DC Universe Riders

(Disclaimer: read the 'Other World Riders' prologue chapter. Also, I'm going to make some adjustments and additions to certain characters along the way, so long as I have time. Don't worry; I won't make too big changes. Also I don't own any superheroes, DC material, etc., any OC is mine.)

Ch. 1: New World of Superheroes and Justice

"KENNETH YOU RUNT! YOU GET BACK HERE!" roars one of a few bigger students, most likely one of the bullies.

Kenneth 'Kenzaki' Blue runs for his wellbeing alongside young Daisuke Hayashi from. Earlier they had to run from the bullies because at first they were pressuring the younger man into giving them whatever money's on him, but Kenneth saw this and punched two of them to rescue his friend and have the both of them escape.

It's not that these two boys who live in the Little Tokyo district of Boston, Massachusetts don't like being bullied; they hate it.

As soon as they make it to a path where the bullies never can look for them, the two of them sneak toward the school grounds safely.

Kenneth 'Kenzaki' Blue is a young man who excels in a lot of physical activities against a lot of people his age but he also has really low confidence. Because of his confidence problem, a lot of people never saw him at his fullest potentials. Kenneth often acts tough, fiery, and confident just to build his confidence, yet a lot of people mistake it as him actually being brash, hotheaded, and impulsive and don't see his true nature underneath that façade. To him, it felt better than feeling shy or left out.

A lot of his classmates had also called Kenneth an idiot, a runt, or even a loser since he got the most barely passing grades without any help. But despite Kenneth not precisely being the sharpest pencil in the box, he has some intelligence and a distinct maturity. Unfortunately to his misfortune, there are very few that see it. The bullies in school call him runt because of all the 15-year-old men in his class; he's the shortest, standing a mere 5'3". He has short and wild brick red hair and his eyes are blue.

What those outside his small circle of friends don't know is that Kenneth is an orphan since he was seven years old, so the young man had to fend for himself for a long time; looking for food to survive, picking such items such as old clothes out of the garbage, learn from viewing how other people live, etc. His father, Kenneth Blue, Sr., had died moments after naming him when was born. Then when he was seven, his mother, Belinda, mysteriously disappeared into a strange phenomenon.

After running out of food for a few days while never been outside before, Kenneth decided for the first time to go outside to get some. He got lost wandering the streets, he was too shy to talk to people or enter buildings, and he couldn't get the right amount of money to get things so he chose to pick it off the streets. When he found his apartment complex/home, it was closed due to disappeared residence and lack of payment because of it. It was a few months before Daisuke's grandfather, Hikaru, who was a friend of the unfortunate child's parents finds the poor boy out in the streets and takes the child in under his care instead of being in the orphanage.

Hikaru gave young Kenneth's nickname 'Kenzaki' to him during swordsmanship practices, to help build his character. In Japanese, it means 'Spirit of the Sword'.

Daisuke Hayashi is a 12-year-old genius Japanese boy with incredible wealth. He is the reason that Kenneth hadn't repeated any grades, in return for keeping the other company. He has straight blonde hair in a ponytail and bright blue eyes, which is considered unusual for a Japanese child but all the more interesting.

Once upon a time, the younger boy's life was once so full of pride and annoyance because of his advantageous privileges (wealth, status, etc.) that he even thought of taking over as head of the family, so he could be recognized as for himself and not just 'young master'. Seeing Kenneth initially in the home of his grandfather, he thought everyone was seeing the older boy more the heir than him and got jealous of him; their relationship was initially rather unpleasant. Having enough of the child's excessive pride, Kenzaki struck him; which is something no one's ever done before.

Realizing the older boy is different from everyone who treated him before, Daisuke hung around him to be better than him. After their heated confrontation between them starts cooling down, they come to an understanding of one another. It took Kenzaki's words to teach him that there are no shortcuts in anything in life, not everything in life can be given to you on a silver platter, and everything else in life matters most. The two then became friends. Because of that realization, he had learned to turn his life around. Because of him letting go of his old self, he got popular with others his age. His genius was recognized two years ago, having him skipping grades to join alongside Kenzaki's side.

When Kenzaki was first having trouble with his academic grades, Daisuke decides to give him a few helpful hints and minor bits of tutoring to help him avoiding being in summer school or repeating grades. But because of his need without the bodyguards, he depends on Kenzaki and advised him into heavy and seemingly gruesome and grueling exercises so he could help him not only build his abilities to their finest, but also build up his confidence. The two remain friends to this day.

Kenzaki is a fan of superheroes and adventures, looking at the lone superhero fight injustice of terrorists and mysterious monsters (i.e. 'Kamen Rider'), but since Daisuke is a super team fan, looking at a group of superheroes fighting as a team to triumph over organizations of evil to save the world (i.e. 'Super Sentai'), he considered togetherness was probably being the best virtue in any given situation. They both agreed to model themselves after various heroes in their own special way.

As soon as they reach class, the two boys look around for their seats…

"Ahem!" they turn to see their black-haired homeroom teacher, Isabelle Kay; who reminds people of the stereotypical strict if not pretty teacher with an inner teenager personality many see in anime and manga, looking at Kenzaki with a very strict manner.

Feeling guilty, the 15-year-old orphan walks up to the teacher's desk and asks "What is it, Ms. Kay?" She strictly asks, "Surely you didn't forget that tonight is the start for time for our assignment to be working in groups for the week?"

Kenzaki cringes and then gulps before asking, "So… who am I assigned to be with for the week?" Looking at her papers, "Since you don't have a lot of friends, save for Daisuke, nor a hobby in school, I'm assigning you to—" She stops in mid-sentence and widens her eyes, then immediately says "No wait! That's for cute little Dan! I mean Dan-baby! I mean Daniel Harvey! Well you know who I mean. " Then she rapidly shuffles through several documents in search for the one with Kenzaki's name as well as the ones in Kenzaki's group.

Hearing some commotion behind him, he turns to see his other classmates enter the room. Most of who, thankfully not including Daisuke, are not too pleased to see him… again. Kenzaki never exactly done anything to upset them, it's just that a lot of them judge him before they get to know him.

"Oh, here it is!" smiles Ms. Kay, "You and Daisuke are going to be teamed up with Nami Akimura."

Nami Akimura, the smartest girl in their class, groans out with distress and displeasure.

She reminds a lot of people of a randy rabbit when the class heartthrob, Dan Harvey, is around. She has brown eyes and silky, straight, lapis lazuli blue hair in a ponytail that reaches down to the middle of her back. She has an average build (which she is upsettingly sensitive to having, especially when it comes to the T&A department), an embarrassing tattoo (a blue tattoo of the kanji for 'water') on her inner thigh, and a disfiguring heart-shaped scar on her left shoulder.

Kenzaki can see that she's cute, but apparently not cute enough for the attention of other young men's point of view. She hates her underdeveloped figure, wanting it to be bouncier, as well as her scar and the tattoo. To get her crush's attention, she's been on a number of activities in order to appeal to him. As for Kenzaki, she's one of those who see him as a runt, an idiot, and a hindrance without knowing him first. However, she has the utmost respect for Daisuke despite him being around Kenzaki for so long for whatever reason she among others in class doesn't know.

Kenneth and Daisuke known her and just about every other foreign exchange student from their travels to different schools to fit in.

With no choice but to accept the assignments handed to them, the class quietly sits and listens to the lecture given to them…

Kenzaki yawns in boredom as the teacher continues talking about the current class subject. It isn't as if the subject itself is boring, but the way she was talking about it was making it boring. Kenzaki figures that literature and social studies is an interesting subject, but Ms. Kay is ruining it.

'As much as I would rather be watching 'Justice League', 'Heroes', 'Kamen Rider', 'Super Sentai' or reading comics or doing some other thing with an adventurous feeling or the superhero genre… I must endure it a little longer.' Kenzaki sighs inwardly.

As soon as school was over, the young man and child are walking with Nami not looking at the shortest 15-year-old man in class.

Nami says to Daisuke, "You know, I bet your parents are really great." "I guess they are," replies Daisuke, "but they're not going to be home in Japan or in this country for another six months, they even left this morning, and my grandfather is really busy at the moment. So you should expect a babysitter at my home."

At the fancy complex where Daisuke, his parents and/or grandfather, and Kenzaki generally live in when in America…

The three enter to see an 18-year-old woman in a dark green dress with a white apron embedded with diamond-shaped imprints sewn into it. She is extremely tall; almost Amazonian in height (180cm or 5'11"), beautiful, bosomy, has dark brown hair with strong tints of green and stripes of earth tones dyed parts, brown eyes, and a calm expression on her face. Her build stands in between athletic and sexy.

Nami blinks in shock, 'OMG! She's taller than my dad! In fact, she's the tallest woman I've ever seen in person!'

"Good day to you again, Ms. Blum " nods Kenzaki. The young woman, Emma Blum, pats the young man's head, "Good day to you too, Kenzaki."

Nami asks the older woman "How do you know each other, madam?" "I've been babysitting these two forever, but I'm enjoying their company," replies Emma. Then she pinches the younger girl's cheek, calmly stating "Plus I'm not that old; I'm still 18 and unmarried." Nami's eyes widen in surprise, then she bows apologetically as soon as her cheek is freed "I'm so sorry, Ms. Blum." Emma returns to her work, "You're forgiven."

The two young males on the flat knew that Emma makes it no secret that she is an otaku in several areas, as well as cornucopia of other kinds of fans of other things in one person. The weirdest thing was that she doesn't really look like one. She looks more like a beautiful woman with an Amazonian physique. Emma feels insecure because of her height, but that doesn't stop her cosplaying as big characters like Alphonse Elric in his gigantic armor body form from 'Fullmetal Alchemist' and the like during several conventions she visited. But one unbelievably unheard of, if not unique, thing about her amongst the 'otaku' is that she doesn't need to buy any graphic novels or DVD's to keep up with any series; she's got an eidetic memory.

Nami lays out the first homework they have to work on together for the first day on the tea table in front of Kenzaki, who silently thanks the spirits that she's being merciful toward him this once. Some of the students prefer their daily life in class while some would like to take on the world already, but the young man is bored out of his wits of this casual reality. There's a lot more things that he would rather do with his time. One of those things would be watching his favorite superhero series or perhaps an adventure film.

He isn't sure why he likes it so much. Maybe it was the ideals that superheroes held on to as they fight evil. He thinks it's pretty cool. Of course, the battles in the tokusatsu series were pretty cool too. Although he knows that if they were any real as he is that those Kamen Riders and Sentai were taking incredible risks, but they're still pretty cool to him.

He doesn't know it that he isn't the only one in the room with those thoughts, Daisuke and Emma both has about enough of the current status quo too.

Emma slumps down on the floor in back of the living room while typing on her laptop computer.

"Another day, another bore," sighs Kenzaki as he struggles to study. Emma looks him, as she and Daisuke have greater understanding and liking of Kenzaki than Nami does.

"Listen, Kenzaki…" says Emma, "if you finish up the homework you have for tonight, we'll all play Hero System with me as game master." "Hero System?" blinks Kenzaki, Daisuke, & Nami in confusion. Emma explains, "It's a role-playing game like DnD or GURPS, but it's universal but got a new system for you." Kenzaki's face brightens, "Alright! Now I'm really motivated!"

Then Kenzaki realizes something, he asks Emma "Hey, wait a minute, Emma-san! What's the campaign or genre of the game?" "I'm glad you've made a successful wisdom roll, Kenzaki" giggles a smiling Emma, "The genre is superhero, but I suppose I can mix a few extra stuff in too, as well as have us feel like living a big crossover fan fiction story; in DC comics mostly."

"Living a fan fiction?" sighs Nami, "I'm a magical girl fan." Emma states, "Before 'Sailor Moon' or 'Tokyo Mew Mew', there were magical superheroines like Wonder Woman. Some even suppose that that's where your homeland got the idea for the superheroic Mahou Shoujo."

Daisuke asks, "Is it alright if I play a sidekick to whoever Aniki plays?" Emma nods "You bet. I'm thinking of putting several bits of stuff from other stories in, to get your creativity and imagination ablaze along with hopefully self-discovery of yourself. I call it the title of this campaign the 'Heroes of Justice'."

"The Heroes of Justice?" ask the younger three in unison.

Emma smirks, "Finish your homework and I'll introduce the premise and the prologue, I know that will sound like something similar to 'Lord of the Rings' but please work with me then."

As soon as everyone was done studying for the evening, Emma takes on a dramatic air and starts—

"In a time when the world of Earth was coming into great danger, heroic individuals each possessing strong sense of justice and incredible powers arise to become champions of mankind to avert it, they have later received the title of superheroes. The most famed of these superheroes are—"

"The powerful paladin from another star"

"The terrifying knight in darkness"

"The virgin-born warrior princess"

"The crimson rogue blessed by lightning"

"The steadfast crusader of emerald magic"

"The jade protector from the world of red"

"The angelic barbarian with the soul of a bird of prey"

"The wondrous ward of the knight of darkness"

"The atoning sorceress born from darkness"

"The magical princess from a world far away"

"The battling blacksmith with a body of iron"

"And the wild child who becomes a thousand beasts"

"There soon came a day unlike any other, when these mighty heroes were united against a common threat. On that day… the Justice League and their young assistants, the Teen Titans, were born to fight foes that no ordinary force on Earth could withstand."

"In the most desperate of times, they enlist the services of other superheroes to combat the threats of the situation."

"Whether their foes were time-traveling conquerors, alien invaders, masters of evil, psychotic criminals, mystical overlords, mad scientists, terrorists, robot commandos, or even giant oozing monsters, it didn't matter, their courage and dedication to protect the lives of the good people gave them the strength to vanquish them all in order to make the world safe once again."

"When danger would lighten up, the heroes find ways to gain lives of their own in a world changing for the better meanwhile. But sometimes the balance of the universe needs to mercilessly summon great and dangerous evil to force their trade to defend the innocent in effect across the universe."

"Are we going to play one of those you've described?" asks Daisuke. Emma shakes her head "No, you're going to create your own superheroes to play the roles."

"Kenzaki," says Emma, turning to Kenneth "Recite your favorite Lantern Oath." "Is it alright if I say both of them?" asks Kenneth. The babysitter shrugs, "Sure, I wouldn't mind."

Kenneth takes a deep breath and recites—

"In fearful day, in raging night, with strong hearts full, our souls ignite! When all seems lost in the War of Light, look to the stars, for hope burns bright!"

"In Brightest Day, in Blackest Night, no evil shall escape my sight, let those who worship evil's might, beware my power— Green Lantern's light!"

"Green Lantern?" exclaims Nami in surprise. She looks to Emma and asks, "We're going to play DC comic heroes?" Emma keeps a straight face and says "Those guys will be extremely helpful non-player characters while you get to play your own custom-made ones." "Well, in that case…" says Nami, "I'm going to design my character a little bit after a few magical girls, because I'm more partial to them."

As soon as everyone was done studying for the evening, Emma gives them time to build their role-playing characters—

The four take turns in designing their player characters in other places on the flat… while Kenzaki sits alone at his own laptop computer designing his character like the minor fan of RPG he is, while watching Justice League clips and checking up on lists of superpowers. He works on making his character to correspond to Emma's game world and researching the information he doesn't know of.

He sighs writes on a card, to playfully parody a certain Superman scene—

'You will endure much, my little Kenzaki, but we will never leave you— no matter what. You will be different, sometimes you'll feel like an outcast, but you'll never be alone. You will make our strength and power your own. You will see our lives through your eyes, as your life will be seen through ours. The child becomes the parent and the parent becomes the child.'

Kenneth then hears something—

"Do you wish to change your life forever, Mr. Kenneth 'Kenzaki' Blue?" asks an ominous disembodied female voice from somewhere around Kenzaki. Kenzaki felt like saying yes, but remembering the old phrase 'be careful what you wish for', he wonders what the catch is.

"I'd like to," he brings up out loud, "but…" he becomes listless before he could continue. Maybe whatever the voice is talking about, his life would get infinitely better. Inwardly, he feels his heart is saying 'yes' to the question.

Then he feels the temperature in the room begin to rise and a growing quaking of the earth. He thought nothing of it for a while before he realized that his room was beginning to be filled with violet light.

"What the heck?" gasps Kenzaki as the light begins growing brighter and brighter. The energies are becoming unbearable and soon Kenzaki was struggling to get off the bed and to the front door. However, his legs are quickly becoming disobedient.

Daisuke struggles to get to his best friend but is having a similar problem, "What's going on here, aniki?" Kenzaki asks, "Why are you asking me, Daisuke?"

Nami starts screaming, and then looking to Kenzaki she hisses out "WHAT DID YOU DO?" "I DIDN'T DO ANYTHING!" pleads Kenzaki.

Emma rushes into the room, she worriedly calls "What the heck is going on—" and then she squeaks out "here?"

The four of them couldn't even reach the door to escape the room before the light became too bright for him to see anything but the violet hued atmosphere.

That is when the floor gives out beneath the four of them.

They then fall before being launched upwards!

Kenzaki suddenly feels himself and the other three flying uncontrollably through what feels like space, but they can still breathe. All around them is blinding purple light. He cannot tell up from down. All of it looks more or less the same to him as he's flying through the violet space. They look in every direction that they could, hoping that they could find something to stop their fall or even an indication to just where the heck they are. Looking around himself, Kenzaki spies something that isn't violet light appearing around the four of them: pure white spherical star-like phenomena that collide against them. Some of which go into each person, while some of them harden into solid objects. Kenzaki thinks of them like a lifeline if he could collect enough of them, only to discover that he needn't worry about losing anything since they attach to him like magnets.

The non-solid stars are like small electrical shocks at first but feel comforting as if they are part of him, while the metallic surface of each solid star is cool against his fingers and definitely real. He manages to use his weightlessness to his advantage to move himself toward his panicking friends and lasso them to him with the solid stars stuck to them. After Kenzaki reels the three closer to him, all four of them begin to feel a sensation that fluctuates from burning to shocking to freezing erupt not only in their bodies, but from the solid stars stuck to them as well. Whatever's going on, they hope that it would end soon.

When the fluctuating sensations become almost too much to bare, Kenzaki's world goes black.

Somewhere, in a dark cave… a man in a black suit is working on a massive custom-made computer. The large screen suddenly brings up a graphic globe with pulsating blips. Below the globe on the screen, are capital lettered words of red reading 'Dimensional Anomalies Detected. Total Number of Anomalies: 640,000'.

Under his frightening cowl, the man says "400 times the number of similar anomalies 7 and a half years ago, which was 20 times the original number from the first 7 and a half years prior to it. The inventor of the source of the dimensional anomalies sure made it persistent. But the more important question; which one is that Other World resident looking for?"

Then he moves to a different location, thinking to himself 'Might as well find the arrivals from the one closest to Gotham City and Metropolis… in Atlantic City Harbor.'

He isn't the only one who detected the anomalies.

One amongst them includes a womanly figure in iridescent white armor of white metal standing on a building's roof in a certain city turns her helmeted head toward the streets, as if she has just sensed something.

Around her waist is a mechanical silver belt with a golden winged crest engraved around a quarter-sized sapphire in its center-front inserted into the buckle. A sword with a silvery hilt shaped like angelic wings with a walnut-sized pearl rested in a sheath on her belt at the left side. A leather pouch rests on the right side.

Under her white armor is a pure white low-cut tunic. Her considerable chest is covered with smooth metallic white breastplate with a golden crescent moon in the top-center area. Her shoulders are covered with smooth metallic white shoulder armor. Covering her lower body, from her waist to her knees, is a scalloped battle skirt. Her forearms are covered in smooth white metallic cuffs. She is also wearing white boots with gold linings.

She has a white cape with black feathers elaborately embroidered on the edges and held around her neck with a golden heart-shaped brooch.

Her silvery helmet is modeled after a winged helmet akin to the Mighty Thor's, but over her blue eyes is a visor akin to that of an owl's face. Her long brown hair flows from underneath her helmet like a second cape in the breeze.

"He's come!" she gasps, before sighing with hope "At long last."

She then turns back to the edge of the building and walks into it, whistling a little bit before she fell… then she is caught in mid-fall in the saddle on a winged horse of white. She grabs the reigns and they charge off in the night sky.

On another side of the city is a young man with long red hair and blue eyes dressed in a fine Italian business suit. He frowns, "I can no longer see through his eyes… he's finally here. At last… after seven and a half long, arduous years of waiting and preparing… I'll finally get my wish."

At the docks of Atlantic City Harbor, in Delaware Bay…

A couple of cargo loaders were moving a couple of crates onto a truck, when they gather to one of their co-workers when he told them he saw a strange anomaly in the sky and heard a couple of splashes nearby.

One of them spots a few suitcases and he asks, "Where did these come from?"

Hearing coughing in the dark waters, another says, "There's someone in the water!"

They gather and help four young people out of the water.

They are Kenzaki, Daisuke, Nami, and Emma.

Catching their breaths from almost drowning, Kenneth coughs out "Thanks for the rescue."

"Hey," says one of the dock laborers "anyone could've done that." The laborer that saw the anomaly asks, "Where did you come from, kids?"

"Boston, Massachusetts?" nervously replies Daisuke.

"But that's hundreds of miles north of here" blinks one of the laborers.

Nami looks at the workers nervously and cautiously asks, "Where is here?"

One of the laborers answer, "Uh, Atlantic City Harbor in Delaware Bay, somewhere between Metropolis and Gotham."

"Metropolis? Gotham?" gasps Emma. She looks at the laborers and asks "As in Batman, Superman, Joker, Lex Luthor, Wonder Woman, Metropolis, and Gotham?"

"I don't know who this Wonder Woman is," nods the same laborer "but yes you four are in a harbor in between those two cities."

"How could you not know Wonder Woman?" asks Nami "Emma, they're pulling our legs!"

Emma pulls the kids down and whispers to them, "Then how would you explain that phenomenon-like anomaly, or our transportation here all the way from Boston, and them not knowing who Wonder Woman is?"

"We're having a crazy dream, got kidnapped and then thrown in the waters here?" asks Nami, trying to make sense.

"We fell back in time?" asks Daisuke.

"We're in another dimension?" asks Kenneth.

Emma points at Kenneth, nodding "My most reasonable and logical theorem precisely. Good thinking, Kenzaki."

Looking back at the dockworkers, who are for some reason looking scared and backing away slowly, Daisuke says to the others "They're backing up. Why?"

Hearing a click, the four turn in the direction the laborers were facing and spot a couple of thugs brandishing weapons; including a few clubs and guns.

"Your wallets, now!" demands the leading thug wielding a gun.

"Money? Is that what you want?" gasps a frightened Nami, "I'm sorry, but I've blown the money in my wallet at McDonald's on my way to Daisuke's apartment."

One of the thugs frowns, "Let me think for a minute; a couple of Japanese kids transferring to America, in a city closest to Gotham City, which is usually full of rich big shots, and one of them is claiming to have no money when they're obviously carrying a lot of interesting and probably expensive merchandise. Obviously after falling of a plane, you must be a liar or just plain crazy."

Nami steps forward, "You're the ones who are crazy, as well as stupid if you actually think that—"

SMACK!

Nami is then seen laying on the wooden planks whimpering in pain and tending to her cheek which was pistol-whipped by the sane mugger.

Daisuke rushes in to try to help, only to be shoved to the side by the awaiting arm of another of the muggers and into a stack of large wooden crates.

Emma spots another of the thugs looking at her with predatory eyes and reaching for his belt. But before he could react, Emma unleashes a mighty kick to his abdomen, catapulting him into his buddies, knocking them down like dominoes.

Emma looks at her feet, quickly thinking 'No way, it's just like that kick in 'Shanghai Noon'! Did I gain photographic reflexes or something?'

Seeing her do that, the muggers try to gang up on her, only to immediately balk with wide eyes.

One of the laborers says in surprise, "Whoa! Superboy, probably."

Confused, Emma turns around to see a frowning Kenneth hefting a large wooden crate over his head without effort walking threateningly at the cowering muggers.

"That's no way to treat a lady," growls Kenneth.

Nami, still nursing her cheek, looks up to gasp in shock at the sight of Kenneth's true strength.

Kenneth growls as he hurls the crate toward them, forcing them to drop their weapons and scamper for cover and safety. The crate crashes into most of them, knocking them unconscious. The rest are frozen in fear from the display of bodily brawn.

Emma says casually, "Good distance, Hulk Hogan."

Crossing his arms over his chest, Kenneth says to the laborers "They're all yours."

Feeling more confident with the situation and no longer left out, the laborers grab some chains and rope to tie up the muggers before calling the police to pick them up.

"Now to find Daisuke" says Kenneth.

A bright green flash of light bursts from behind the crates where Daisuke was thrown.

Rising from behind the crates is a fiery humanoid, looking like it's coming out of a daze. His body is composed of brown and black rocks that appear to hold in yellow/red magma. His head is completely fiery, and his eyes are connected to that flame. His hands and feet are like they're made up of yellow glowing magma. His feet have a slight oval-like design with two front toes and a lone back toe on both feet. Emblazoned on its chest is a round emblem with an almost open book-like symbol.

"Heatblast?" blinks Kenneth.

Nami screams in fear at the sight of it!

The laborers gasp at the sight of the humanoid, one of them says "Look, flame dude, don't hurt us!"

With a young yet gravelly and semi-deep voice, the magma-based creature replies, "I don't want to hurt anybody!"

"Daisuke?" blink Emma and Kenneth in unison.

"The kid?" asks one of the laborers, "What planet are you from? And I mean literally!"

Nami stutters out, "Kenneth Blue has superhuman strength, Daisuke-kun turned into a humanoid entity of fire and magma, and fiction is now fact?"

Then Nami runs away.

"Aww man," groans Kenneth "now she'll think I'm a mutant!" Then he chases after her.

Emma and Heatblast/Daisuke both run after the two.

One of the laborers says, "I'm pretty sure those kids are good, just a bit like fish out of water and forgot what happened to them according to shock." "They're even missing their baggage," remarks another.

As the former turns around, he gasps in shock finding a tall and athletic man in a black bat-themed outfit with a cape and a yellow mechanical utility belt and a bat symbol emblazoned on his chest. Looking at the figure, everyone immediately knows who it is—

It's Batman!

"Tell me what happened," demands Batman.

Nami is running like crazy, hoping to escape everything that's happening now. She's not the type to accept being wrong more often than not since she felt pretty perceptive about several things. But this time, she has encountered what was impossible; Kenneth is super-strong when he was supposed to be a wimpy and stupid runt, Daisuke has turned into a flaming magma humanoid, and she's in a comic book universe reality with those three, Kenneth specifically.

As she continues running, she hears cars honking at her and finds herself in the middle of a street!

She tries to get away, but one of the cars hit her.

As the other three arrive, they find her on the car, but more molded onto the car like she was a dummy of silly putty when it hit her.

Kenneth shakes his head in surprise, "Great galloping globs of goop!"

The malleable Nami peels herself off of the car, crying out with a slightly warped voice "What's happening to me?"

The driver exits from his car in horror, watching as Nami is reforming, before finally running away.

Emma says, twisting her head quickly "Let's get out of here! People are easily scared when they encounter the unnatural!" "The three of us are unnatural!" cries Nami.

Heatblast/Daisuke's eyes widen in shock, "Aniki, your hands are on fire!"

Lifting his hands to see his hands, Kenneth panics "What's happening to us?"

His shoes explode, then with his feet on fire he is thrust into the air like a rocket!

The three remaining on the ground look up, startled by the recent occurrence.

Heatblast/Daisuke instinctively thrusts his hands down, using a column of fire to launch him up to his friend.

Kenneth looks up to find himself about to crash headfirst into the bottom of the cabin of a blimp in the air. He cries out "Oh my, sweet jumping Jehosaphat of Judah!"

BAM!

His arms, upper torso, and head pop up through the floor!

"Ow…" groans Kenneth softly, "and I thought it would be more durable than that."

Heatblast/Daisuke opens the door on the side, unintentionally melting part of it, and says "Aniki, are you alright?"

"We've got to find a way to get me onto solid ground and turn your Omnitrix off" says Kenneth, as he struggles to pry himself from the hole.

Back on the streets, Emma and Nami are panicking at the oncoming sirens of police cruisers coming their way.

The two run, hoping to avoid trouble from the police.

Nami then jumps for the shadows, unexpectedly taking her and Emma, whose still holding onto her, up into the air uncontrollably.

Crashing onto the roof of a building, the two girls see the police staring in their direction.

Turning toward Nami, Emma asks, "Think you can make that blimp the boys are at?"

Nami grabs Emma's arms and says "I don't like Kenneth that much but I will help!"

Nami then jumps, a few times but makes it to the blimp's open door.

FLASH!

A red flash fills the cabin, later revealing human-again Daisuke and freed Kenneth, as well as a completely melted control panel.

Kenneth nervously chuckles and explains, "After Daisuke pulled me out, we've discovered that this is an unmanned blimp and I've just destroyed the controls."

"Oh no…" cringes Nami, when they all suddenly get zipped out by the strengthened suction of the wind pressure from outside.

The blimp then begins a few explosions.

WHOOSH!

A familiar figure in a blue suit and a red cape comes by in a flash and shoves the exploding blimp into the harbor.

In another building…

The four had earlier crashed into a window of an office in the building… or more likely, Kenneth had crashed in first while flying the other three safely to the floor of the office.

Nami is chanting to herself, "This is just a very bad dream" repeatedly.

That earns her everyone with her to roll his or her eyes behind her back.

Then a gruff male voice says, "I don't know who the four of you children are, but I do know you are Other World residents and you've had enough fun for one night."

They turn to find Batman glaring at them. He pulls out a small ball and throws it at them, causing a yellow-green cloud to engulf them.

"Oh my goodness gracious me!" exclaims Emma.

"Smokescreen?" screams Nami, "Run before he knocks out!"

Emma groans, "I know this smell; it's not smoke, just anesthetic gas."

As the cloud clears, the four children drop to the floor unconscious.

In the Batcave…

Batman is currently examining the four young ones, who are each still out cold. Earlier after taking them into his command center, he examined the items in the containers that came with them.

On his Batcomputer, he notes out loud "Their DNA is still human, but like most of the other Other World residents aside from those who have remained normal, they have gained powers and equipment beyond most people's imagination. But oddly, the 18-year-old woman and the 15-year-old boy have heightened concentrations concerning of mind and body. The red-haired boy is definitely someone fitting for what Pearl Valkyrie is looking for, but contained stress has stunted his growth rate for age. The watch on the blonde Japanese child is more organic then mechanic."

Kenzaki wakes up, finding himself strapped to a metal table looking up into a scanner, he turns his head and says with a friendly tone "Um, excuse me?"

Batman turns to the boy, who responds "Yes?"

"Um… good evening?" continues Kenneth.

The others wake up, with Nami as the most frightened squirming her way out of the metal harnesses before slipping free like it was nothing.

Nami utters to herself, "This is one advantage to be literally malleable."

Batman takes a stance, prepared to counter anything the new shapeshifter may dish out.

"Where's the camera?" asks Nami, desperate to get a grip of reality "Where's the crew?"

In Japanese, Batman replies "I'd be skeptical too if I'm in a universe that I once remembered being from a comic book, but I have the will to act and survive and the comprehension to adapt and accept. I'm sorry to inform you but now this is reality, not a movie set."

Nami kneels to the cavern ground and grabs her head, "OH KAMI-SAMA! SAIYAKU!"

Kenneth suddenly finds enough strength to easily rip free from the metal straps, he grins innocently toward Batman and quickly says "Sorry."

"As I have theorized," says Batman "you gain powers and abilities from other super-powered beings so long as you're within 20 yards of them or if there is one around you."

Emma, who awoke the same time as Kenneth, says "But that would mean someone with superhuman strength is nearby. And the only one I can think of that you would know the location of your Batcave would be Superman."

"That would be correct" assures a more soothing masculine voice nearby.

Everyone turns to find a muscular and well-built man with black hair with a slightly bluish luster in a form-fitting blue suit. He has red boots and trunks with a yellow belt with a round buckle. Emblazoned on his chest is a stylized triangular shield with an uppercase 'S' in red with a yellow interior. Flowing from his back and shoulders is a large red cape with an all-yellow 'S' symbol opposite of the one on his chest.

It's Superman!

"The powerful paladin from another star…" gasps Kenneth, then looks at Batman "and the terrifying knight in darkness."

Batman says "We respectively prefer 'Man of Steel' and 'Dark Knight', but they're also good descriptions of us, if you're speaking in a prophecy." "In a premise of an RPG," speaks up Emma.

Hearing a horse neighing, everybody turns to find a woman in armor of iridescent white metal riding a winged stallion flying in their location.

"Is that the Mighty Thor?" asks Nami to Emma. Emma shakes her head, "Thor is in Marvel comics, this is DC, and she is a woman." Kenneth says to Emma, "You know the language Vikings speak, right?" "Norse, Scandinavian, and a little German" replies Emma. "Well, talk to her, in German!"

Emma asks, "Hallo, bin ich Emma Blum. Die Kinder mit mir und mir wissen nicht, die Sie sind.."

('Hello, I am Emma Blum. The children with me and I don't know who you are.')

"Ich bin die Perle Valkyrie," replies the woman in German "und ich bin hergekommen, weil ich ein Kind von meinen hier entdeckt habe. Ich kann Englisch sprechen, also lasse sie nicht zu viel sich sorgen, Kind."

"She says that she's the Pearl Valkyrie, and she has come here because she detected her child in the Batcave. She also speaks English. Introduce yourselves."

"My name is Nami Akimura."

"I am Daisuke Hayashi."

"Kenneth Blue II…"

Pearl Valkyrie gasps, looking at Kenneth "Kenneth?"

Kenneth nods.

Turning to her steed, she says "Astracura, let me down."

The horse lands on the ground before them and its rider gets off, she smiles and hugs Kenneth, letting her helmet fall off, surprising him.

He thinks, 'This warmth… is familiar…'

"Uh…" speaks up Nami "What's going on here?"

Kenneth gently pushes the unmasked Pearl Valkyrie, revealing her face to him.

He begins to cry but with a bright smile, "Mother!" then he embraces her.

"Oh my baby boy," smiles the young woman, identified as Kenneth's long lost mother, as she embraces him some more "I've missed you so much!"

Superman nods calmly, "We've brought one family together, huh, Batman."

Batman says, "Not many of us feel that fortunate all the time."

Nami gawks at the scene, "Okay… now I'm really confused!"

To be continued…