"Get out of the way!" Agent Sage yelled as a small group of people tried to run across the road.
Sage grabbed the steering wheel and leaned into the right in order to avoid hitting the pedestrians. He waited for them to flinch and then panic before running out of the road. Sage shook his head and drove up on the curb as he came closer to the street where the White House was located.
"Yield to pedestrians. Even in times of national attack." he said to himself with a groan.
Take that, you big piece of mechanic flesh and oil!
Come on, Tin Man! Try to catch up!
Shit! I didn't see that car right there. Oh! I'm never driving one of those things again. They don't do anything but get in your way.
Can you androids run up the sides of buildings and defy human physics! Ha! Didn't think so! You can't beat the fastest man alive, Cook! Eff you!
Oh, crap. Spoke too soon. Even still... eff you, Cook.
Whoa!
RPGs are no-go, man! I just got this suit out a few hours ago, dude!
WHAM! Punches feel great, don't they! Ha!
Oh no, is that a stoplight I'm soaring through the air at 200 MPH about to hit?
Ouch... yeah. Yeah it was.
Sage continued to drive the Humvee through the relatively empty streets of Washington D.C. as the sun started to lighten the city. He threw the Humvee into third gear as he crashed through a parked car stopped in the middle of the road and flew down a steep hill before pulling the E-brake and crashing into the gate that covered the White House front yard. He drove up to the barrier blocked by three soldiers who, at gunpoint, ordered him to stop. He growled in anger and desperation, throwing the Humvee into park and rolling down the window, showing his Secret Service badge.
"Stop where you are and let us see your identification!" one of the men yelled behind the sights of his rifle.
Sage watched as the main soldier slowly walked up to the window and swiped the badge from Sage's hand. He rolled his eyes and stomped his foot.
"Listen, bud. I'll have your job if you don't let me through right now. I need to get to the President. Right. Now. The drones are coming. Cook escaped and I need to protect POTUS. I'm the lead Secret Service guard in command. Look at the badge!" Sage said, getting desperate.
The soldier carefully looked over the badge and Sage waited impatiently, about to utter a slew of curse words before a loud explosion crashed through the orange sky. Sage looked out the opposite side of the Humvee and saw a puff of smoke and fire, followed by a green figure flying through the air.
"What the hell was tha-?" the main guard asked before Sage threw the gear shift into first gear and drove through the gate.
Bullets bounced off the bullet-proof siding and even with two tires punctured, Sage ignored the gunfire and drove up the front steps of the White House, cracking one of the expensive steps and parking the Humvee on the stairway. He ran through the front door, busting the glass out and being confronted by two of Cook's mercenaries, knowing their allegiance by the gas masks of death they wore. He tackled the mercenary nearest to him and broke his arm before hiding behind his body. Tuffs of fabric flew into the air as the other mercenary shot his fellow comrade several times. When he stopped to reload, Sage threw the dead body down and killed the man with a single shot to the left eye. The man fell to the ground and Sage undressed, taking the man's body armor and strapping it to himself before placing the Secret Service jacket back over his shoulders. He heard the screeching sound of a jet racing overhead followed by machine gun fired. He braced as a loud explosion rocked the chandelier above him and made the glass tendrils twinkle loudly. A sharp bang hit above him and he figured a dead drone hit the roof. A few more bangs followed and he flinched as a bombardment of android limbs and wiring hit near the stairway outside. He shook his head and proceeded to check each doorway in the main lobby before rushing toward the Oval Office.
"Here they come!" Diana yelled, leaping thirty feet into the air and using her sword to slice a drone in half as over fifty hit the ground.
Batman dodged an incoming Amazo as it slammed into the asphalt and he kicked its legs out from underneath it before using a large batarang to stab the back of its head. He ripped out a large metal box followed by a splatter of robotic fluid that covered the tank beside it. Stewart pointed at the machine gunner on top of the tank and directed him toward the drone flying in from the North. The gunner wasted no time, firing with violent precision at the soaring drones racing at them from above. The Flash saw two drones who leaped into a shop window and raced inside, zooming at over 400 MPH as he punched them in the chest and blasted them out of the shop. Diana hit them with her shield and flattened them out onto the street before throwing the shield at incoming drones from above. The shield bounced off one of the Amazo's heads and dented into the visual cortex, blinding the drone and making it a crazed, robotic zombie.
"I'm going to look for a signal? Think you can handle it?" Batman asked Diana as she finished taking down a drone with the help of the gunner.
"We'll be fine. Good luck."
Batman pulled out his grapnel gun at a nearby building and shot up into the air, executing a front flip and taking out a flying drone. He kicked it into a nearby satellite dish and punched its face in before stabbing a batarang up through its jaw. He prepared a jump off the building and ran with all his might, leaping off the edge at the last moment and unfolding his cape. He soared through the air and steered to the left suddenly as Green Lantern was overpowered by two drones and hit the road below. Tanks began firing rounds and being too focused on landing, Batman didn't notice as a drone grabbed him by his legs and unbalanced him. Batman was powerless as him and the Amazo flew to the ground. Batman braced for the harsh landing and bounced off the ground, the drone flying high above him and crashing into the tank. Marines arrived behind it and began firing shots as the Amazo picked up the tank and looked at Batman with a evil, cold, lifeless glare. He watched as the Amazo lifted the drone over its head and prepared for a toss. Batman threw out a small glue bomb from one of his miniscule pouches and threw it at the Amazo's chest. The bomb collided and at once, sticky arms of adhesive stuck themselves to the limbs of the android and the road beneath it.
The android heaved its arms and broke the extremely strong glue with a sharp snap. Batman braced for action and spotted a manhole cover to his left as the Amazo prepared once again. The Marines continued to fire, making the Amazo lose control of the front half of the tank, the long gun scraping against the asphalt. Batman rolled out of the way and tried to lift the manhole cover with all his might as the Amazo flipped the tank upside-down and growled loudly. Batman watched the Amazo grab the long gun and swing down just as he slid down the hole. The tank collided with a loud smash and dust flew down the manhole with him as he hit the shallow river of runoff water down below. Darkness covered him and the roaring of the water made him confused as he quickly pulled out a flashlight and the signal locator.
"Well, that was convenient." Batman said, unfazed by the near-death encounter.
"Sam Worthers? Is that you?" Sage said as he ran inside the dining hall where Sam Worthers, a former agent-in-training in Sage's command a few years back, was reloading weapons with three other Secret Service agents.
"Victor Sage!" Sam yelled, shaking hands quickly and being thrown off guard by the outfit he was wearing.
"Where's the President?"
"Inside the Oval Office with the First Lady. We have two agents inside. That terrorist, Key has mercenaries all over. What's with the gear? Did you switch careers or something? Aren't you working with Craven?" Sam asked.
Sage urged him to be quiet and looked around at the other agents who suddenly gave him a look.
"What's wrong?"
"What Phase are you in, men?" Sage said, his hands gripped tight around his pistol.
The other three men in the room stood still and solemn. One of the men responded quickly.
"Phase 2, sir. 6th year." the man responded.
"And you?" he said to the other men.
The men were silent and looked at each other intently for a moment before drawing their weapons and shooting Sage point-blank in the chest. Sage screamed in pain and fell to the floor, crawling backward and shooting the leading man in the kneecaps before the honest agent returned fire on the standing agent. The agent fell to the ground and blood splattered onto the glass table, shattering the platform and bending the base. Sage leaped up and tackled the man to the floor, putting the hot mouth of the pistol against the man's cheek, creating a large burn mark. The man wiggled in pain and tried to punch Sage in the neck before Sam stomped on his attacking hand.
"How many are there inside the White House? I'll stick one in your jewels first if you lie, I swear to God!" Sage yelled.
"Fuck you. We've won! We've got double agents everywhere! Ha! I won't tell you a thing." the agent said, slyly slipping his hand in his pocket and putting a pill in his mouth before Sage could catch him.
The man bit down and immediately, his mouth filled with bubbly liquid and blood. He began to shake violent and Sage rolled him on his side, performing a halfway Hemlich maneuver to try and get him to throw up the pill. The man's eyes rolled in the back of his head and Sage cursed, rolling him away as he stood up. The honest agent sighed in disappointment as the three of them readied to enter the Oval Office. Sage turned to Sam and cleared his throat before asking his plea.
"Sam? I need someone I can trust, okay? That's why I'm undercover as one of you. So the President can have someone who won't kill him out of sight from the rest. I need you and your fellow agent to watch the doors. More men will be coming and we need to get POTUS to the bunker before more drones fly in. Do you understan-?" Sage said before shaking rocked the building's foundation and brought the men to the floor.
"Ah! What the hell was that?" Sam asked as his radio blared.
"I think it was a jet. I heard it before it crashed." the honest agent responded as more Secret Service agents entered the now-fiery hallway.
"Ugh. I need to get to POTUS. Hold down the fort, okay? I'll be back soon! Give me a status report. I hear them talking through the radio!" Sage said as he climbed to his feet and burst through the door to the Oval Office.
When he entered the room, it was halfway destroyed. Fire was everywhere along with smoke and a dead body on the floor. It was the First Lady. He cursed in his head and quickly began to check the area for any double agents of Cook.
"Washington is down, sir! We need to evacuate right now!" Sage told the president who sat in his chair with a bloody cut running across his left cheek.
The President's chair had a leg broken off, wood splinters across the burned carpet and a large piece of metal from a destroyed military jet was stuck in the desk, hot as the engine itself. The left section of the roof of the Oval Office had been torn off by a U.S. helicopter after a few drones had taken it over. The flames were spread across the wall and it was smeared with black. Sage came across the First Lady's body and held back getting any closer. Her head had a giant, bloody hole in it and he watched as the President tried to stand up, only falling back over as he realized a large metal shard had become lodged in his left thigh, blood slowly seeping out. He was in a quiet form of shock, only hearing a slight buzz in his ear and seeing everything fly by with grey, hazy vision. He watched as Sage continued to secure the scene, checking the sides of the room before running up to the desk and seeing that Hockner was injured. The President kept his sadness inside, only a small tear slipping out the corner of his eye as he stared at his wife's corpse. A loud explosion shook old law books and photo albums from their shelves and those fallen had caught fire, turning the carpet into an inferno.
"I did what I could. But I couldn't reach her in time." Hockner said solemnly.
His fists were clenched and he glanced around the room, seeing two Secret Service guards dead with various wounds and their blood soaking into the floor. Their government-issued weapons were melted to their hands and the singed flesh had steam flowing upward. He picked up an abandoned pistol by his feet and handed it to Sage. The agent gave him a nod and stuck it in his right suit pocket. He grabbed Hockner's forearm and lifted him up from the broken chair quickly as another explosion rattled what remained of the windows.
"I'm sorry. She's dead, sir. We need to move you to the bunker. The Amazo drones have taken out Washington!" Sage said, holding the president's right arm and jumping out of the office just as a large missile from an Air Force fighter jet careened into it, shrapnel and wood flying everywhere.
Sage's flak vest protected him from the blast but pain still shot into his back. The entire back portion of his black suit was torn off and only the flak vest remained. He watched as two more agents were shot in the legs by three of Cook's men and he slammed the president behind a fallen bookcase. He aimed his pistol up and dodged gunfire from their advanced assault rifles. A giant hole in the ceiling of the hallway allowed the disturbing sounds of war to attack his morale as he heard innocents screaming, gunfire, and pure death. His heart skipped as he saw the brief image of Superman flying across the sky in the distance, screaming as he fought off two of the giant Amazo drones. The hallway had turned into a complete warzone, wood splinters and bullets showering the White House as he spotted Sam fending off more mercenaries.
"Sam! Get over here!" Sage yelled.
Sam had been shot twice and was blindly firing rounds behind a broken down door. The honest agent was dead against the wall, blood seeping from his pale, white throat as his hand was still tight around his pistol. Sage shook his head and brought the President closer to safety.
Sam noticed him and fired the rest of his clip before running as fast as he could, Sage covering for him as the mercenaries got closer. He jumped at the last minute, wood splinters flying as the mercenaries' rounds hit the bookcase. Sam grunted as he crawled over to him and gave a status report heard over the radio.
"Ugh. Aquaman's gone and the Amazonian is dead." he said as gunfire erupted closer.
"What?" Sage asked in disbelief, flinching as a nearby car explosion rocked the hallway.
"Yeah. They saw her get slaughtered by the Amazos. I'm pretty sure Batman got flattened by a tank. We lost, Vic! It's over." Sam said, bowing his head in loss of hope.
No. It's them, though. The ones who were supposed to save us. How can they lose? How can they lose?
Superman screamed with all his might as he used his heat vision to melt through an Amazo drone's head. The one behind him used his super-strength to launch the Man of Steel across the Mall Lake, water rushing out at high speeds as Superman tumbled into the park beside the lake. He looked up and saw four more Amazos heading for him. He lifted up a tree and tossed it through the air, various small roots and dirt clumps soaring across the Mall as the tree collided with two of them. Superman burst into the air and ripped off an arm, using the heavy metal to knock off another's head while surveying the battle zone that had become Washington D.C. Within a few short moments, with Cook's men on the ground and the drones in the sky, the landscape had completely changed.
He watched in exhaustion as military convoys fired with heavy artillery at the Amazos who darted across the sky and destroyed everything they came in contact with. Helicopters and jets flew across the smoky sky and fired onto the streets. Civilians left in the city ran around in fear and were either killed by friendly fire or the mercenaries who fired live rockets into the streets. A fighter jet's wing flew off and Superman saw that it was heading for the Lincoln Monument. He flew high in the air and watched the body of the jet collide into the harbor beside a scorched bridge.
He created a sonic boom as he flew as fast as possible and grabbed the wing, hovering 180 degrees and facing two Amazos who flew around him. Superman growled in anger and knocked one across its chest, the mech tech inside shredded as the two ripped sections fell to the bridge below. The second Amazo punched him in the jaw, slightly denting the drone's fist as it attempted another swing. Superman grabbed it by its throat and completely crushed it. The Amazos fired laser beams directly into Superman's eyes and he fell to the bridge one hundred feet below.
He collided with a car and totaled the roof as he lay inside in pain. The Amazo's head hung by a few wires and a damaged metal spine, giving a monotone stare as it repeatedly punched Superman in his weak spots; his sides, throat, ear canals, and his solar plexus. Superman coughed loudly and shook bits of metal from his hair as the Amazo picked him up by his head and the two flew into the air. As Superman watched a convoy truck full of soldiers blow up on L Street, he breathed heavily, feeling no strength inside him as the Amazo flew to three hundred feet. Superman looked around in despair as America's most important city burned to the ground. He could see the brief green glow of Green Lantern's power, a few drones flying into the air like ragdolls as an energy blast shook the city in the east side. He turned to his right and saw the electric blasts left by the Flash appear suddenly as the Scarlet Speedster engaged in a chase with a speed-enhanced drone.
Flash ran with all his might, running up the side of a flower shop on C Street and doing a back flip and using the Speed Force to slow down time, the pursing Amazo drone flying straight inside the shop, nearly blowing itself apart as it hit a concrete wall in front of him.
Flash landed on his feet, quickly standing up and watching it turn its nearly-detached head, the small threads of electric wiring creaking as its pure red eyes zeroed in at the Flash. He remembered Batman's speech about the hive cortex and suddenly felt fear and despair.
"Shit!" Flash yelled, quickly speeding away as three more drones flew from the sky and raced after him.
He jumped over burnt cars and toppled over buildings, jumping over fifteen feet in the air and using the energy inside him to fire an electric blast with help from the conductor gauntlets in his forearms. The yellow energy traveled through his suit and shot out as a yellow stream that hit the Amazos and fried the hive cortex as Batman had called it. The Amazos seized up for a moment and fell, one of the drones colliding with a destroyed truck while the rest pressed on, firing their propulsion systems up again.
He groaned in annoyance and saw a military convoy up ahead with three surviving National Guard soldiers firing at the mercenaries who kept firing their sonic rifles which shot a potentially lethal blast of sound energy which could cause eardrums to bleed and brain hemorrhaging to occur. He jumped well ahead of the barricade and was able to get the young soldiers' attention.
"Listen. Deal with these guys. Fire for their weapons. Right in the middle. It's wearing the sound generator is loca-!" Flash began before an Amazo drone flew at him and launched him into the DC Metro Police building.
He flew straight through the second story window and collided into a metal desk. He shook his head in dazed confusion and saw the drone brush off dust and drywall. Flash grit his teeth and planned to attack. The Amazos were eight feet tall and looked humanoid with two arms and two legs. Their faces were all the same, a blank, monotone, male face that was molded to look like a clean-cut American poster-boy for the military. The organic skin flaps were in all denominations, white, black, Chinese, Latino, all with slight facial differences to fit their skin tones. They were broad-shouldered and capable of extreme feats with their advanced technology. In addition to their advanced technology, Batman and Aquaman had realized that the Amazos organic material was capable of temporarily absorbing any metahuman's powers through direct contact. Flash didn't completely understand the process but it had to do with oils and bodily fluids excreted only by the metahumans.
"C'mon! You want me?" Flash said, feeling anger like never before and delivering a punch to the face at 300 MPH.
Flash's heart skipped a beat as he watched the Amazo drone catch it and toss him backwards, flying into the wall and breaking a portrait of an old police captain. Flash groaned as the drone ran at him faster than he could process, the punch knocking off his cowl helmet and making him fly through the wall. Barry blew drywall dust from his face and exchanged blows with the drone, deflecting his punches and kicks with expert precision. Small sonic booms were heard as the metal from both Barry's gauntlets and the Amazo's forearms collided.
He head butted the drone and immediately regretted it, losing his footing and soaring through the air as the drone tossed him outside. He hit the side of a damaged building and grabbed onto a streetlight, nearly slipping off as he regained his full vision. He looked as the drone grabbed an officer's desk and tossed it outside the window, Barry dropping to the street and quickly running up to the drone as the desk flipped around erratically on the fiery street.
He delivered an uppercut with all his strength and watched as the Amazo's head flew off and its heavy body fell in a heavy thud to the ground. Barry found his helmet and stuck it on, taking a breath before seeing a new wave of the Amazos flying in from the south along with two black helicopters full of Key's mercenaries. He narrowed his eyes and prepared to fight, feeling at a loss as he saw Superman fly into the Washington Monument, the patriotic ivory structure falling almost at the base with a loud crash. He ran after his new friend but was suddenly stopped as he saw Green Lantern, his best friend in the world, about to get blasted by a missile strike four blocks away. He screamed his name and began to ran. He watched as the missile hit the green hero's projected shield, breaking it apart and making him fly into the sports car behind him. He fell to his knees as hundreds of enemies approached and his phone rang again.