Nightwing stood, unflinching as any of the statues as he had perched on over the years in the Watch Tower, glaring at a screen. He had removed his domino mask and gloves; he had brought up a file of an old friend, from only a few months ago. He looked from the left to the right where a photo of the woman he had met only a few hours ago had been taken.
They were identical down to the last skin line. It was strange. He remembered the incident perfectly.
He had been patrolling Bludhaven as usual when he had heard screams and the sounds of fighting coming from an old warehouse district. After using his grapple to swing across the street, he had found a girl about his age fighting back against her attacker!
"I said get off me!" The woman growled, "And I meant it!"
The woman was going after the man! She kicked him in the side and delivered a left hook. He fell on the ground, spitting.
"Now you're getting it good! Feisty little animal like you will make some good action overnight!" He lunged at the woman with a pocket knife.
Wrong move.
"Don't even try me!" She snarled.
She grabbed his wrist, forcing the knife on the ground and wrapped her legs around him. She stared him down in the eyes snarling at him like a rabid animal.
"I. Said. No!"
She leaned back, slamming herself on the ground and flipping him overhead with a kick.
Nightwing stared; it was the exact same move as Moontail had used on ShadowMist!
"Ugh! You little… ugh…" The man stuttered as he tried in vain to rise.
He had been slammed against a concrete wall with enough force to crack it. He wasn't getting up anytime. Just to be sure though, Nightwing flung a wing ding at him, knocking his already fading conscious out completely. He dropped to the street, prepared for anything.
"Who the hell are you?" The woman asked setting herself up exactly as before.
"I'm Nightwing. I protect Bludhaven," Nightwing introduced himself.
"Psh, I don't need a protector, you saw that," She snorted, flinging her brown hair out of her eyes.
"I can see that," Nightwing said, noting her brilliant golden eyes, "Can I ask though, who you are?"
"Why do you want to know?" She asked, "Because if you think formalities will get me to lay an egg for you, you're about as dumb as him!"
"No, no!" Nightwing shook his head, "I just think I've seen you before somewhere. You're really familiar."
"Right," She rolled her eyes, relaxing, "I just moved her like yesterday."
"Oh." Nightwing looked down and prepared to disappear into the shadows.
Then everything changed.
The woman relaxed more, her hard defiant eyes softening as she brushed back her hair. She stepped into the light, revealing beautiful olive skin. She wore blue skinny jeans with a black tank top. A red and white flannel shirt was tied around her waist. She was clearly fit and very beautiful. Everything about her reminded of Nightwing of Juna. He looked up with a smile when the women cocked her heads to the side, introducing herself.
"I'm Marie," She stuck out a hand with trimmed purple nails, "Marie El Conta."
Of course, Nightwing had lunged at the opportunity. Marie El Conta had been a cover name that Juna had used when they had gone to an Art Gala a few months prior. It was a sign that maybe she wasn't completely gone. Nightwing focused again on the photo of Juna.
She was in civvies. A lime green tank top with black jeans and a black and white checkered flannel shirt slung over her shoulders, she had looked ravishing. Her beautiful golden eyes smirking at the camera as her brown moppy hair just brushed her shoulders. She was fit and skinny at the same time, evidence of her living on her own for years in her native realm and scrap fighting with whoever ticked her off. Juna was brash and sarcastic, always looking for a fight and never taking no for an answer. She had scared the League and the Team with her aggressive tactics and yet impressed them with her determination to protect innocents at all costs. Nightwing could imagine her speaking in the same sarcastic drawl in the photo that Marie had spoken with him earlier. It couldn't be a coincidence that the two were exactly alike. He had experienced magic, aliens and alternate realms. He was allies with gods and people from the future; he fought mutated villains on a nightly basis.
So why did this revelation that the two girls were the same scare him so much?
His thoughts wandered back to only hours earlier, looking for more evidence.
"Marie El Conta?" Nightwing asked, amazed, "I knew it! I knew you were alive! They said you died but you didn't! Seer said you might come back! You did Juna, yes! Oh my God just wait till everyone knows! Juna, you're alive-"
"Uh excuse me what?" Marie interrupted him, "What are you talking about? Who are you talking about?"
"Oh c'mon stop with the act!" Nightwing laughed, "You know me Juna!"
"Ok…" Marie stepped back, "I suggest you go back to swinging around putting out fires or whatever because I'm not whoever you think I am."
"What are you talking about? It's me, Nightwing!"
"Look, unless you want to end up like that guy," She jerked a thumb at the unconscious attacker, "I suggest you leave me alone. I have to get home. To my uh… boyfriend… so bye!"
"Wait!" Nightwing yelled, but Marie had already fled down the street, screaming at him to leave her alone.
Nightwing pursed his lips at the sour memory. Of course he followed her to an old loft above a shut-down club by the river and seen she had no one. In fact when he returned to the Watch Tower, he discovered that no one owned the building and it was in fact condemned by the Bludhaven City Commission Office. Now he was studying the two photos of the girls, dressed differently, different names and yet the same person without any memories of her life. Nightwing flashed back to when he had met Seer, a hero of the alternate realm and former Guardian of the barriers between realms. She had god like abilities, her most powerful being able to see everything that had ever happened to an object or person. She could also see a person's future, if they stayed on the path they were on.
"Tell me what the Godslight is," He asked.
"The Godslight is a very powerful force that separates and binds the realms together. It is unchained and free for manipulation," Seer explained.
"How did Juna possess the Godslight?" Dick thundered, "Why her?"
"She was chosen as its door to the mortal world. Her spirit was strong enough, resistant enough to contain it. But again the Godslight is a force, a power that can't be contained," Seer continued, "That's why others began to develop abilities. The power of it leaked through her physical body and effected change in other people in her own realm."
"So now what? Why would it destroy its… its own host?" Dick asked.
"The force, once unleashed destroys anything in its path to allow the rebuilding of what existed into something better. She knew the risk once she realized what she held. She accepted that risk Dick."
"Why didn't it rebuild her? Save her? If she was its host, its path into the mortal world?"
"The Godslight exist, but it doesn't have an agenda like you or I would. Once it's directed, it's directed, it can change hosts, return to its own plane of existence or anything," Seer stood up, preparing to leave, "I'm sorry Dick, but I cannot sense its power and Juna died, using it to destroy ShadowMist. It's either back between the barriers or within another host."
Dick looked down, clutching the mask of his friend, unable to bear the truth.
Dick whirled around as he felt the hair on his arms rise and the air began to taste like salt. A loud rumbling and lightning appeared as the barrier between his world and the other was ripped apart, allowing his best friend Wally to appear.
Amid a small amount of smoke and the sounds of panting, Wally looked up with a grin, garbed in the traditional red of the Flash.
After he had disappeared from the Reach Invasion into the alternate realm and returned with Juna and ShadowMist, he had been deemed worthy to carry the Flash legacy.
"What's up?" He asked casually, pulling his cowl down.
"I found her," Dick said, stepping aside for Wally to see the two photos.
"You're crazy Dick," Wally shook his head, "Every look alike you see and you think she's back from the dead!"
"I'm not! Dude let me explain!"
"Fine, but you owe me lunch."