4 Justice League Family Affairs

Plastic Man stood before the nanite entrapped hostages and prepared for the largest intentional shape-shift of his life. He was going to stretch three blocks and form a covered arch for the JLers to walk through. Taking a deep breath he shape-shifted into the arch and stretched forward. Where he encountered an obstacle, such as a person, he gently shoved it aside. He reached the entrance to the Wilkinson Center in minutes' time.


Inside the main conference room the Brain began issuing orders to the other members of the Brotherhood of Evil. Mallah raced out to insure that said orders were followed. The Humanite turned to the Mad Hatter.

"Shouldn't you be doing something?" the Ultra-Humanite asked.

"He just moves my pawns out of the way." The Hatter complained, "I can't stop him."

"Pawns attack diagonally." The Humanite advised. Seeing that the analogy was lost on the Hatter, the Humanite elucidated; "Attack Plastic Man's sides. He will be under considerable strain. You should be able to collapse him under his own weight."

"Marvelous." The Hatter giddily sent the orders.


"J'onn, hurry!" Plas radioed in, "They're attacking my sides and I don't know how long I can keep this shape with all of this abuse."

"Understood, Plastic Man. We are on our way." J'onn assured him. Turning to the assembled JLers waiting to follow him, he said; "Come! Now is the time to strike!

Mary Marvel led the procession by flying down the tunnel. J'onn flew marginally ahead of the foot traffic. Above the tunnel, Black Adam led Captain Marvel, Hawkman, Aztek, Steel, Booster Gold, Stargirl, and the Ray towards the conference center.

Plas "opened" vent holes in his "roof" to allow sunlight through. They still had three hours of daylight left. Plenty of time to bash bad guys in. It also gave him more "flesh" to reinforce his sides with.

Mary emerged from Plas's "tunnel" and slammed straight into Plasmus. The protoplasmic villain laughed.

"Now you die!" he happily declared.

Mary pushed off of Plasmus's gooey skin. She was imbedded in the German's altered form. Plasmus noted that she wasn't being broken down to cytoplasm through contact with his skin.

"I don't know how you're surviving my touch but we'll see if you can be smothered." He announced.

His arms wrapped around her back and began to pull her in. Mary pushed for all that she was worth but her hands began to sink into his chest. She realized that her efforts would ultimately prove to be futile. She had to buy time to come up with a new tactic.


J'onn emerged from Plastic Man's form only to duck Big Sir's energy mace. The big man was worked up.

"Go away!" he demanded, "Leave us alone!"

The Flash raced out of Plastic Man's tunnel, "Hey Big Sir! Let's play tag."

Flash raced forward and touched Big Sir's side and then raced off. Big Sir smiled with delight and trundled off after the Flash. That left J'onn facing Major Disaster.


More JLers appeared behind J'onn. As the last emerged, Plastic Man resumed his normal shape. The closest hostages started to move in on the JLers' position so he formed a wall around his teammates' immediate vicinity.

Disaster saw this and smirked, "It seems you've got me."

"Disperse the storm." J'onn demanded.

"No." Disaster grinned, "And you can't touch me. After all, you know what'll happen if I unleash a hurricane on the Metropolis/New York/Gotham metropolitan area." His expression turned decidedly malevolent, "But I can touch you."

An earthquake suddenly epicentered at the Wilkinson Center. Green Arrow nocked an arrow in his bow but J'onn prevented him from firing it off.

"We cannot allow him to lose control of the hurricane. We have to take him down gently. I will try and reason with him." J'onn insisted.

Sadly, the aerial unit of the JLU was passing overhead and Booster Gold saw the problem and decided to solve it. He swooped down and blasted Major Disaster into unconsciousness. J'onn was beside himself.

"That was foolish, Booster!" J'onn angrily declared, "Now we have no control over the storm."

"I…uh…" Booster was at a loss.

"Stargirl, take Booster and see if he can follow orders." J'onn ordered.

Stargirl, who'd followed Booster in order to see what kind of trouble he was getting into, tossed of a mock salute; "C'mon, dork."

As they flew off J'onn paged the weather team.


Apache Chief answered the signal, "I understand. I will inform my fellows."

"That bad, huh?" Black Vulcan saw the Native American's grim expression.

"Yes." Apache Chief said without elaboration. He strode over to where Samurai and Red Tornado were conversing with the Weather Wizard.

"My wand says that the hurricane is approaching." Weather Wizard said with some alarm.

"I agree." Samurai concurred, "We must act now."

"J'onn agrees with you." Apache Chief said as he reached their side, "Booster Gold knocked Major Disaster out. He is no longer in control of his creation. You must act to preserve the lives of millions."

"Heh. Yesterday the 'lives of millions' would have been worthless to me but since I'm now one of those millions I'm more than happy to help." Weather Wizard freely admitted.

"Shall we proceed as we planned it?" Samurai asked.

"Of course." The Weather Wizard programmed his wand, "On my mark…3, 2, 1, mark!"

The Weather Wizard and Samurai began manipulating elemental forces while Red Tornado stayed in reserve. His powers were for the endgame.


Phobia, Houngan, Gemini, and Mallah confronted the JLers on the ground while Black Adam and Captain Marvel were teleported into the ocean by Warp. Steel and Aztek flew by while the Ray and Hawkman dealt with the Frenchman.


The combined Wisdom of Solomon and Minerva called out to Mary and she went on the offensive. Digging her hands into Plasmus's torso, she lifted him into the sky and flew off into the approaching hurricane. 157 mph winds whipped at them. Lightning flashed and skated cloud to cloud. One strike finally hit them when they were 30 miles offshore. Plasmus released Mary with a cry.

She also let go and Plasmus plummeted down through the storm until he fell into the Atlantic below. Not being able to swim, he sank. Fortunately, he didn't require oxygen to survive so he didn't drown. Mary gathered her bearings and set out for shore. Artemis's skills led her through the storm and back to Metropolis.


Steel and Aztek crashed through the roof of the Wilkinson Center into the heart of the main conference room. Bizarro reacted instantly. He flew straight into Steel and pushed him through seven walls. Steel bopped him in the head with his sledgehammer and Bizarro stopped. Then they began to fight for real.

Mantis squared off with Aztek and they swiftly blasted each other out of the room. The world leaders stayed eerily calm during these events. Godfrey and Vundabar were boom tubed to Myanmar during this respite. After this, Stargirl and Booster made their appearance.

They dropped in through the hole in the roof. KGBeast opened fire. Stargirl created a high gravity field in front of her and the bullets fell harmlessly to the floor. Booster returned fire with his gauntlet mounted proton blasters. Mr. Freeze took aim but a wingarang knocked his cold blaster out of his grip. Nightwing, Catwoman, Question, and the Huntress made their appearance.

Scarecrow plucked a gas canister out of his coat and Huntress knocked it out of his hand with a quarrel. Catwoman retrieved it and examined it, "Now Jonathan, what were you planning on doing?"

"Why nothing, dear Selina." Scarecrow sing-songed, "Now be a dear and pull the pin on that gas grenade."

"I don't think so." Catwoman replied. Scarecrow came at her but she lashed him with her whip and he hurriedly retreated, while whimpering over his wounds.

Luthor shot the Question while the JLer dodged plasma fire from the Ultra-Humanite. He was hit with a neutrino dart. Its massive power discharge could have easily killed him. Fortunately for Luthor, it didn't.

Huntress let a war cry loose when Question went down. She sprang to his side and checked his vitals. They were weak but he was still breathing and his heart was still beating, which counted for something.

"You're lucky, Luthor. If you'd killed him you'd be dead too." She coldly informed him, "This way, I'm just going to hurt you."


Mr. Freeze plucked his cold blaster off of the floor. He stood and took aim at Huntress. Knowing that the bulk of Mr. Freeze's body was a complicated cybernetic suit with no body within it, Stargirl aimed the Cosmic Rod at him and fired. Her first shot blew his arm clean off. Holding the Rod in reserve, she used her Cosmic Converter Belt to shoot stars out of her free hand. The stars shorted out the rest of the suit's systems and it collapsed to the ground.

The canister containing Freeze's head detached and scurried away on eight mechanical legs. Courtney scrunched up her nose, "Eww!"

Booster suddenly tackled her. Plasma bolts flew overhead. He activated his force field, "Are you all right?"

"I would be if you got off of me." Stargirl groaned.

Booster scrambled to his feet, "Sorry. I just couldn't let anything happen to you."

"Booster, you are such a dork. Almost as big of a dork as Al is." She sighed.

He knew Al referred to Atom Smasher. The Smasher and Courtney had "enjoyed" one of the most epic almost romances in JLU history. Sadly, she'd been 14 and he was 23 at the time. Her family had forbade it and the two had gone on to serve the JLU all while slightly avoiding one another. His status as a fugitive had sealed their respective fates.

Fortunately for the pair of them, they'd never faced one another since he'd joined the Legion of Doom. Stargirl didn't know if she could fight her first love, especially since she still believed he'd been justified in killing the terrorists that had set off the Meta-Gene Bomb. She never discussed her feelings regarding Atom Smasher with the other JLers. Most of them were willing to forgive Galatea and Black Adam but they wanted to hold Al accountable for his "crimes". She saw that as being hypocritical at best.

"Yeah? The big exception is that I'm not in love with you." Booster shot back.

He saw the hurt in her eyes at being reminded of her lost opportunity. Booster was instantly sorry, "Geez Court, I didn't mean it. I…"

"I don't mean to interrupt but I have to inform you that you're both about to die." The Humanite chuckled.

Booster and Stargirl just exchanged a glance.


Phobia held the JLers in a grip of fear. Gemini used her stretching abilities to reach into Phobia's domain and wrap her arms and hands around the throats of several Leaguers and began to choke them. Houngan watched from behind the two women and looked for a way to use his techno-voodoo. Mallah supervised with his rifle poised to take care of the slightest hint of resistance.


The Flash had entered the Wilkinson Center in an effort to keep Big Sir at bay. He was dying of thirst though and he spotted a drinking fountain and took a swig. He was instantly soothed but within moments he could feel the loss of control of his limbs. Big Sir rounded the corner.

"There you are! I got you now!" he yelled as he advanced. He activated his mace construct and began to swing it. Flash desperately tried to dodge, to run, to do anything. He was frozen in place as the mace descended upon him. Then he knew nothing.