Year Twenty-One: Exile
Author's Note: Bad things ahead.
Jun 30, 2033, 7:25am CST UPDATED: Jun 30, 2033, 8:18am CST
Starrware Labs Profit Up Sharply
Bill Batson
Business Reporter-Fawcett City Business Journal
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Starrware Labs edged out earnings estimates as sales of solar panel arraysgrew more stable.
The Wall Street Journal reports on the solar-based tech company's fiscal second-quarter earnings, which were $92 million, or 89 cents a share, on sales of $419 million. That compares to earnings of $64 million, or 63 cents a share, on sales of $409 million in the same period a year ago.
Related: Read Starrware's full earnings announcement here. The company's conference call with analysts began at 7 a.m.; a recording is generally available later.
Excluding one-time items, Fawcett City-based Starrware earned 91 cents per share, ahead of the 90 cents per share analysts estimated.
CEO Kara Starr, in a statement, said, "We are performing at or better than the market in almost every one of our business lines."
/-\
Kneeling in the smoking crater, Bill tried very hard to keep from throwing up.
His ears were still ringing, blood dripped from his nose and eyes, and all he really wanted to do was stop struggling against the nausea roiling around in his stomach, but he didn't have the time. Black Adam was still loose, Kahndaq's still unstable government was in danger, and, far more importantly, he was already late for his night out with Kara.
Despite his complete lack of balance, he shot up into the sky, faster than the human eye could follow, and aimed himself in the direction of the smoke climbing up from the sky near the former presidential palace. He could hear gunfire and screams, not to mention a furious and far too familiar voice bellowing orders in an archaic dialect of Arabic. Tracer fire screamed up toward him – evidently, the Kandaqi Army either couldn't tell the difference between him and Adam or they simply didn't care; Billy was betting on the latter – but he was flying too quickly for them to line up a shot. Hovering to get his bearings was how he ended up in that crater in the first place. He'd always wondered if his skin was tough enough to take a direct shot from a tank and now he knew.
He streaked in fast and low, smashing through a marble wall and tackling Adam from behind. The speed of his passage carried them both out of the palace and into the sky before Adam half-twisted and slammed his elbow into Billy's face with such power that it sent him spinning away. He righted himself almost immediately and darted back, ducking under a lightning fast punch to retaliate with a blow of his own. It struck hard, knocking Adam even higher into the sky and further away from Shiruta, but like Billy had before, he arrested his out of control fall very nearly instantly and turned furious eyes upon his attacker.
"Get out of my way, boy," Adam snarled. "This is not your fight."
"It became my fight the instant you put innocents in danger," Billy replied. "Kahndaq was your home!" he remarked, keeping his senses peeled for threats. If Adam didn't attack right away, there was always the threat of military jets. "They don't deserve this!"
"You have no idea what they deserve," Adam hissed. He blurred forward and they exchanged blows, each impact so powerful that it could be heard for hundreds of miles. Back and forth they dueled in the sky, trading punches, kicks, head butts, and even judo throws. With each second that passed, they put more distance between themselves and the Kahndaqi city, and within moments, they were near the coast. Adam's rage was terrible to behold – he kept screaming something about his long-dead wife, Isis, but none of it made any sense – and Billy was on the verge of calling in for reinforcements when something unexpected happened.
The sky turned red.
There was no warning – between one moment and the next, the cloudless, clear blue sky turned scarlet – and the change was so abrupt, so jarring, that it caused both of them to hesitate in sudden surprise. Something fundamental … shifted around them and a wave of crippling nausea sent Billy tumbling from the sky. He struck the rocky coast with a hollow boom that sent a geyser of sand and broken rocks into the air, and a half second later, he heard a second explosion as Adam slammed into the ground a hundred feet away. Billy's head spun as he forced himself to his feet and looked around. What the hell was that? He looked up – the sky was still the color of blood – and tried to blink the dizziness away. For the first time in a very long time, he felt … slow and weak and heavy.
Adam came at him a heartbeat later, screaming something unintelligible, and struck Billy with just enough force to knock him back to the ground.
"What did you do?!" Adam roared as he tackled Billy. They grappled for a moment, but Bill's head was still spinning and he quickly found himself locked in a tight hold, with Adam behind him. He was looking at the sky, Billy realized with sudden fear. He heard Adam draw breath. "Shazam!"
But nothing happened.
There was no thunder, no lightning, no searing flash of light that heralded the transformation between a magically-endowed superhuman and a mere mortal. The sky remained devoid of clouds, even if it was still this strange color. Billy heard Adam's surprised noise, felt the hold slip, and struggled against it, lashing out with his elbow in an almost identical manner to the way Adam had struck him earlier. It staggered his opponent and gave him just enough leverage to break free. He rolled away, leaping to his feet and bracing himself for the next onslaught.
"What did you do?" Adam demanded. He touched the blood dripping from his smashed nose and glanced quickly to the sky. Tensing his muscles, he very obviously tried to throw himself into the sky, but succeeded only in pitching face first into the sand. "My power," Adam whispered, eyes wide in shock. "You stole my power…"
Bill didn't bother correcting him and instead, lunged forward. He hit Adam once, twice, a third time, each punch rocking the other man back. Stripped of their superhuman abilities as they appeared to be, the advantage was his – he was bigger, stronger, younger – and he pummeled Adam with meaty fists until the other man toppled into the sand, unconscious. Breath coming in ragged spurts, Billy looked up at the sky once more.
It was still red, though the strange hue was fading away as the normal blue reclaimed its rightful place. Within seconds, the atmosphere looked to be no different than normal, with no sign of the strange atmospheric anomaly that had been there only moments earlier. Bill tested himself – his powers were still gone, it seemed, though he frowned at the large crater he'd made in the Kahndaqi beach. If they'd been completely gone, there was no way he'd have survived that fall. He gave Adam a quick glance to confirm the man was unconscious and not just faking it, then looked skyward.
"Shazam," he murmured.
And still, nothing happened.
Kara showed up several minutes after he made the call to the Watchtower and her expression was both grim and relieved. Ever since Superman and Wonder Woman vanished through that portal with those two strangers last year, she'd worked extremely hard to take her cousin's place and, in fact, had emerged as the almost de facto leader of the League when Aquaman announced his intention to resign from active membership so he could concentrate on rulership of Atlantis. Thus far, she'd done fairly well, even if some members of the League and more than a few world leaders had difficulty meeting her eyes thanks to that ridiculous boob window of her costume. Billy had tried to talk her into adopting the House of El crest there – every time he saw someone checking out his girlfriend, he wanted to break them in half or perhaps thirds – but she continued to refuse.
"It happened around the world," Kara said when he mentioned the red skies. She finished securing Adam with one of those power inhibitors her company had developed alongside WayneTech. "Zatanna and Fate are both unconscious," she added sourly, "and no one can find Constantine." Billy winced.
"What about Themyscira?" he asked. At this, her expression darkened even further.
"The Embassy is closed," she replied. "No one's there and we can't get in touch with any of the Amazons." Billy frowned as he looked skyward.
"Now what do we do?" he asked. Kara scowled.
"Until we know what this was," she said, "there isn't anything to do." Her eyes softened as she looked him over. "And if you're powerless," she started.
"Awesome," Bill said with a black look of his own. "I'm the damsel in distress." Kara laughed.
Later, after they had relocated Adam to Belle Reve and he'd suffered through a remarkably in depth medical exam, Bill found himself back in Fawcett City, alone for the moment and filled with worry. His sister had already checked in – like him, she was stuck in her depowered form, but unlike Bill, it didn't bother her too terribly since she'd been focusing more and more on her civilian life – and he stood on the roof of his apartment building, staring quietly at the twinkling stars. No one had any answers. Zatanna was awake and functional if confused, but Fate remained comatose … or at least his human body did.
"What the hell do I do now?" Billy wondered aloud. He considered himself a decent enough reporter, but so much of his life had been centered on the Captain Marvel identity that he felt bereft without it. Would he ever be able to rejoin Kara in the clouds? They'd never had to hold back before when they kissed or made love, but now, she could break him without even realizing it.
billy...
The soft voice echoed through the darkness, across an ocean of night, and Billy looked around, his body tensing as he half expected one of his old enemies to spring out of the darkness. There was no one there, no one to see, and he started to turn away before a flicker of light coalesced into the old wizard. He was barely there, semi-transparent at best, and his voice sounded so far away…
rock of eternity adrift, the wizard said across distances so vast they could not be calculated. strength enough only for one more transformation so to the most worthy I turn. The wizard's image stretched out his hand and Billy reached forward to take it.
Lightning exploded through him. The pain … dear God, the pain. It had never hurt like this. He felt energy course through his body, a hundred times greater than ever before. Strength like he'd never felt before made his muscles quiver. He could break the world with this kind of power. Someone was screaming and he suddenly realized it was him. Images flashed across his mind's eye but they were so fast, so utterly foreign that he could not comprehend what he was seeing. Lightning splashed against shadow. Blood turned the sky red. Rage and fire and death waged war against one another. None of it made any damned sense.
When the pain passed, Bill found himself floating in the clouds, high above Fawcett City. Of the wizard, there was no sign, though that was not a surprise if his words had been any indication. The power, the strength, they were still there and considerably more potent than before. Comprehension came at once. Before, the power had been spread between two, sometimes three people, but now, there was only one. Things were as they should be. Or rather, they weren't.
"Captain Marvel to Watchtower," he called out, knowing that Victor would be able to hone in on his voice through his technical wizardry. "I'm en route to the station. Inform Superwoman that I have new information."
And without another word, he shot up, into the sky. Worry flew with him.
/-\
A harsh blue sun glared down at him, but through the fuzzy haze of agony and exhaustion, Kon-El barely noticed.
He was vaguely aware of the taste of sand as he crawled away from the smoking wreck that had been the starship he'd been using for the last three weeks, but the burns across so much of his body stripped away coherence and left him barely aware of what his name was, let alone where he was. Time had no meaning to him – he was aware only of the waves of pain that coursed through his body in time with his pulse, of the stabbing flames in his legs that hinted at broken bones, of the harsh torture that was sand and wind against his seared flesh, of the taste of fire each time he inhaled. Fear drove him forward, an inch at a time. He had to get away from the Enemy. He had to …
His head swam. And suddenly, he was back home, reclining in the warm sand of the Hawaiian beach and simply trying to enjoy life. There was no horrible black smoke here, no crippling injuries, no threats, only gorgeous babes in bikinis and … and …
"I need your help," the stranger in red and blue had gasped before collapsing to his knees. He looked familiar and it took Kon long minutes to recognize that Lar Gand fellow that Kal-El had introduced him to once a couple of years ago, right before Superman disappeared with Wonder Woman. The alien looked terrible – his skin was an off-color, his eyes were visibly having trouble focusing, and his entire body twitched. "I need…" Gand never finished his statement as he slumped forward into unconsciousness.
The sound of metal tearing behind him pulled Kon-El back to the present. He had to crawl faster. He had to get away. There was something behind him, something …
"Kryptonian." The raspy, pained voice echoed over the landscape. Memory flared – there had been four of them: a humanoid of living metal, a woman who seemed as strong and as capable as any Kryptonian, an armored figure whose gender and race could not be determined, and a creature of rock and stone, all wearing uniforms of black and red. They had appeared out of nowhere, an impossible boom echoing through the hard vacuum of space and heralding their arrival. The stolen ship hadn't stood a chance against their onslaught.
Is this it? Kon-El demanded of himself, through the fog of pain. Is this how you're going to die? Weak and crawling away like an insect?
No.
Grimacing at the effort, he forced himself to his knees and then to feet. He swayed briefly as his body struggled to stay upright and he once more wished that his Kryptonian genes had been even more dominant. Oh, he was strong and durable and fast, but he couldn't fly and right now, that was the one thing he needed the most as he turned to face the wrecked hulk of the starship. Kara was not going to be pleased.
"No," she'd said when he presented his plan. She'd already been pissed off that he'd broken into the Fortress to use the Phantom Zone projector in order to save Gand's life. As long as he was there, the poison tearing apart his body would be arrested. When Kon-El asked for further help, the only person he truly considered family had glared at him. "This Vril Dox is bad news, Kon," she'd said. "The League will investigate Lar's claim."
Kon-El shook his head to clear it. He had to concentrate on the now, not the past. There were still three of the hostiles to deal with – the armored one was gone, having been right in front of the starship's core when it went critical – but the other three were still here, even if they looked as bad off as he did. The metal man especially appeared to be having difficulty moving – it looked like half of his body had melted under the intense heat and then frozen once more in the cold of space.
"Kryptonian," the rocky creature repeated in Interlac. Kon-El balled up his fists, ignoring the sharp pain it caused.
"Half," he replied. "Which is more than enough to kick your ugly ass."
He never saw the woman move.
She blurred forward, as fast as Kara was, and struck him with a punch that sent him tumbling backward. Kon hit the ground, rolled, and forced himself to one knee, barely biting back the scream of agony at the pain that coursed through that ruined leg. Fury thudded through him, a rage that wiped away everything but the desire to destroy his enemies. His scream became a roar and he met her in the air, his fists a blur as he struck again and again and again. Bone splintered, blood flew, and the woman tumbled into the sand, twitching once before going still. He didn't know if she was dead or merely unconscious – in the red haze that was always his greatest foe, he didn't care either – but she was down and there were others. Kon-El blurred forward, ignoring the bone-crushing blow he took to the chest from the creature of stone. His counter-strikes boomed across the horizon, each blow rocking the monster back, but he kept attacking, even as the bones in his hands fractured and collapsed. He would not surrender. He would not give up. He would not …
"You just don't give up, do you?" Kara asked him so many weeks ago. She'd caught him trying to steal one of the small hyper-warp capable skiffs on the Watchtower and once again, shown him how much greater a pure Kryptonian was when compared to him. It hadn't even been a contest – when his rage started to take over, she'd contained him in less than a heartbeat. "You don't even know this guy and you're throwing everything away to help him."
"Kal-El would have helped him," Kon retorted. It was an almost rote answer – so much of what he did these days was because Kal-El would have done it and he never felt right standing aside when he knew that.
The sound of metal upon metal drew him back to the present once more. Before him, unmoving but breathing, the stone monster was stretched out on the sand, his rocky exterior cracked and shattered. Kon-El gave him another kick – he felt the impact and his body shivered with pain – before turning to face the half-melted man of metal who was lumbering toward him. There was a strange boxy device on the metal-man's arm – it was on all three of their arms, Kon-El realized – and it was flashing brightly, repeatedly. Through the fog of exhaustion, pain and rage, he realized the danger and sprang away without thinking.
He was airborne when the boom tube exploded open. The shockwave of displaced air slammed into him and Kon-El was sent spinning. He struck the sand a moment later and slid several yards into an immense dune that almost instantly spilled down upon him. Fury dwindled as pain thudded once more through his abused body. Consciousness flickered…
A second boom followed the first and Kon-El could see a new creature appear. This one floated above the ground, his body wreathed in the same dark crimson and black colors as his fellows. His skin also was the strange grayish-blue, but otherwise, he appeared human. A sinister helmet protected the being's head as it glanced around the wreckage before gesturing. With a groan, the wrecked starship rose from where it had struck and vanished through the shimmering portal. The two fallen figures – there was no sign of the metal-man – lifted up off the ground as well and floated behind the helmeted man as he vanished through his tube. It hissed once and then vanished.
"Do you even have a plan?" Kara demanded from the past. Kon-El glared at the memory.
"I'm going to find that Coluan and beat a cure out of him," he told her angrily. He hated that about himself – everything he did was angry. The quicksilver rage was always there, always waiting for his self-control to slip so it could overwhelm him. In the span of a single second, he could go from sane to rampaging lunatic … and people dared to wonder why he chose seclusion, why he so often sought out the most remote places he could find to hide from this curse of fury. Even as he spoke, though, he had to admit, it was a pretty crappy plan, but right now, it was the best he had. Gand needed his help, dammit, and Kal-El wouldn't have even hesitated a second.
"That's a crappy plan," Kara told him. She'd taken his shoulder then and looked in his eyes. "Lar is safe in the Phantom Zone. Let the League look into this and we'll find a way to help him." Anger came once more – he knew what she saw when she looked at him, knew how hard it was for people to get over the fact that he still looked like a teenager and would probably stay this way forever … or at least until he was killed – and he'd left without agreeing.
And then, when the sky turned red and world-wide panic forced the League into action, he used one of the new transporters and snuck back onto the Watchtower where he stole the hyper-warp capable skiff.
He faded in and out of consciousness, trapped under the sand dune and so badly injured that he couldn't work up the strength to move. The air on this planet tasted strange – he'd been damned lucky it even had oxygen at all, what with that blue star and no apparent vegetation in sight – but as the day dragged on, the temperature around him increased dramatically. He tried to remember what he knew about blue supergiants, but it was so hard to focus, so hard to concentrate. Much easier to just let it come…
"Are you sure about this?" The comment was spoken in a strange dialect of Interlac and, for a moment, Kon-El thought he was hallucinating. "A rock like this?"
"My simulations indicate there is a greater than ninety percent chance of locating the Kryptonian hybrid on this planet at this point in history," a second voice stated. It too sounded strange, as if the man speaking were not accustomed to the words. "Scans indicate a life form in the near vicinity…"
"It's more than that," a third voice stated. "The magnetic fields in this area are all distorted. Something seriously disrupted them…"
"A boom-tube, I would theorize," the second man said. "These readings match with what we have encountered previously."
Kon-El. This was an unspoken voice, a warm, soothing wind that eased his pain and misery. She was a warm sun on a chilly day, a cool breeze after hours in a desert. Be at ease, Kon-El, the mind-voice whispered. We are here to assist.
Something unseen wrapped around his body and pushed aside the sand. Even that motion was too much and he instinctively groaned in pain as his fractured body shifted. Broken bones scrapped against one another, torn muscles strained again, and agony flooded through his entire body. The blue light from the massive star was too bright.
"His condition is critical," the second voice announced. Through narrowed eyes, Kon-El could see a humanoid with green skin and a shock of blond hair. Coluan, his tortured mind whispered.
"Dox," he murmured, the name causing the green-skinned man to look up sharply.
"I am Dox," the stranger admitted, "but not the one you were seeking." He looked away from Kon-El. "Imra, I need him sedated."
Sleep, the silent voice instructed.
And Kon-El obeyed.
When he opened his eyes again, the pain was gone. It was not just suppressed, but rather, completely absent which indicated some sort of medical attention. He was not alone, of course. The green-skinned man was there, along with a dark-haired human male and an attractive blonde woman whom Kon-El instinctively knew to be the source of the soundless voice. A fourth person joined them – another young man with red-hair and golden lightning bolts emblazoned upon his strange blue shirt. As one, all four turned to face him. They were all wearing sleek, streamlined outfits just similar enough to make him think they were uniforms and with identical belts bearing a prominent, stylized L upon the round buckle.
"Hello, Kon-El," the dark-haired young man said. He approached and, this close, it was more apparent that he was younger than Kon-El originally thought. "My name is Rokk. And we need your help."
/-\
Bruce had been in his office for little over an hour when it was invaded by men in suits.
He was in middle of reviewing the various memos and reports that Lucius insisted he keep up with when the four men stepped out of the executive elevator and swarmed over his office. Caroline, his ever-harried secretary briefly tried to run interference, but she froze up completely at the sign of badges which Bruce noted without much surprise. It was to be expected, of course, given her checkered past, but he made a mental note to have Tim and Cass dig deeper. Her recent appointment as his secretary had Greg Falstaff's fingerprints all over it and if that man was involved, it was entirely possible that Ms. Crown's life was in danger.
The four Secret Service agents were very competent – one flashed his badge at Bruce and engaged him in a conversation that ultimately answered nothing but wasted enough time for the other three to go to work. It was a good tactic, one Bruce himself had used numerous times in the past, though generally, he'd let others do the stalling while he poked around. The sweep uncovered the two bugs Bruce was already aware of – he noticed Caroline blanch, which confirmed his worst suspicions – but when the agents placed several devices on his windows, devices that would send discreet sonic vibrations through the glass which would thus spoil any attempts at using a laser microphone to eavesdrop, and then pulled the heavy curtains shut, Bruce frowned.
"Clear, sir," one of the agents announced. They filed toward the door.
"We're clear, sir," the delaying agent stated into a microphone secured to his left cufflink and, a moment later, another agent exited the elevator along with a man Bruce immediately recognized.
Lex Luthor.
He was still wearing former President Alexander's face, but his eyes carried that dangerous intensity that Bruce had seen only in a few other men. He was a little heavier than before and his hair … Alexander's hair was almost completely white now, but still, there was no mistaking the man's identity. Reflex kicked in and Bruce tensed, automatically shifting into combat mode as he eyed the five Secret Service agents. They weren't the most dangerous threat, of course, but he'd have to neutralize them quickly as he went for Luthor or one of them might get in a lucky shot.
"I would like a few moments alone with Mister Wayne, Robert," Luthor said as he strode down the hall. The senior Secret Service agent's face darkened, but he bit back whatever it was that he wanted to say. Instead, he pinned Bruce with a fierce glare, as if that were meant to intimidate him.
Bruce ignored him.
"I was not aware that we had a meeting," he said stiffly as Luthor approached.
"It was a spur of the moment thing, I must admit," the former president replied with a wry smile. "I was hoping to have a few moments of your time, Mister Wayne." He stepped past Bruce, lowering his voice so no one else could hear him. "I'm not a threat," he said.
"No," Bruce growled, his own reply pitched so low that only Luthor could make it out. "You're not." He gave the man his most insincere smile and offered his hand. "Reschedule my ten o'clock, Caroline," he added as he gestured for the former president to precede him. Again, the senior Secret Service agent – Robert, was it? – glowered at him, but Bruce simply offered the man a condescending smile and pulled the door to his office shut. "You have five minutes," he declared grimly. "At the end of that five minutes, you are leaving, either through the door or through the window."
"Still your charming self, I see." To Bruce's absolute surprise, Lex collapsed in one of the chairs arranged in front of the desk. "I need your help." Luthor frowned. "No, that's not right. I need you to give me access to the Kryptonian database that Kal-El possessed." Reclaiming his own chair, Bruce frowned.
"Under what circumstances do you think I would ever-"
"My wife has brain cancer," Luthor interrupted. He slumped back into the chair and began rubbing his temples in what looked like an unconscious habit. "I've had the best specialists in the world look at her and even then, they've given her less than a fifteen percent chance of survival." Luthor grimaced. "I know that Kal-El dove into cancer research before his mother passed away." He abruptly shook his head. "I already owe him one for that – some of the drugs he developed then are why Madeline can still walk." His fingers once more returned to his temples. "But I need more. I need to dig into that database myself and find a cure."
"Have you considered cloning her?" Bruce asked flatly. Luthor offered a bleak smile.
"I did, actually," he admitted, "but the cancer … it would make the transfer of consciousness less than perfect." He exhaled heavily. "I know we've had our differences–" That was an understatement if ever there was one. How many times had this man tried to kill him? Admittedly, he'd been wearing a different face then, but still, the point stood. "– but I need access to Kent's database." Bruce's scowl darkened ever so slightly at mention of Clark and he struggled to hold back the urge to go over the table.
"Why did you come to me?" he asked instead. Luthor frowned in mild surprise.
"You're the logical choice, Bruce. I thought that, if Kent left it to anyone when he went away, it would be you." Abruptly, he looked away. "Of course," he murmured. "His cousin. I didn't factor her into the equation." The expression that flashed across his face was a strange one that seemed to combine rage and fear and disgust and confusion all at the same time. It was, Bruce thought, the look of a man on the very brink of losing control. "Damn," Luthor muttered. "Damn." He shook his head. "She isn't going to want to work with me, not after what I did to her … did to both of them."
"Say that I do help you," Bruce said after a long moment of silence, steepling his fingers and tapping his chin with them. "What guarantees do I have that this isn't another one of your insane schemes? You don't exactly have a good track record for trustworthiness." Luthor exhaled bitterly.
"I deserve that," he admitted softly. "Kent and I … we had an agreement. Regardless of how it came to be, I'm a different man now." He gestured to his face and offered a wan smile. "Literally, in fact. And I'm trying a different path." He glanced at his watch, winced, and then reached into his jacket to extract a jumpdrive. Bruce tried very hard not to smile when he recognized that it was a WayneTech model – that had to burn, especially given how much of LexCorp that had been absorbed into Wayne Enterprises. "That has everything I have on Madeline's condition," Luthor said. He stood. "I know you don't trust me, Bruce," he continued, "but please, help her." He started to turn away, but then hesitated. "Are they coming back?" he asked. There was no need to identify who they were, but Bruce offered no response. Grunting softly, Luthor exited.
"Sir?" Caroline asked a few minutes later. She'd poked her head into his office and was watching him from behind those immense glasses of hers.
"Cancel my appointments for the rest of the day," Bruce ordered. He pocketed the flash-drive. "And let Lucius know that something's come up."
He left the office soon after and snuck into the nearby satellite cave that Tim and Cass usually used, which was unoccupied at the moment. Heading back to the Manor wasn't really an option right now, not with how many people were so often in and out these days. With Alfred effectively forced into partial retirement due to age and persistent sickness – something that Bruce hated even thinking about – they'd been forced to hire a maid service to maintain the manor. Selina ruled them all with an iron fist, jokingly (he hoped) referring to them as her minions and henchwomen, and coordinated with Alfred to ensure that the small army was where it should be, especially as they geared up to host a major party to launch Jim Gordon's mayoral run. Unfortunately, this meant using the Cave was problematic – suddenly emerging from a room which a maid had just observed to be empty would inevitably cause some snooping they couldn't afford.
The computers were active when he ducked in – by the look of things, Robin had been reviewing the latest on the Jokerz, a gang of lowlifes who intentionally modeled themselves after the late and unlamented clown prince of crime himself – but no one else was present. That made sense, though, in between their plans to go to Central City this weekend to attend the Crock-West wedding and Cassandra's recent brush with death at the hands of Gotham's newest rogue, a metahuman who went by the name of Totentanz (which was a name that frankly made no sense in this connotation, but Bruce had long ago given up on criminals, metahuman or not, using anything like logic or reason.) The official story they'd released to the papers was that she'd been mugged and the tabloids had splashed pictures of her and Tim all over their headlines, one or two even hinting that he'd been the one to hit her while the more responsible ones reported how he'd flown back from Metropolis the moment he learned about the incident.
Bruce spent a few hours reviewing the information on the jumpdrive, trying very hard to find something that would reveal Luthor as a liar but instead, all he found was medical records indicating that Madeline Alexander was extraordinarily sick. He tapped into Oracle's network – Barbara was at the Manor helping with the party setup so he did not have to worry about her screaming at him for doing this, at least until she reviewed the logs later – and spent another thirty minutes reviewing the Alexanders' recent flight records. Bruce frowned at the rather compelling evidence before him, that Luthor was telling the truth. Everywhere they went was known for having prominent cancer clinics. He leaned back in the chair.
"It's me," he said into the phone when Kara answered it. "Can you come to Gotham? I have something I need to discuss with you."
"Is this an emergency?" She sounded distracted. "I'm in the middle of something at the moment." Bruce considered for a moment.
"Not an emergency but still potentially urgent," he replied. "At your earliest convenience, please." The politeness of his tone shocked even him – once, he would have been terse and demanding, but having witnessed firsthand how capable Kara had become in the last few years, he constantly found himself inclined toward giving her the benefit of the doubt. With Clark and Diana gone, someone had needed to step up and assume the role of League leader and the woman that the entire world now called Superwoman had done so admirably. It had been her idea, after all, to split the League up into regions to better maximize their response times – these regional teams drew the names of their assigned continents, so there was a Justice League of America, a Justice League of Europe, two Justice Leagues in Asia, one in Africa and another two that covered Central and South America. This division of efforts had assuaged some of the concerns regarding the League's raw power, but those convinced that they were only a bad day away from establishing a totalitarian state insisted this was but one more step in that direction.
"Give me an hour," Kara said. "I'll check in with you before I arrive."
The sun had already begun to disappear behind the horizon when Bruce hung up the phone and he rose, wincing at the cacophony of pops and snaps his abused body made. After spending a few moments stretching out, he opened the costume safe and quickly donned one of his spare Batsuits. This one was several years out of date – the kevlite material was worn and the boots were remarkably uncomfortable – but it served for Tim when he needed to make a stand-in appearance … which was honestly becoming more frequent than Bruce wanted to admit. Just last month, for example, Tim had logged more time in the Batsuit than he had, a fact that caused no small amount of consternation…
Kara arrived exactly on schedule, which was far better than her cousin had ever managed as he'd always been perpetually late. She touched down on the rooftop where he stood and glanced around briefly before frowning in the direction of Gotham General Hospital. To Bruce's relief, her normally white Kryptonian suit was charcoal gray at the moment which led him to suspect it was some sort of smart-cloth not too dissimilar to how Clark's hard-suit functioned. He wondered if he could get a sample to test.
"Is there a reason why you're lurking here, outside the Alexanders' room?" Kara asked without preamble. Bruce gave her a glance and she smirked. "There are three Secret Service snipers watching at the moment … and one of them just freaked out a little bit because I announced that out loud." She turned her head to face a distant building. "Hello, Agent Smith," she said with a smile. "How is your daughter?" She paused, and then nodded. "That's great news. I knew she could do it."
"Do you know how disconcerting that is?" Bruce asked sourly. He'd been aware of the snipers already – Oracle's drones orbited silently overhead and had identified their nests – but had not bothered revealing his knowledge to them. Kara flashed a smile.
"It's not my fault you have wussy ears," she said as she pulled a small disc off her belt buckle. "Agent Smith," she said calmly, "my associate and I have some things to discuss. Please don't freak out … yes, it's exactly like Albuquerque." Kara placed her thumb on the disc and an energy wave pulsed off of it. Bruce glanced around – the shimmering field stopped a half foot away from him but enclosed them both – and then looked at Kara. She grinned again. "Distortion field," she said. "It's an application of Phantom Zone technology – we're slightly out of phase with the rest of the world, so they can't eavesdrop." Bruce grunted. He wanted one very, very badly and knew it had to show.
"I had an interesting visitor today," he began instead of asking if she could provide him with the specs for this device. Knowing her, she'd gladly do so … but they'd be written in Ancient Kryptonian and engraved on some chunk of metal he'd need an industrial-sized forklift to even budge. Kara gave him a look, then glanced in the direction of the hospital with a very slight frown.
"President Alexander," she guessed. "And what exactly does Mister Luthor want?"
Bruce blinked.
Until now, he'd been positive that the only people in the League who were aware of the situation with the president were himself, Clark and Diana. In fact, they'd intentionally tried to keep it from reaching Kara's ears out of concern over what she might do in retaliation. Yet here she was, completely professional and totally unmoved by her proximity to the madman who had so thoroughly changed her life. At his silence – and probably some other clues only a Kryptonian could decipher – Kara's frown vanished and was quickly replaced by a smirk.
"I have ears, B," she said wryly. "Very, very good ears. You and Diana talked about it on the Watchtower once though I don't think either of you knew I was there at the time." Bruce grunted. "Kal's database," Kara abruptly guessed. She was still staring at the hospital. "His wife is sick and he wants to look over Kal's research into cancer."
"Correct," Bruce rasped. These damned Kryptonians … they never failed to knock him off his stride. Just when he was certain that he'd figured out how they would react to certain stimuli, they turned around and did something completely different. It was so frustratingly easy to forget that they weren't humans with amazing powers – if it had been him that had been affected like Kara, Bruce had little doubt he'd have long since paid Alexander a visit and knocked the clone's teeth out. And that was only after he broken a few dozen bones.
"I will have conditions that must be followed," Kara announced in a coldly analytical voice. "If I get the feeling – even once – that he's trying to access something other than cancer research, I will throw him in the Phantom Zone without hesitation or warning." She turned her cool gaze onto him and, for a moment, Bruce had no trouble at all remembering that she wasn't human. "Trust me on this: he will not like that in the slightest."
"I'll let him know," Bruce said. Kara nodded and manipulated the tiny device that generated the distortion field. With a whoosh, the shimmering field vanished.
"Agent Smith," Kara called out, "please say hello to your daughter for me." She climbed into the sky. "Have a pleasant evening, gentlemen." With a flicker of motion, she vanished into the night. Bruce was silent for a long moment.
"I hate it when she does that," he announced to the empty air before he too turned away from the hospital.
/-\
War had come to paradise.
Overhead, the sky was bleeding as gods and monsters, native and alien alike, fell, their lives spilling out from gruesome wounds. Thunder shook the ground. Lightning flashed like quicksilver – here, there, there again – and where it struck, creatures not of this world died. Fire scorched the air and burned even the hardiest of heroes to ash. There were bodies everywhere.
And in the very center of this maelstrom, in the heart of the chaos, surrounded by a carpet of fallen enemies was a single woman.
Her name was Artemis.
And she was dead.
Or rather, she should have been dead. Her wounds were beyond terrible – one arm was simply gone, seared away by an impossible heat that had also been responsible for the horrific burns that ravaged her once lovely face; both legs were shattered, as if she had tumbled off a mighty cliff; smoke still curled up from a handful of bleeding injuries and there were at least three spear shafts of alien design standing up from where she'd been pinned to the ground. She should have been dead. She wished she were dead.
The Presence drew nearer, observing dispassionately as the girl labored to free herself from the spears. Even now, as wounded as she was, Artemis continued to struggle, to fight, to seek once more to hurl herself at the Enemy and sell her life dearly. It mattered not – the Presence knew that only a handful of Amazons yet breathed, the rest having fallen in brutal combat or, in a few terrible instances, been captured. Time was running out and the Presence needed to act.
"Artemis." The name whispered across the wind and the girl with the flame-colored hair responded instantly, tensing and looking around for someone she could not see.
"Lady Athena?" she rasped through bloody lips and the Presence felt the impact of her Name.
Athena. Yes. That was what she had been called. It was not the name she was born with on a planet now long gone, but it was the name that Father Zeus gave to her when he nursed her back from the brink of oblivion. She could recall leaving Krypton, the crash that stranded her here, the fight with the other explorer whose name she could no longer remember and then … light and peace. The magicks Zeus used to restore her had fundamentally altered her in some fashion – so many of the abilities that were the hallmark of her species under a yellow sun faded – and two millennia of living and breathing and eating as an Olympian had completed the process. Had it not, had she still been a full Kryptonian, the power she might have possessed after living for so long on Earth might very well have been enough to throw down the Enemy…
The Presence shook away those thoughts. There was no time to waste.
"I have need of you, Child," she told Artemis. "I am dying and there are things that must be done before my time ends." She saw the raw confusion on the girl's face – after all, how could an Olympian die? – but it vanished an instant later when she grimaced in agony.
"Mistress," Artemis hissed through clenched teeth, "I regret I am unable to aid you."
In response, the Presence, the whisper of a ghost that was already fading, reached out and Touched her.
The world vanished in a flare of muted light. Artemis screamed in surprise and pain – the Presence that had been Athena screamed with her – as a torrent of images flashed across her mind's eye, most too fast to be truly recognized. She saw Apollo in a smoking crater, dead and broken. She witnessed Hermes locked in mortal combat with a foe wielding an impossible-looking spear. The god of messengers was already direly injured and would not long survive, not as reinforcements flooded toward the battle. Hephaestus stood over his fallen wife, surrounded by the Enemy and wielding his blood-soaked weapons with a fury never before seen. He too would soon be overwhelmed – the Enemy's numbers seemed limitless and their commander thought little of hurling a legion or three at an entrenched position. She saw Zeus and Hera, back to back, fighting together in a way that they never had before, but even it would not be enough.
Is this happening? Artemis wondered and the Presence would have smiled if she could.
It is, she stated. The Olympians will fall. We have known this was coming for millennia. Despair shot through them as Artemis reacted to that revelation and her thoughts automatically turned to her sisters. They were all gone, of course. The Presence had observed how gloriously the Bana-Mighdall held against overwhelming numbers. For each of them who had fallen, dozens of the Enemy had joined them. Even as the shadow felt a reciprocal sense of loss, Artemis' emotions hardened.
Show me the queen, she ordered and the Presence relented, already knowing what they would see. Once proud and strong, Hippolyta's body had been desecrated in the Enemy's rage at her refusal to yield. Alone and unarmed, she had bested many of their greatest and then, wielding captured weapons, she bore the screaming monster who had commanded this invasion to the dirt, ignoring the killing blows his guards rained down upon her. She had died, triumphant and victorious, content in knowing that the monster known as Desaad would never again torture a living soul. In her final moments, as the excruciating pain fell away for the last time, the queen had even hoped this act would someday reach the ears of her daughter's consort. Would he find it within him to forgive her for her myopic hatred of him? Would her soul be able to rest easy? She who had once been Athena did not know if he would; all that mattered was that the two were not here. It had taken every bit of Hermes' considerable ability to draw the Asgardians to this world, at that exact moment, and all in the slim hopes that Kal-El and Diana would survive long enough to accomplish a miracle. The Moon had found her Voice and if Apollo – lovely, beautiful Apollo – had been correct, only together did they stand a chance to throw down the tyrant who even now waged war against Olympus. Zeus would fall, but the effort required to accomplish this would cripple the old monster for a very long time.
But Artemis knew none of that. Instead, all she saw was Diana's mother in the mud, dozens of fierce wounds upon her body but her face at peace and a glorious smile on her lips. The Bana-Mighdall girl inhaled.
How can I assist, Mistress? she asked. There was no hesitation, no concern about what it might mean for her, only a desire to be of some further use. She had resigned herself to death. The Presence that had once been Athena paused only for a heartbeat, momentarily awed by this girl's faith. There was no time, though, and she flooded forward, merging her fading essence with that of the Bana-Mighdall girl's. In the span of a single picosecond they became one.
Artemis opened her eyes.
And she knew what had to be done.
Her wounds were still crippling but she was able to push the agony away long enough to focus on what needed to be done. There was a tiny kernel of power deep within her soul – a fragment of Athena's divine abilities that could not long survive outside of a body incapable of containing it – and she reached for it, gripping it tightly as she cast one last look at Themyscira. Seeing it in flames caused her breath to catch – once, years ago, when Despoina tumbled into this world, she had seen another Themyscira burning through a portal, and now, it had come to this.
Away, the ghost of Athena whispered and Artemis obeyed. With an implosion of silver light, she vanished.
Her exile had begun.
A/N #2: A handful of additional notes are in probably in order. Really old fans may recognize the red skies thing from Crisis on Infinite Earths. Yeah. I go back that far. And yeah. I stole it.
The Kon-El scene is intended to feel weird - he's got a concussion, after all. And yes, those of you who thought the people he fought were kind of Marvel-like, that's intentional. It should give you an idea what's happened to the Marvel-verse when old Darkseid comes calling. As a fan of both DC & Marvel (though my preferences have flipped to DC as I've grown older which contrasts with my mostly Marvel upbringing), I'm of the firm belief that the DC characters are significantly more powerful. An entity like Darkseid who gives the fricking Justice League trouble would blow through pretty much anything the Marvel-verse could field, IMHO. Admittedly, there are exceptions - Reed Richards could certainly come up with something if given the time and someone managed to nick that Infinity Gauntlet, then all bets are off - but overall, I don't think the Marvel-verse would stand much of a chance.
Although ... hmm ... Darkseid vs Galactus ... hmmm... now, that would be ugly.
Also? No idea what a blue sun does to Kryptonians. But woot! I got the LSH in there!
Finally, yeah. The Amazons. Ouch. Fortunately, DC has obliterated them a dozen times (usually bringing them back soon after) so I'm not the first to have done this sort of thing.