Chapter 25
Montreal
Anastasia entered her boss' office, "Pri-, uhh, Emperor—we are receiving a message from the U.N. via satellite."
The new, self-proclaimed, emperor stood up and smiled, "Let the games begin."
They walked over to the video screen, the diplomatic leader of the U.N. was already waiting for them.
"Good Morning, Prime Minister."
"It's Emperor now." He cut the man off.
"Of course. W here at the U.N. hope that you are aware that you are in direct violation of multiple U.N. sanctions. Obviously we would like to settle this peacefully, but if you force our hand we will have no choice but to attack and forcefully take control of your government. If no progress is made by noon, the siege will begin."
"An ultimatum!" The emperor laughed. "You pencil pushers have more gumption than I had thought."
"Sir, they don't actually believe that they can defeat our new army..?"
"Let's hope they do."
BatCave
Wally couldn't believe that Bruce worked in such drab conditions every day. He'd only been working down in the BatCave for one night and he already felt extra grumpy, so much so that he kicked his teammates, who weren't much of a help at that point anyway, out of the cave to focus on his work in solitude. A few more hours down here and I may turn into the guy… Time was running out quickly and millions of people were relying on him to get this antidote concocted. Still, he thought looking to the clock and realizing how little time he had left, it would be nice to reverse time for-
He stopped working, he dropped everything. The idea that popped into his head…could it work? Could it be the solution? Could it be so easy? He wasn't sure, it was a longshot but his gut told him that it was the answer.
If I reverse the charge of the elemental makeup of the compound, then maybe the new solution will have the opposite effect as the original!"
Rushing over to the cabinet to his right, he grabbed one of the several beakers containing the original compound. He placed it on the countertop and began searching through every drawer in the lab.
"C'mon, c'mon, Bruce…gotcha!"
An old, crumpled sheet of paper laid in the bottom of a drawer- probably hadn't been used in years. Bruce must know this thing completely by heart, that's dedication.
On the paper was a plethora of squares, one after another, some different colors- each square had one, two, or three letters inside of it with some accommodating numbers. It was the Periodic Table of Elements.
Early in the investigation he identified each individual element that made up the compound, now he searched feverishly to find each element's corresponding square on the table. Although he hadn't used the table in some time, he knew the symbols for most of the elements; it didn't take long to figure out the rest.
"Okay, so we have plus six, plus four, minus two, plus five, minus six….seven, so it's positive!"
According to the table, the combined elements gave the compound a positive ionic charge, which meant to reverse it he obviously needed to make it negative.
Alright, Bats, what do you have in this facility that'll do the job?
To his surprise, nothing. A state of the art facility, he thought, and not one-
I wonder what a bat keeps in his trunk…
The batmobile, like every other automobile runs on an engine, although it may be bigger and more expensive, Wally knew that all engines have the same problems. And when they run into these problems, every smart car owner makes sure that they have the necessary equipment to fix it. Let's see if Bruce is a responsible car owner.
It took him ten minutes to figure out how to open the heavily guarded batmobile, but what he found inside made it all worth it. Jumper cables.
Attaching only the negative claw of each side of the cable to the batmobile's engine and a steel plate that held the counter-agent, respectively, Wally eagerly jumped into the complicated cockpit of the batmobile and floored it.
The sound of the revving engine echoed throughout the entire mansion. Diana, Clark, and J'onn, who were all enjoying a nice brunch with Alfred, dropped their finger sandwiches and rushed down into the cave. Engine exhaust filled the cavern, disturbing the vermin above.
"Wally!" Clark yelled to no avail. Wally couldn't hear anything over that engine. "Wally!" He tried again, running up to him and shaking his shoulder.
Wally looked up, smiling, and mouthed, twenty more seconds. Clark began to countdown in his head.
When Wally's foot finally relaxed off the pedal, the air in the cave was barely breathable.
"Kaff, kaff… what are you doing?" Diana asked."
"I figured it all out!"
"What!?"
"I did it! Well I think I did. I reversed the charge of the original compound using Bats' jumper cables. If my hypothesis is correct, the compound should now yield a negative ionic charge, which will hopefully grant us our powers back!"
"I knew you could do it, Wally." Clark stepped up to his friend and threw his arms around him.
"But how do we consume it?" J'onn asked.
"Same as the first time, it needs to be in gaseous form, so I'll just heat it up," He rummaged through equipment until finding a Bunsen Burner. "And we can all breathe it in."
"Outstanding, Wally! Spectacular work!" She punched him in the arm.
"Well don't thank me yet," He said, rubbing the spot on his arm that she just hit, "As I said I'm not absolutely positive that this will work, and if it doesn't I'm not absolutely positive if it will have a different, less desirable effect on us."
"Less desirable, like what?" Diana asked.
"I couldn't tell you. If the original compound stripped us of our powers, there is no knowing what this could do."
A nervous silence filled the cave. It only took a couple of minutes for the solution to boil and start evaporating into the air.
"I guess I'll volunteer, it's my experiment." Wally stepped up to the beaker.
"No." Clark objected. "If this doesn't work then we'll need you to continue to work for an antidote. I'll test it."
The other three agreed, watching anxiously as their leader stepped up to the boiling liquid. He bent at the waist, so that his face was inches from the top of the beaker, all of the gaseous steam rising straight up to his pours. He breathed, slowly and deeply, allowing the gas to travel all the way into his lungs. He took three, four, five breaths, before stepping away from the solution.
"Well?" They all asked apprehensively.
"I'm not sure, I-" He stumbled backwards, falling into J'onn who kept him on his feet.
"It's okay." Wally reassured. "His body is just reacting to the foreign substance."
J'onn let Clark rest on the cold floor for a few minutes to gather himself before asking, "How do you feel?"
Clark took a few breaths, "I'm good, I'm fine."
"Do you feel any different?!" Wally asked anxiously, offering a hand to help him up.
"I think so." Clark grabbed Wally's hand and squeezed almost crushing every bone.
"Yow! You could've just said 'yes'!"
"You did it Wally!" Diana hugged him hard.
"Well done, Wally." J'onn said. "Let us hurry now, we have a job to do.
Diana, Wally, and J'onn eagerly took turns breathing in the Wally's cure.
"Ahhh, Hera, it feels so good to be strong again! Let's go show the world what we think of the Prime Minister, boys!" She punched Wally again in the arm, this time sending him fifty feet across the cave. "Whoops."
