A young woman walked down the crowded sidewalk, weaving gracefully between intrusive shoulders and swinging arms. She wore her midnight-black hair in a tight bun and was cloaked in a beige trench coat that reached past her knees. She was no slouch in the height department, approaching five-eleven, but it seemed that everyone in the Nordic countries was taller than her. Even that blonde high school bimbo in front of me. Is a skirt that short even legal for teenagers? God, I wish my thighs were as toned as hers. She jumped as a man brushed her side. She half turned, to tell him to go screw himself, but she relaxed when she saw it was only Oliver Queen in a dark green hoodie, faded jeans, and Vans shoes.
"You seem to be on edge, Zee. You alright?" he asked her.
The League magician known as Zatanna Zatarra smirked.
"Remind me to compliment Dinah once we get back. You're actually turning into a half-decent human-being, Ollie."
"Ouch, right to the heart. So if I'm a decent person now, what was I before?"
"A sleazebag. Philandering billionaire. Party queen. Emotional wreck. Sociopath. Should I continue?"
Oliver chuckled, "Nah, I think I got the gist of it."
They walked in silence towards the Ferry Terminal, a few hundred metres away.
"How do you have enough arrows?" Zatanna suddenly asked.
"Huh?" Oliver was confused.
"Arrows. You somehow never run out of them in battle. I've always wondered how you do that."
"Ah, my arrows are hollow and made of a light metal. So Cyborg hooked me up with a quick, miniaturized 3-D printer that prints arrows when I need them. I added a few inches to the bottom of my quiver - get your mind out the gutter, Zee, and stop smirking - and I slotted in the printer and a few pounds of tightly compressed metal that the printer uses to print the arrows."
"Somehow I envisioned something more exciting than a printer," Zatanna fake yawned.
"Well, I can fly now, if that helps," he offered.
"Nope, not really," she squinted at him as they approached the entrance of the low rise building in front of the port. "I still can't see what Dinah sees in you," she teased.
"You're bad for my ego, you know that?" Ollie lamented.
"You know it," she said as they breezed past security.
"Ylluf etaucave gnidliub," Zatanna chanted.
Oliver felt a weird sensation spread through his body, and watched as the people surrounding them turned around and walked out of the terminal without a fuss. The Brazilian band that was playing a popular song in the lobby patiently finished their song and then packed up to leave. It was like a scene out of an 80's cult movie, eerie. In a few short minutes, the entire building was deserted. The two Leaguers made their way to the docks behind the building. A single cruise ship was moored at one of the two wide ship-berths. More than two hundred metres long, it was at least fifteen stories high. It was painted in a pleasant combination of white and blue, and for such a large vessel, it was surprisingly sleek, shaped like an over-sized, water bound bullet train. The captain's Bridge capped off the top front of the ship, jutting out on either side to give navigators a clear view of the sea ahead. Zatanna spotted movement on the crow's nest, where Hawkgirl seemed to be rigging up some equipment. They heard beeping and turned to watch as a truck backed up to the car deck of the ship. Superman waved at them cheerfully from the driver's cabin of the 16 wheeler that was towing a large container.
"Hey, guys! Glad you could make it!"
Oliver and Zatanna walked over the wide ramp and onto the ship. They spotted Clark floating down from the truck.
"I can't believe this ship can even handle that truck," Oliver remarked.
"Are you kidding me? This ship is a beast! It can easily handle around four-hundred cars, so one truck is peanuts."
"You seem almost proud of it, Clark," Zatanna observed, a little amused at how much he looked like a kid in a candy shop.
"I am, indeed. I spend so much time with my tech that I sometimes forget to see just how far humans have come with theirs."
The trio walked around to the back of the truck.
"Bruce wanted some things from the Fortress, and I might have taken the liberty of bringing you guys a few toys too. Enjoy," he grinned as he swung open the doors to the container and watched Oliver's and Zatanna's mouths swing open.
Zatanna exclaimed, "Holy f-"
Captain's Bridge, The Silja Serenade
"Do you have control?"
"Yes Batman, the engines are running fine. I should be able to handle the ship now. Initiating remote control," Victor's voice came through the communicator.
Victor Stone, known as the Cyborg, was on the Watch Tower, controlling and enabling the entire operation, moving pieces around like in a game of chess, only here, the stakes were incalculable.
Batman grunted his acknowledgement and left the Bridge to check up on the equipment he'd requested from Clark.
The Island of Grinda, Stockholm Archipelago
Whoooosh
A peal of laughter burst out and Captain Cold smirked. Circe was holding up a bird frozen in flight.
"Now what did that bird ever do to you?" Harley asked as she twirled her bat around, inspecting the island around her.
The trio had been on the island for over two hours and was growing bored. They turned to watch as a blue-white cruise ship lazily drifted by, trying not to go too fast in the small waterways of the archipelago. Yet another civilian ship doing its thing.
Circe spotted the shock-wave the millisecond before it her, but even she was too slow to avoid it. They screamed and fell to their knees as a wall of pure sound slammed into them from the ship. Harley was knocked out cold instantly and Captain Cold was near-unconscious. Circe was getting to her feet as Flash blurred in and cuffed the three and laid them on the ground. He used an anaesthetic device to cover Circe's mouth and keep her asleep for the duration of the battle. He hid them underneath a camouflage blanket and marked the location for the League's retrieval team to find later.
Over the next fifteen minutes, as the ship slowly trundled by the rest of the islands, the Injustice League found themselves out of action before they could even comprehend what was going on. By the time the ship left the archipelago, every island except the main one was secure and around a hundred and fifty Injustice Leaguers lay incapacitated and marked for retrieval.
Diana felt the ship come to a halt underneath her feet.
"I'm tasking the ship back to Stockholm on a longer route. You guys can meet it there after the mission to get your stuff," Cyborg said.
"Thanks, Victor," Clark spoke into the communicator.
"And guys," Victor continued. "Forget stealth on the main island, Luthor knows you're coming. They had Firefly go check out one of the other islands and found their people neatly packaged and out of order."
Diana looked at Clark.
"Shock and awe?" she asked.
Clark nodded with the hint of a smile.
"Let's do our thing."
"Not that it doesn't sound ridiculously awesome when you two say it like that, but what's your thing?" Wally asked.
Diana chuckled. "Just a small technique that we perfected in Asgard. It's a lot of fun. You guys stay exactly a second behind us. For this to work, you have to come in as soon as we start and get the UN people out," she instructed.
The League agreed.
Hjalmo Island
Lex Luthor was angry. His best plan yet, his one chance at redemption, had gone awry, and it hadn't even been a fight. Three-fourths of his people were out of commission and he didn't even have an idea of who he was up against. He'd gathered the rest of his League together tightly surrounding the stolen UN building on the island, each armed with Kryptonite and powerful weapons. He had speedsters manning the area, so he wasn't worried about the Justice Leaguers sneaking up on the scene.
A loud boom suddenly shook the island. And another. And another. The island began vibrating uncontrollably and Lex was stumbling around trying to find a footing. Zoom and the other evil speedsters lost their posture for a millisecond, and that was all the invitation Clark needed, he flew in low at just under the speed of sound and threw every villain in the vicinity straight up into the air. In three milliseconds, they were cresting a few kilometres into the air, where John Stewart and Hal Jordan were waiting for them with giant, green baseball gloves and a League troop carrier.
Lex Luthor managed to stand straight finally and all he saw was the crest of the house of El filling up his vision. He looked up to see Superman staring down at him with a smirk on his face, but a simmering anger lay underneath the smirk. Lex tried to shove his Kryptonite ring in Superman's face, but the latter didn't even flinch as the stone touched his face.
"You really think that after all these years, I'm going to let myself be taken down by a rock, Luthor?"
Clark moved back as Diana flew in, her fists dirty from pummeling the surface of the island. Luthor's eyes widened.
"You..." he sputtered.
"...were responsible your break-dancing. Yes. Yes, I was. You're not half bad a dancer Lex, I think you missed your true calling."
"Hey John!" Clark spoke into his communicator.
"Yes Clark?"
"Go long!"
Diana picked up the cowering psychopath by the scruff of his neck and threw him like a baseball. He disappeared from view in a few seconds.
Clark felt a little disappointed when John called in to say a few seconds later that he'd caught the man around a hundred kilometres away.
"That vermin ain't got nothin' on us," Diana stated proudly, and Clark chuckled.
"What?" she asked.
"You're cute."
"I am not cute, Clark! You take that back right now or I'm going to throw you to heaven like I did Luthor."
"Oh trust me, Diana, in a short while, I am definitely going to take you to heaven. Do you have any idea how delectable you look right now, with your dirty hair and glistening body?" Diana blushed and smacked Clark.
"I hate that you know how to embarrass me and turn me on at the same time," she said in a sultry voice.
They heard retching voices on the communicator.
"For God's sake you two, turn off your damn microphones," Bruce's voice came in.
And it was Diana's turn to smirk as Clark blushed.