Chapter 1
"Anything new?" said Clark Kent, who was sitting on a table, eating a slice of pizza.
"Nothing. Maybe your planet must be reborn" said Diana Prince, who was sitting on the other end of the table.
"That's not a joke" said Bruce Wayne, sitting between them. "His planet was destroyed"
"Why do you stay so serious?" said Arthur Curry, sitting opposite Wayne. "Don't you be humourous?"
The Kryptonian, Amazon, multi-billionaire and the Atlantean were having dinner at Wayne Manor. They were enjoying themselves, in Gotham.
Bruce Wayne had crashed a party for them, personally, only for the three of them.
Clark Kent, a reporter at Metropolis, saved lots of people in the identity of Superman. His original name was Kal-El, who was sent to Earth from his planet Krypton, which was now extinct. Bruce Wayne, the multi- billionaire, owner of Wayne Enterprises, saved people in his vigilante form Batman.
Diana and Arthur belonged to the Amazon and Atlantean race, who lived in the island of Themyscira and the underwater city of Atlantis, respectively. Diana was called Wonder Woman for her operations in the urban life. Arthur was the protector of the oceans, also called the Aquaman, who saved people not only in the marine but also on land. Finally, the food they were eating was finished. The team enjoyed the feast.
"Well, I have to say I want to eat more, but there's no space left in my stomach" said Clark, giving a burp.
"I thought you could eat as much as you wished" said Arthur.
"Only if I had any food left" said Bruce.
"I really love this atmosphere" said Diana, going to the window.
She looked at the landscape, when she noticed something. Over the gray clouds in the windy night, she noticed the black symbol of a bat, surrounded by white be seen. She lifted the window and observed it.
"Bruce, is that your signal?" said Diana, calling for him and pointing to the signal on the clouds.
"Got to go" said Bruce. "Your suits on"
In two minutes, they were dressed in their respective suits. Arthur in his waterproof suit, Bruce in his Batman form, Diana in her Wonder Woman suit and Clark in the suit given to him by his father. They all were set to rescue the city once more.
On the roof of the police headquarters of Gotham stood Commissioner James Gordon, waiting for Batman to arrive. In a second, he saw the unexpected arrivals of three more superheroes with Batman.
"Well, I didn't expect you" said Gordon to Clark.
"So did I" he replied.
"So, what's the big deal?" asked Bruce.
"Okay, we've witnessed a robbery from the Wayne Enterprises"
Bruce stood in silence. It was his own company, but overcame his astonishment in quick time.
"Who was it?" asked Diana.
"Don't know his identity, but he wears a green suit with a mask"
"Edward Nigma" said Bruce, and addressed his team with him.
While they were walking, Bruce connected his call with his butler, Alfred Pennyworth.
"Alfred, I need you to track our Thought-Detecting Machine, wherever it is"
"On it, sir" said Alfred.
"Where are we going?" asked Arthur.
"Wait for a minute" said Bruce, checking his Bluetooth device. "Yes, he's on his way to the Gotham Bank"
"I'll go first" said Clark, and began flying through Gotham. He, through his sensing abilities, detected police sirens in the city and at once headed towards it. But, he found Bruce, Diana and Arthur there before him.
"You guys here before me?" said Clark.
"I knew the route. You left without listening" said Bruce.
"Fine" said Diana. "Where do we go now?"
"We wait till Nigma arrives" said Bruce.
"How're you sure he passes through here?" asked Arthur.
"Because he will go from that corner over there and since the police will surround him from all sides over there, he has to take a cut into this lane"
"I'm impressed" said Clark.
"This is nothing" said Bruce. "Now, we have to hide. He'll arrive soon, and on my signal, Clark, you'll jump onto him and knock him down. I'll ensure he won't escape beyond us. Diana and Arthur, you will look into him in case he fights Clark"
Edward Nigma was also known as The Riddler, who was very fond of riddles. He had confronted Batman in previous incidents, and had been to Arkham very often. He carried a stick (in the shape of a question mark) with him, with which he could control the minds of people. He was now into stealing this device from Wayne Enterprises, which could sense people's thoughts, and Nigma thought he could control the entire world with it.
Then, they heard engine sounds. It was that of Nigma's motorcycle. Bruce and Arthur hid to a side, when Diana and Clark hid to the side opposite to them. Slowly, the motorcycle sound grew louder. Arthur took his trident in hand. He calculated the time when Nigma would arrive and got ready with his trident.
Clark had to knock Nigma by shooting laser from his eyes, but Arthur was jealous of this priority. He instead thought of doing the job himself. As the motorcycle arrived, Arthur threw his trident into the tire of the motorcycle, and then Nigma was flying in the air, his motorcycle skidding into the pathway, the device he stole falling near Clark and Diana.
"Arthur, no!" said Bruce, but he would not listen to him.
Arthur threw himself into the air and pushed him onto Nigma, who fell near the device. Arthur was simultaneously punching Nigma, who was groaning in pain. The police arrived. Bruce ran to Arthur and stopped him from punching Nigma. The police too tried to stop him. Diana and Clark were not normal. They were continuously blinking their eyes, coughing and experiencing pain. Bruce went to them.
"You guys all right?" he said.
They stopped coughing at once. By their facial expressions, Bruce could tell that the pain had come to an end. Blinking took time to stop, after a quarter of a minute. They lifted their thumbs, signaling Bruce to stop worrying. Bruce gave a sigh of relief.
His eyes were on Arthur. He was too blinking badly. Cough after cough came from his mouth. Bruce ran towards him. He patted his chest gently, and after a while he too stopped strange behavior.
"What's this Alfred?" asked Bruce, through his Bluetooth.
"As the instructions read, going near the device without suitable equipment would cause irritation" said Alfred.
"Then what about Nigma?"
"His stick is similar to that of the device's. We can call it a type of sync"
"Fine"
Bruce saw one officer hitting the other. He looked to see that his eyes were green.
"Oh, I've told them a million times"
Bruce went towards Nigma and before Nigma could control him, he took his stick and broke it into two parts.
"This is the fifth one, Batman" said Nigma.
"And this is the fifty-ninth one" said Bruce, punching Nigma on the face, who fell back into the police van.
The police took Nigma to Arkham, this was his sixth imprisonment here. They thanked Batman once again and Commissioner Gordon revealed in one of his interviews that it was Batman and his allies who had helped Nigma to get back into prison.
"What the hell was that?" said Clark, back in the Wayne Manor. "It was clearly said that I should knock him down, by shooting laser on his shoulder. But, what did you do?"
"The thing you could've done" said Arthur.
"No, Arthur, we were in danger. We just acted abnormal for a minute. What if we were completely exposed to that thing?" said Diana.
"Thank god nothing happened" said Bruce, arriving from the corner, having changed into his sleeping dress. "Next time" he said, moving closer to Arthur. "You better listen to me"
There was a minute of silence.
"I've got to go" said Clark.
"So have I" said Diana.
Then both of them immediately left.
"It would be better if you leave, too" said Bruce.
Arthur stared Bruce for a while. Then, he picked his shirt from beside and went out of the room, slamming the door.
In the wee hours, at one, at Metropolis, there were a very few cars on the streets. The Daily Planet was closed, willing to open again at seven in the morning. But two of its workers were awake – Clark Kent and Lois Lane.
Clark Kent and Lois Lane were involved in a strong relationship ever since Kal-El was exposed to the world. Lois, who got interested in the existence of a non-Earthling, had written an article over the internet. She was in turn in danger, when Kal-El's people had arrived on Earth and enquired her about Kal-El's whereabouts. Kal had saved Lois, and over the time their relationship had grown deeper.
"What are you doing here?" said Lois, who was angered by the thought of being awaken at midnight.
"I was on my way home, and I decided to have a look at my baby" said Clark, in turn watching a smiling Lois.
They hugged each other. After about ten seconds, Lois freed herself from him.
"Wait! You were on your way home? Where were you?"
Clark gave a sigh.
"You were on high again?" she asked, and put an unhappy look on her face.
"Look, Bruce was just giving me a personal party because I had saved his city once" explained Clark.
"You promised me not to go on parties again" said Lois.
"Well, parties don't mean just going to the bar and you know, dancing with the disco and all that stuff" Clark tried to explain. "It was just a private dinner"
"You sure?"
"Yes"
Lois kissed Clark on the lip, and the latter left for home.
Amidst his flight, his mind suddenly got its senses on danger. He looked at his surroundings, even on the clouds. Finally, on his left, about two kilometers away, he sensed the sound of a clock ticking. On thinking and sensing further, he analyzed it to be that of a time bomb's.
He immediately pushed his hands in front of him and eventually was flying in that direction. His speed was the reason he could reach there in fifteen seconds. He finally stopped at a huge bungalow, which was beautifully painted in white. Clark scanned the entire house, and what he found was five people.
He headed to the entrance and eventually entered the house and whom he saw was Diana Prince, Arthur Curry, and two thugs, fighting each other. He saw Diana kick one of the thugs, who in turn fell back and hit a pillar. Arthur was fast in blocking the other one's punches and after a good defense, he placed the trident in front of him, which released a huge jet of water onto the man, increasing the distance between the two people.
"Clark?" said Diana, who was the first to notice the presence of a fifth person.
"Well, my senses told me that you were here" said Clark. "By the way, what makes you stay here?"
"There's a huge bomb in this house" said Arthur, "which is gonna explode within no time"
"I've known that before you" said Clark.
"Okay, enough talking, Clark. Can you locate the bomb?" said Diana.
Clark scanned the entire house once again. His x-ray vision told him that the bomb was placed on the roof, which was made by red bricks.
"On the roof!" said Clark, who then repulsed himself from the ground, and began flying in the air.
He went to the roof and began searching for the bomb. He finally finalized its location. He began shooting laser from his eyes, which resulted in the bricks dismantling into small pieces. When he finally removed the bricks blocking the bomb, then held the red bomb with a bunch of wires in his hands.
"Ten more seconds!" said Clark, tensed.
He threw the bomb in the air, then began shooting laser on it, which was directing the device up into the atmosphere. The longer he shot laser, the higher it went. When just three seconds were left, Clark was applying more pressure, but got distracted as one of the thugs who had placed the bomb knocked over him.
The bomb was no longer getting pushed, plus the thug knocking Clark made it to diverge in a different direction, towards a tall building. The bomb made its way into one of the floors of the building, and 'Boom!'
The upper part of the tall building was on fire, with orange flames flying rapidly in all directions. It created a loud noise, awakening the civilians. Arthur was shocked, as his blue eyeballs kept staring at the orange flames, whereas Diana kept a hand over her mouth, looking at the explosion in awe, dumbstruck at the apparition.
Clark Kent was the most emotional and depressed one. He closed his eyes, rolling tears from his eyes, feeling that he had failed the city once again.
