Batman got Green Lantern's message just as he reached the pavement beside Flash. Flash listened in, still looking up at the ships in the sky. Wally had faced the Rogues dozens of times as Kid Flash, but always been sidelined for the big world ending live-or-die fights. This fight was too spread out for him to have any idea how to combat it.

He didn't blink at the idea that he would fight. He had already crossed that bridge and wasn't about to turn back because more people needed him. He turned to Batman.

"You have a plan?"

"Yes."

"Good, I'm in."

Batman nodded, "We'll need to talk to the Rogues." He turned and headed for the doors back inside.

Flash grabbed his arm. "First tell me where Iris and Linda are."

Batman stopped and turned in Flash's direction. "Why?"

"Oh, I don't know, maybe because I need to know they're safe."

"The planet is being invaded. No one is safe."

"Jease you really are soulless. Just humor me; I won't be able to concentrate."

"You've been managing so far."

Flash planted his feet, crossed his arms and looked into the blank lenses of Batman's mask. "Maybe against enemies I know but this is something else. But hey, I get it. You don't want to tell me, fine. I'll find them myself. Maybe I'll come help you when I'm done." Flash turned away looking down one street then another as if wondering where to begin.

"You'd put the world in danger for two people."

Flash's shoulders went back. "You know, somewhere along the line I think you Lords lost sight of what you should be fighting for. The world doesn't mean squat without people."

Batman spoke without inflection.

"They're in the federal building on fourth. I had Iris Allen-West, Linda Park, Joan Garrick and Sue Digby declared non-hostile persons of interest. They were to be detained for questioning until transfer orders were delivered."

Flash stopped and turned back. "They're really alright?"

"To my knowledge, yes."

Flash took a breath and when he let it out a measure of tension drained from his shoulders. "Okay, let's go."

"You're going to trust me? Just like that?"

Flash was at the door, he held it half open, looking back. "Umm, Yeah."

Batman watched the younger Hero for a moment then pushed past him through the door.

"You two are really alike."

"What?" Flash took a few quick steps to catch up with the dark knight.

"Nothing important. Now, what will it take to convince the Rogues to work with us?"

Flash considered, his head rocking back and forth as he measured pros and cons. "You never coming back maybe? Depends on what you want them to do, but they're not going to want to listen to you. Cold's stubborn enough to say fuck you even if they would have protected the city otherwise."

Batman stopped outside the doors of the ballroom where they'd left the Rogues. "They've been running these cities for two years."

Again Flash simply planted his feet and crossed his arms. "As far as I'm concerned they did more to protect this city then you Lords ever did. They may have been breaking the law, but they kept order. We may have had to deal with thefts but we never had to deal with a body count, thanks to them. Don't get me wrong, I'll take them down if they try anything." He waved a hand at the doors, "but I'm not going to hold a grudge."

Batman nodded. "I need you to get someone for me. Heartly Rathaway, he - "

"What do you need the Piper for? You know he's not really a member of the Rogues right?" Flash spoke over Batman's low words.

Batman waved a dismissive hand. "His contacts will be necessary for a coordinated effort."

Flash waited for more but at that moment he didn't have a lot of patience. He shrugged when nothing was forthcoming and turned speeding into the city.

Searching the city for a person was getting to be routine, and as it happened, the Pied Piper was actually fairly easy to find. He was standing in full costume on the roof of an apartment complex at the edge of downtown, one of his modified pipes in his hands as he surveyed the thanagarian ships.

Flash came to a skidding stop after running up the side of the building. "Piper,"

The pied piper turned, raising his pipes automatically before hesitating when he saw who had actually approached him.

Flash brought up his hands. "Easy, not here to fight."

Piper hesitated, and then lowered his weapon. "I'd heard the rumors, weren't sure they were true. Guess you're really back."

"Sort of. More like I'm trying to fill his shoes."

"Oh, great, the world's ending and we get a copy cat hero to the rescue." the piper threw up his hands, before Flash was suddenly in front of him.

"Hey, he was my mentor, so if anyone's going to wear this it's me and frankly I don't think now is the time to be turning away help." Flash waved a hand at the ships in the sky.

Piper looked him over. "Okay, point taken, which raises the question, whose side are you on?"

"There are thanagarians invading and you're asking whose side I'm on?"

Piper backed up, shrugging his shoulders and shaking his head. "Wouldn't be asking if you had stepped into the game at another time. I think we've both seen enough end of the world scenarios to know that if we're all alive at the end of this, everyone will go straight back to what they were doing. I just want to know if I should be watching my back. You're a hero, but are you with the Lords or against them?"

"Well, I'm not with them." Flash looked up again, bouncing on one foot. "Look, I'm just figuring this out as I go along. I don't have a plan, Batman does. When I get a minute I'm going to punch him into next week, but right now I don't know anyone else who could get us out of this." Flash shook his head. "He sent me to come get you. He's talking to the Rogues now. Will you help?"

Piper's head fell back and he ran a hand over his mouth. "God. I'm going to regret this."

"You want me to what?" Flash looked at Batman and the small data drive he was holding out.

Flash had brought the Pied Piper back to where Batman and the Rogues waited. the Rogues were all conscious and grumbling but they seemed to be on board with whatever Batman had proposed. Cold was openly watching the heroes, dislike written in neon letters over his features. Piper went to stand by them. not near enough that he was with them but clearly choosing their side over the Lords.

"Green Lantern will need this. It's the only way to trigger the safeguards." Batman shoved the drive into his chest. "You're the only one who can get it to him, so get moving."

"I'm not leaving my city unprotected."

"Your city is protected." Batman waved one hand at the rogues. He leaned in close, using his height to his advantage. "This is about more than one city."

Flash stared into the soulless white lenses of Batman's cowl. He bit his lip. Flash was the one to look away.

"I'm going back to Gotham." Batman informed them. "With the watchtower taken the Batcave is the only information hub that they won't be able to access. Tell Green Lantern I'll be coordinating the offensive from there."

Flash nodded but his eyes were on Piper and the Rogues.

"Flash."

"Yeah, I'm on it. Just give me a minute." He snatched the drive from Batman and stalked over to Piper. He leaned in, speaking low and hoping maybe Batman wouldn't hear. "You asked what side I'm on, but I never asked you. I may not have been in the game the last two years but I've kept my eyes open. I'm trusting you here. I need to know someone is here looking after my people."

Piper blinked in surprise, then nodded.

Flash nodded back. "Thank you." He turned, oriented himself and pulled in speed. He started vibrating and a moment later he was gone speeding east towards Metropolis and the battle he knew was waiting for him there.

Stargirl and Static came in towards Metropolis low. Anything more than a hundred feet and they started hearing the strange wind-cutting sound of the thanagarian ships. It had been less than two hours after the call and they were already everywhere, and all of them seemed to be heading in the same direction as the two heroes.

Stargirl crested one last rise and the city was laid out before her. She had seen movies and pictures in magazines, the city was beyond famous. She had always wanted to see the city of the future, but she had never imagined seeing it like this.

There was a battleship hovering over the city. Smaller fighters swarmed around it like bees around a hive. Blasts of green light and flashes of sparking energy dotted the sky like fireworks as blasts of fire explodes from buildings as they collapsed and ships as they went down. There were a handful of places where winged figures swarmed around something, fighters who were attempting to hold them off. The number of them seemed to be terrifyingly low.

Static pulled some kind of radio from his belt. He held it up but rather then speak into it he circled his hand with electricity and a moment later battlefield communications were pouring out of it, overlapping and conflicting even as they gave a picture of what was happening.

"Need some help over here!"

"Have at thee, Harpies."

"Supergirl, give shining knight a hand. Captain Atom east side, I'll cover you."

"Roger that."

"I can't hack the frequency, but I think I can jam it."

"Try to draw them over water; we're seeing a lot of damage down here."

"I'm going to hammer in there." Static suddenly called over the noise through the comms. "Try to give Vixen a hand with that taking down that ship. I want you to follow me in and try to punch through the hull."

Stargirl didn't know what he meant, not really. She had no idea who Vixen was or what ship he meant. How he could just glance at things and tell what was going on was beyond her. To her it all just looked like a mess. Stargirl nodded, gripping her cosmic rod tighter, and focusing on her flight path. He wanted her to follow him in. She could do that. Just follow him in and blast anything with wings. She tried not to think about the fact that she was flying into a war zone.

"Okay, I'm right behind you."

Static nodded, crouched down lower over his flying disk, and put on a burst of speed.

Two of the hawk-men noticed their approach and swooped in their direction as the two heroes passed the edge of downtown. With a clap of his hands a bubble of electricity expanded around Static's frame and they were blasted away, their weapons dancing with blue sparks of power as they fought to regain control of limbs that were seizing up.

Another wave of Thanagarians saw the light show and banked in their direction. Stargirl pressed in closer behind Static letting him play the part of the battering ram, as they swooped in towards one of the escort ships. Static's bursts of power were coming faster now, he was slowing and there were simply too many of them.

Stargirl focused her own power, taking aim at the hawks that slipped in through Static's defenses. Time was acting strangely; it might have been minutes or seconds before Static suddenly veered away and a ship the size of a small school bus was looming in front of her.

Stargirl was passed the point of thought; she just blasted, unleashing everything at once. There was the creaking of metal, the screech of something tearing and the ship tilted in the air. there were word shouted over the din of combat. Off to her left a woman in a brown cat suit was using the outlines of talons around her hands to lash out at the hawks while the outlines of wings battered at the air to keep her aloft. Static had dropped, looping under the ships leaching frame and Stargirl had lost sight of him.

The woman, (Vixen?) attacked the ship again, opening her back to an attack from a hawk wielding some kind of battleaxe with an energy blade. Stargirl took aim and fired off one of her star bolts. Her aim was off, instead of hitting him dead center of the chest she her shot ricocheted off his shoulder. He cried out, and the ax was thrown from his hand. It gave Vixen the opening she needed to spin in the air and catch him in a grapple.

Stargirl tried to suck in a breath, tried to get her bearings. Everything around her was moving, the din of sounds that were coming at her were a chaotic mess. She didn't have a radio like static. The ship she and Vixen had attacked seemed to be scuttled but she had no idea if there was another target she should go after or if the other heroes were rallying, or if she and Vixen were the only ones left.

She moved closer to the other hero, trying to blast at anything that came too close.

A flash of blue and red crossed her vision, and she had time to think 'Superman' her heart jumping before she registered the blond hair and revised the thought to 'Supergirl'. Supergirl was fighting alongside what looked like a knight in s full on suit of armor and riding a winged horse. Stargirl wasn't sure if she had started seeing things, but if she was, she was also hearing things because, even over the roar of the combat and the whipping wind from so many ships and wings she could hear his cries of "Have at thee Demons, Fowl Harpies, feel the steal of my blade."

Apparently Static has joined this new team. Either they have radios or they've practiced together because they watch each other's backs without thinking. Where others are making impressive individual efforts those three are making a real stand.

Static would blast away whole waves, then retreat to recharge, supergirl covering his flank and drawing them in, while the knight on the Pegasus hacked through any that managed to get around her, calling out patterns to the others, so no one was caught by surprise. Then Static would pull himself together and send out another blast wave.

Stargirl swung her rod, clipping the wing of a hawk that darted in to close. She wasn't really thinking, wasn't planning, but she saw a shot with them and she took it. Twisting around she tried to launch herself higher, get clear of some of the rabble, but there were just too many of them.

The main ship was nearly directly overhead now and they seemed to be pulling out all the stops, more of the smaller guard ships were emerging from its hanger alongside individual soldier hawks. Green lantern and another hero, all in silver and using energy blasts, were trying to bottleneck them.

Another hawk was suddenly bearing down on Stargirl and she raised her staff in a block that Wildcat had spent months drilling into her. The electricity sparking off his battleaxe shot through her weapon, making her hands clamp down in a spasm as something short circuited. She was falling for the second time that day, screaming and cursing as she tried to get her numb fingers to work enough to switch over to the backup power cells, and desperately hoping they weren't fried as well.

Above her the airborne battle spun in a wild kaleidoscope of colors. Someone, Static, let out another blast of energy. Her screams took on a note of panic, wordlessly begging for help. Except no one had noticed in all the chaos. She passed the level of the buildings, rocketing toward the street below with no one there to catch her.

Wind, a whirlwind like the passing slipstream of a train. Stargirl's mind gave up the ghost wondering coolly if this was some new form of attack, and she wouldn't even reach the ground. Except she really should have hit the ground by now, that was kind of odd. Then as suddenly as the wind had arrived it was gone and crimson arms were catching at her wrapping around her waist and stopping the last few feet of her fall.

Stargirl's rescuer set her carefully on her feet. She turned taking in all the shattered glass, the twisted dents in the buildings the rubble that had piled up on the street where the top of buildings had been torn away. The street was empty of people; cars run up on the sidewalks and tilted on their sides. There were bodies, Hawks that had been knocked from the sky and civilians who had been in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The man who stood behind her was wearing a costume that Stargirl had never expected to see. Flash stood tall, undaunted by the wreckage, his head tipped back to look up at the chaos in the sky above them. The lightning bolt emblem on his chest seemed almost to glow, shimmering against the red that made up the rest of his uniform. His form blurred slightly at the edges as he twitched, looking this way and that, somehow taking in everything and making as much sense of it as anyone could.

"You alright?" he asked, and he seemed distracted but that was kind of understandable given the circumstances.

"Umm, yeah, thanks. Are you, umm, are you really Flash?"

"That's me. You don't have a radio do you?"

"No, I'm not with them. I kind of got dragged in by Static."

He glanced down at her and a sunshine smile came over his lips. "First world-crisis?"

Stargirl blushed slightly. "Kind of, first anything really."

"Well, if that's the case, then you're doing great."

"Really? How so." Stargirl could admit there was a little scorn in her voice. She was probably the least experienced person on the field, including the hawks.

"Well, you're not dead." He leaned forward, laying a hand lightly on her shoulder. "Look, you're doing fine, and I get that this is more than you're used to handling. In this game you learn quickly that the odds are never in your favor, and never all that great even if they are. Trust me, focus on the task at hand and you'll pull through. Now, think you can help me get a message to Green Lantern."

Stargirl blinked up at one of the most recognized heroes in modern history and found herself nodding. "Yeah, well, if I can. Not sure how useful I'll be. I can't fly without the rod." She held up the Star rod, it was looking even more battered than earlier. When she got a moment she really had to do some work on it.

In a split second his eyes skimmed over it. "May I?" he asked and as soon as she nodded it was slipped from her fingers. A blurry second later he was twirling a roll of electrical tape around one finger and passing back her Star Rod. "That should hold for now."

Stargirl took the rod lightly testing the strength of the repairs. They certainly weren't permanent fixes, and she'd have to be careful how she blocked, but he was right, they'd hold.

"Right, what's the plan?" Stargirl met Flash's eyes and for a moment she almost thought he seemed surprised, the expression was gone a moment later and he pointed at the conflict in the sky that both of them had been keeping an eye on.

"I'm grounded, so I need you to get up there and tell Green Lantern I'm here, and that Batman sent me with information he'll need. Tell him I'm on the old sidekick's frequency." he tapped his cowl.

Stargirl looked back up at the raging battle and couldn't help but hesitate. Flash seemed to notice.

"Hey, I saw you up there. You're stronger than you think. You can do this, and I'll be here to catch you again if you need it."

Before Stargirl could respond the silver man with the energy blasts sent another one of the escort ships crashing down towards the water. Flash pushed her towards the sky then he was gone in a blur of red. She set her shoulders, dodged the outer edge of the debris and got to it.

Red Arrow pushed the unconscious guard out of the chair in front of the monitors and started typing away, trying to get a view of the exterior. Nightwing set the guard beside the others and joined him in the other chair. Zattanna didn't bother trying to help, she knew next to nothing about hacking and electronics. The last time she's tried to force something this complex with magic she had short circuited her laptop. Instead she leaned over the two men's shoulders and watched them work.

From their little spot in the observation room, they watched a nightmare come to life above them.

It started with half a dozen fighter jets in a hawk-winged style none of them recognized circle the compound, establish a perimeter and unleash a flock of thanagarians on the sleeping facility. In the dark they looked like black winged demons, unearthly armor and medieval weapons raised and ready in a strange parody of a child's crayon drawing of hell.

Unlike the lower levels the main complex hadn't been alerted, and the sleeping buildings were being surrounded without a fight.

"Oracle, are you seeing this?" Nightwing's hands flew over the keyboard, flicking the PA system to life so they could hear the first screams that echoed from the dormitory.

"I'm seeing it. It's not just you. The Thanagarians have taken the watchtower, they're launching a full out assault on Metropolis and half a dozen other targets, Gotham, Central City. I think they're using the Lords threat assessment list. We need to retreat and regroup; I'm working on finding you an exit now."

"No!" Zatanna looked back and forth between the two other heroes who had both turned in their seats. "There are almost five hundred people up there. At least a third of them are teenagers, or at least under 21. They'll be helpless?"

Nightwing hesitated, but Red Arrow turned to face her. "And how do you plan to save them?"

She hesitated, "I don't know," she finally admitted. "But we can't just leave them."

Nightwing's shoulders slumped. "The Lords have plans in place for a worldwide assault like this. The fact that they're even here means that either those plans failed or it's now too late to use them. We're unorganized and outnumbered, and don't know the terrain. The logical thing to do here would be to retreat, and regroup with any other heroes we can find." he nodded at Red Arrow, "The resistance already has the network needed to act under the radar."

It was all perfectly rational, but neither of them had spent the last weeks getting to know the people up there. Zatanna put her foot down.

"No! There are children up there. They need to be protected. And even if that wasn't the case, there is no way that surrendering this location could be a good tactical decision. do you know how many super-powered beings are being held here? Monsters and demons, and aliens and who knows what else, Hell there were nearly a dozen people brought in with Red alone. You let the things out there have them and we've basically handed over an arsenal. Hell, half the kids upstairs could seriously hurt somebody if turned loose, not to mention that we're standing on the first major magical wellspring since Merlin sealed up Stonehenge. Aim a strike at this place and the chain reaction would probably poison the whole planet, that's if it didn't tear it apart first."

That made them stop. Red Arrow just looked up at her as if he didn't quite believe he had heard her correctly. Nightwing looked more serious, but his expression was harder to read behind his mask.

"I can't get you any backup. Everyone who could get there in time is already occupied elsewhere." Oracle finally broke the silence, her voice a crackle from the console in front of them.

"Okay, okay fine." Red Arrow rubbed at the bridge of his nose. "If we sound the alert now, some of them will be able to escape, but I don't know about the prisoners down here. Maybe if we put the place on lockdown? That would trap us in here too though, wait, Can you teleport?" the last was directed at Zatanna.

She started to nod, and then hesitated. "I can, I might be able to get us all out of here. I've never tried it with this many people. I could, I'd need more power, but, maybe."

Nightwing stood and reached out, taking her shoulder. "Zee, take a breath. What are you saying?"

She nodded, and filled her lungs. "There are pockets, outside of space and time. Fate's tower, the rock of eternity. One of them is the house of mystery, I know the coordinates, I could take us all there. It's like teleporting but only going halfway. Only it's an area spell. to grab everyone…" she glanced at the screens.

"You'd pull the thanagarians in too."

"Yeah, and that's if I could get the power together."

Nightwing looked at the screens. "I say do it. If nothing else it'd stop them from calling in reinforcements."

Red Arrow nodded. "Agreed, what do you need?"

Zatanna hesitated, then her expression hardened. "Set off the alarms, I need everyone awake. The prisoners too. Just FYI, The house won't let just anyone in so I don't know how well this will work." Nightwing and Red Arrow were already battering the keyboards following her direction without hesitation.

A blaring alarm rang through the complex above and below. People leapt from their beds, and screams joined the alarms as the students saw the invaders. A hundred smaller defense spells sprang to life on the screens and half a dozen people who Zatanna remembered teaching simply vanished, teleporting themselves and those around them to some distant and hopefully safer place.

A red light shrouded the three heroes as the rows and rows of prisoners were unleashed from their bonds. Before the camera was destroyed there was lightning a flicker of green, and a rumbling of the earth that didn't stop when they lost visual.

"Patch me into the PA." Zee screamed over the rumbling. A green light flashed and she grabbed the nearest microphone. "This is Zatanna. I can get us out of here but I need the power to do it. Joint spell on my mark."

On the screens dozens of half trained mages looked up at the familiar voice. Parents grabbed children, in the dorms, older students backed into groups, clasping hands in desperation.

Under her breath Zatanna started chanting. Her hands wove patterns through the air, then swept out to her sides encompassing the whole complex. She sucked in a breath and nodded at Nightwing.

"Now." The intercom sent his voice through a dozen buildings, and hundreds of voices answered him, each chanting a variation on a common theme.

Zatanna closed her eyes and called out in her strange backwards language. the air around her rippled, shimmered and started to glow. She lifted off the ground, her chanting never faltering, as the world started to flicker around them.

Red Arrow let out a soft curse and Nightwing couldn't help but silently agree.

Zatanna's chanting faltered, the world flickering violently. She was sweating, her skin pale, and for a moment the world seemed to break. Then a green glow shrouded her and her cadence steadied.

She screamed out the last words and bright yellow gold, light replaced the flashing red.

Zatanna fell to the polished floor of a gilded ballroom, unconscious before she hit. Red Arrow and Nightwing found themselves on their feet, weapons in hand as all around them the space was filled with friend and foe alike.

There were cries and snarls, and the flapping of wings as the hawks took to the air to circle the glittering chandeliers. Men and monsters faced each other, the sudden change of scene barely causing a pause in the battle.

"Okay, now it's our turn." Red Arrow growled an arrow appearing in his hand in his own brand of magic. Nightwing's hard grin was enough of an answer.

Author's Note: So I have a few developments to announce.

First: I have finished the outline for this story. It should be complete at 33 chapters so we are very much in the home stretch.

Second: at this moment I have Chapter 26 finished and am wrapping up the last scene in chapter 27. I'm guessing you'll want those sooner rather than later but I also don't want to leave you hanging for another month after they're posted, like I've done for the last few chapters.

What do you think? should I stagger them or just post them all at once? you can tell me in all the wonderful comments you'll be giving, right? Or criticizing comments I'm not picky. Actually it's thanks to one of your comments that the next chapter is done. My email had stuffed my updates in the trash so I had to go back and find them and lo and behold, two comments were waiting for me. Thank you Immaworkin and Lanelle both of you made my day and gave me the drive to finish that chapter.

Sorry on the lack of Bat/Flash teamups Immaworkin they suddenly have bigger problems.

And Lanelle, I will say that Both Superman and Wonder Woman are basically out of the picture at this point. They may get a mention but their parts are done.