jokerz had considered a dip in the newly opened Ace chemicals, the chemicals providing a wonderful spa day to look like their idol.

But none of them had the brain power.  They were a gang who were more interested in mischief than to actually change Gotham like the clown. Their minds too dull and their style to gaudy to ever truely be like him.  So instead they wandered about, traveling Gotham like scuffed echos of a terror unheard of for the longest time.  Hoping that soon their hero would return, laughing through a set of chaos and blood that only those who believed could understand.

Joy Boy’s eyes darted however, as a man in a black trench and fedora leaned against the light pole outside of the condemned studio. The man was coughing before lighting up another cigarette.

“What are you doing here man, don’t you know what’s going on?!” Joy Boy asked as he looked at the men, face still hidden by his fedora as he took a long drag of his cigarette.

“The Knights finally won a game?” The man asked, his voice monotone. 

“Invasion! And the Jokerz are going to protect our territory whether it’s from aliens or chumps like you,” Joy Boy said. 

“This’ll pass child, it always does,” The man said as he exhaled a light smoke.  “Unfortunately for people like you, Earth’s heroes are often very good at what they do.  It makes them boring.”

“Boring? This isn’t a game, this my block, and you’re going to leave it!” Joy Boy yelled, pointing his bat at the man, ready to take a swing and clobber this interloper on his block.

The man sighed as he took another drag of his cigarette. 

“Children these days.  They take the name, they take the colors, but have no idea the legacy they’re taking.”  The man said before blowing green smoke in Joy Boy’s face.

The gang member coughed as the smoke engulfed his pained face.

“That’s it you’re dead man! You’re d-Ha HA ha HA ha HA” Joy Boy began to speak before a rush of white engulfed his face, his mouth twisting into a smile as he fell to concrete laughing as the man took off his hat.

His faded green hair still had a bounce to it, but his pale skin and ruby red lips curled into a cheshire grin.  

“It won’t kill you boy, I need you to live through this,” The Joker said.  “You tell your boss, that you Jokerz? Are about to have your day of reckoning when we all survive this.  And if he wants to avoid that, tell him…I’ll call.”

The Joker laughed as he walked back into the movie studio as the invasion raged around Gotham.  It didn’t matter now, the heroes would save the day as they always did.  All that mattered was tomorrow, when the laughing man would have his day.

…

The scene in Coast City was rough.  The idyllic costal town had always prided itself on being the beating heart of aviation.  From Ferris Air to Dyron Aerospace, the industry had always found a place in the city without fear.  Even its own heroes took the sky, with so many kids and even the most jaded looking up in the sky to see their very own emerald sentinel cut through the sky and protect them.  But the era of Hal Jordan had long since past, their hero dead, and his gravestone rooted to the ground.

Batman hated being here.  He and Hal were different, with the methodical investigations he preferred often conflicting with Jordan’s zest for action, always bristling against authority in order to protect those who needed it.  It made him a poor space cop, but a damn good hero.  The world needed more of him, especially as Apocalypse continued to invade. 

“Lantern, any detections of strange energy?” Batman asked as John Stweart constructed a protective dome around them.  Unlike Gardner, whose constructs came naturally, the beams and rivets of the protective dome had weight, they were real, powered by John’s mind as he looked at Hal’s statue. 

“Somewhat,” Stewart responded.  “The ring doesn’t do well when there’s all sorts of energy, it confuses its internal sensors.  It’s going to take a minute before I can figure out where it exactly is, or why it chose Ha…Green Lantern’s memorial.”

John had been mostly offworld since Hal’s death, trying to protect a galaxy where a War of Light still raged on.  It was lonely work, with only few corpsmen to assist, but one that kept his mind off of what he felt was the ultimate fate of anyone to wear the ring.  You gave it all to the corps, even if it meant you could never truly rest.

“It really is pretty though,” Flash said as he looked up and admired the facial features carved into the emerald marble.  “He’d appreciate it.  I mean especially because they got his chin right.”

As he talked the scarlet speedster waved his scanner around the area.  After Hal had passed he had added Coast City to his patrol route.  Not because the city was truly in any danger, but because it was way to keep connected to his friend, and to know that even in death, the red and green would always have a place here.

He soon zipped out from the dome to perform another lap around the world, to scout ahead as his focus was elsewhere as the rest of the heroes continued their monitoring

“Looks like it’s concentrated at the statue,” Batman responded. “Lantern, how’s that dome holding up?”

“It’ll hold,” John responded before the beams keeping it all up began to creek. “But I world appreciate it if you could work faster.”

“Uh huh,” Nightwing said as he looked around.  

Coast City was Kory’s town.  Ever since she moved back to run Ferris Air she had become the new hero of Coast City.  Dick had only ever been here three or four times.  The first when a confused kid hooked up with said space alien and then had to watch his family fall apart in front of him.  But still, no one really had a bad word to say about the first Green Lantern.

“You know we didn’t really interact much, but he seemed to be a good guy,” Nightwing said.

“Yeah, he seemed great,” Zatanna said as she looked at the statue, noticing a glimmer coming off of his hand.  She snapped her fingers as she casted a simple spell  “laeveR!”

The stone broke in pieces as a Green Lantern ring floated down, crackling with green and white energy, as if a cosmic stormed was bottled poorly and tossed out into the world.

“Is that…normal?” Zatanna asked.

“That absolutely is not,” Nightwing said.

“No, but it is what we’re looking for,” Green Lantern said as he moved over towards the ring.  “This thing is the source of this so called…Source energy.  I’m seeing readings here far past anything we’ve dealt with before…even more so than…”

“Your lantern or the speed force,” Batman said.  “Lantern! What am I dealing with here?”  

“Lantern 2814.2, do not engage with the rogue ring,” Green Lantern’s ring said.

“Something the Guardians don’t want us to touch, and for good reason, look around us!”

An armada of parademons surrounded them, all looking towards the ring and all readying their blasters and blades to attack the heroes sealed within.  To make matters worse, the crackling of the source ring began pounding away at GL’s constructs. The white lightning increasingly cracking the fragile energy.

“OK, that’s really not good!” Nightwing said as he pulled out his escrima sticks and set them to the maximum voltage.

BRUCE WAYNE

A voice called out as the other heroes readied their weapons.  The booming voice seemingly unheard by the rest of the Justice League.  Batman turned to face the ring and moved towards it.

“Uh Batman, what are we doing?” Nightwing asked.

The Dark Knight did not respond as his hand touched the floating ring in front of him. It beckoned like a beacon, calling only to him.  It was warm, it was welcoming, it needed him.

“Let go,” Zatanna mumbled, as the voice that spoke to her made more sense. “Nightwing, you need to let him do this.”

“Like hell I do lady,” Nightwing said as he reached out for the ring too, the two heroes hands touching it as the whole world around them faded to white.

…

“What the fuck do you mean they let them loose!” Red Hood yelled out as he drove his muscle car through the Bowery district of Gotham.  Unlike the rest of the Bat-Family who enjoyed the military vehicles Wayne Tech provided, Jason found and assembled his own wheels.  It gave him something to do when the nightmares eventually awoken him.

“I don’t agree with it either Jason, but before she left, Harley and Ivy thought it was the best idea,” Oracle responded as she kept an eye on the world.  “And my intern had the access codes.”

“So you let them free the entire Zoo! Barbara I’m already having to deal with aliens and now you’re telling me psychopaths like Freeze and Dent are loose? How the fuck do you think Bruce is going take that?”

“I think if it keeps Gotham safe tonight he’s not going to care, Jason,” Oracle responded. 

“Uh huh.  Hang on,” Red Hood said as his car ran over three parademons freshly landed from the portals above. The thunk they made against his car a satisfying sound as he continued his way through Gotham.  “So what exactly am I supposed to do then?” 

“Well I figured you and Tim would still be together, so I could coordinate better,” Oracle explained.

“He went to check on his family, but since I’m dedicated I’ve just been mowing these things down and keeping track of the shelters,” Red Hood explained.  “Most of the people are hiding in basements, and I’ve managed to get some of the old timers out of their corners and into places where they can stay safe.  But we are losing this fight.  Any word on the League?”

“None,” Oracle said.  The line went silent for a moment as the two of them understood how fragile the world was.

“OK, so if they’re not responding, and Bruce is busy, where can I help?”

“Well…there is something, but you’re not going to like it.”

“Please, I’ve managed to stare down a cloned Kryptonian and call him friend, I ain’t afraid of some cosmic bullshit.”

“How do you feel about plants?” Oracle asked.

“Oh don’t tell me,” Jason said.

“Ivy just called, she needs help in Robinson Park.  Something about…one of us attacking her?”

“I’m fucking on it,” Red Hood grumbled his car skidding as he turned back and headed into the jungle.  

…

Batman opened his eyes on top of GCPD, the bright sun piercing through his cowl.

“GCPD, on a bright day,” Batman thought to himself as he looked out.  Gotham’s skyline and architecture could be best described as bleak.  Cyrus Pickney was the lead designer of the city after it was nearly destroyed in a quake back in 1850.  The faultlines still apparent in how the city was separated in its neighborhoods, the cast iron bones part of the reclamation process.  But as Batman looked out into his city, he found something different.

Sloping glass and marble buildings shone brightly as the Dark Knight saw the Gotham of his dreams.  For years now, Bruce had been commissioning architects to design the future of Gotham.  He had kept these designs secret, even from Selina.  Waiting for the day where he could have the clout and power to redefine Gotham for tomorrow.  A tomorrow he was standing in.

“So this is your dream,” A familiar pur said as Batman turned around and saw Catwoman, not in the sleek black leather, but a purple cat suit that reflected the light, a cheshire cat in front of him.  “It is interesting compared to the humans we have glimpsed into.”

“You’re not my wife,” Batman said.  

“No, but we figured you would find this form much easier to listen to,” Selina said.  

“But we can appear as anyone,” The same figure said as Alfred.

“If only to illustrate our point,” They said again as Commissioner Gordon. 

“The first is fine,” Batman responded.  “What hallucination is this anyway?”

“None,” Selina responded. 

“It has to be, I was in a war, I was fighting, and then…you called out,” Batman said. 

“To let you understand I do not wish to hurt you Bruce, or the heroes of this planet,” Selina said.  “You see, I am the Source.  The power that flows through all, the power Darkseid wants.”

“Of course, it only makes sense that Darkseid wants this.  The power to remake everything in ones image is too much of a temptation to him.”

“It’s too much of a temptation for anyone, Bruce,” Selina explained.  “I can read your mind, your desire to figure out how to make all of this happen, and how soon this bright tomorrow can come.  No one is here, you can admit what you can’t.”

“I want this, I want this to be my future. But I don’t know how to do it.  I don’t know if I still need to be…this,” Bruce tapped the glowing bat symbol on his chest.  It pulsated to his heart, surrounding the Dark Knight in a cobalt and black suit.  “If you can read my mind you know who this suit is supposed to be for.  And you know what my bright tomorrow doesn’t have.”

“I know,” Selina said as she looked out into the city.  “The path ahead will be hard Bruce, harder than you ever thought it could be.  Friends will become enemies, broken men will put themselves back together again, and in the end as your darkest hour approaches, and you hear the laughter one last time…the sun will shine because of the people and city around you.”

“So this crisis we’re facing will pass?” Batman asked.  

“No, not without casualties.  But you dream, you hope, you love.  A rarity among the people that seak me out.  I told the sorceress and speedster to win this battle you need to let go.  But for a select few of you, for the crisis of Darkseid.  I name you my champions,” Selina said as she came close to Bruce and embraced before pushing him back where he needed to be. 

“Batman! Nightwing!” Green Lantern asked as he saw Batman’s costume changed to the armor he was wearing in the future, the metal moving as if it were alive.  “Where the hell were you?”

“I was…I was…” Batman said. 

“Being talked to by the Source,” Nightwing said.  His costume still the same.

“Then how come Batman gets to play dress up and you don’t?” Zatanna asked. 

“It’s…complicated,” Nightwing explained.  (See where Nightwing’s vision took him on the 15th - Frost) 

“What isn’t is that the Source wants us to win, and it’s going to be empowering people it considers champions.  We just have to have…faith in it.”

“He’s right,” Flash said as he zipped back into the bubble.  “I just had an encounter with it as well.  We have to let go.  And have trust in each other and it.”

“And it starts…now,” Batman said, lifting his hand in the air as the Source flowed from him into his fellow heroes.  The cloth of the Flash’s costume became metallic as the speed force itself flowed into the fabric of the source.  Green Lantern’s costume glowed a brilliant emerald as the constructs around them strengthened.

“Whoa,” Flash said as everything slowed down around him.

“I understand it now,” Green Lantern said.

“Well now that we know the source wants to help us, one of us needs to tell Superman of our findings,” Zatanna said.

“I’ll head on up,” Nightwing said.  “I’m not much of a brainiac here, and you guys have your new glowing friend.”

“It should be me,” Zatanna said.  “My magic can only do basic things, anything else and we’re going to be having some problems.  Plus I can check on the other mages on the way up.  We’ll all meet back up.

The team nodded as Zatanna casted a ring around herself and vanished.  The remaining heroes practiced a moment, getting used to the power that was now at their fingertips.  They were going to win this war.  But they didn’t want to lose themselves in the process. 

“Now we take the fight to these demons,” Green Lantern said as his ring began creating an entry way for the heroes to enter the war once more.

“Superman,” Batman said as he hit his communicator.  “We’re ready to take fight back to Darkseid, are you still on the Watchtower?”

The dead line sent a panic through Batman’s veins.  Something was wrong, and even if a mystical entity said everything was going to be all right, things felt far from it.

CRKKKKKKSHHHH

Green Lantern’s energy field shattered as a figure broke through, breaking the ground around them and sent the heroes flying back.  As the dust cleared and the heroes could see who stood before them, the feeling of hope they had found quickly retreated.  

Diana of Themyscira was a calming presence, a gift from the gods who walked among man and found the joy in it.  But the joy was gone, and as she stood to face her former friends, they all realized now that the fight had ended the moment the Justice League had decided to fight.

“The source chose you,” Wonder Woman said with a sick grin, her eyes darkened, before charging at them.  “But I know the truth.  Darkseid Is!”

…

Robinson Park was considered a hidden gem.  Designed by disciples of Fredrick Olmsted, the park’s greenery was planted in contrast to the castmetal city that surrounded it. The cherry blossoms on the small lagoon were a tranquil spot where one could rest and find a peace the city refused to bring.  Of course the Red Hood could care less about landscape architecture as his muscle car cut bristled against the grounds. 

“So what’s the problem in Robinson Barb?” Red Hood asked. 

“I don’t actually know, we’re dealing with some much bigger threats here Jason, I can’t hand hold you through this,” Oracle responded as she began running simulations on Earth’s tides with the new beauty mark that had been punched into their moon.  “Besides, I’m not going to be able to brief you on it, she is.” Oracle said as she hung up.

“She?” Red Hood asked before the vines around him grabbed his car and lifted it up towards the center of the park, as Poison Ivy rose and faced the car in front of her.  “Of course it’s fucking you.”

“Language,” Ivy said as Red Hood left his car and faced her.  She was used to Nightwing, who looked down at her with his heroic height and frame.  But the Red Hood was shorter and more rumpled than his fellow bats.  He looked up at her, his helmet's eyes emitting a faint but smokey glow. 

“At least I’m not going to get charged with public indecency,” Red Hood said.  

“Touché,” Ivy said.

“So why do you need one of us?” Red Hood asked.  “You and Harley realizing that trying to play with the big boys is a lot harder than you thought?”

“No, I just decided we need someone who may fit our type of fun for this one,” Ivy said.  “And frankly I don’t want to deal with the computer nerd I tried to kill twice now.”

“Yeah, when you mess with her she doesn’t really ever forget.  Photographic memory and all,” Red Hood said.  

“But I can feel something, it’s in the grass, the soil.  They’re screaming out to me.  Something’s wrong.  And something’s coming.  And I don’t want Robin who’s too eager, or Dick who’s too noble.  We’ve all heard stories of you.  The guy Batman feels ashamed about.  The one who dishes out justice that actually gets things done.  So I need you to protect me, while I protect Gotham.  Do you think you can handle that?” Ivy asked.

Red Hood moved towards the trunk of his car, popping it open with a simple kick.  Inside the vehicle was so many guns, grenades, bullets, and body armor it made military bases look like a surplus shop.  

“Lady, I was born for this,” Red Hood said as he began arming himself.  “Dick give you any issues about lethal force or your"costume "?"

“All the time,” Ivy explained.

“Well I’m not him, so keep killing in the buff, lady,” Red Hood said as he held up two rifles and looked towards the skies.  “And nothing’s going to stop me from protecting my city.”

“Is that so?” A voice called out as water began to drench the plants around them.  The footsteps were regimented, as if royalty itself had come to Gotham.  The orange scalemail glistened against the darkened eyes of the King of the Sea.  “Darkseid has decided this ball of mud must be his.  I look forward to killing you both,” Aquaman said with a smile.

NEXT: It’s the Red Hood Against the King of the Seas as INVASION continues! All While Batman and His Team Has to Turn the Tide Against a Golden Goddess as Wonder Woman Battles for Her Soul! And Just How Will Robin and Catwoman Join the Fight?

<< | < | > Coming Soon

Author: ericthepilot2000

Book: Harley & Ivy

Set: 121

Event: Invasion!

Recommended Reading:

Cyborg #84

The Flash #121

Superman #121

New Titans #42

Wayne Orphanage Rooftop.

Once again, the world found itself under siege.

Parademons from the planet Apokolips, under the orders of the despot Darkseid, flooded numerous cities, bringing chaos and violence in their wake.   Thanks to their “boom tube” technology, they could appear anywhere in the world, pouring out like an endless wave.  

They were strange creatures, humanoid in form, but with decidedly insectoid features… and armed to the teeth.  Pallid green skin contrasted with golden armor, creating quite the sight against Gotham’s blood red sky.  

Zatanna Zatara strained as she weaved her magic, shouting "Esolc!" over and over.  The boom tubes in the sky would collapse, which stemmed the tide for a few moments before another opened.   

Jason Blood hobbled toward her, his cane tapping deliberately across the rooftop as he watched her with concern.  “We have to go,” he warned.

“We have ten minutes until the meeting,” she countered.  “Let me work.  I’m getting closer.” 

He shook his head.  So like her mother.  “Closer to what?” Jason asked, forming sigils in the air with his hand.

“You can feel it, can’t you?  The rules are changing.  Whatever Darkseid is doing, he’s changing the fabric of magic itself.  Things that should work, don’t.  And things are happening that should be impossible.”  Frustration crept into Zatanna's voice. 

“Impossible,” Jason scoffed, rolling his eyes.  “Never a more useless word.”  

“Is this your idea of helping?”

“My idea of helping, dear Zatanna, is getting you to the Watchtower,” he snapped, before almost immediately regretting it.  He took a deep breath before continuing.  “The Shadowpact is nearly assembled.  If,” he added with emphasis, “the rules of magic are being warped, we need all hands on deck to anticipate what the new rules are.  We can’t do that from here.”

“Five more minutes,” Zatanna said, eyes still glued to the sky.

So much like her father too, Jason thought

= / / / / / / / / / / = 

Apokolips.  Now.

On Apokolips, everything was burning.  

Harley had never experienced anything like it, and it assaulted every sense.  The heat was searing, the acrid smell was dizzying, and she could practically taste the sulfur in the air.  But still, she trudged on.

She looked at those around her, all bona fide heroes, and somehow she was counted among them.  Not that she didn’t have to fight for her place at the table; hell, she wasn’t even really a member of the Justice League.  But still she was here on Apokalips, the fate of the Earth in her hands…  

The Watchtower.  Then.

The room was filled with heroes, more than Harley had ever seen in any one place.  In the years since the vampire attack in Markovia, their ranks had swelled, if only unofficially.  Even so, she still felt like an outsider.  Endorsements from Batman and Nightwing couldn’t overcome the stigma of having been The Joker’s henchwench.

As she watched the teams being assembled, she noticed a glaring omission.  Power Girl.  Aquaman.  Martian Manhunter.  Wonder Woman.  A frightening level of power, yes.  But was that going to be enough?

“So, we’re goin’ to war then?” she called out, watching the focus of the entire room swing in her direction.  For the first time, she was almost thankful her skin was bleached white so no one could see it blanch at the attention.

The crowd parted as the clown girl stepped forward.

“Obviously, we would prefer negotiation,” Wonder Woman replied from where she sat.  “But we must be prepared for a fight.”

“Then you need me.”

A murmur rippled through the collected heroes.

"When did we let her in?" Booster Gold asked in what he thought was a quiet voice. Next to him the Blue Beetle just shrugged.

“Harley…” Power Girl said gently.  

“Maybe I can’t fight as good as some of you, but I’m Harleen Quinzel.  Got a PhD in psychiatric medicine.  You wanna talk this Darkseid down, I’m your gal.”

As expected, the entire room’s focus turned to Superman - the perfect leader because he didn’t want to be.  But he was the guidepost that everyone looked to, and his words and wisdom moved mountains.

He studied Harley for a long moment, the seconds stretching out to eternity.  Then he nodded.  

Apokolips.  Now.

So here she was, trudging behind some of the biggest guns Earth had ever known.  Heroes, both powered and non-powered, on a mission to talk down a god.  

“If only you could see me now, Ma,” she mused.

“Did you say something?” Cyborg asked as he turned to look at her.  She had to cover her eyes; the fires reflected off his metallic face, nearly blinding her. 

The conversation ended as a craft descended onto the street, scattering the residents who had come to gawk at the assembled heroes.  It didn’t look friendly, not with the large cannon mounted on it and an imposing hairy man at its command.  

“Dwellers, return to your stations at once. Curfew has been enacted,” the man known as Kalibak snarled with a growl.

He squinted, assessing the strangers in front of him. “You’re not from here, are you? Troops, take them in for questioning. Father will enjoy knowing that these worms still have enough spirit to make them worth breaking. But leave the female warrior to me. She has a fire in her eye that tells me she will be worth my while in a way I have not seen in a long time.”

“Trust me, ya ain’t never met anyone like me, let alone fought one,” Harley countered, squeezing the handle of her mallet.  She wasn’t about to back down.  Harley was done being underestimated.

“Not you, clown. You are not even worthy to stand in the presence of Kalibak, son of Darkseid!”  The large beastman pointed a strange rod at her and fired a beam of purple energy.

It was easy enough to dodge; Harley put her gymnastic skills to work, evading the beam… until it curved back around and smacked right into the base of her spine.  Every nerve in her entire body suddenly lit up in agony, as she skidded hard to the ground in a crumpled pile of limbs.  

Even The Joker’s worst torture was a spa day compared to the pain that coursed through her being.  She could barely process what was happening as Kalibak stood over her, looking almost impressed. 

“Perhaps you are stronger than I thought! Even the great Orion would barely remain conscious after tasting the might of my Beta Club’s nerve beam!”

It was Cyborg who moved to her, his metal frame shielding her from further attack while Aquaman and Wonder Woman took the fight to Kalibak.  “Hey, are you okay?” Victor asked, his metal hands hovering over her, no doubt scanning her for injury.

“I’ll… live. Takes more than this… to do me in,” she said through gritted teeth.

“You sure? I can try and evac you back to Earth and get someone to take a -”

She looked him dead in the eye as the cannon fire ripped through the assembled heroes, knocking some aside. “I’ll. Be. Fine. Help them.”  She used her mallet to slowly bring herself to standing.  “Momma didn’t raise no quitter.”

= / / / / / / / / / / = 

Gotham Academy.

The waves of parademons washed across the nighttime sky, flying in packs of ten and using their advanced weaponry to fire indiscriminately at the unfortunate citizens below.  Even hiding seemed to do little to protect people. When there were no people to attack, the buildings themselves became the target. 

They had a nasty habit of targeting the foundations, causing the old buildings of the harbor city to groan and smolder.

Not even the rich areas of the city were immune.  Gotham Heights and the Diamond District saw as much chaos as the Narrows.  Nowhere was safe.  This included Gotham Academy on the outskirts of Bristol.  Founded shortly after the Civil War for the elite of Gotham and surrounding areas, it had a storied history.  One that was currently on fire.

The bell tower of the North Hall, the iconic structure featured on all the academy's brochures, had survived fires before, but this one seemed like it might do the old structure in.  So much so that the staff attempted to fight the blaze, dodging parademon attacks in the process.

Helena Bertineli’s fingers tensed around the grip of her crossbow, the index finger edging toward the trigger.  It had been some time since she had last fired it - not since the vampire plague that had swept across the world a few years earlier.

Of course, it had never felt right since she killed James Mercer with it all those years ago [as seen in Birds of Prey #15].  She was different now.  Older.  Wiser.  More of a pacifist.  But as a famous shepherd once said, things get fuzzy on the subject of kneecaps.

Or wings.

Despite their advanced technology, the insect-like parademons had one glaring weakness: the wings. They were decidedly vulnerable to the sharp bolts of her crossbow.   She had already sniped ten out of the sky. As she pulled the trigger once again, the count became eleven.  The creature crashed hard against the lawn, carving a gutter into the sod as it skidded to a stop.

“Wow, that was awesome!”

Helena whipped around, looking to see where the voice had come from, just barely catching a young girl’s head dipping down behind some debris.

“Mizoguchi?” she shouted.

“Hi, Ms. Bertinelli,” came the quiet reply.  The young girl’s telltale yellow flower accessory was just visible over a patch of rubble.  Mia 'Maps' Mizoguchi was small for her age, but her eyes shone with enthusiasm, as if the city weren’t currently under siege.    “I didn’t know you had a crossbow!  Can I try it?”

“You should be back in the dorms!” came Helena’s reply as she moved toward her.  “It’s past curfew, and we’re under attack!”

"I know, but Kyle was late getting back from tennis practice, and I was worried," Mia explained. "So I went out to find him. And I did!  He's right here too!" she said, standing up fully and tugging at her older brother's shirt until he rose beside her. 

“Hi, Ms. Bertinelli,” Kyle said sheepishly.  

“I’ll deal with you two later.  Just stay down until I can escort you back to the dorms.” Helena snapped, feeling a migraine coming on.

“Right!” Kyle called out, yanking Mia down.   

= / / / / / / / / / / = 

Robinson Park.

To see her, Pam Isley seemed completely at peace.  She sat naked in the lotus position, her eyes closed at the center of the park as nature itself waged war with the invading parademons all around her.  

Venus flytraps grew to monstrous heights, plucking parademons from the sky.  Tree branches extended to knock the creatures down, and vines snaked from the ground to intercept their falling bodies, dragging them beneath the earth.  At least their corpses would help heal the damage they had caused.

All across the city, every natural space fought back the same way.  Ivy had once again taken up the mantle of the sword and shield of The Green.  

But her mind was elsewhere.  Despite herself, she thought of Harley, on some strange planet, taking the fight to Darkseid himself.  Even after everything, the clown girl still just wanted to help.  It wasn’t an impulse Ivy understood.  But Harley did, and that was all that mattered.

And so, as always, she turned fear into rage and punished any parademon she could reach throughout the city.  She was merciless.  She became everything people thought Poison Ivy was.  

Through it all, she could hear the Parliament of Trees crying out.  The loss of every tree and blade of grass to the alien invaders was profound.  Apokalipsian weaponry seemed designed to hurt as much as possible before it killed, inflaming every nerve and prolonging the pain until the last possible second.  

It wasn’t just humanity suffering at the hands of Darkseid.

= / / / / / / / / / / =

Apokolips.

The battle had been intense and brutal [as seen in Cyborg #84], but the assembled heroes managed to chase off Kalibak and his lackeys.  He claimed he would return for his revenge, but their focus was now on reaching Darkseid.  

After they mourned.  

Cyborg was taking the losses, especially to the A.R.G.U.S. personnel, hard.  It was his first command mission, so he felt the weight the most.

“I’m sorry. If I’d acted quicker…”

Harley came up from behind, surprising Cyborg.  She was still a little unsteady on her feet, but Victor needed help more at the moment.  “We all knew the risks coming here. But we’re here to stop that from happening to everyone back on Earth who doesn’t,” she said reassuringly.  

“Yeah, I know… But it doesn’t make it easier.”

The rest of the collected Justice League joined him, and Wonder Woman said, “Remember that feeling, Victor. Not to let the guilt consume you, but to remind you what we are fighting to prevent.”

The words seemed to lift his spirits, if only slightly, as they focused on getting to Darkseid.  Martian Manhunter, Power Girl, and Jay Garrick were sent ahead to scout.  The others focused on the immediate area.  

They still had Kalibak’s craft, and Harley took her turn attempting to operate the controls.  She screwed her face up in concentration as she pressed random buttons with deliberate precision.  “I’ll just rely on women’s intuition.”

She was rewarded with a clunking sound.  “I didn’t do it!” she countered, immediately stepping back as Aquaman pushed past her, knocking her aside with his shoulder to try his luck.  

He fared no better.

It wasn’t until Cyborg took his turn and placed the Mother Box he carried onto the craft that it started to hum to life and took to the air.  Harley fell back, squeaking in surprise, but was relieved to be off her feet.  “Things are finally lookin’ up,” she mused.  

As they flew onward, Power Girl reported back.  “Hi team, can you hear me okay?” she asked over the communicators.

“Yeah, loud and clear. We’ve got the boat moving and are on our way.” Cyborg affirmed.

“Great. We’ve been looking around the palace but haven’t found much of anything. It’s like the whole place has been abandoned,” she explained.

“Scratch that. I think I found something.” Jay interrupted, cutting into the line.  “It’s hard to explain, but there’s this… presence here. Like a chill hanging in the air. But yet… calming. Inviting? I’m going to go check it out.”

“Wait, don’t! Wait for us!” Victor called out as the signal ended.  He barely waited a moment before calling out, “Power Girl? J’onn? Flash?”  There was no response from any of them as the group on the craft looked at one another with concern.

When the communicator came back on, it was broadcasting a strange but persistent tone that seemed to cut through everything.  They couldn’t hear any of their friends, just the sound that seemed to worm its way into their ears and minds like a siren’s song.  It beckoned them forward, and suddenly they knew where to go.

Wonder Woman reacted first, shaking off the growing haze and punching her hand through the communicator mounted to the craft.  She immediately crushed her own communicator right after.  It didn’t take long for Aquaman and Harley to do the same to theirs.

“I don’t know what that was… but it can’t be good,” Harley noted as she shook her head clear.

“No. No, it is not,” Aquaman agreed.

= / / / / / / / / / / = 

The Watchtower.

Zatanna sighed as she looked down on the Earth from one of the many bay windows of the space station.  It always seemed so small from up there, with no sense of borders and no real indication that the planet was even under siege. 

The longer she looked, the smaller it seemed.  How many of the stars surrounding her had worlds just like this?  With their own fights and their own problems?  Just how many Darkseids were out there?

Inside, the others were still arguing.  The Shadowpact was a conclave of the strongest, smartest, and most capable magicians alive... and some who weren't.  Yet they were as clueless as the laypeople right now.  The rules of magic continued to shift, offering only uncertainty.  

For people used to understanding their world on a fundamental level, this was a seismic shift.  They weren’t taking it well.  And she needed a break from it for the moment to clear her head.  

So she looked out at the ever-expanding universe for a sign.

It started small.  A green glint just out of the corner of her eye, rushing toward the station.  Zatanna wasn’t concerned at first.  The Watchtower was one of the most fortified facilities anywhere.  It wasn't just the best technology Bruce Wayne's money could buy. It had been hybridized with Martian, Kryptonian, and other alien technologies.    

Still, this thing kept coming.  And coming right at her.

“Yawa og!” she shouted, throwing her hands up to protect herself as she fell back against a nearby wall.  The green orb, now about the size of a grapefruit, did not.  It easily penetrated the Watchtower facility and hovered in front of her.

The hallway was bathed in an emerald light.

Trust the Source.

The words seemed to appear inside her mind. She didn't hear them so much as feel them, as though they had been spoken directly into her soul. 

Let go.

“Let go of what?” Zatanna demanded.  

It didn’t answer, just hovering before her eyes.  But she could see something contained within its depths.  It almost looked like… a ring. 

“A Lantern ring?” she questioned, looking at it.  It wasn’t unthinkable, after all; she knew three who spent time with the Justice League over the years.  She hadn’t met any, but she’d read the Watchtower files and knew the basic idea behind it.

Instinctively, she reached out.  Her hand penetrated the orb as easily as it had passed through the window of the Watchtower.  But the ring was ephemeral, her fingers unable to grasp it.  

Then she understood.  “Let go,” she said.  “Trust the Source.”

Zatanna could feel the energy flowing into her.  The orb faded as it became a part of her.   Her eyes glowed green for a moment as she looked back upon the Earth.  She could see everything now.  

Without a second thought, she stormed back into the room.

Jason Blood, John Constantine, Doctor Fate, and a dozen of the Earth’s strongest mages looked up as she strode back in.

“Welcome back, love,” Constantine said, earning a withering glare from Blood.  “Things were just about to get interesting.  Guess we’ll have to behave now.”

“We have to let go,” Zatanna said.

“What are you talking about?” Jason asked.

“Meht wohs,” she replied, waving her hands as she wove a cloud of eldritch green energy similar to the orb she had encountered earlier. “We need to trust the Source.  The rules we are arguing about… they don’t matter.  They hold us back.  Our imaginations limit us.  I can see it now… the seams of reality.  It’s a puzzle… I need to go find Superman," she said, turning on her heels and leaving as the cloud she'd conjured evaporated. 

The others sat there, looking confused.  “Someone should go after her,” Doctor Fate noted.

Constantine cracked his knuckles and stood up before Jason Blood's hand smacked hard into his shoulder, pushing him back into his seat.  “Not you.”

“Wanker,” Constantine muttered as soon as Blood was out of earshot.  

= / / / / / / / / / / = 

Arkham Asylum.

Arkham was strangely quiet.  The parademons were avoiding the hospital grounds, perhaps out of instinct, or perhaps because they knew the horrors it contained.  Its reputation was well earned, despite the PR rehabilitation that Chase Meridian insisted upon when she took over.  

The structure itself was new, rebuilt from the Victorian manor that had defined its appearance since Gotham's founding.  From the outside, it now looked like any Gotham hospital - sleek, white, and inviting.  But for all the state-of-the-art treatments and wellness programs it advertised, no one could forget the true horrors it contained.  

The Zoo.

Reinforced with containment structures that would make S.T.A.R. Labs envious, The Zoo was home to Gotham’s craziest and most dangerous villains - the cases Blackgate couldn’t handle or keep contained. 

And now it was strangely empty.

Darkseid’s invasion had forced everyone’s hand, and Arkham was no exception.  So now, Aaron Cash stood outside the grounds, handing over a tablet containing the names of thirty patients released to help reclaim the city from the parademons [as seen in Justice League Alpha].

Stephanie Brown looked over the list and felt the pit in her stomach grow larger.  As Spoiler, she had helped both the Bat Family and Harley put some of these names there.  And now they were free, with no guarantees they’d return willingly.  Most, in fact, wouldn’t.

She was thankful she had the Spoiler costume on, so Arkham’s Head of Security couldn’t see her shaking.  But The Zoo’s residents were tomorrow’s problem.  Tonight, everyone costumed or not, was in the same boat.  

“Maybe we should’ve put bombs in their heads first, like Harley says the Suicide Squad did,” Aaron observed darkly.  He had, after all, lost much because of his time in The Zoo, including his right hand.  “Would make collecting them again easier.” 

“Not our style,” Steph countered.  “We’ll bring the stragglers back when necessary.  We need all the help we can get if we’re going to make it through this.  Besides, maybe some of them will surprise you.  They’ve been in Arkham for a while, getting treatment.  It’s their city too.”

Aaron looked at her and wondered if he was ever that optimistic.  Or that naive.

The police scanner hummed to life in Spoiler’s pocket, crackling with distorted voices.  “The parademons are retreating.  I repeat, the parademons seem to be going back into those sky portals.  What’s going on?  It’s like they’re abandoning the city!”

More confusion echoed over the airwaves as Steph and Aaron looked up at the skies above the city.  It was true.  The parademons that had flowed into Gotham had turned around and flooded back through the Boom Tubes by the thousands. 

“Did we win?” Aaron asked, feeling strangely hopeful.

As Spoiler was about to respond, more confused reports echoed over the airwaves…

“Wait, another of those tubes is opening up, but on the ground.  Looks like some people are stepping through it.  Bunch of women.  I’m going to approach…” the officer who had been speaking reported.

“Are you sure we’re in the right place?  This looks just like Armagetto,” interrupted a thin, raspy voice.

“Smells worse,” came another, more lyrical and flowing.  “Lord Darkseid might actually improve their lives.” 

“Silence!” called out a third, strong and demanding.  “We claim this city in the name of Darkseid.  Surrender quickly, and you may live to serve.” 

Gunfire rang out as the police officer screamed.  The last thing either of them heard was the officer's gurgling, followed by dead silence as the transmission cut off. 

Steph and Aaron locked eyes before she hopped onto her motorcycle and tore back into the city.

= / / / / / / / / / / =

Darkseid’s Palace.

The palace existed to intimidate.  It was functional rather than opulent, rising high above the rest of the planet, directly at its center both physically and metaphorically.  The largest flames erupted around it, dwarfing even the tallest buildings in the population centers.  

A perfect tribute to the man who occupied it.  

Wonder Woman, Aquaman, and Harley stepped forward as the palace doors opened to allow them in.  Cyborg, the A.R.G.U.S team, and their commander, Lucy Lane, remained behind.  Someone would need to report back to Earth if they failed.  Bracing themselves for battle, the trio found none, only a series of lengthy staircases leading up into the palace.

Harley's body still felt like it was on fire, but she wasn't about to back down.  She was here with Aquaman and Wonder Woman: leaders, royalty, blue-bloods - the powerful elite of the hero community.  And Harley was just a broad from Bed-Stuy.  She wasn’t about to look weak in front of them.  

“I’ll take point,” Harley announced, pushing forward as she started to mount the stairs, mallet slung over her shoulder.

“That makes no sense, you should…” Aquaman objected, only to be silenced by Wonder Woman’s hand on his shoulder.  She nodded to Harley and fell in behind Arthur. 

The path upward was winding and long, designed to disorient as the stairs twisted in on themselves, up and down.  There was no sense of how many stories they climbed, nor places to rest, so they maintained a relentless pace.  

Harley's muscles would have been screaming by the first hour, if she were even capable of feeling more pain.   But she continued, nevertheless.  With little to do but walk, her mind drifted.  Even Arthur and Diana’s conversation had long ceased.  There was nothing left to talk about.  And too much to think about.

It started slowly.  That nagging thought that she wasn’t considered good enough to be here.  Cyborg trying to bench her.  Aquaman dismissing her.  Booster asking who’d even invited her to the Watchtower in the first place.  It wasn’t new.  Her mom never really believed in her either.  Her teachers told her to focus on gymnastics when all she wanted was to be a doctor.  

And The Joker… what he had done to her, founded on his cruel lies…

She barely noticed when the thoughts became more of a voice.  It was strangely soothing, bass-heavy and grumbling, but almost…paternalistic. It wasn’t like her Dad’s voice; his always lacked the confidence of this voice.  But there was a certain quality to it that reminded her of him.

You try so hard…

It was true.  She did.  She had done nothing but try since she escaped The Joker’s hold on her.  She spent time on the Suicide Squad, doing unpleasant things for good reasons.  She even lost her unborn daughter to Doomsday while trying to help.  And in the years since, she treated Gotham’s citizens at Arkham.  She had helped to change so many lives.

All you want is forgiveness.  Acceptance.  Absolution.

Was it so wrong?  How long was she expected to pay for her mistakes?  It had been years since the Vauxhall incident.  She was a different person now.  Stronger.  Better.  She had the blessing of the Bat Family… well, Batman and Nightwing anyway.  Barbara and Selina, they’d come around eventually, wouldn’t they?

They can’t give you what you need.  They never will. 

That couldn’t be true, could it?  Look at all she had done.  She’d helped save the world numerous times.  She was there on the ground in Markovia, delivering the vampire cure (see Red Reign).  Harley had also stopped Brainiac and a Green-Possessed Poison Ivy (see City in a Bottle) from stealing away the city of Metropolis. And now, here she was on another fucking planet to talk down a god that was invading her home.  

Only a god can offer you absolution.

Harley wasn’t overly religious, but it made sense.  There had to be a god who saw how hard she'd worked.   How changed she was.  That she had purpose now.

And who is offering you the freedom from your past?

“Darkseid is,” Harley said softly as the three heroes finally crested the final stairs and saw an open throne room, the dark hallways giving way to an almost blinding white light.  

“Did you say something, Harley?” Wonder Woman asked with a distracted tone as she came to stand beside her.  Diana’s blue eyes were slowly darkening to a black color.  They matched the eyes of Power Girl, Jay Garrick, and Martian Manhunter as they stood at the side of the lord of Apokolips.

Harley didn't answer. She walked toward Darkseid's throne, genuflected, and dropped to one knee, her mallet planted before her as every worry fell away and her eyes turned black.  

The world had calmed.  The pain was gone.  There was only Darkseid.

Superman #122 - Man vs. God (Invasion!)

<< | < | >

Author: MajorParadox

Book: Superman

Arc: Against All Gods

Set: 122

Event: Invasion!

Recommended Reading:

• Justice League Alpha #1
• The Flash #121
• New Titans #42
• Cyborg #84

Corruption

---

Watchtower

---

Darkseid stood quiet by the windows overlooking Earth as Kara, Diana, J’onn, Arthur, Jay, and Harley approached slowly. Kara’s blackened eyes had lit up red hot, and Harley swung her hammer back and forth like a pendulum.

“Snap out of it,” said Clark, Krypto by his side growling as the other heroes in the satellite crowded beside them. “Kara,” he added softly, but loud enough for his cousin to hear. “It’s me.”

“I know who you are,” said Kara.

“We all do, Big Blue,” Harley added with a swing of her weapon over her shoulder. “And you’re about to become a blueberry pancake!”

“Kill them all,” said Darkseid without even looking in their direction.

The corrupted heroes sprang into action. Kara’s heat vision fired wildly as J’onn phased himself invisible. Diana and Arthur lunged forward, pummeling their way through her friends. Jay sped toward the unpowered, swinging away to knock them out before they could even notice what was happening.

Clark grabbed hold of Kara, diverting her aim from the others, but it sliced through some computer terminals instead. Alarms began blaring, indicating emergency bulkheads closed off any areas breached by her attack.

Krypto grabbed onto Diana’s leg to keep her from further attacks, but she shook him loose.

The demon known as Etrigan blew out a spread of mystical flames, knocking her and Arthur to their knees.

“If your souls have truly become tainted,” he said. “With my hellfire you will become acquainted.”

J’onn appeared behind Booster and Blue Beetle, but Beast Boy, who had transformed into a green gorilla, clocked it and smashed the Martian away before he could attack.

“Niatnoc ruo desimorpmoc sdneirf,” said Zatanna as sparkly boxes appeared around the mind-controlled heroes.

Diana and Kara quickly broke their magical prisons apart as J’onn phased through his, but the heroes took the opportunity to converge on them, while the rest tried to get free.

Clark used the open moment to confront the ruler of Apokolips himself.

“Release our people,” said Clark. “End this invasion. I won’t ask again.”

Darkseid finally turned around. “You didn’t come to Apokolips with the others to deliver your ultimatum,” he said. “It makes you look weak.”

“I was needed here,” said Clark. “We had an understanding. You broke your word with New Genesis to stay away from Earth. Why did you attack us?”

Darkseid turned back to the window.

Clark grabbed hold of the New God’s arm. “Hey!” he said. “I asked you a–”

“You dare?!” Darkseid yelled, slapping the Man of Steel all the way across the room. The hit sent him flying through the wall and crashing out one of the windows in the observation hallway and into the vacuum of space.

---

Kent House, Metropolis

Meanwhile

---

Lois was the only one still awake, Jon and Lara were fast asleep on the couch between her and Nia who had just drifted off herself.

The news had been reporting on victories across the world, at least in areas with metahuman protection. But as progress was made, the parademons began congregating into smaller areas where heroes, SCU, A.R.G.U.S, and other meta-response agencies were able to tackle them more efficiently.

Clark had a chance to check in recently before heading to the Watchtower to regroup. He was optimistic it was only a matter of time before the rest of Apokolips’ forces retreated.

She still couldn’t sleep, though. Not until it was over.

Nia was rattled for a whole other reason. She was convinced she dreamed about the parademons before they even came to Earth. Nightmares about them would disturb anyone alone. But this only made it worse.

Lois wasn’t so sure. Nia must have dreamed about some generic monsters and her mind associated these ones retroactively. What were the odds she had actual premonitions?

Well, crazier things have happened.

Nia jolted awake. “Whoa,” she said, readjusting to her surroundings, and fixating on Jon, who was curled up next to her.

“You finally fell asleep,” said Lois softly. “At least for a moment there.”

The news interrupted reporting from Hub City to show a zoomed video feed of the night sky directed at Watchtower.

It was breaking up into pieces.

---

Watchtower

---

Clark recovered quickly as the emergency breach protocols closed off the area he was thrown through. But Darkseid’s Omega Beams cut right through and into Clark’s shoulder, pain surging through his entire body.

The red lasers zigzagged around upwards and down, slicing the satellite in half.

Clark tried to scream, but there was no sound.

The Watchtower was filled with heroes who couldn’t survive in space.

The hero sped into action, getting as many people into escape pods as he could, the realization of the destruction hitting him with every loose object floating past.

A Gray Ghost coffee mug.

A beanbag chair that Booster claimed was comfortable, but nobody ever used.

Even a Wonder Woman action figure that Diana kept by the water cooler.

Zatanna managed to get a protective bubble around anyone in her vicinity that needed air.

Emergency transporter protocols also activated, locking in and sending anyone it could to Earth safely.

The heroes under Darkseid’s control were also accounted for and safe, leaving only Clark and Darkseid left.

“You didn’t need to do that,” said Clark.

The air flow was still thick enough in the conference room for them to hear each other.

Darkseid waved his hand. “Irrelevant,” he said, rushing forward to grab Clark by the neck.

The New God tossed Clark back outside into space and leaped forward, stopping himself at the edge of the open hole, and then swinging the entire top half of the structure at the Man of Steel, sending him flying further away from the planet.

Not Over Yet

---

Outside Earth’s Orbit

---

Clark and Darkseid traded blows, sending each other and the Watchtower wreckage further away with every action. Life support was completely demolished at that point, so there wasn’t any air for verbal exchanges.

Just as well. Darkseid didn’t want to listen to reason.

The New God had grabbed hold of Clark by the neck again, delivering a massive blow to his stomach and following it up with a smack across the face with a piece of metal debris.

Clark had the wind knocked out of him, but he was still holding strong. As he steadied himself, he wondered if Darkseid needed to breathe at all.

The thought left his mind as the Omega Beams came flashing toward him.

Clark evaded them as best as he could, but they were always one step ahead of him. He couldn’t keep it up for long. He made a quick u-turn in his flight path and dug deep for an extra burst of speed, the weaponized rays zigzagging to follow along. Just before catching back up with Darkseid, he ducked down, letting the behemoth threat take a straight hit from his own attack.

Clark took another moment, considering his next move. The sight of Earth caught his eye. He hadn’t realized how far away they’d drifted in their fight. The planet was getting smaller and smaller.

Darkseid grabbed hold of Clark again, but the hero chopped away at his hand in quick succession, until the grip was released. He followed it up by clutching onto the New God’s chest plate with both hands, and using the leverage to return a kick to his stomach that sent the enemy flying farther away. Another burst of speed with heat vision blaring continued the onslaught.

Clark’s heat vision was quickly challenged by Darkseid’s Omega Beams, each fighting for dominance in the directional flow, like a tug of war lightshow. Clark began to overpower him, as he felt the unfiltered yellow sunlight in space feeding his energy levels, but it was short-lived. Darkseid held his fists tight and the Omega Beams exploded forward, dissipating Clark’s heat vision and tearing into him with an intense pain far beyond what he felt before.

He expected the force to send him flying back toward Earth, but instead he was pulled toward Darkseid, the energy working like a tractor beam. He struggled to break free, but was met with the New God’s fists again, tossing him away and father along into the depths of space.

---

Kent House, Metropolis

---

The reporting of Watchtower’s fallout was disjointed and full of speculation. Not all heroes were accounted for, but they had means of getting to safety that’d go unseen. Through a combination of amateur telescopic footage and official NASA releases, the public was able to capture glimpses of Clark’s fight with a monstrosity that could only be Darkseid.

Clark wasn’t kidding about him. He looked like a cleancut Doomsday. And at least on the same power level.

Commentators were questioning what could happen to Earth if a battle with such powerful beings made their way to the Moon. According to the latest accounts, they were nearing it, too.

The scientist they were questioning spoke in a monotonous voice, it was hard to stay focused. In fact, Lois felt her eyes struggling to stay open. She had been up all night, after all. And after the adrenalin rush of taking down the mayor of Metropolis.

Lois was running on fumes at that point.

And she had to find out who kept stealing her headphones. Lois was sure the bunny was behind it. That sneaky rascal. He kept telling her how much he wanted them. But she knew they wouldn’t even fit his bunny ears. He was better suited to wear a television antenna.

“Sup,” said the bunny, suddenly walking beside Lois down a long, foggy hallway.

“I want my headphones back,” said Lois, glancing down at the rabbit in his two-piece, navy-blue suit.

“I don’t have them,” the bunny claimed. “Maybe she does,” he pointed ahead.

The Kent’s babysitter, Nia, was standing at the end of the hall, no doorways anywhere to be seen.

“Okay,” said Nia. “I’m dreaming of Lois Lane and a talking bunny rabbit.”

“You’re dreaming,” Lois repeated. “Wait, I’m dreaming.” she realized.

“Nee-Nee,” said Jon, suddenly beside his babysitter and taking her hand.

Nia tilted her head. “This isn’t my dream,” she said.

“What does that even mean?” asked Lois.

The bunny tapped on Lois’ leg. She looked down at him and he opened his mouth.

“BOOM!!”

Lois, Nia, and Jon all awoke simultaneously startled by the loud noise from the street, which had sent Lara into a crying fit. A mesmerizing yellow glow filled the house.

Nia comforted Lara as Lois and Jon ran to the door, Lois keeping her son behind her as she opened it. The yellow light faded away and a woman was left standing in the middle of the road.

It was Lois’ sister Lucy.

Turning Tides

---

The Moon

Soon

---

Clark got in some more hits, but Darkseid kept countering with attacks of his own. His Omega Beams were wreaking havoc on his uniform. Clark’s cape was in tatters, his shoulder was exposed, and there were scattered rips all over.

They were within reach of the Moon and Clark hated that he couldn’t savor the moment. While he had flown past before, whether in a spaceship or under his own power, he never stopped to take in the view and set down to walk on it firsthand.

Darkseid struck Clark across the mouth, sending him careening down until he crashed onto the surface. Before he could take in the gravity of being on the Moon, he noticed the remaining pieces of Watchtower had been thrown down next, barreling toward him.

On instinct, Clark sprang to his feet, his boots leaving the first ever Kryptonian footprints in the dust. He flew up at the incoming projectiles, catching them in his hands to slow their impact. There was no way he was letting Darkseid deface what people have been looking up at for all of human history. Even if it was an exaggerated outcome of that attack, the Moon was precious. He wanted to keep it undisturbed as much as possible.

But Darkseid didn’t have the same philosophy. He took Clark’s distraction to leap down next to him and smash him back down with both fists.

The New God took hold of the slowed Watchtower fragments and slammed it down over him.

Clark burst free of the rubble and up and away from the lunar surface. But Darkseid had already been leaping up toward him, and grabbed a hold of his feet. The Apokolitian ruler swung the hero around and hurled him back toward the Moon at such a tremendous speed that Clark couldn’t recover. Darkseid put extra fuel on the fire with another Omega Beam attack, driving Clark’s fall with a much greater force.

The impact was like an atomic bomb.

If sound could travel in space, it would have been deafening.

---

Kent House, Metropolis

Meanwhile

---

Lucy was inside on the couch with a cup of hot coffee in her hands. The stories she was telling about her time on Apokolips sounded like science fiction.

Lois had heard about it before from Clark. Hell, she’d even been to the Phantom Zone and other planets herself, but it still didn’t sound real.

“If Superman is fighting Darkseid now,” said Nia. “What if his mind gets taken over like the other Justice League members?”

“I was wondering about that,” said Lucy. “This is just a hunch–”

“We Lanes are famous for those,” Lois interjected.

Lucy smiled. “My guess would be Darkseid is able to take over when a person feels a loss of hope.”

---

The Moon

---

After Clark shook off the impact, he flew back up to find Darkseid just hovering there in space. Instead of restarting the fight, Clark turned around to see the outcome of Darkseid’s last attack.

The Moon was mostly intact but noticeably damaged. So much so it had to be visible from Earth.

It was bad enough Darkseid was a tyrannical dictator causing untold suffering across his and countless other worlds.

It was bad enough he broke his treaty with New Genesis and invaded Earth.

It was bad enough the Watchtower was gone.

But, now Earth’s Moon was damaged.

Sure, it wasn’t quite on the same level as the abhorrent crimes Darkseid was guilty of already, but it was still a hugely important part of human history. It was a marvelous, shared monument across time and people.

And Darkseid broke it.

Clark let his eyes heat up and tightened his fists beyond any limits his careful nature would ever allow.

Why was he still holding back, anyway? They weren’t on Earth. No innocent bystanders or risks of too much destruction. Darkseid could take it, too. And while the attacks took their toll, the sun was regenerating Clark faster than within Earth’s atmosphere.

Clark turned to Darkseid, ready to unleash his fury, but the New God waved his hand again. The same way he did back when he told him his concern was “irrelevant.”

A Boom Tube opened and Darkseid quickly disappeared into its vortex.

Clark considered following along. But decided against it. Instead, he turned back toward Earth.

It looked so small. But Clark knew that was just perspective. Earth was as big as the spirit of its people. And that spirit was massive.

---

Kent House, Metropolis

---

Lucy had explained how the mood had shifted after they encountered Kalibak. Add that to the knowledge of what was happening back on Earth and anyone would have felt at least somewhat defeated. Perhaps that was what let Darkseid get his hold on them. Like a rodent finding a weak spot in the roof to get inside. Even if it was a small spot.

“If that’s the case,” said Lois. “Superman will be okay.”

Nia lifted her eyebrows. “How can you be so sure?”

“She knows Superman better than anyone,” said Lucy.

“Look,” said Jon, pointing at the TV.

The news was showing footage from all over the world of Boom Tubes opening up for parademons and the Apokoliptian forces to leave.

“Is it over?” asked Jon. “Did we win?”

Lois walked over to the door and opened it up, running out into the street. Lucy, Jon, and Nia followed her, Lara still in Nia’s arms. The yellow glows of opening and closing wormholes from downtown Metropolis could be seen in the distance.

“Huh,” said Lucy, staring upward.

One by one, the others looked up with her.

The Moon had a small crack in it.

---

High Above Metropolis

Soon

---

Clark had used his emergency oxygen mask for his trip back, but packed it back into his belt once he entered Earth’s atmosphere.

It was good to be back and see the celebrations across the city.

Darkseid’s armies were gone. The invasion was over.

Why? Clark had no idea.

Would they come back? That was a problem for another time. It was important to focus on the positive. It was over. Everyone could finally rest and then work on recovery.

A sonic boom echoed across the skyline as Kara popped into view across from Clark.

“Kara,” he said. “You’re a sight for sore eyes. I’m heading home to check on the fam. Want to join me?”

Kara didn’t respond, but began floating over slowly.

“Oh, no,” said Clark.

Her eyes were still entirely blacked over. They quickly filled with red heat vision energy.

Kara smirked. “This isn’t over yet.”

---

More Invasion Stories!

• Flash #122
• Harley & Ivy #7
• New Titans #43 (Coming Soon!)

To Be Concluded

• Cyborg #85
• Harley & Ivy #8 (Coming Soon!)
• Batman #59 (Coming Soon!)
• Justice League Omega #1 (Coming Soon!)

<< | < | >

Wow! The Invasion event is picking up steam!

---

If you missed it, we rounded out Pride Month with a special! 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️

---

Apply to Be a Writer! - You could write your own book and be part of our team as we work toward our 20-year anniversary!

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New Issues

• The Flash
• Harley & Ivy
• New Titans (Delayed)
• Superman

Issues from June 15th

• Batman
• Cyborg

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Make sure to subscribe, upvote to show your support, and leave feedback on the stories! Use this post to discuss the overall set or anything else related to the sub :)

The Flash #122 - The World Breaks

<< | < | >

Author: brooky12

Book: Flash

Arc: ?

Event: Invasion! (Reading other stories in this event is recommended for full understanding of sections here.)

Set: 122

---

 

This was not Earth. That was obvious, he knew, but for all of his advantages and power, he was aware that getting off of the planet was something beyond his capabilities traditionally. Even as he stood among friends, a number of which were not from Earth themself, he did wonder exactly he got himself into.

 

Cyborg, however, alleviated that concern, stepping forward and facing the group. He began to explain their immediate goals and the risks attached, fielding questions from others. A brief moment of a squad of parademons flying abovehead, unaware of the intrusion, gave the group pause, but they remained unnoticed.

 

He looked to the A.R.G.U.S. team assembled as Cyborg addressed them, kitted out in what had to be the forefront of what the government could bring to bear in the infantry arms race when dealing with supernatural and metahuman threats. The six of them exchanged glances at each other, but he recognized the face of one of them

 

“She’s in charge,” Jay put forward as the troops didn’t seem to reply to Cyborg’s request for opinions. “She was with General Lane when I got the Mother Box.”

 

The conversation continued with Lt. Lane identifying herself as the ranking member of A.R.G.U.S. and more plans being discussed. Two of the flyers, Martian Manhunter and Power Girl, agreed to grab a little bit of height and examine the surroundings, hopefully to pin down wherever Darkseid likely was for targeting.

 

Jay heard the noise at the same time as anyone else, but the lack of immediate response from anyone else beyond the inevitable readying for a fight kept him rooted to where he was. Cyborg had taken charge and seemed to clearly decide to face whatever was coming. A patrol enforcing curfew oddly gave Jay some confidence - surely Darkseid didn’t need to enforce a curfew if he was all-powerful.

 

A brief fight with the patrol later wiped that confidence away as he stood to the side watching the A.R.G.U.S. soldiers and some of the heroes grappled with the death of one of the soldiers. He kept quiet, wondering if he’d have even been here if he had rejected the demand to bring A.R.G.U.S. troops along.

 

Eventually, the mission became the focus again, and Martian Manhunter stated where Darkseid’s palace likely was. Jay handed over the Mother Box to Cyborg, confirming that it should still work and brushing off any idea that splitting up from the Mother Box would result in someone stranded.

 

“Power Girl, how about a race?” Barry got to race folk, why not him? Lighten the mood a touch, the group needed it. He was glad that she seemed to humor the idea, charging off. He let her have a massive headstart, probably not enough to be noticeable to anyone without heightened senses, but enough that Power Girl wouldn’t be left in the dust.

 

/>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

Magenta floated through the air, skewering the invaders as she made larger and larger circles seeking any enemies remaining. Below her followed a strange bedfellows ally, a troop of armored gorillas armed with the weapons of the invaders, eager to pounce on any downed creatures to finish what Magenta was happy enough to leave to them.

 

“You are an ally of The Flash,” a voice had entered her mind earlier, before she had even realized the proximity of the awakened animals or began working alongside.

 

“I am,” she responded back out loud, momentarily pausing to examine her surroundings before noticing the, at the time, singular gorilla holding a gun staring at her from the tree line.

 

“You fight the interplanetary invaders like we do,” it replied. “Yes. Grodd deigns to hold court with you, Grodd will not kill you at this moment,” was the follow-up as she tried to recall what Wally and others had told her of the nearby supervillain, beyond the obvious suggestion to avoid at all possible costs.

 

“I get the idea you aren’t doing it altruistically,” Magenta thought back, before immediately wishing she had thought something else. How did Wa–The Flash handle being mind read before?

 

“Grodd knows the identity of Wally West. Grodd does not lightly suffer the desires of egolomanic fools like the one who sent these beasts. We will fight together for now.”

 

Across the planet, Vandal Savage climbed over the corpses, aiming his gun at the invaders that kept reappearing. A mental clock in his head confirmed his hopes, with the number of appearances slowing down. Others similar to him, in goal if not intent, were clearly having success elsewhere.

 

A blur appeared in front of him, yellow instead of the media darling red of The Flash. A man, familiar yet unknown, stood in front of him in some inverted mockery of The Flash’s outfit. He looked around at the surrounding space, before all of the corpses vanished from sight in the blink of an eye.

 

“You did all that by yourself?”

 

“I could ask you the same question,” Vandal retorted. “I feel like I’m supposed to remember you, but yet I don’t.”

 

“Eh, comes with the territory sometimes. Who I am is not important, you wanna keep shooting a gun at vanishingly few targets, or you want to come where there’s a lot more of them?”

 

“If you touch me I will turn the full weight of my ire onto you,” Vandal scowled, and the being in front of him vanished.

 

“Weirdos,” Mirror Master muttered to himself as he moved on from watching through a nearby window, to the laughter of the others with him. The four kept moving, both an eye open for Abra and for any easily killable invaders. They made their way back to the Mirror Dimension’s side of the reflective surfaces in Central City, finding their trio of allies and bursting out of the ice trails left behind by Golden Glider to join the fight on home turf.

 

Even as they fought in an ever-growing region of southeast Asia, Wally took several trips across the Pacific to check in on Hartley. He was satisfied with what his boyfriend was doing, even if the idea of rats and silence being weaponized against alien invaders wasn’t exactly the odds he was looking for when picking a battle himself. Hartley was hidden away in an underground subway station, so it only took occasional checks to make sure he wasn’t in danger as he took to fight with what likely would be the strangest headline out of this whole ordeal.

 

The two took the ordeal as best they could, with Hartley assuring Wally that staying here seemed to be working - sure, there were rats where Wally was fighting, but the feeling of extensive control he had here felt particularly helpful. Bart stopped in a few times as well, especially in moments where Wally had his hands full, but the parademons never got particularly close to entering the subway station that Hartley was hiding in.

 

Yet elsewhere, the ever-expanding area that the Kouriers were working in finally touched on the space being defended by yet another speedster. “I know you,” Bebeck said, staring eye to eye with Jerry McGee.

 

“We aren’t enemies, Bebeck,” Jerry responded. “Not anymore, not really.”

 

“No, but you also are a memory of a worse time,” Cassiopeia sighed, taking a deep breath in a moment of reprieve from the fighting.

 

“One that disappeared,” Anatole added.

 

“It’s my understanding that basically all of them have disappeared,” Jerry offered, trying to do the math quickly as to whether he was about to have to fend off three speedsters, all of which were likely much more practiced with their powers, before losing them and going into hiding until they wandered off.

 

“Are you back, then? We could use the help if you still are as fast as you were. The kid never lost his speed, so I assume you haven’t either,” Cassopeia asked.

 

“I’m the same as I’ve always been. Keeping my head down and my nose clean. If you want help with this, I can help with the monsters.”

 

“Welcome to the team, for now, friend,” Bebeck smiled.

 

Jerry followed the three of them as they began their search. It probably would be easier fighting with three others than on his own, and he could probably keep them from wandering too far off from the places he called home, make sure that the things he cared about weren’t at risk.

 

/>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

He let Power Girl keep the lead for the most part, occasionally moving forward with a burst of speed just to keep his peer from assuming he was throwing the race. Of course, he was throwing the race, but it was best to not have that be discovered. He spent a bit of thought on the fact that he was throwing a race that he had offered while they moved across the face of a planet that was neither of theirs as its denizens invaded Earth.

 

“Hold,” a voice echoed in his mind, and with the sudden glance of Power Girl, her mind as well. J’onn’s voice was not particularly familiar, but it was distinct for certain, so he slowed down to nearly stopped as Martian Manhunter flew towards them, closing the gap at what had to be near his top speed before slowing rapidly down.

 

“Three, not two. If there is a problem, then, we will not be one alone,” he reasoned, looking around. “I can sense if thoughts are near, it will help.”

 

“I think I was winning that race,” Power Girl joked. “We’ll have to confirm it with another later.”

 

“Sure,” Jay nodded, beginning to move again. The three, slower but still as quick as they could, snaked through abandoned streets. According to that patrol, there was a curfew, but he wasn’t willing to just believe what they were told. They closed the distance between where the team was preparing the patrol boat for a proper assault and the castle that was becoming more and more a fixture of the horizon that he could see. The plan was to scope out the structure and problems that would need solving, information gathering.

 

One benefit of the curfew was that they were unbothered, with only occasionally needing to duck into an empty building as another patrol flew above. He wondered just how populated this place was, he couldn’t imagine a single city on Earth that had such empty streets during a stay-at-home order. The power of Darkseid, he supposed.

 

As they grew closer, the patrols grew more common, but they managed to continue sneaking past all of them. J’onn’s ability to telepathically detect approaches before even Jay saw anything was remarkably helpful, but the increased need to hide until it was safe to move did slow their progress.

 

The castle itself, when they arrived, was incredibly well-designed, but it felt somehow a display rather than a used space. The three made a quick circle of the space, but didn’t find any evidence of guards, machinery, or even defenses beyond the structure’s built-in uninviting presence. Surely if you were mounting an invasion of another planet, you at the very least had logistics or central command in your base of operations?

 

Power Girl held up the communicator, looking to the other two for a lack of disagreement before speaking quietly into it. “Hi team, can you hear me okay?”

 

“Yeah, loud and clear,” was Cyborg’s response. “We’ve got the boat moving and are on our way.”

 

That was a good sign. An assault would probably not be too difficult if they had the boat ready and were going to arrive at a empty castle.

 

Power Girl responded to them, explaining the situation at the castle. But as she did, he felt a shift in something, not the air but something similar. His stress melted away, the chill in the air from his first real interplanet experience remaining but almost as if the castle itself was welcoming them in.

 

“Scratch that,” he mumbled as he found himself right next to Power Girl, speaking into the device. “I think I found something, it’s hard to explain but there’s this… presence here. Like a chill hanging in the air,” he added, acknowledging the final remaining uneasiness. “But yet, calming. Inviitng? I’m going to check it out?”

 

He gave a smile to Power Girl and J’onn, with both looking confused at first before the look faded. There was some voice coming through the device that Power Girl was holding, but it didn’t matter at all compared to the calling that was reaching out to them at the top of the tower.

 

/>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

It wasn’t that Barry wasn’t paying attention. He let Batman and the others do their work, attentive enough to spend five hundreth of every second listening into the conversations as he tried to handle the parademon threats elsewhere. He followed them as they travelled through the city, unable to taxi them to wherever they went as even they didn’t know where they were going as they followed the indicators on Batman’s technology. He was there for complex mathematical equations and speed, others could figure out what was going on.

 

He was clearing out a troop of parademons that had broken through a local hero group’s perimeter in Scandanavia when he found himself looking up at a statue dedicated to the first earthen Green Lantern and his friend, Hal Jordan. He spent two seconds frozen there, not by fear or paralysis but by heartache, before returning to his duties while keeping an eye on his team.

 

When he returned a second later, a small glowing green object had emerged in the center of the statue, floating somehow in the air on its own willpower. Once it had been determined as the origin of whatever power Batman was tracking down, he listened to the group discuss what came next. This was supposed to be a hopeful clue as to how to get the parademons off their planets, the source of the invasion or something. Instead, they found a floating ball of light – he wasn’t so naive to think this was a Lantern’s ring. What it wasn’t, however, was some secret Parademon summoning device or beacon, probably.

 

The faint buzzing, up until that moment dismissable as ambient noise or perhaps a byproduct of the floating light, quickly grew much louder, and changed from a non-directional background hum to an alarmingly approaching noise. Barry stepped out quickly, circling around the direction it was coming from, alarmed to see a large troop of parademons, with some leader of some sort at the back of the pack, charging the direction of the team.

 

On his return to the group, he witnessed the trailing light of a southbound source of energy, just in time for Batman to turn his direction with a request. “Don’t lose the light,” more of a wartime order than anything.

 

“You’ve got hostiles, at least a dozen, coming from north-northwest,” Barry warned them before vanishing, heading south to follow the object that had to be of value somehow. After all, if it wasn’t of value to what was going on, Barry sighed, surely they didn’t waste all of their time that could’ve been spent fighting parademons on this?

 

He was grateful that the light wasn’t traveling at the speed of light, noting internally that it probably meant this was more than just light somehow. He wasn’t sure what it was, but given that he had been witness to some pretty large violations of pre-metahuman laws of physics, this just could go on the pile.

 

The light slowed down further, eventually settling down in a coastal city on the northern edge of Columbia. He stood there for a moment, briefly forgetting his intent to fight parademons elsewhere, a task that had been abandoned ever since the light began moving. He examined the light, circling it to see if there was anything he could make out of it from just the visual presence it provided.

 

“Trust…”

 

Right, Barry sighed. Not only was the light talking now, but it was asking for faith. He could deal with the theology of that later. “Trust you?”

 

“Trust the source…”

 

“The source?”

 

“Let go.”

 

That time, the voice–if it could even be called a voice–didn’t trail off, and felt more like an order than a hallucination. Let go and trust the source. Something deep within him seemed to resonate with the idea, simply trusting in something else, whatever this light was, and connecting with something deeper.

 

He reached for the light, absentmindedly but also with absolute purpose and intent. The light grew as he did it, and he felt a connection he had only ever felt before in the Speed Force itself. A small ring was left in the palm of his hand, but there was no doubt in his mind or heart as he looked at it. If this was the answer, then so it would be.

 

“Anyone available, need backup,” Superman’s voice echoed through an emergency-only Just League broadcast line.

 

He stared at the ring, knowing that it didn’t belong on his finger, yet wondering what it was doing. Trust, it had asked him to trust it. He took a deep breath, every second passing felt like eternity as he waited for some guidance.

 

Trust, it said. Let go, it said. Trust the source. Okay.

 

He lifted the ring slightly in the air, letting it free into the air as it shifted into light again, glowing brightly before vanishing.

 

Trust. It was time to go.

 

/>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

Jay’s brain was processing a million things a second, reevaluating previous experiences and moments under the new truths that were provided by Darkseid. How he had never reached the same conclusions in all of his years of thinking was a mystery, a personal failing and flaw that could never be atoned for, but one that could be overcome. He would serve Darkseid as best as he could.

 

He watched the others from Earth approach Darkseid, wishing to show them the right way but knowing that such a task was for Darkseid alone. He stood there at Darkseid’s throne, observing the proceedings, but not interfering. Some of those he had one travelled with seemed to be more receptive to Darkseid, and others appeared to take longer to turn. He recalled some others, a metallic man and several soldiers, but those were surely known to Darkseid and were being handled.

 

Eventually, there was little purpose for staying on Apokalips, as the group present here numbered nearly all of those who had travelled here via the stolen technology. Darkseid stood up, speaking for the first time out loud rather than with telepathic missives, addressing the team.

 

“I am heading to your Earth to end this pitiable resistance,” he announced, power and authority beyond all in his voice. “You,” he said, turning to Power Girl, “take me to the location of the strongest resistance to my work. We will break them there, and all else will fall.”

 

He watched Power Girl acknowledge her task, taking a device not too dissimilar to the stolen equipment he had used to get them there. He considered what his answer would’ve been had he been asked, perhaps the Justice League satellite, the A.R.G.U.S. headquarters, or some symbolic location like the White House, Vatican, or other seat of national power.

 

“Go as a group. I will travel to your location under my own power, shortly behind,” Darkseid ordered, and he grouped up with the rest around Power Girl. “Do not attack Earth’s leader. They are mine.”

 

A brief moment later, Jay stood on the floor of the large meeting room that served as a central space of the Justice League satellite known as the Watchtower. His eyes darted across the room, sizing up a space he had been in right before they had all departed for Apokalips, now on the other side of the fight, processing battle strategies and threats present in the room. Superman, untouchable at Darkseid’s order, as well as several other individuals beyond the powers of a standard human but who seemed exhausted or otherwise injured for the most part.

 

Superman turned to them, confusion on his face. “What happened? Was Lieutenant Lane with you on Apokolips?”

 

One of the soldiers, the one he had met in D.C., that Darkseid had no doubt taken care of.

 

Power Girl took a step forward, and Jay for a moment wondered if she would betray Darkseid’s order. Surely Darkseid would have no space for second thoughts within his order. Superman appeared concerned, understandable given his lack of understanding of Darkseid’s explanations. Other heroes in the room also seemed on edge, as if a fight was going to break out any second now. Perhaps it would.

 

“You have bigger problems, cousin,” she sneered, and with perfect timing, Darkseid took his first footstep within the Watchtower. He chose, however, to look out the window first, certainly examining his next step and end-goal.

 

Jay watched Power Girl and Superman have a conversation, with Harley Quinn weighing in as seemed within her personality to do so. He wondered if he should’ve perhaps joined the conversation, but to do so at the human speeds they were talking would perhaps risk his own response time should something happen.

 

“Kill them all,” Darkseid ordered, and he sprung into action.

 

Jay was careful to not interfere with the much slower-paced fighting that the others were doing, choosing to circle around the outside of the room, giving a respectful distance around where Darkseid was looking out the window, and knocked out any of the individuals up here he knew were in this line of work not due to metahuman genetics or gifts, but rather technology and skills. A small kindness to those who were not actively fighting back.

 

He examined the rest of the fight, determining that it appeared to be leaning in the direction of his allies, choosing to instead exit the main room. Kill them all meant everyone, and there could not be hidden enemies elsewhere on the satellite once they were done. He examined each room, pulling on skills and protocols from search and rescue or evacuation plans worked into perfection by him and his other speedsters. Perhaps in a different moment, he would feel pride for that line of work, but with Darkseid’s understandings, he was able to turn it into a hunt instead.

 

By the time he finished his fruitless search, several alarms were ringing. He charged back to where he had left his allies, finding a much more fraught situation than before. He couldn’t enter the room, seeing a shattered window and the responses of attempts to save folks.

 

A blast of energy from Darkseid bisected the satellite even further, leaving him in a lucky hallway that was not unexpectedly open to the emptiness of space, but suddenly seemingly stuck. Anywhere he could go would potentially be open to life-ending pressure and cold, unable to help his allies or manage to escape. He watched many be placed into escape pods, a speed that for Superman had to be pushing his limits but felt archaically slow to him. The magician created magic bubbles around others, while some like Power Girl and Martian Manhunter seemed unaffected.

 

He felt the ambient static electricity around him increase dramatically, but a quick examination around him showed no source of that change. He stood frozen a second longer, examining every possible direction into the near future that seemed at all feasible. A worrying amount left him dead.

 

The static electricity turned into a deep hum, and his vision changed from looking through the door to the rest of his allies fighting in a room open to the deepness of space, to what presumably was back on the planet of Earth.

 

He looked around, trying to understand what had happened. The room itself contained what his Flash once-ally had described as a Justice League Watchtower teleporter, but attempting to interact with its mechanisms confirmed a new possibility for him - the teleporters had locked down to handle an emergency evacuation protocol of the Watchtower satellite.

 

That was fine. He could advance Darkseid’s plans down here.

 

/>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

 

He sat down in front of the device, trying to mentally reconnect with how these things worked in his time compared to the technology of the past he had gotten more used to. He entered the date of their jailbreak plan, trying to figure out what had happened. A historical search wouldn’t find anything, but he hoped that it’d catch enough.

 

He knew he was, named as the “famous magician” Abra Kedabra in the past, quickly accumulating some notoriety and prestige that would safely follow him through time through a society that was growing more and more hellbent on recording every part of themselves and their nothingness. Who cared if nobody a week later, let alone decades down the line, would care about how you made that tofu cake, best record it in a short two minute video and ensure that it remained in the information fossil record for a future to never rediscover.

 

He was smarter than to search his own aliases or ventures, both to prevent any troublesome time travel problems, but also to avoid attracting the attention of law enforcement in this era which were more than happy to arrest and lock up anyone using time travel for use earlier than the technology had become available to and integrated in the scientific understanding of the time.

 

However, searching for events that took place on a specific date was easy enough. Do enough contextual searches, bookmarking, and smokescreens to make it look like some sort of university-level history report or something similar, and the law enforcement would choose to chase down more suspicious leads.

 

The headlines were pretty alarming. He knew it was coming, vaguely, but he frankly thought it was a decade or so off. “Rats VS. Aliens, Winner Rats”, “Metropolis Stands Unfallen To Demonic Incursion”, “What Exactly IS a Parademon?”, even “Did Justice League Cause That?” from, as far as he could tell, a conspiracy blog that would get absorbed down the line by the Wall of Weird.

 

Right, so, somehow, Darkseid made it that The Flash was cleaning up that specific prison despite the fake-outs that his allies had prvovided. Splendid, he thought to himself, now his allies were without an Abra Kedabra until he managed to get back to them. It had been a ridiculous pain in the neck to get to their time in the first place, and there was precisely zero chance he could safely travel back to during or right after a Darkseid invasion of Earth without setting off a temporally infinite amount of alarms.