So the 3 1/2 way crossover between the Flash, Arrow, and Legends of Tomorrow (and some Supergirl) was actually pretty good.
Parts of this chapter might seem overblown or over the top, but it's that way on purpose.
Chapter Thirty-Five:
Future World Industries was a home-grown success story, of which people only really knew the cliff-notes version. The truncated, sanitized-for-the-media version that edited out a lot of the backstabbing, blood-thirsty bits where the founders had pulled hair, cut in line, and stabbed people in their spleens.
The company had only come forward in the last five years or so with the appointment of the charismatic and attractive CEO Deirdre Merlo. The usual detractors had come at her first, for she couldn't have been more than twenty-one when she had been appointed and they demanded to know what business such a young, untested woman had running a nationally recognized company. They wanted to know what had made her more qualified than other candidates.
Lois suspected that the size of Ms. Merlo's jugs might have played a hand in it.
Ms. Merlo might have "played a hand" in it.
It was hard to say. Lois didn't want to cast disparagement in the event that Ms. Merlo had been appointed CEO based on her own merits as a businesswoman. But it was hard to ignore that the CEO had still been very young to be taking such a high-level position with no apparent skills that qualified her over other equally viable candidates.
Future World Industries was a conglomerate company that seemed to be out to copy the business model of Wayne Enterprises by dipping its fingers into a little bit of everything. Medicine, technology, engineering, chemicals, and they were making a slow push towards aerospace. They had grown far and fast since Ms. Merlo had taken the top desk, with ten branches in as many cities across the nation. They ranked up in the top fifty of most profitable companies in the United States.
At the very least, Ms. Merlo knew how to market her company appealingly.
The chopper came for Lois at the appointed time, when she barely had half the page filled with relevant questions. She bullcrapped the rest while the chopper ferried her across the Business District to far side near the Sundial Bridge out to Hell's Gate Island.
The Future World Industries building was one of the most distinct in Metropolis. It had a pyramidal base that leaned up through the first forty floors while the executive tower that housed the other ten was a weird spiraling thing, like the tip of a screwdriver. Sheathed completely in glass and highly reflective, with guided tours through some of the less sensitive departments where interesting things were happening and a visitor friendly observation deck, the building was easily a tourist draw all by itself. It was all sleek lines and chrome and steel and white tile floors, giving off the smooth sterile vibe that people expected in the future, when construction learned how to do away with ragged edges and dynamic colors.
Lois had been in the Future World pyramid a few times, but this was the first time she had ever set foot in the executive tower. The tone could not have been more different.
The sleek lines continued to be a feature, but gone was the chrome and the steel. Replacing it was dark cherry and mahogany. The floors were carpeted in a wine-red shag that made Lois feel like her heels were going to sink in with every step. The lighting was in-set and did almost nothing to brighten the halls, leaving a perpetual gloom.
But it wasn't the creepy kind of gloom that resulted from insufficient light.
It was more like mood lighting.
This feels unprofessional. Lois thought, trying to ignore the sense of anxiety gnawing at her guts. Why do I feel like I'm being led into a sex dungeon?
The chopper had set down on the landing pad on the fiftieth floor, giving her direct access to the executive tower. She had been greeted by the executive assistant, a young woman with modest assets, but an immodest dress sense. The skirt was too short and a corset top, of all things to wear in an office setting, didn't cover enough. The corset top pushed up the set of jiggly breasts until she appeared to have more bounce in the chest region than otherwise. Her eyes were dark blue and her hair was a bottle-given color of blonde. She had looked Lois over, made a decidedly impolite face, and ordered her to follow.
The top two floors of the building were the most opulently decorated and Lois couldn't ignore the feeling that she had stepped off the elevator into a particularly classy brothel and smelled like it too. There were expensive artworks and statues and rich tapestries and yes, those were silk drapes on the dark walls. Heavy brocade curtains framed the windows. The glass was tinted, making the already dark and gloomy morning seem even more so.
"Where's Ms. Merlo?" Lois asked, as the EA led her into what must have been a meeting area that looked far more like a very expensive living room. It definitely had the feel of a private lounge. It was opulent and featuring two leather couches that were squeaky in their shininess. There were two matching armchairs and a mismatched Victorian fainting couch. She tried to squash the feeling that she was going to be asked to take off her clothes.
The EA made a rude noise before saying: "She knows you're here. Don't be impatient." She pointed brusquely at a couch. "Sit down. Ms. Merlo will be along in a minute."
"You're rude." Lois told her bluntly. "Not even going to offer me a water?"
"It's not my job to cater to you." the EA snapped, making another impolite face, as though she considered the very idea of offering anything to be truly abhorrent. "Your legs work, don't they?"
"You'd get fired anywhere else." Lois commented. She decided to be difficult and made a shooing noise. "Why don't you run along and get me a water. Cold, not frozen. From a vending machine."
The EA scowled. "Make me."
Oh, you were so not hired for your people skills. Lois thought, smirking. Whether they liked it or not, an executive assistant had the task of being a good host in the sense that they arranged everything before the meeting. At minimum, it was polite to ask if the guest wanted anything to drink.
Lois opened her mouth to explain this to the impertinent chit, but she was cut off when a soft, purring voice chimed out like a small bell.
"Amelia, you mustn't be rude to our visitors." Ms. Merlo said, gliding into the lounge. There was no other way to describe her movement and rolling gait. It was a glide, as smooth as silk on polished glass. There was a sensual sway in her hips and not the slightest hitch in her stride. Her glossy black hair shimmered in the low lighting and her liquid dark eyes glittered. Her golden toned skin took up a burnished hue. She had long painted fingernails and she trailed them, rather suggestively, over the exposed shoulder of her EA.
"Please fetch Miss Lane a bottle of water." Ms. Merlo said to the younger woman. "You're being very rude. And I expect you to apologize."
The EA ducked her head with a shamed expression. "I'm sorry, Ms. Merlo."
"Apologize to Miss Lane, not to me." the CEO instructed with the patience of a sainted mother.
The EA turned to Lois, barely raising her head to meet the reporter's eyes.
"I'm sorry for being rude. It won't happen again." she said, in a tone that was just sincere enough to pass muster, but held enough of a sneer to show that she wasn't actually apologizing and it probably would happen again.
"Very good." Ms. Merlo lightly touched the dyed black hair. "Don't let me catch you being rude to the guests again, Amelia."
"Yes, Ms. Merlo."
"Now go and fetch that water."
"Yes, Ms. Merlo."
The EA turned and left. Ms. Merlo turned to her guest with the smile that had won her a prize for being the best smile in the city. Her teeth were very white and even. If work hadn't been done on them, Lois would be shocked.
"Hello, Miss Lane. Thank you for accepting my offer." the CEO said. Her voice purred like a contented cat and she glided into the sitting area, extending a shapely hand. "It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance. The whole city has been talking about you."
Squashing down her general revulsion, Lois took the hand in a loose handshake.
"It's funny, they're talking about you too." she said, trying to make adequate small talk.
"And you're here to tell them all about what I have to say." Ms. Merlo chirped brightly, her eyes oddly wide and child-like.
"Shall we get started?" Lois asked. This was going to be a strain; she could tell already.
Lois had done plenty of interviews before; enough that she knew how an interview was supposed to go. Some people just wanted to talk about their stuff to the first person who would listen. Others chatted on so much that she was usually forced to interrupt them just to get anywhere. Others were more difficult or unprepared or tongue-tied and it took prompting before they put the words out there.
It only took two questions for Lois to conclude that Ms. Merlo was a horrible person to interview. She wasn't deliberately rude or uncooperative. No, she was perfectly pleasant, she spoke clearly for the recording, and she waited patiently for Lois to make her notations. She was easily the most cooperative person that Lois had ever had the opportunity to interview.
The problem was that she just didn't fucking answer the questions.
Lois kept her questions on point. The topic was the urban renewal of the West River. Lois had opened the interview by asking what had prompted Ms. Merlo to get so heavily involved with the project.
She had expected the usual self-serving dribble about being a public figure and doing good for the community and fixing a blight on the city. The same sort of egotistical commentary that Luthor expounded on a regular basis that tried desperately to speak to people on a personal level and left them feeling vaguely like that they had been poked in the buttcrack.
Instead, Ms. Merlo had given the bizarrely chirping reply: "I'm a good girl who just wants to help." She used a bright, peppy tone that had been hooked up to an IV of sugar and Red Bull.
And it didn't answer the question either.
Well, it could have if you took it as the short answer, but interviews just didn't do short answers. They all but demanded long explanations that included personal thoughts on the matter and sometimes too much information. Short answers had to be explained if the interviewer expected to make the minimum word count.
But Ms. Merlo had decided to fuck that noise. Immediately following her "good girl" comment, she had gone into a monologue about growing up in a children's home run by a fanatically religious old woman. She had given Lois a dirty look when the reporter had tried to interrupt her so they could get back on topic.
Either Ms. Merlo was dancing around the answer like it was a May-pole or she truly believed her history in the children's home was relevant to the West River renewal project.
After today, Lois would finally be able to explain a more defined reason as to why she hated Deirdre Merlo.
This woman was a maddening dichotomy of extremes. She had a voice like phone sex and the mannerisms of a Lady of Society. Of someone who had been raised to be poised and elegant at all times and to never act like she wasn't being watched. Her smile was vapidly pleasant, but her movements were sensual. And while she spoke like a highly educated woman, she phrased her sentences the way a small child might and pitched her voice to sound like a little girl. Never mind the way her gestures constantly veered towards her crotch or her ample-sized bosom.
As the interview seemed to stretch into eternity and each second lasted a minute and the answers got more rambling and less relevant, Lois was able to conclude exactly what kind of image Ms. Merlo was projecting.
She was Barbie.
She was just a Barbie doll that the Board of Directors could dress up in nice clothes and they could give her a script. She was the porcelain marionette whose strings they tugged; the puppet CEO who signed her name on command and didn't properly know what documents she was signing. The public face of the company with her gorgeous looks, sexy voice, and charming charisma, but unfathomably useless.
Without a script, she had no idea what to say, so anything spewed out of her pie-hole.
And then there was the whole thing where her office looked like a mix between a private lounge and a classy sex room. It had taken Lois over half an hour to find the desk on the far side of the room, half-hidden behind a dressing screen, and the EA had never actually come back with her water.
It seemed to take forever, but it was with the greatest of relief that Lois finally reached the last question.
"So, what do you hope to bring to the West River? What sort of change are you really hoping to invoke?" she asked.
Ms. Merlo's eyes brightened. "Would you like to see my model?"
"Model?" Lois repeated.
The CEO all but flung herself off the couch, where she had been lounging comfortably for the last hour. The semi-wild movement barely disturbed her hair and her clothes were hardly wrinkled in the process. She got to her feet like she had floated up to a standing position.
"My model! Come and see it!" she ordered, beckoning to the reporter. "You'll love it! Everyone worked so hard on it! It's the best ever!"
She said that in exactly the same tone as a six-year old who made cell models out of toothpicks and gumdrops and half a glue stick. Reluctant for no reason she could properly pin down, Lois stood up and followed the CEO across the office.
"C'mon, c'mon." Ms. Merlo urged, waving an elegant hand. "It's over here. It's amazing. I could never do anything so intricate by myself."
There was an unlit alcove on the far side of the room, out of sight of the door. With a massive grin on her face, Ms. Merlo flicked up a light switch, shedding bright hot light over something Lois always thought she would find in an evil villain's hidden lair.
It was a scale model of the entire city. All of Metropolis laid out on a twelve by twelve platform. The tallest towers no more than three feet in height; the spire of the LexCorp building wasn't much past Lois's waist. The buildings were painted Styrofoam, the streets were rubber, and the cars were die-cast toys. The most prominent buildings in Metropolis's actual skyline were on display in all their glory. All twenty-three bridges were present, as well as the hydro-electric dam further up the river. Lois could pick out the individual neighborhoods. They were picture-accurate. Even Stryker's Island had been perfectly rendered.
Only two of the neighborhoods were different.
One of them was the West River Island, obviously, but it had been designed to resemble the completed renewal project. Fancy high-rise apartment buildings and office towers blanketed the landscape. A series of condominiums on the south shore and a beach resort on the far west side. New consumer-oriented businesses. A big green park complete with plastic trees and tiny plastic people graced the center of the island. It looked like an extension of New Troy.
The second was Metrodale. Gone were the rows of collapsing terraced houses that currently dominated the streets. Replacing them were identical suburban houses with green lawns and picket fences.
Actual picket fences.
In a scale model.
That was dedication.
Today, West River. Tomorrow, Metrodale. Lois thought. Well, you just wanna be the new Lex Luthor, don'tcha. He's been talking about Metrodale for the past year. I could appreciate the idea of you beating him at his own game -- because it's high time someone did -- I just don't think I want it to be you.
"What do you think?" Ms. Merlo asked.
"Of the model?" Lois asked.
"No, of the plan." the CEO corrected. She did not hide her eye-roll. "This is the final product! It'll be the result of two years worth of construction! By this time in 2010, everyone will have homes and jobs and dinner every night and no one will be poor! All poverty in Metropolis will be wiped out!"
"That's not going to happen." Lois predicted. Idealized thinking, that.
A vague scowl marred Ms. Merlo's perky grin. "What makes you say that? Are you doubting what my contribution can do?"
"Yep, I am." Lois nodded, crossing her arms. "See, no matter what you do, there's always going to be poverty in one form or another. Even if the new average is to make nineteen thousand a year, that's only an average. There's still going to be people who are only making ten thousand a year and in comparison, they're still going to be poor. Because cost of living is going to rise and there's always going to be someone who can't quite reach it. That's life. It always screws you over."
"Don't be silly, Miss Lane. When the West River is rebuilt, there will be no such thing as a poor person or crime. Everyone will be happy and they'll all have jobs and everything will be alright!" Ms. Merlo declared in a tittery voice, like the school girl who had just spotted the vaguely handsome older boy.
"And how exactly do you plan to do that? Are you even thinking about the actual reality of what you're proposing?" Lois asked. "It's an admirable thing to aim for, but you're also saying that this is going to happen within the next two years."
"Of course it will!" Ms. Merlo chirped. "I'm going to show everyone what happens when cooperation and unity is the driving force behind society!"
Oh my god she ate a four-year old girl who's trying desperately to communicate with the outside world. Lois cringed. This was a grown woman with a rose-colored world view who couldn't see the damn chainsaws in the forest.
It wasn't that humanity couldn't band together and cooperate, but it usually took a crisis to make that happen. Times when survival was imperative and strength was found in numbers. Other than that, most people preferred to think that no one else's lives affected them. That it was all Somebody Else's Problem.
Ms. Merlo was suggesting that she could make an entire city unite under a single banner just by fixing up the West River and Metrodale, and expecting it to happen over the course of just two years.
Or she's a robot being remotely controlled by a four-year old girl. That would make sense too.
Ms. Merlo snapped her fingers and smiled secretively. "I know what you're thinking." she said. "You're wondering how I could possibly make something like that happen."
Lois snorted. "You read my mind." she said sarcastically. "Go on, tell me. I'm dying to hear it."
"It's actually very simple, once everyone understands what they're supposed to do." the CEO began. "If you could just answer one little question for me, Miss Lane. Are you seeing anyone?"
"No!" Lois half-shouted. She rubbed her forehead. "Ms. Merlo, that question has nothing to do with the West River and my dating life shouldn't even be an issue. If you don't mind, I really should be getting back to the Planet."
"So you're not seeing anyone." Ms. Merlo said. She shook her head and tutted disapprovingly. "A woman your age should have been married at least a year ago. But that's not a surprise. You're not eligible to be anyone's wife."
Lois had barely turned around to leave when the CEO said that. A low fire burned in her chest, at the implication that her life needed a man and a marriage in order to be complete.
She had never bought into the idea; it was dribble to her. If other women wanted to be married, that was fine, but they didn't need to be dragging her into it. She didn't measure her worth against the men in her life (or else the numbers might come out pretty low, considering what she thought of the men in her life were worth and there weren't enough Clark Kents to even the scale).
"Excuse me?"
"You're loud. Strident. Argumentive." Ms. Merlo told her, clearly oblivious to the expression of outrage on the younger woman's face. "No man is going to want you, if you keep up with that horrible behavior. Which is a shame, because you're very pretty too and you'd make a fine mother." she added, like it was supposed to be a compliment.
"Men like women who are quiet, with a melodious voice. They don't like women who argue with them or question them. Men always know what's best. That's their job. A woman's job is to make the house a safe haven for the husband and cater to him when he comes home from a long hard day at work. The home should be quiet and free of distractions and dinner should be ready to go on the table by the time he gets home. The woman is to listen to the man and comfort him."
"And this has what to do with unifying Metropolis?" Lois prompted. It sounded like nothing more than 1950s housewife rhetoric that the feminism wave of the sixties and seventies had sought to wipe out.
Coming from a successful businesswoman of the twenty-first century.
She's the fucking Barbie doll. She has to be.
"Roles, Miss Lane. Everyone's going to know their place, their lot in life. Their role." Ms. Merlo explained cheerfully. "A system only works when everyone knows what they're doing and how they're supposed to do it. Cogs in the machine. Well-oiled, spinning smoothly, and brightly polished. That's the American way."
I don't think she has any idea what comes out of her mouth. Lois thought. A sense dread sank into the pit of her stomach. She just takes words and phrases that sound nice and strings them together.
"Do you understand my vision, Miss Lane?" Ms. Merlo inquired hopefully. "I wanted to explain it to you first. I admire your articles and your words. I thought your words could explain my vision better than I ever could. I have such great plans for Metropolis, but I need your words to help me give them power."
If only I could figure out what you were trying to tell me in all that rambling. I mean, what does a pet dog have to do with fixing up one of the city's worst areas? Lois wondered. Unless you were trying to refer to some idealized version of childhood or something that everyone deserves...
"I'll do my best, Ms. Merlo, but I can't promise anything." the reporter said. If anything, she was going to shove this steaming heap of poo down to some cub reporter who needed a break and didn't care what the assignment was.
Ms. Merlo nodded. "Of course." she said, taking the other woman's hand gratefully. "It really was a pleasure meeting you, Miss Lane. You're such a good listener."
I deserve a raise for putting up with your nonsense. Lois thought, hoping her smile at least looked half-real. "Maybe we can do another interview." she said. But only when Lombarde goes an entire day without mentioning anything relating to sex or his manly physique.
"That would be lovely." Ms. Merlo cooed. She smiled sweetly. "The chopper's waiting to take you back to the Planet. I hope to see the interview very soon."
"It might even be on the front page." Lois said, though she sincerely doubted that.
At long last, she was released from the clutches of the insipid CEO and her ridiculous little girl voice and the creepy sex brothel interior decoration mood lighting and the street-corner-hooker-clad executive assistant who made no effort to hide a sneer as Lois rushed to the elevator as fast as she could without looking rude.
The chopper was waiting on the landing pad ten floors down, as promised, and the pilot didn't need long to start up. A quick check of the instruments and then they were in the air.
Any other time, Lois might have been staring out the windows, watching the city unfurl beneath her. It was a sight she didn't get to see very often and she usually enjoyed it every chance she got. Instead, she stared at the completed interview recorded into her phone. It was over an hour of rambling, as Ms. Merlo vaguely touched on a real answer and then toddled off into a tangent that had nothing to do with Metropolis, much less its current problems.
As such, Lois had learned far too much about the woman than she had ever wanted to.
The children's home and its fanatically religious elderly woman headmistress had come up a few more times. She had talked about having a rough childhood in a bad city where the only love she ever got was from her beloved puppy that she'd been forced to euthanize herself when it had gotten very sick. She had gone on at length about the bullying from her school-mates and the abuse from her foster parents. She had spewed out so much that Lois was barely inclined to believe a word she was saying, for it had sounded completely unreal. Frankly, anyone who had suffered as much abuse as Ms. Merlo had claimed would never be in the mood to blurt it all out in an interview that was going in a national paper.
But if even half of that was true, then Deirdre Merlo was a very troubled woman.
I'll have to play this for Perry. He has to listen to the crap I put up with and then he'll see how batshit this woman really is. Lois decided, tucking her phone into her bag. There was just no fucking way she was going to put this into writing. The Daily Planet was a respectable newspaper, thank you very much.
Maybe I could sell it to the Whisperer...
The chopper jolted so hard Lois felt her stomach drop and her hands lurched to find a grip on the side of her seat as the motion threw her sideways. The pilot yanked just as hard on the steering yoke, trying to right the bird.
"What the hell was that?!" she demanded, looking at the pilot.
"Dunno, the read-outs look fine..." the pilot said, looking over the instruments. Everything was still green. "I did pre-flight checks. Everything was fine."
Above their heads, the blade rotor made a sound. It was a rusty sound of a motor running out of oil. The sound of an engine that was overheating and under-lubricated. It was the sound of a machine that was about to shuffle off the mortal coil.
"Something is not fine." Lois declared.
The pilot frowned. "Shit. I'm gonna set her down. Looks like it'll be LexCorp. Hang tight, ma'am." he said, picking up the radio handset to convey his intentions for an emergency landing.
"I smell something burning." Lois reported.
The console flashed a red warning light.
"It's overheating!" the pilot shouted. "LexCorp tower flight control, this is Future World One! We're experiencing mechanical failure! Repeat: mechanical failure! I think something's caught fire! Permission to perform an emergency landing!"
In that split second before the tower could reply, the chopper lurched like an upset stomach and Lois heard the engine cut out entirely; the wheezing throb just vanishing. The smell of burning became that much stronger and the nose of the chopper started to tilt forward and to the right. It was a strange split second that seemed to last far longer than it should have. Lois saw the city below with a surprising amount of clarity and she had the time to wonder what that moving red blur was not more than sixty feet below them.
The helicopter spasmed to the right when the blades tried to restart and before she could think of anything more, Lois slammed into the door with enough force to make her shoulder tingle.
But Murphy's Law wasn't done with her yet.
Apparently, the stars were in alignment to make this a shitty day.
She didn't have the time to grab the safety harness for emergencies like this and her seat belt stopped doing its job. So did the door latch. For a second, she had hoped the door would take her weight, but when her back slammed into it with all of her body weight, it simply gave way.
Then there was nothing but empty space beneath her.
Great, another Monday, another near-death experience.
She didn't have any time to build up momentum or adrenaline and she was barely clear of the chopper door before the air whooshed around her and something that felt an awful lot like abs, pectorals, and strongly muscled thighs were suddenly underneath her. A thick, corded arm clad in a very familiar royal blue came around her waist, the sleeve made up of some metallic-like fabric that she had felt before. She looked up and back at the bright blue eyes of Superman and his toothpaste-ad smile.
"Oh my god..." she groaned.
"You seem to be making a habit of out of this, Miss Lane." he commented lightly.
"I'm not trying to." Lois informed him, rubbing her forehead. "Mondays and Tuesdays are just not my friends. Thanks, though, your timing is really, really good."
"I have really good hearing."
"I'll bet."
This is getting ridiculous. Lois thought, groaning again and covering her face with both hands. This is the third time he's saved me from a death by splat, fourth time overall. I think I might have to buy him dinner. I mean, god, I'm practically sitting in his lap!
She looked up to where Superman's other arm was stretched up above his head, balancing one of the chopper's landing struts in his palm. The pilot had managed to get his safety harness on, his face slack and he was staring straight ahead with that horrified disbelief of someone who didn't understand why he was still alive, but couldn't find it in himself to really think about it. Gray smoke poured out of the blade rotor.
Superman was holding the chopper above his head.
With one hand.
Lois didn't know how much the average commercial helicopter weighed, but they weren't light.
Flight, super-strength, immune to bullets, boy you are a package and I love it.
There was a sharp *zzzt!* sound and Superman twitched and Lois saw his face change from that pleasant smile to something more like confusion and then she heard the buzz, zap, and hiss of electricity just half a second before he flung her off his legs, both safely into the air and not safely at all.
Lois didn't know why she had time to recognize the taser round embedded in the back of Superman's thigh, but not have the time to trace the trajectory of the second and third rounds that buried their prongs deep into the muscle and she wasn't even sure how they made it that deep because if you were invulnerable to bullets, didn't that extend to any other sort of piercing weapon?... Maybe because she was distracted when Superman bit down on his lip hard enough to draw blood that was as red as any human's.
Maybe she was entirely too distracted by the scream that burst out of him or the way his body convulsed in pain and the fact that he dropped the chopper in the process. And she remembered that electricity had had an effect on the good Dr. Essex, and both he and Superman were apparently from the same part of the universe.
Hey look, another brush with death on a Monday morning. Second one today and not more than a minute apart. Lois thought, the words flitting across her mind as she fully registered her new-found plummet.
With her luck today, she'd probably end up impaled on one of the city spires.
"I want weird flowers on my grave!" Lois shouted into the air, not sure who was listening and not satisfied that those would be her last words, but she didn't have the presence of mind or the time to think of something more poignant.
The breath was getting thin in her lungs and her vision was prickling black at the edges. Oh goddammit, she couldn't breathe! Or she just wasn't. Well... If she did get impaled, she would pass out before she felt it.
The last two things she saw was Superman convulsing against not three but six taser rounds, three more having gone into his shoulder, and then a narrow face with a foul grin swept into her rapidly diminishing vision.
Then it was darkness and vertigo and nothing else.
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