Hello and welcome back! Thank you for the reviews. Please enjoy this chapter, which has just as much (if not more) action as the last chapter.


Vi was prepared to jump down the hole and grab the falling girl, hoping she wasn't too late, but she was shocked when she saw Gwen holding onto the side of the tunnel with one hand. The girl's eyes were shut, but once she realized she wasn't falling, she opened her eyes and looked upward, expressing her surprise. Chris and Vi sighed in relief.

"I can hold onto walls!" Gwen shouted.

"We can see that!" Chris shouted.

Gwen looked over her shoulder to the ground, and then looked back up to them. A smile crossed her face and a gleam was in her eyes.

"So I'll meet you at the bottom!" Gwen shouted, starting to scale down the side of the wall.

Vi flew down, and Chris used his super-speed to run down the wall, arriving at the bottom first. He was surveying the area, trying to pick the right tunnel to take, while also avoiding the falling debris. When Gwen touched the ground, she felt her phone vibrate in her hand. Her eyes brightened and she nearly dropped the electronic device in her excitement.

"The Voice Lady's calling back!" she informed her teammates, quickly answering it.

"Finally! I was worried I wasn't going to get back to you," the Voice Lady said in relief. "My scanners are able to pick up on you three again. Take the right tunnel."

"Okay, right tunnel," Gwen replied, informing her teammates of the tunnel they were to take.

With the tunnel picked, all three rushed down the tunnel before arriving in a room with what looked like a console.

"That looks like something to break," Chris commented.

"Hold on," Vi spoke up, walking over to the console. "I want to try something."

Gwen and Chris looked at each other and shrugged, letting Vi do what she wanted. The older girl stopped directly in front of the console and, after giving it a look over, began to mess around with it. To the surprise of the other two humans, debris fell from the roof and on top the Overseers in the room behind the console.

"So cool!" Gwen cheered. "Way to go Vi!"

"Thanks," Vi said with a smile. "I saw them in there, and thought it would be worth a shot to try the controls out."

"Guess that's the direction we're heading in," Chris commented. "Which means the entrance has to be over this way, c'mon."

The three humans ran through the opening and entered what looked like the debris destruction room. In the middle, where the Overseers had been (they had self-destructed into smaller parts) were now Sentries and Subjugators. Chris pulled out his weapon.

"Brainiac really doesn't want us to leave," Chris commented.

"There's a lot of trash," Gwen commented, and then plugged her nose. "And it smells."

"We can complain about the smell later. Let's handle these guys and get through that door," Vi instructed, her staff materializing in her hand.

"Whatever you say," Chris replied before speeding over to a group of the robots.

"He sure is eager to fight," Gwen commented. "But then again, so is Vav! Let's go Vav!"

She leapt onto one of the soda machines (why it was there was a mystery to Gwen) from where she had been standing, surprised by the feat but not distracting herself as she used her hand blaster against the Sentries that came towards her. Vi shook her head at the actions of her two teammates but took to the air, assaulting a group of Subjugators from the air. Given their practice, powers, and the fact that there were three of them against Brainiac's forces, they managed to destroy the Sentries and Subjugators that had been sent to stop them. They exited through the door and ran down the corridor until they came upon three large window panels. They took a glance at it, coming to a stop when they saw what looked like an entire army waiting for Brainiac's command.

"Voice Lady, there's a problem," Gwen said into her phone.

"Problem?" the Voice Lady questioned.

"Can you receive video footage?" Gwen asked.

"Yes," the Voice Lady answered.

"Okay, give me a moment," Gwen said, messing with her phone until she was able to video what they were seeing to the Voice Lady. After feeling she'd sent a long enough video feed, Gwen switched off the feed and went back to the call. "So yeah..."

"This is bad," the Voice Lady said with concern. "This is really bad. We've already suspected this is where Brainiac was hiding his armies on these ships, but this just proves this is a full-scale invasion, especially with the number of harvester ships he has...We have to stop this at all costs."

"How?" Gwen asked.

"I'm thinking about that," the Voice Lady answered. "Continue through the ship and defeat whatever enemy get in your way."

"Okay," Gwen said, putting her faith in the lady on the other side. To her teammates, she said, "We need to keep going. Voice Lady is coming up with a plan to stop this. She says we need to keep moving on."

The older humans nodded, and the three ran to the end of the hall and through the door, entering a chamber. Close to the wall was a glowing yellow device with a force-field protecting it. No Sentry bots were in sight.

"That looks important," Chris commented. "Think we should break it?"

"Totally," Gwen agreed, raising her palm and firing at the shielded device.

The moment the shield was hit, Sentry bots appeared from another entrance, immediately firing at the three humans.

"Scatter!" Gwen said for dramatics (because everyone already knew what to do at that point), throwing a canister at the Sentry in front of her.

The Sentry bots that attacked them were beaten down easily, and their attention was then turned to the shielded device. All three of them attacked it, breaking the shield and then the device in no time.

"Hm," Gwen muttered. "That didn't really do anything, or at least not what I was expecting."

"What did you expect it to do?" Chris questioned.

Gwen shrugged, "I dunno, just something I guess."

All three of them were focused on the device that was no longer there, that they didn't notice another one of Brainiac's robots - a Lunger - coming towards them. They only became aware of it after it hit Gwen in the back, sending her tumbling forward.

"Hey!" she shouted, turning to see what had hit her.

"Just great," Chris snarled, raising his sword. "It's got a force-field."

"That looks pretty strong," Gwen commented.

"Just break it!" Chris ordered, swinging his sword against the force-field.

The blade touched the force-field, but it didn't get past it.

"That isn't going to work," Vi argued.

"Then you come up with something!" Chris argued back, continuing to put pressure on the sword's blade to break the force-field.

"I'm trying to," Vi responded. "Give me a little longer."

"Hurry up then!" Chris shouted.

Vi ignored him, analyzing the robot critically and trying to find it's weakness. While she was doing this, the Lunger managed to push Chris away from it. Lunger lunged at Chris, and because he was unable to attack, Chris held up his sword to block the hit. When the Lunger hit the blade, its force-field disappeared and it crumbled at Chris' feet.

"How'd you do that?" Gwen asked with some awe in her tone.

"I don't know! I just held up my sword and it crumbled," Chris answered.

"Is it dead?" Gwen asked, stepping over to it and poking at its metal.

"Would you stop poking it!?" Chris shouted angrily. "Why the hell are you walking up to it when you have no idea if it's dead or alive!?"

"I'm just checking," Gwen argued back, pouting at him.

To their surprise, the Lunger came back online, and reactivated its force-field, which sent Gwen backwards and towards the wall. Chris ran over to her side and helped her up, giving her a condescending look.

"What did I tell you?" he questioned.

"Meanie," Gwen replied with a pout.

Vi flew up into the air, avoiding a hit from the Lunger as it rushed at its enemies. She had been curious on Chris' ability to stun the robot, and she wanted to replicate it. Landing back on the ground, she waited until the Lunger lunged at her, before holding up her staff in a defensive stance. When the Lunger hit her staff, it went into stasis once more.

"Hit it now while it's stunned!" Vi ordered, whacking the Lunger with her staff.

Her two teammates immediately attacked the stunned Lunger; Chris was up-close slashing at it with his sword while Gwen was at a distance, firing at it with her hand blaster. They managed to damage the Lunger before it reactivated, encasing itself in its protective force-field once more.

"If we stun it one more time, we should be able to beat it," Vi explained to her teammates.

"Alright then. If we block its next attack altogether, maybe we'll have a longer time," Chris explained.

"Okay!" Gwen said. After a few seconds she asked, "Uhm, how do I block?"

"What do you mean how do you block!?" Chris demanded, jumping away from the Lunger that had tried to attack him.

"My weapons are my hands! I don't want it to hit my arms! I've already been hit twice by that thing!" Gwen argued angrily.

"Then stand back and fire when the force-field's down," Chris instructed.

Vi and Chris got in Lunger's pathway and, when it lunged at them, got in a defensive position and blocked the hit. Once again, the Lunger fell to the ground with its force-field deactivated. Once the force-field was down, all three humans attacked it mercilessly; killing it and watching it explode on itself.

"That was easy," Gwen commented.

Almost immediately after she made the comment, she was hit by an energy beam. She fell to the ground, breifly releasing her hold on her stuffed doll and phone. Vi and Chris immediately looked to the source, finding another robot aiming at them. The Channeler was protected by a yellow force-field.

"Seriously, another one?" Chris demanded.

"This one is different," Vi replied.

"The pain still feels the same," Gwen complained from her seat on the floor.

"How're you feeling?" Chris asked.

"Me and Vav are okay," Gwen answered. "We just hurt a little."

"Well get your asses up and help us," Chris ordered.

"Meanie," Gwen pouted, but she used her telekinesis to throw a canister at the robot.

The effect did nothing. The canister bounced off of the force-field and fell on the ground.

"I was kind of hoping that would work," Gwen admitted.

"You weren't even sure?" Chris demanded.

"It's worked before!" Gwen argued.

"Both of you," Vi snapped, "focus. We need to stop talking and start strategizing."

"It's getting ready to charge," Gwen pointed out.

"Vi, Gwen, distract it," Chris stated. "I'm going to slash at it while it's firing at you two."

"Are you sure?" Vi asked, keeping an eye on the robot who did look like it was charging for an attack.

"I'm sure," Chris responded. "It's a long shot to take, but I'm going to take it."

"Alright, we'll distract it for you," Vi responded.

Chris gave a nod of thanks before running around the Channeler. The Channeler had turned its attention on Chris, but Vi regained its attention by lunging at it, hitting the force-field with her staff. She knew it wouldn't do any damage to the Channeler, but she needed to regain its attention. The Channeler fired off at Vi, which she blocked using her staff. While she was blocking the attack, Chris came from behind the robot and slashed it with his swords, interrupting the attack and breaking the force-field. Gwen immediately threw a crate at the Channeler, and this time it hit, causing the robot to explode.

"Anything else coming to attack us?" Chris asked, rejoining the girls.

"And can they please stop hitting me!" Gwen complained. "It really hurts."

"Well, looks like Brainiac's got another for us," Chris stated, nodding to something behind Gwen.

Said girl immediately jumped behind Chris, which irritated him.

"What the hell are you doing hiding behind me!?" he demanded, looking over his shoulder at her.

"I've already been hit twice! I'm not getting hit again. You can get hit if you'd like," Gwen argued.

"Big baby," he scoffed, glaring at the Blocker. "So Vi, any ideas?"

"It's got two force-fields, so that must mean its defense is pretty tough," Vi replied, analyzing it.

"So no attacks then?" Chris asked.

"Should we try blocking it like we did for the first bot?" Gwen asked.

"It's worth a shot," Vi said, responding to Gwen's question.

"Alright then folks. Time for another block," Chris said, stepping forward.

"Uhmmm..." Gwen hummed, not sure if she should actually respond.

"Just wait for the shield to drop and attack," Vi instructed the younger girl.

"You can count on me," Gwen said.

The Blocker moved closer to Chris, who was the furthest from the two girls. When the robot was close enough, opening its arms for an attack, Chris rose his sword up in defense, which broke the force-fields. Immediately, Gwen and Chris attacked; Chris attacked from close range with his sword while Gwen attacked from a distance with her hand blasters. One hit from each of them was enough to end the Blocker.

"That was easy," Gwen commented.

"It wasn't even tough," Chris commented, watching the door slide open for them. "Time to get going."

"I wonder if we're almost to an exit," Gwen mused as they left the room.

"The only exit we'd get is going down," Chris responded. "We'll have to find a teleporter of some sort to get us out of this thing."

"After we destroy his army," Vi reminded. "We need to get rid of them before leaving."

"That too," Chris agreed. "Has the lady on the phone come up with something?"

"I haven't checked, and we've got some problems," Gwen answered, pointing ahead of her.

Up ahead, in a larger corridor were even more Brainiac Sentries.

"You know, at first this was fun, but now it's getting annoying," Chris muttered.

"There's more here than we've run across before," Gwen stated, counting the 12 sentries that were scattered in the corridor.

"He's getting desperate," Chris hypothesized.

"Or we're getting close to something he doesn't want found," Vi theorized.

"Well now I want to find it, just to wreck it," Chris stated. "Guess we'll have to get through them to get to it, huh?"

"Looks that way," Gwen agreed.

"Piece of cake," the boy said with a smirk. "I'll take the ones on the left, you two take the ones on the right."

"Are you sure? You could drain a lot of energy that way," Gwen stated with concern.

"I'll be fine," Chris replied. "It's actually easier on us if we split up, that way we get rid of more of these robots faster."

"He's correct," Vi spoke up, defending Chris' statement. "If we each take our own number, that will cut them down faster and all three of us taking on one at a time."

"I guess so," Gwen muttered, trying to remember if she'd ever seen the Lads split up when facing the bad guys.

She eventually gave up thinking about it when she watched Vi and Chris rush off to the robots, each of them taking on a separate group. Tucking Vav into the safety of her elbow, and making sure she had a good grip on her cellphone, Gwen ran along the walls of the ship (and boy was that fun for her!) and attacked the Sentries from behind with an energy shot from her hand and then hit them with a crate. The combo had taken out two weaker Sentries, but the two stronger ones struck back. They managed to force her off the wall and into a crouching position, but Gwen wasn't going to go down easily, and she fought back. After a few good hits, all the Sentries she had been fighting self-destructed, leaving only scrap metal. Looking up, she found her fellow humans waiting for her by the exit, their opponents destroyed already. Flushing from embarrassment, Gwen jogged over to them.

"So you can run on walls too?" Chris asked.

"More like stick to them," Gwen replied. "I'm like a spider or something. Kinda cool analogy, if I wasn't creeped out by spiders."

"I think the lady on the phone is trying to get your attention," Vi spoke up.

"Huh?" Gwen asked, before she too heard some mumbling. She brought the phone up to her ear. "Yes?"

"Good, I was a little worried you wouldn't hear me," the Voice Lady said. "Listen, from the information I'm gathering, you three are close to the main guns. It's literally up ahead of you. Go in there and destroy them. Once those are down, we can get you out."

"Really?!" Gwen asked in excitement, making her teammates look at her expectantly.

"Yes. Once those guns go down, I can send in the League, and we'll get you out. So take them down, okay?"

"You got it!" Gwen promised, lowering her cellphone. "Okay guys, good news! There's guns up ahead that once we destroy them, the Voice Lady will get us out."

"Seriously?" Chris asked, earning a nod from Gwen. "Awesome. So all we need to do is get through any more obstacles. You guys ready?"

"I'm ready!" Gwen said in excitement.

"Then what are we waiting for?" Vi asked with a smile, leading the way through the door.

They were confronted by Sentries and Subjugators, but with their new excitement giving them adrenaline, the trio managed to defeat the robots easily. However, after they destroyed that group of bots, the door to their right opened and released more Sentries and an Overseer.

"More company," Gwen stated.

"Bring it on!" Chris roared, throwing a fireball at the Overseer.

"Gwen, take the Sentries!" Vi ordered.

"Okay!" Gwen agreed.

Gwen was able to use her hand blasters on the Sentries while Vi and Chris fought the Overseer. The Sentries were destroyed easily, and the Overseer fell easily under the might of Vi and Chris. After the Overseer blew up, they waited to see if more robots were going to show up. When none did, they continued down their path, running through the door the Overseer and Sentries had come through. The trio ran down the ramp and through the door, entering a room with a giant robot floating in the middle of the room.

"FOOLISH HUMANS," the Ship Guardian spoke. "YOU WILL NOT PREVAIL!"

"He's big," Gwen commented.

"What's that behind him? That glowing thing?" Chris asked.

"It might be our way out," Vi replied.

"Hey Voice Lady, are the guns here?" Gwen asked, keeping an eye on the Ship Guardian.

"Yes, you're in the Nexus. We need those guns destroyed, so take out anything that is connected to them!" she ordered. "I can't assist you until the shield is down."

"Okay," Gwen replied. "She says to destroy things."

"Like those things on the red tile with the sphere floating above them in the center?" Vi asked.

"Those look important," Chris commented. "Time to break 'em."

"But there's that thing to worry about," Gwen reminded, pointing to the Ship Guardian that was waiting on the other side of the room, waiting for them.

"You and me will take care of him," Chris told Gwen. "Vi, you handle those things."

"Are you sure?" Vi asked, subtly taking a glance at the youngest member before returning them to Chris.

"We can handle it," Chris said with confidence.

"Alright," Vi relented. "But be careful."

"Ready kid?" Chris asked.

"I'm so ready!" Gwen responded.

"Then let's go!" Chris stated, running at the Ship Guardian with his super-speed.

The moment Chris stepped away from the doorway, Brainiac Sentries appeared firing at him and the girls.

"More of these?" Chris growled, diverting and slashing a Sentry in half before moving onto another.

Gwen joined the fight, taking out the Sentries with her telekinesis and hand blasters while Vi attacked a power coupling. The Sentries were easily taken care of while their teammate attacked the power coupling. When the first power coupling went down, Subjugators appeared. Chris and Gwen attacked the Subjugators while Vi took care of a second power coupling. When the Subjugators were destroyed, and no more appeared, the three humans attacked the remaining power couplings, destroying all of them.

"How was that?" Gwen asked the Voice Lady.

"It worked!" she cheered.

"Aw-" Gwen stopped when she saw the Guardian land and sent an attack at them. "I'll call you back."

"Move!" Chris ordered, using his super-speed to get away from the attack and towards the Guardian.

"Altogether now!" Vi ordered, flying towards the Guardian while Gwen kept a distance and fought from afar.

The Guardian was tough, as was expected due to his size (making him taller than Chris). The Guardian disappeared and teleported to the opposite side, powering for an attack that all of them shielded against. Because of the power of the attack, the Guardian began to recharge, forcing it into a vulnerable position.

"Again!" Vi shouted, flying over to the Guardian and hitting it with her staff.

Chris followed suit and began hacking at the Guardian with his sword. The three of them managed to get some hits in, but its recharging ended, and it backed away, fully charged and ready to go. It got a few hits in on the three of them, just as many as the humans got on the Guardian. It released another energy pulse, which Gwen hadn't been prepared for and was thrown back. Chris ran to her side and helped her up while Vi attacked the vulnerable Guardian.

"You enjoy getting hit a lot, don't yeah?" Chris questioned.

"I'm still getting used to this superhero business," Gwen responded indignantly.

"You're doing fine, but you need to concentrate better, and keep a closer eye on your surroundings," Chris instructed. "You'll get hurt worse if you don't."

Gwen lowered her head in slight shame.

"Okay," she consented, looking over at Vi and finding her still hitting the vulnerable Guardian.

Chris also glanced over, and rushed back over, striking the Guardian too, just as it was getting to its feet. Before it could disappear, all three of them hit it (Chris and Vi with their weapons, and Gwen with her hand blaster), and it crumbled in defeat.

"We did it!" Gwen cheered happily.

"How do we get out of here?" Vi asked out loud.

Chris opened his mouth to open, but a new noise stopped him. Looking to their left, they found an orange portal open, and out flew Superman, looking tall and powerful. Gwen was instantly in awe when she saw the superhero.

"All right you three, we're not done yet," Superman addressed. "We've still got more of his army to face. Get ready."

"You heard the man in blue," Chris said, watching as Sentries and Subjugators appeared out of nowhere. "Time to wreck some bots!"

All four superheroes rush to combat Brainiac forces, each picking one and attacking it with their powers and weapons. When one fell, another took its place, and Gwen was starting to feel the pressure. She was backed against the wall, using her hand blaster to attack since there was very few things to throw at the Sentries and Subjugators she faced against. One Subjugator managed to hit her in the face, making her crumble to the ground. The Subjugator raised its arm to fire at Gwen, but was destroyed by laser beams from Superman. The Kryptonian flew over and helped her up, which made the young girl blush.

"Sorry," she apologized.

"There's no time for apologies," Superman said. "You've made it this far, so don't give up now."

Gwen nodded, feeling pumped up by Superman's small pep talk, and hit a Sentry with her hand blaster. Seeing that Gwen could take care of herself again, Superman went back to go and attack a Subjugator. Gwen blasted the oncoming Sentries away from her, and when she hit the final one, she looked around. The four superheroes had managed to stop the onslaught of robots.

"Excellet work, all of you," Superman said with a smile.

"Thank you sir," Gwen said, "but you helped us at the end."

"Exactly, at the end," Superman stated. "You three traversed the ship on your own, and faced Brainiac's security on your own. You became a thorn in his side, and that's what we're hoping for."

All three young superheroes smiled at each other.

"All of you, take those teleporters," Superman said, nodding to the strange devices that Vi had asked about earlier. "I'm going to finish up here."

"Are you sure?" Chris asked.

"Yeah, we can help," Gwen offered.

Superman smiled and shook his head.

"All of you have done enough for us, now it's time for you three to get to safety," Superman explained. "Oracle will explain everything once you're off here. Now get going, I can handle the rest."

The three young superheroes looked at each other, before agreeing to follow Superman's orders. There were three teleporters, so each of them took separate ones. In seconds, the area lit up, and one minute they were looking at Superman, and the next they were at a police station. Some cops looked up, but they went back to work.

"Wow. That's what a teleporter feels like," Gwen commented. She brought her phone up again. "Hey Voice Lady, we're off the ship."

"I know, I managed to get you three out of there. Now that that's done with, I can finally introduce myself. My name's Oracle," the woman introduced.

"Oh, Superman mentioned you!" Gwen said, getting weird looks from her teammates.

"Since you're off his ship, Brainiac won't want you three anymore, but he's going to try and kill you now, through his robots," Oracle explained, ignoring Gwen's outburst. "But we need your help. The nanites you have in you, those Exobytes, give you powers. It was released upon the world, and not 2 in every 4 humans have gained superpowers, and the Justice League is trying to recruit everyone who will join."

"The Justice League?" Gwen repeated.

"The Chief of Police should be there, he'll give you three communicators so I and the other Justice League members can get in touch with you," Oracle continued. "Once you're ready, use the teleporter in any of the Metropolis Precincts, and it'll bring you to the Watchtower."

Gwen looked up, finding a man she believed to be the Chief of Police walk over to them.

"Okay, we will. Thanks for everything Oracle," Gwen said to the woman.

"I'm happy you three are out," Oracle said. "I'll be in touch."

She hung up, and Gwen focused her attention on the Chief of Police.

"Oracle told me we'd be getting three guests," he said when he arrived, earning strange looks from Vi and Chris. "These are for you. They're communicators. It's so you can keep in touch with the Justice League."

"Thanks," Chris said, taking his communicator and looking it over.

"There's a teleporter here that was set up to take you and other heroes to the Watchtower. Use it whenever you need," the Chief of Police said. "And good luck."

"The Watchtower?" Chris repeated while the Chief of Police walked away.

"Mhm. That woman who guided us was Oracle, and she says the Justice League is recruiting. We have access to the Watchtower," Gwen explained, looking over her communicator. "This is pretty cool, huh Vav?"

"So do we head to the Watchtower now or...?"

"I'm going to go later today. I have to head home," Gwen responded. "My parents are probably freaking out right now, and I'd like to not be in my pjs when I go to the Watchtower."

"Let's get each other's contacts before we go," Vi spoke up. "I'd like all of us to go to the Watchtower together."

Gwen agreed happily. After getting their contact information, Gwen bade them farewell, and left the precinct, ignoring the looks some of the officers were sending her. It was bright when she got outside, and she had to shield her eyes from the brightness, since she had gotten use to the lighting in Brainiac's harvest ship. Heaving a sigh (and accessing a map), she starts to head home, preparing herself for the confrontation with her parents.

They would be the scariest opponents she had faced all day.