Illusion Suite

(Two Legionnaires, plus a deepening mystery involving old foes and old friends alike. Cham/Vi. Begun for Green Earth's Crack Pairings Contest/Challenge. Chapter set one and one-half years after S2's "Dark Victory." 'T' for violence, language, implied m/f, m/m, f/f. If that bothers you, please don't read. Comments and/or constructive criticism welcome. I don't own any DC characters and situations and blah blah blah. )

Late 3010

Nimah – Orbits its yellow sun from an average distance of 160 Mil. Km. …Surface was initially 82% water, prior to terraforming begun in the 2900's. [see links] A stopover for shipping, primarily to and from colonies in the Driscoll System [see links]. Less hospitable regions often used by operations at the margins of U.P. law… – Encyclopedia Galactica dot com, amended 3010

possible common ancestry. Neuro-mapping indicates a similar diffusion of structures governing memory and physical sensation. What would be fixed pain or pleasure "centers" in high-functioning static species are mobile in the brains of Grystaadians until they reach the final adult stage, and attendant powers. A similar mobility is noticeable in all Durlan life stages, unless the form is "locked" by illness or other intervention. [see links] – Dr. Parisu Birg, "Mapping Our Minds," [lecture excerpts] Heisenberg 7, 3008.

Lately it seemed as if every answer I found only led the way to more questions. So I shut off that part of my mind for now, concentrating on the scenery instead.

"Sure is beautiful out here." Nimah was swirls of blue and green against starry black space. Surrounding particles gave both the planet and its two moons an opalescent glow. Our shuttle was cloaked and moored behind us on the first moon.

"We'll be down in two minutes." Cham was on my right. Both of us wore plain dark gray. Even our rings and signal belts had their emblems disguised. "So if you're gonna' spout poetry, make sure it's haiku or idjakra."

"Be nice, or I won't buy you a drink at the engagement party."

He smirked. "I can't get drunk around an Imskian. You'll film my cells moving around when I'm passed out and sell the footage to some Med site."

"Mocking my planet's culture, and our morals? You're on dangerous ground, Detective."

"Beneath all the glitter, it's a hard, cruel galaxy, Commander. Just trying to help you stay tough."

I made a face at him, as Nimah's surface started to emerge from its particle "coat." Water and land took on distinct shapes. "Cham?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you remember when Brainy used the identity implanter on you?"

"Uhh…'remember' in what sense? As in, 'Hey, here's fifty pages on what being a super-strong homicidal maniac feels like?' "

"Exactly."

"His notes are everything I know. Knew. A few days after I got better, it was like a nightmare where you remember a few details; but deep down you're sure it never happened. Does that make sense?"

"Yeah. Guess it's good that he was so pushy about talking to you."

Cham sighed. "In that 'forgive-my-screwing-up-like-you-mere-mortals' kind of way."

I laughed in spite of myself. "Yeah. I remember what that was like."

"Why are you asking? Not planning to revamp his implanter and try again, are you?"

"Hell, no. It's about Grystaad. I'll explain later." The plate-sized chart that blinked above my ring showed the co-ordinates Lyle had beamed to us earlier. I hoped he was all right down there.

"Glad to hear it. I didn't mind trying to slice up my own teammates, but going shirtless..." Cham shook his head.

"Right, Mr. Modest."

"Forget modest. Imperiex wasn't into central heating."

"Neither is Lyle." I studied his diagram against the backdrop of real live stars. "It's the dead of winter here." I started shivering as soon as we slipped through the clouds over Nimah's Southwest sector, despite my insulated clothes.

"Hey, inclement weather equals privacy. Or do you think he picked this area just to annoy you?"

"How much time do I get to consider that question?"

He sighed. "I'm ignoring you now."

We landed by a salt lake so large that its far shore was beyond sight. The late-morning sun was mostly hiding. Patches of black ice beneath our feet made me glad for the heavy treads on our boots.

"So what's first?" Cham turned towards a ruined steel bridge that had left its middle jutting from the center of the lake. "Shopping, or lunch?"

"Shut up." I smirked and shoved his arm. "Looks like we go about 300 km. across. There's an artificial island there."

"That's what I've got, too."

Imperiex had struck Nimah not long after his first dance with us. This sector had been depopulated even earlier, its industries long relocated elsewhere. Superman X and several Legionnaires had chased off his forces before they could reach the more populous regions. Too bad our business wasn't there, in a warm climate; where there would have been greenery other than metal patina on torn railings and iced-over shore grasses.

My teammate was the most vivid part of the landscape. He was shivering a little himself. "How do you coastal types get used to this much water everywhere?"

There were boats in varying sizes and states of repair, both at lake's edge and further out. Some were half-sunken. Others were carefully tended and had flickering lights, indicating either residents or some kind of remote monitoring.

The water about six meters in began to bubble. I pointed. "Uh, I think we're about to have company."

"No kidding?" Cham took a few steps back, as a bright blue dome broke the water's surface. More followed, and I stepped back, too.

Within a quarter minute, there were six robots hovering ten meters in the air above us. Each a white, tapered metal cylinder slightly larger than my head. The gleaming blue half-domes up top each had a single red lens. Silvery "fins" sharp as knives, a dozen per greeter, whirred at forty-five-degree angles from the flat base of each 'bot, shaking off water.

"So much for seeing the sights!" The lenses lit up. "Move, Cham!"

I shrank instantly as six "eyes" clicked open and fired energy blasts; then veered left, dirt and rocks exploding around me. There was just enough time to see Cham race right, turn into a Venusian flying fish and disappear into the water. Three robots followed him.

I flew towards the lake's center with the other three on my heels. They formed a circle around me, linking their fins together with a series of clicks and firing dozens of bursts my way. Well, if that's how you wanna' play... There was a gap between the base of each blue half-dome and each white body. Maybe a centimeter wide; plenty of room for a savvy Army brat from Imsk to slip in, play anti-mechanic and slip out again.

A few crossed wires here, some kicks and punches to a micro-rotor there. I could have done it in my sleep. When the first one blew, its buddies on either side followed seconds later. Conditional symbiotic design like this had fallen out of favor for good reason. I evaded smoking debris as it splashed into the water. To see better around me, I resumed full size.

"Cham?" The sudden quiet scared me more than the commotion had. Weak sunlight was disappearing behind a cluster of dark clouds. I began to fly further out, but I looped back every few meters, searching the waters below. I had the ring's tracker on, but it wasn't giving me a thing. Too much interference.

"Cham!" There was a floating sandbar down and to my right. Logs swayed back and forth at one end, streaming seaweed into the water. A colony of birds rested on the logs, wings folded. My shouting barely disturbed them.

Damn it. There were scattered pieces of white and blue, but where was he?

The air in front of me began to shimmer, quickly forming a human-shaped outline.

Lyle? No, this male was taller, and broader in the shoulders. The outline filled in to reveal dark blue plainclothes, a hood covering most of his face. He flew towards me. I glided back, fists out as I put about ten meters of air between us.

"Back off, damn you! I don't want to—" Behind him, I glimpsed the outline of the island where I needed to be, along with over a dozen steadily-enlarging blue-and-white dots. Great. More robots. Had this all been a trap, right from the start?

Evading him by heading back towards space was feasible. It was also out of the question.

"The light show's nice." Before I could shrink again, he vanished. The air around him hissed as he reappeared directly behind me. If I'd been thinking clearly- "Not so much the knife-throwing." He got an arm around my upper body, pinning my shoulders and arms. I swore at him, kicked and elbowed backwards as the lake disappeared.

We rematerialized, and I fell to my knees in the semi-darkness. My stomach lurched. I hated teleporting. There was torn carpet underneath me, and the air was a little warmer than it had been outside.

"Shrinking Violet, are you okay?" The tall man was whispering, crouched down on his heels as he pulled back his hood. I saw brown eyes, dark skin, short black hair with a white streak in the center. "Stay down."

"Foccart?" I hadn't seen Lyle's old university buddy since… since Brainiac 1's final attack. It was the last time "Invisible Kid 2" had been called up from our reserves, after Lyle had been injured. "Jacques, what are you doing here?"

"Playing decoy." We were inside a small round observation structure on the island. It had cracked white walls and a low-slung metal ceiling. Its large plex windows were scratched and dirty. Each pane framed dark sky and a blue-and-white shape moving ever-closer. "Damn Scavenger 'bots think they've got us, but it's the other way around." He grinned, pulling a small remote from his shirt pocket. "I've got charges in a circle around this place. In a couple of seconds, the whole thing goes up and we'll be out of here."

"But where's—?" Something small and grayish-white fluttered through a broken window and across the floor, then landed near my hand. A water bird; like the ones I'd seen out on the sandbar, but its eyes were bright green. "Cham," I whispered, and scooped one hand under him. I yanked the hat off my head and tucked him inside.

"Lyle's back on the shuttle," Jacques whispered. "On Nimah's second moon. Your info's there, too."

"Let's go then." My hat was squeezed into a makeshift bag, protecting my teammate. I remembered a similar improvisation from a while back. "Oh, and sorry about attacking you before."

"Forget it." Jacques grinned and pressed a button. I saw fiery bursts even with my eyes squeezed shut. Broken glass and torn metal shot everywhere as we—

Silence.

We were on the shuttle. He helped me stand up.

"You've done a lot of work on this thing since the last time we saw you, Jacques." I unclenched my hand and let Cham's bird-form loose from the hat. He was back to his regular shape within seconds.

There was Lyle, sitting by the console. "Glad you two could make it. Jacques, should I move us out?"

"Not yet." He had moved over to one of the consoles and was running a scan on Nimah's surface. "Just want to make sure all our friends are gone."

"What idiots." A Grystaadian stood up from the other side of the small, curved space and regarded us coldly. "Racing around in circles like a swarm of buzzers." She wore the same dark blue plainclothes as Jacques, and had a black case slung against her right side. Her skin was bright blue, almost turquoise-colored, and her eyes were golden yellow. "Foccart, did you have to wait until they surfaced?"

"Sorry." He directed the comments as much to us as to her. "My sister did her best with our trackers, but the way those 'bots were designed…"

"…You have to feed them to find them, huh?" I grinned. "They were down too deep in the water before?"

"There's a lot of old tech in the lake, and it probably interfered," added Cham. "Forget it."

Yeah, and I'll forget how worried I was. "What did you use to break up your followers, anyway?"

"Eastern flat-head mud shark. Do I still have any plastic in my teeth?" He drew back his lips in a mock-snarl. Lyle snickered.

"When you've finished your conference," the Grystaadian pointed at Lyle, "You baby-skinned fools might want to fix that."

For the first time, I noticed that Lyle had a hand clamped over the outside of his left thigh. There was blood seeping between his fingers.

Cham looked around. "Jacques, where's your kit?"

"Right behind Sulvat's feet."

There was a nice comedic moment when he nearly bumped heads with her, as they both stooped for the small first-aid box.

"I'll be fine, Cham. One of those blade-fin things got me when I brought our friend here from the neighboring sector, about two, three hours ago. Just nicked me. Don't know why it's still bleeding now."

"All clear, far as I can tell." Jacques turned away from the monitor. "I'll set a course back to the transmatter station near Eris. That's as close as I get to Earth these days."

"Same old Jacques." Lyle grinned. "All those irons in the fire. No time for play. By the way…" He waved his free hand. "This is Jil Sulvat. She's Eddrun's sister."

"How d'you do, Sulvat ?" Cham had a cauterizing pad and some tape. "Let go, Lyle." He covered the wound after peeling back some of the gray cloth around it.

"Nice to meet you, Sulvat." I held out my hand.

She ignored me. "You know, that bandage is basically useless." A gesture back towards the receding landscape. "There's a hemorrhagic compound on those blades, one I'm told isn't legal here. Back home, the Junta was very fond of it."

I swore under my breath. "Lyle, we should get you to Medicus One. Now."

Lyle watched Cham stand up and close the med-kit, then he looked at Sulvat. "What's the compound, do you figure? Something like an LT10?"

"Try LT23. You'll want treatment within the next couple of hours, if LTs work on you like they work on us. You'll bleed like mad from that wound and all kinds of other places, too. Painful first, then fatal."

Lyle nodded. "I can head out on my own and meet up with you later. Even under flight-ring power, it's less than a two hour trip."

Jackass. I shook my head. "You can't go alone. It's too dangerous. First of all—"

"—there's no telling if you've really got two hours." Cham frowned.

"Second of all, you should be protected," said Jacques.

Lyle shrugged. "Nobody will be able to see me."

"They couldn't see either of us on the way here, either." Jacques turned around, duplicating Cham's expression. "They still found us."

"All right, all right." Lyle stood up, wincing. "Let's go then, Jacques. Maybe I can score a cup of coffee on the way."

"Oh, no." Sulvat turned away from us. "Jacques, you don't leave me alone with these— these incompetents who nearly got my only living family killed on Terra."

"For your information—" I began.

"Yes, Yes. I know you and SciPol did your best. It wasn't good enough." She narrowed her eyes. "The Junta is locked up for life and yet they still rule over us! If you idiots—"

"Sulvat, please." Jacques' tone implied that it was an old discussion.

"Fine." Her feelers hummed angrily. "Send the Durlan with him."

Cham raised a brow at her. "I just realized… Sulvat, you were there, weren't you? When the Legion first went to Grystaad?"

It clicked in my head. Can't Legionnaires fly?

Sulvat nodded. "Do a better job this time than you did with Tran Delse, 'Legion Friend.' "

He flinched. "It's okay, Jacques. I'll go."

I clasped Lyle's shoulder, then gave Cham a quick hug. I was past caring who saw and what they thought about it. "Careful. No tropic joy-riding, okay?"

He rolled his eyes. "When will you stop believing everything Phantom Girl tells you?"

"When she's done being team leader. So… about two weeks."

"I'll punch that into my planner then."

A few minutes later, they were on the other shuttle and gone.

.O.O.O.O.O.O.O.O.O.O.O.O.

Jacques kept us cloaked as we neared Eris. I tried to focus on the stars, instead of on how irksome our "friend" was. She handed me a field unit from her case; one that was probably a collector's item by the time my parents were born.

"The mountains up North were where our rulers usually hid their archives. Especially in later years, when they saw how the Junta's days were numbered. It was their way of trying to make peace with the gods. We retrieved them when we could; then people like Delse were our relays." Sulvat sighed, then motioned me to turn a few pages.

"You took a lot of risks."

"You mean we had nearly nothing to lose." She shrugged, then pointed to the screen. "Look here. That's what my brother wanted you to know, before he was attacked on Terra."

" 'Before all witnesses, I swear to this: My partner spoke to me while I slept. She awakened me to say that she was alive; that the Junta had lied when it said she was killed in prison. I could hear her, calling me away…' Sulvat, where was your niece?"

"With me, underground further east." She continued. "Eddrun's unit was a day's march from Aalt City. He tried to slip away in the dark. He should have 'struck a mine' like all the others, but…" She began to giggle at something that we both knew wasn't really funny.

I waited.

"H-he tripped and fell in a ditch. Hurt himself. The other soldiers woke up and stopped him from fleeing. They thought it was just battle-madness, hunger, exhaustion…"

"Which isn't what Cham or I think."

Sulvat nodded. "Your theory of some device that placed these lies in our minds? I'm sure it's true. Eddrun's clothes were torn up badly that night. Because he's a big man, it took half the unit to stop him. Somebody threw those rags away, and he never had the vision again."

"But why did you both keep this secret for so long? Somebody like Derbai could have—"

"You still believe in the word of a Zir?" She shook her head. "She was a plant, a spy for her family; not a true freedom fighter. Not some kind of heroine. The war ended before she could move against us. Her good luck was to be on the winning side, physically; but her true self was never ours."

"You have proof of this?"

"I don't need proof. I know. Plenty of us suspected her from the start, but the unit needed to stay cohesive or how could we have fought? Derbai had a real knack for sabotage, or else she had extraordinary luck. She won our unit's trust by volunteering for the riskiest work; by going out alone to do it. Some said it was bravery, but I was never fooled."

I waited.

"She went alone because it was all staged." Sulvat's feelers hummed. "She communicated with her family, somehow. Hid their wealth for them, took it off-world. She charmed those idiots on the Rep. Council, too. But her business with that Luthor woman was an over-step. Now everyone can see her as she truly is."

"Sulvat, I—"

She looked away, into her own minefield of memory. "Don't you wonder why nearly the whole squad is dead now?"

Of course we'd wondered.

"She wanted us all silenced! Blood always tells in the end, Shrinking Violet."

It was a good thing I'd skipped dinner. Her story would have brought up whatever the teleporting had failed to.

"Wake up, Legionnaire. Your own ship, that first day, was sabotaged and then shot down. Who could have done that, if not Derbai?"

"Someone you hadn't caught and locked up yet?"

"Never mind." She threw up her hands. "Why should you see past a Zir's pretty words when we couldn't? How do you think the whole planet was first duped into signing our lives over to those monsters?" She shook her head. "Sleight of hand; revealed too late."

It couldn't be true. Derbai… I kept reading. "These look like very thorough translations, despite the language being…"

"Archaic." She sighed. "We weren't supposed to retain our old tongues, but some did anyway." She gestured at the unit. "Keep it. I have copies elsewhere."

I nodded. "You and Lyle made an agreement?"

"My family's somewhere safe." She smiled briefly in Jacques' direction. "We'll be together again soon, and we'll lie low somewhere until you find the last Zir. Dead or alive."

"We appreciate your help." I think.

"Not my help." She studied her feet. "Eddrun still believes, but I don't. The Junta rewrote Grystaad's very nature. They destroyed our ecosystem, our culture; all of it. They tried to alter us, our very cells and forms. It's over. Our homeworld is done."

I knew what Cham would have asked: "But why?" Jacques was franticly inputting something at the navigation console. I quickly shut down the unit and slung its carry strap over my shoulder. "Why do you think they did it?"

"You Legionnaires…" She sighed. "You really believe there's a reason for everything."

"Sulvat—"

"Evil needs no reason. Those who can perpetrate it, will. The Junta treated us like toys; breaking and discarding whatever they wished. Doubtless Luthor is the same."

"But—"

Jacques called over his shoulder. "We should split up pretty soon, Violet."

"Is somebody after us?"

"Not yet, but the longer we wait..."

"Understood." I got up and went over to look at his console. We weren't far from Eris now. "Can you get me to the transmatter gate?"

"I'll try. There's a lot of solar flare activity in the area, though."

"If you keep that unit closed," added Sulvat, "Going through the gate shouldn't harm anything inside. I'm afraid it won't shrink, though."

I nodded.

Jacques swore under his breath. Against the viewscreen's black and white grid, I saw the mask symbol of a Scavenger ship. "They're only ten minutes away, tops."

"That figures." I hoped that my two teammates hadn't also met any of Luthor's pals on the road.

"Lyle and Cham were fine, last time I checked."

"Thanks." Am I that obvious?

"Violet, if it weren't so dangerous for Sulvat, not to mention that—"

"—our unauthorized visit to Nimah could be a problem later." I touched his shoulder. "Just get me as close to the gate as possible."

He nodded. I looked over my shoulder at Sulvat, who had an unreadable expression. Suddenly she darted over to me, slipping off one of the distinctive bracelets that Grystaadians always wore on each wrist.

"Put it on, Legionnaire." Something in her tone made me obey. She looked at the coiled bronze chain and spoke. "I-A 9889."

I felt a flicker of warmth where the bracelet was, then light enveloped my whole body. My reflection in the shuttle console was a tan-skinned female with curly blonde hair. My gray plainclothes were gone, replaced by a pale blue repair-tech's uniform, right down to the cap and boots.

A Solid Light Hologram Unit. "That should make things a little easier." She waved away my thanks and sat down next to Jacques. I looked over their shoulders, seeing the station on my left, and a small black and red ship, barely larger than a dot, on my right. Scavengers. But Jacques could easily shake them.

"Shall we?"

He nodded and stood up, tapping a button that would let Sulvat take the controls. "Be right back." As if he were walking a block to pick up a pint of estchav.

She nodded without looking at us. He took both my hands between his and grinned.

"Thanks again, Jacques. For everything." The ship disappeared, and there was the nasty lurch in my guts again. How did he ever get used to it?

I felt stone beneath my feet. The transmatter station. He let go of my hands, after making sure that I wasn't going to just keel over on my pseudo-blonde head. "Bon chance, Violet." The air around him wavered, shimmered. He was gone.

The gates to New Metropolis were down a nul-grav slider. It only took me a minute to get there. Sure enough, a blinking sign at the entry way read, "Transport Suspended Due To Solar Flare Activity. Please Locate Alternative Transport Method." Damn. I put down the unit, shrunk down and broke the gate lock from inside.

This was a terrible idea, but waltzing back to Earth on ring power? With a case full of vital info and no way to shrink out of sight? That was an even worse one. Just as I was getting back up to full size, two real repair-techs came down the slider and saw me.

"Hey! What the hell are you doing?"

I ignored them, tapped the gate control, and stepped through a thousand flickering tints of gray and white.

"Hey, you can't—!"

"Emergency!" I yelled over my shoulder. There were strange noises: high winds mixed with rocks striking a gong. My body got what felt like a million jabs from hot needles, but that ended after a second or two. Then I was back in New Metropolis. The unit and I both seemed whole and unhurt. I crept down a corridor, then in with other travelers as they moved towards the street. My insides were a confused jumble of answers, questions and their attendant sensations. Only some of which had to do with the case itself.

There was a decorative pool near the lift, and as we rose into the air, I caught a glimpse of my false reflection. A short code could fix that the minute I was crosstown. Dealing with the other illusions was going to take more work; and we were running out of time.

End Ch. 8

("Illusion Suite" can be found on Jane Bunnett's Spirituals & Dedications CD. Lyrics posted to my LJ. Thanks to the usual suspects at Legion World for their assistance. Yeah, two Invisible Kids are better than one. :p Jacques, like my takes on other characters, is a total mash-up of various incarnations. He had a blink-and-miss-it cameo at the very end of S2. Thanks again for reading.)