5/11/11 - 8:30AM - Centennial Apartments. Apartment 2552 - Metropolis, KS
The rest of the League arrived in time to see Oliver, Chloe and Cyborg entered a shining yellow portal as they escaped.
"No!" screamed Lara as she saw them escape. "Blast it!"
The rest of the League then looked to the side and noticed that Lois had been left behind as she was on her knees rubbing her wrists. As Lois looked up and saw Lara offering her a hand, she noticed the look on her face and it wasn't happy. It was the same look she always appeared to have whenever she met her at the Daily Planet and now she knew why. She slowly extended her hand forward as Lara picked her up. Her expression didn't change in the slightest as she began to speak.
"Are you okay?" said Lara.
Lois felt so many thoughts go through her head. One of which was knowing how much like Clark seemed to behave whenever he was angry. Lara had this exact same behavior. Lois felt ashamed to be stared at like this. But after what she had just seen between Clark and the girl's mother, it must have felt like her father was cheating on her mother and this was the awkward meeting with the other woman.
"I'm fine." said Lois.
"Awk-ward." said Bart as he leaned next to A.C.
"Why did they leave you behind?" asked the Phantom Stranger.
"Something to do with needing to leave in a hurry to a set of coordinates; thirty, twenty-two..."
"We got it." said Victor. "Practically everything we could manage in about a minute and change and speaking as a cyborg myself that is several lifetimes worth of information." Victor then took a breath as he continued. "And believe me when I say I have never been more disgusted to process all that information. Murder, treason, genocide and the list goes on."
"Try being two feet from him." said Lois. "They wanted to bring me with them as leverage against those women they were threatening to kill. Lara they plan to kill your mother, retroactively..."
"Killing me and my brothers." finished Lara. "We have to get there right away."
"Yes but first we need to get dad and..." said Bruce before he was cut off by the Phantom Stranger.
"No. His presence will only provide Cyborg the information he needs to fight back at the League."
"But we must have him involved!" said J'onn. "If there is anyone who has the right to face him its Clark."
"Yes." said A.C. "We need everyone here, you can't bench the best of us when we need him the most. Mera and I have been around magic. There has to be a way you can block him while he's still awake. You have the mightiest magical being within you Jon. You know you can manage something like that."
The being that was the Phantom Stranger grasped the medallion across his chest as his face reverted back to normal as he looked at A.C. "What we just did for my father earlier was difficult enough. I swear I'm not strong enough to protect my father from him while he has to fight Cyborg." Jon then looked away only for Zatanna to appear from the rest of the League as she stepped forward and approached her future husband looking into his face and begged him to look at her.
"Please Jon. Look at me." said Zatanna as she finally made eye contact. "Don't despair. You've done amazing things already for all of us. I know it hurts when you feel you've let down others but please don't give up now."
"You said I helped you understand the magic within you. I don't know enough to be able to teach anyone but what I do know is that when it comes to having a genuine opportunity to save your father without anyone else having to die..." Zatanna was fighting hard not to cry, remembering what Clark had done for her when she tried to exchange her life for her father's "Then you do whatever it takes. The Phantom Stranger chose you to wield his power. Do what you can, we'll get you all the time we need."
Jon looked into Zatanna's eyes and saw the confidence that she had for him and was more than ready to return to his father. "If that's the case then all of you had better prepare yourselves. I'll teleport all of you there while I get to work on my father. In the meantime, Lois as much as it pains me I'm going to have to send you with them as well."
"Fine!" said Lois.
"Are you crazy!?" said Lara.
Lara couldn't believe that her brother was suggesting putting Lois in the middle of things. "She is useless and a magnet to danger, its because of her that we are in worse trouble now than we…"
"Sissy, please. Knock it off!" said Jon as the rest of the League looked either ready to laugh or stand there amused. "I know how much you detest her but that is not the point here. She needs to be there to tend to her cousin, more importantly she is not going to be a part of this fight. Because there is not going to be a fight. If things go as I plan then the rest of you won't be needed."
"What are you talking about bro?" said Bruce. "We discussed good battle plans for about half an hour before Tess and Victor found what we needed. You didn't offer any help whatsoever."
"Did I brother?" said Jon. He then looked over every member of the League and asked them a question. "Has anyone of you faced a member of the Yellow Lantern Corps before?"
The rest of the League looked blankly as they honestly could not answer truthfully. Only J'onn appeared to offer some words. "I have heard of rumors as to the yellow power of fear that the Green Lanterns had dreaded. Minerals that supposedly interacted with fear said to have drained away their power." He then turned to Bruce as he asked him a question. "Tell me have you actually been trained to face a Yellow Lantern before you encountered Cyborg at that park?"
Bruce spoke up almost instantly and bluntly. "No. We've had some sessions with decoys created with minerals that sap our strength in certain simulations as well as the experience of beings across every sector in the universe that fought the Yellow Lanterns in their heyday. When I fought Cyborg he was weaker than I expected he would be. But after what he did with those murders not to mention what had happened with Oliver and the darkness present within him and the rest of world? Maybe I could take on one and triumph with all my might and with all of you helping me. But against two? I don't think so."
"What if we separate them, get another far from here..." said Tess as Bruce cut her off.
"You know him," said Bruce. "All of you and do you actually think you'd be able to separate him from his wife? Let alone his new best friend?"
Everybody in the League looked down in shameful anger. But Bart interjected. "What about your partners in the Green Lantern Corps, can't we just call them from wherever. Screw what they know about the future. We can't just let this happen without a fight."
"Believe me." said Bruce. "I know the Lantern Guardians and the moment we explain to those little blue men that we are from the future they will do all they can to forget we ever appeared before them. I could contact at most one Lantern, but if I remember correctly he is on his way from a planet at the far end of this sector, headed to his eventual death. Even so it would take several hours, maybe even days and by that time Darksied will be on his way and we'd be dead. There is nothing..."
"Actually little brother there is a way." said Jon.
"What is it?" said Lara.
All of a sudden Bruce and Lara stood there attentively as Jon tapped his temple as silence continued between them and the rest of the League.
"Forgive me," said Jon. "But I'm speaking to my siblings in secret. I have a plan I set in motion ever since I showed you what happened in my father's future. I have but one plan in mind and unfortunately I must keep it from you until you all arrive at the coordinates."
The rest of the League were dumbfounded but then remembered that memory when the three spoke to each other psychically. Some turned to J'onn if there was someway to read their minds. But all he did was shake his head. "Its like Zatanna's spells, I can't read their minds while he works his power. Being siblings I take it they are very close."
No sooner did J'onn finish talking did Lara and Bruce look each other with a wide smile on each of their faces.
"You actually think?" said Lara.
"Oh I definitely think it can work." Bruce said. "But its going to be painful."
"If we are going to do it we must do it now." said Jon
"Excuse me." said several members of the League.
"What is it that we must do?" said Mera and A.C.
"You'll know it when we get to the coordinates." said Bruce as he turned around and faced his older brother. "But in the meantime big brother take us there while you head straight back to dad."
Eventually the rest of the League stood side by side along with the two younger members of Clark's children as Lois joined them, as Jon became the Phantom Stranger and teleported them out of the apartment and himself back to Watchtower.