"Perdegaton? No." Clarity shook her head. "No, you can't be."
"No?" The man repeated. Now it was his turn to be confused. What did she mean no?
"Historical records don't lie. Gid's never wrong." Clarity clenched her teeth. Her arm lowering. She didn't have the strength to hold it up anymore. Her arm as heavy as the words about to fall from her lips. "The Degaton's died."
"That's what the world believes yes." Perdegaton nodded his head. "The man in the coat was right. The lengths that my father went to to keep me safe knew no bounds. Another boy who shared considerable resemblance to me was sacrificed so that I may live. My father gave his life so the lie would be as convincing as it could be. He was far braver than I ever imagined. You were right about that too." Perdegaton looked at Clarity in earnest and for a moment he looked all too much like the little boy who had been on the jumpship. "Hell, you were right about everything."
"Alright, lets just pretend for a moment that I do believe you are actually who you say you are. If I'm not your prisoner then what am I? Why bring me here, Perry? Why go through all this trouble?" Clarity asked. "That woman didn't seem to think I was worth it." Clarity left out the fact that she herself believed that to be true as well. Clarity hadn't been expecting to come out of that robot fight alive.
"Enough people have died because of me. Because of the mistakes of my youth. I was foolish to ever listen to a mind like Savage. I see that now. I allowed myself to be herded along like a mindless sheep. My people, the whole world, are suffering because of me. That must be amended."
"That still doesn't explain what I'm doing here." Clarity told him scratching lightly around the power dampener. Her skin getting a horrid itch there, an itch that she knew would turn into an excruciating burn the longer it stayed on her wrist.
"Vandal has to be stopped." Perdegaton clenched his fists. "And as much as I wish I was I'm not enough. I'm just one man. I can't do it alone. If Vandal is to be overthrown then I need you, and your team to stand any chance against him."
"So, you can rule over the people here yourself afterwards?" Clarity asked carefully.
"You say that as if it's a bad thing." Perdegaton looked at her in earnest. "But, I don't want to be the kind of man he is when I rule. I swear it. If the people wish it I'll hold an election once everything has settled and stabilized. They can elect whomever they wish after that. I know what you must think of me after the way I behaved during my capture all those years ago, but i've become better, wiser and it's-it's because of you."
"Prove it," Clarity challenged gesturing to the dampener. Perdegaton gave her a perplexed look in reply.
"If you want me to trust you then take this off me." Clarity explained further, repeating her earlier request when Perdegaton made no attempt to do as she asked. She resisted the urge to claw at the damn thing. The itch really was horrible.
Perdegaton's eye brows furrowed, his left arm scratching behind his ear. "I cannot, you melted the locking mechanism when we put it on you and even if it was in tact I Uh," Perdegaton looked down at his feet like a child who got caught stealing from the cookie jar, "actually don't have a key. We found it when we were scavenging about a year ago, guess the poor sod who was wearing it didn't have a key either, the woman who was just in here took it right off the corpse, but you don't need me to take it off. You can just make it blow up like all the other tech you've destroyed."
Clarity's face lost all color the woman's already pale skin going white as a sheet, her heart rate increasing as she looked at the small banged up device. The implications of what Perdegaton had told her settling in. Sure, she knew that it was stuck on her, but she'd thought that he could get it off. The dampener upon her wrist was faulty, broken, irreparably damaged which could be why her powers weren't totally negated, but with the lock melted and no key to speak of... "Are you telling me you put this on me and you can't get if off!?"
"I can't, but surely you can." Perdegaton nodded making a go ahead gesture the man clearly overestimating her capabilities as a meta. "Just make it-" Perdegaton made a little explosion noise-" like the atobots."
"It's a meta dampener!" Clarity exclaimed holding her itching wrist close to her chest like a wounded animal. "I can't just make it overload when it's suppressing my abilities, it was specifically designed to negate a metahumans powers. If I was at full strength maybe I'd have a chance, but right now..." Clarity shook her head looking at the bracelet helplessly. "..Perry what were you thinking putting a broken meta dampener on me!?"
"I thought you could remove it yourself once your strength came back. Please, Clarity, I didn't think-"
"It was the only way we could save you." M announced, repeating what Perry had already told her not that the red head knew that coming back in the room med supplies in hand. "Quit your winging, and keep it down. I could hear you two squabbling bout it for miles. Are you trying to have Savage's hell goons descend upon us?"
M received no answer, but it wasn't like she would have liked anything that was about to be said to her anyways. The precious box of med supplies was in her hands. It was scratched, dirtied with blood and war torn marks, not to mention the contents inside held much to be desired, but these were desperate times. Even though that's what Perry had told her to retrieve she seemed reluctant to hand the medicine over to Clarity. It wasn't much at all, an aspirin, and a few adrenaline pills, some fancy futuristic cough drop was all that remained in the box. So much of it had been used on the metahuman already. It seemed like such a waste to give her any more, they didn't have any left to spare, if she gave this to her and one of them got hurt...
"You should be more grateful." M snapped at Clarity color in her tone. "Wasn't for P you'd be buried in a mass grave or one of Vandals lab rats. Me, I would've let you die, but Perry's got a heart of gold, still has his head up in the damned clouds thinking that a better future's coming, that we can take him down and make it happen but reality is this wars already over. We're barely hanging on hiding in the cracks and then all our supplies, the most coveted piece of protection we had was used to save who? An ungrateful...what does he keep calling you? Glitch?"
Clarity closed her eyes leaning heavily on a nearby chair, soaking up the other woman's words harsh as they were. Grateful? For what? Condemning her to a slow agonizing death by meta dampener? If it was properly functioning, and they had a key, maybe she wouldn't be so upset right now, but something wasn't right about this thing. It felt off, its hum didn't feel normal, which meant it was damaged, faulty, broken. It was only partially working, which isn't necessarily a good thing if you think about it, she could even argue that it's worse because it could kill her while she's not even using her powers depending on what's wrong with it-it could do who even knows what. It was only a matter of time before it might start to act up.
This entire situation wasn't anything Clarity could've anticipated and freaking out about the dampener wouldn't do anything to help anyone right now, it was stuck on her and there wasn't time to deal with it, not now, not in the middle of world war three when her team was about to face four of those leviathan's, she had to get a grip. For everyone's sake, including her own, she had no one to blame for this situation, but herself. She made a choice to take on that leviathan and whatever happened had happened. She couldn't fault Perdegaton for wanting to help her or even fault him for thinking that she and the rest of the team were all powerful and subsequently the answers to his prayers. He'd been a mere teenager when the team had shown him the truth, so impressionable and easily sculpted like a lump of clay. It wasn't his fault her abilities were so unwieldy in this time period and the odds of him ever being properly educated on meta dampeners were slim to none with Savage having tutored him. If anything she should be elated that the would be hitler of Rip's time had taken their words to heart. In fact, that's exactly what she decided to do.
"You're right, you were both just doing what you thought was right and I can't do anything about it right now. So, Perry and uh, sorry what was your name?"
"You told her who you are!? Are you insane!?" M screeched at Perry smacking him repeatedly in the arm, though her petite frame did nothing against his bigger one.
"We can trust her!" P insisted catching her hands in his, "She saved my life. If her and her team hadn't shown me the truth about Vandal then I would be as dead as my father. You weren't there, I swear on my mother's grave and if you don't trust her then at least trust me."
"If he's wrong about you I'll make you wish for death." M warned glaring at Clarity with all the distrust and rage that was held inside the woman's tiny malnourished body. Her hands slipping out of perdegatons hold.
"Uh, I think my new accessory will beat you to it." Clarity gestured to the meta dampener with a weak laugh. "But you're welcome to try if you like..." Clarity clasped her hands together twiddling her thumbs, smiling softly. "Uh.. I still don't know what to call you."
The redhead sighed, after a reluctant look to Perry, she answered Clarity's question. "Macrediagon, Mac, for short."
"Alright, well as I was saying a few seconds ago thank you, both of you," Clarity looked between the two. "for saving my life, but I can't stay here and rest up anymore, my teams in trouble, they don't have a lot of time, I have to go help them."
"I'm going with you." Perdegaton sheathed his knife in its holster already gearing up.
"No, thank you for the offer, really, but I'm not asking you to-"
"You protected me once, it's high time I return the favor." Perry told Clarity.
Mac frowned at him as Perry looked at her. "By I..." M was dreading the answer even though she already knew the answer. "You mean we, don't you?"
-Meanwhile back on the waverider-
Sara saw red, ripping the scarf Clarity had given the little boy out of his hands. The two were in Clarity's room, Sara having remembered Clarity wanted her to get him after the robot fight had gone down. Only when the assassin had seen the boy next to Claritys still gaping open closet attempting to retie the scarf around his bear, because Clarity hadn't really done a good job with tieing it in her rush, she'd jumped to conclusions. "That's not yours!"
The boy clutched his bear close staring at Sara with wide misty eyes, his lower lip quivering at her harsh tone. "Yes it is!" The little boy protested, trying to jump for it, but Sara was taller and the boy couldn't reach it.
"What you think just because she's gone you can take her things!?" Sara demanded clutching the scarf tightly in her hands, close to her chest. She looked down at the scarf. The fabric was so soft in her hands, the color such a bright blue, it was just so...Clarity. The color instantly reminding the assassin of the meta's eyes. Sara's musings were interrupted however her yelling having attracted some attention from a surprising third party.
"Lay off the kid, Sparky wouldn't want you to lose your head like this." Mick told her taking a sip of whiskey, the arsonist not drinking his usual choice of beer. Beer was for normal days, goodish days, not days like this. Word of Claritys sacrifice had spread through the team like wildfire and Mick Rory was drowning his sorrows the only way he know how. " 'Specially not over a damned scrap of fabric like that."
"What do you know? You probably put the kid up to this, thief." Sara challenged, narrowing her eyes at the arsonist.
"I know more than you idiots think." Mick grunted, taking another swig of his drink. "Now give it back to the runt. Sparky wouldn't mind if he took it."
"What? No, She's going to need this. She-she's going to want this," Sara protested, "The world, It's cold and dark out there and-" Sara's voice trembled, "a-and she has to have this. To protect her from it, to help her stay warm and bright and-and safe."
"I..don't think she's coming back, Miss." The little boy spoke up a bit more confident now that he saw Mick was on his side. "The metal giant got her, just like me Mum and Dad. Would've got us too, but she saved us. She- she was a hero!" The boy used his newly learned word with excited vigor.
"That's right." Mick confirmed nodding his head at the kid raising his bottle of liquor like it was a toast. "She was a hero, best damned hero I ever tried to kill."
"Don't do that." Sara jabbed Mick in the chest with her right hand, still holding the scarf, Mick getting pelted by the fuzzy material as well as the Assassin's fist. "Don't talk like she's gone."
"Don't see her around." Mick made a point to look around the room.
"Gideon's scanners are broken. Jax and Ray are working fo fix them, Rip too. We don't know for sure yet." Sara shook her head. "It hasn't been that long-"
"She's dead!" Mick snapped wrenching the scarf out of Sara's grip tossing it down to the kid. Mick shot the kid a look and the kid ran out of the room holding his bear and returned scarf to find a new hiding spot away from scary yelling adults.
"She could have run once we-"
"Run? You think she ran away from that oversized bucket of bolts?" Mick demanded, sounding rather insulted on Clarity's behalf. There was no way she ran. Not Clarity. Not the Glitch.
"Once we were in the clear she might've." Sara shook her head, blue eyes misting with tears that Sara wouldn't really let form fighting them down.
"Sparky's no coward," Mick told Sara, no room for any objections about the statement in his tone. "If she wasn't fighting for us she was fighting for the idiots who couldn't fight back."
"You didn't see how terrified she was of that thing." Sara denied. "She sat right there, right there." Sara pointed to Claritys bed, her teeth grit together, eyes as sharp as the knives she loved throwing. "And told me we were all going to die, she was so sure of it, her plan was to run."
"She knew we'd die without her so she stepped up." Mick argued. "Gave us the chance to escape while she took it on like a good little hero." Mick walked over to Clarity's lava lamp and placed it back in its rightful place. "She doesn't half ass anything, not even when it gets tough." Mick thought back to those meta cuffs he'd put on her when he was Chronos. How she used her powers in them until they killed her. "Not even fighting against something that'll kill her."
"I was wrong. Your dad's a gem." Snart announced to Cassandra as he stormed inside the brig, Todd right by his side. He didn't need the back up, Todd knew, but he wasn't too keen on losing anyone else that he held dear today and even though he hadn't said anything about it the fact that Snart hadn't objected to Todd accompanying him spoke volumes.
"He's just doing what he must to save his daughter." Cassandra replied, voice as unfeeling as ever.
Todd's face remained neutral at her reply. In the JSA he'd long since learned how to keep his emotions in check. However, his smoke was a different story. Black cloudy tendrils seeping off him joining the waveriders already smoking interior. A tendril snaking it's way to wrap protectively around Snart.
Snart placed a hand back on Todd's upper arm, a signal for the other man to stop his powers. A silent message for him to keep his cool. He was upset about Clarity's sacrifice too, but they had to play their cards right. They couldn't let her sacrifice be meaningless and it would be if they all died because they couldn't get to Savage or have him call off his four robots.
"Whatever you say." Snart told her, never taking his eyes off the young Savage. "Now, where was I?"
"Giving her a little dose of Clarity." Todd reminded him crossing his arms pushing his power down, his smoke dissipating.
"Oh, my handsome pal's right." Snart nodded, he even smirked a bit at Todd's hidden meaning because trying to talk things out and making the bad guy see the error of their ways was exactly what Clarity would have normally done. "Convincing you to help us."
"What a charming euphemism for interrogation." Savage's daughter remarked not at all phased by the prospect.
"I know what you're thinking: "My dad may not be perfect, but deep down, he's not a bad guy." Snart began.
"Time to expel that thought." Todd chimed in, not missing a beat.
"What are you doing?" Cassandra asked as Snart opened the doors to her cell. She was a bit taken aback by this approach.
"Showing you that when it comes to crap fathers, there is no "deep down." After you." Snart stepped aside so she could walk through.
"Allow me to get the door." Todd places his hand on the scanner opening the set of doors to the hall. "Your fathers attack hit us pretty good."
"These are the ones we could save." Snart narrated. "The rest are ash, much like Delta Camp."
"You don't know my father at all if you think his daughter could be so easily manipulated." Cassandra replied not falling for their trickery.
"Just trying to show you the truth."
"Which isn't very easy seeing as how dear old dad brainwashed you into believing everything he ever said." Todd remarked.
"The truth is," Cassandra didn't let them know of her growing annoyance. "My father was trying to save me."
"From what, untrained civilians with barely any weapons? Your father sent a 200-foot robot to level a bunch of tents." Snart argued.
"Without care for what would happen to the innocents who lived inside." Todd added staring down the young Savage.
"The people in that camp were rebels,dangerous radicals." Cassandra protested with practiced calm.
"Please. Do these people look like radicals to you? They're nobodies everyday folk hoping to survive your father's reign of terror. Look, took me a long time to accept my old man was a monster. I'm betting you're smarter than I am." Snart guessed as they continued down the hall, it didn't escape Snart's notice that Todd was leading her away from the civilians. Ever the hero.
"At last, something we agree on." Cassandra smirked.
"Oh, Per Degaton didn't release the Armageddon Virus. That was your father." Snart informed her.
"Impossible. He was only Per Degaton's tutor."
"Exactly, that'd give him control over him, tactically it would be the best way to make sure he did whatever your father wanted." Todd crosses his arms.
"One, Per Degaton was only a teenager at the time. Two, he was hardly a criminal mastermind. Your father, however-" Whatever Snart was about to say would never be known as Cassandra cut him off.
"What makes you think I'd believe anything either or you tell me?" She demanded.
"Because seeing is believing. Gideon, show her the footage. Kasnia, November 3, 2147." Snart instructed a video of Savage saying that the population of the world had to be thinned.
"This isn't true. You're a liar." Cassandra protested.
"Correct. But not about this. And you know it deep down."
"No," Cassandra protested, "This is a trick, a weak ploy into-"
"What the hell is she doing out of her cell?" Kendra stormed down the hall. "We can't have his offspring wandering around the place."
Cassandra's mouth dropped open, her eyes widened a bit. She couldn't believe what or rather who she was seeing.
"Relax," Snart drawled,
"Don't get your feathers all ruffled." Todd chimed in, cutting into Snart's sentence not that the thief minded. "We've got it handled."
"She's supervised." Snart finished hands shoved in his pockets.
"Put her back where she belongs or I'm telling, Rip." Kendra warned, "She's his daughter she doesn't have a single good bone in her body."
"Whoa, easy, okay we'll put her back we were just trying a new tactic. Look, why don't I make some coffee?"
"That...sounds great." Kendra smiled a bit. "I was a barista six months ago, I can't remember the last time I had someone make me coffee."
"Mom. Wait." Cassandra spoke up finding her voice before Kendra could leave and just like that, they'd gained an ally.
-meanwhile back with Clarity-
"Stay low, M." Perdegaton called keeping low to the ground against a collapsing building. Clarity and Mac doing the same. Laser's were firing, people running and screaming as they were gunned down by Savages soldiers. One guard was even flaming, but the fireproof armor protected him.
"No duh, P. Honestly," M hissed with a glare. "Tell that to little miss eye sore over here. This isn't my first time sneaking around this quadrant." Mac turned her attention to Clarity. "And you should've bloody changed your clothes. You're a walking target, that fabric fucking glints even when it's covered in mud."
"It's made of a special-actually I wasn't really listening when Cisco told me. I was a bit distracted by the amazing color, but this thing survived an explosion, it's the best protection I've got so it stays on." Clarity explained, "And uh, why, do you keep using initials?"
"Even just the first few initials of our names trigger an instant alert to Savage. P's been at this for a while and I got roped into it trying to help keep his sorry ass alive. We've been a team ever since and initials are safer. Single letters just by themselves are like background noise to drones."
Clarity nodded, "Makes se-oh my god." Clarity cut herself off, because she saw them, about 20 feet away. Cornered by Savage nowhere left to run were Miranda and Jonas. Clarity's first instinct was to glitch over to them but the cuff prevented her. M slamming her hand over Claritys mouth to muffle the scream, as excruciating waves of pain shot through her. That split second of trying to use her powers having triggered the faulty cuff.
"He can't be..he's never in the open like this." Perdegaton gripped his knife, seeing exactly who Clarity had. It wasn't just his soldiers attacking this area. It was Vandal Savage himself. Was this the moment to get his justice? To avenge his parents? Free everyone from this dictators rule? Could he even make it over without getting gunned down?
Perdegaton saw a feeble old man man try to go at one of the soldiers. Nothing but a block of wood in his hands. The soldier took him down with eased practice and it was then that Perdegaton could no longer just sit watching in the shadows. He had to move, to act. To defend those who couldn't defend themselves. He could think and dream of the peaceful zenith he once had baking cookies with his mother all the live long day, but he would never have times like those again. Not unless he acted.
Right.
Now.
He pulled up his scarf and pulled on his goggles. He sprung at the nearest guard vaulting off a rock, flipping on top of him knifing him under his helmet killing him instantly, silently slipping into ranks standing on top of the body no disregard for the fallen soldier. He then knifed the guard in front of him in the back, moving to fight the last one on the right, soldiers were starting to swarm him having caught sight of his attack.
"He's going to get himself killed, damnit P!" Mac cursed running to help him, leaving Clarity on the ground nothing really left to muffle her screaming.
M wasted no time scooping up the nearest rock bashing it against a soldiers head, this of course did nothing to injure him. But it succeeded in getting the soldiers attention. Mac punched him in the throat the soldier falling to its knees, a swift knee to the chin knocking him down. Not nearly as efficient or graceful as Perdegaton was managing, however it was the best she could do and he needed the help. He'd let his emotions cloud his judgement again and now they were in this mess.
"Cmon, think Clarity, you have to think." Clarity muttered to herself, pain leaking from her tone, her wrist was burning, her body felt like it was getting roasted by a live wire. She looked at the cuff on her wrist then to her hand, she had to ditch this thing, she'd stopped using her powers but it wasn't calming down, and it wouldn't be coming off not unless she... Clarity grimaced. Was she really going there? Was it worth it? Snart had suggested it so long ago when Mick had them cuffed, but now in this situation it looked like her only option. Clarity took one look at Miranda holding Jonas in her arms. Boxed in, Mac and Perry fighting Savages soldiers, Perry attempting to get to the tyrant, Max just trying to get to Perry, no escape for any of them. They needed her. She needed her powers. She was sure, it was worth it, there was no other way.
Clarity looked around for something sharp, after digging around her immediate vicinity for a few seconds she stumbled across a charred piece of metal that would seemingly do the job. She raised her arm gripping the shard tight in her hand and swiped down as hard as she could intent on cutting her hand off. However, the shard didn't hit her skin, a translucent forcefield wrapping around where she had went to hack off her hand because meta devices like these were sadistic in the future and people never liked making things easy.
"Oh c'mon!" Clarity complained, her voice cracking dropping the shard her entire body quivering in pain. She turned her attention back to the battle if one could even call it that, things weren't looking up. If anything it was only getting worse. Savage raised his gun towards Miranda, the woman standing up pushing Jonas behind her to protect him. Clarity could feel the gun revving up, power gathering to spew from the nozzle in a deadly blast. Perdegaton wasn't going to make it in time, the soldiers were crowding all around him, almost to the point of dog piling him. But he was still fighting, and slashing, and shooting dead bodies dropping, only for live ones to take their place not a second later. He wasn't gaining enough ground fast enough. Savage had his sights set on Miranda and Jonas the immortal uncaring for whatever foolish fray was occurring behind him. He was going to kill them, Rip's family was about to die at Savages hands. She'd never make it through all those soldiers, would never be able to beat Savage without her powers. And yet she was still going to try because no matter how much pain she was in she couldn't just stand there and watch innocents die.
Clarity jumped on a nearby soldiers back, the man having hunched over to puke up blood Perdegaton or possibly even Macrediagon having caused him internal injuries. "Sorry," She apologized to him, wincing slightly, "but if you didn't work for Vandy this wouldn't be happening."
From there Clarity jumped to another's shoulders, if she couldn't get through the fighting soldiers, or under or around. She'd just go over them using their helmets like stepping stones in a pond. It was her best shot at, she didn't even know. What was the plan? She was making it up as she went. There wasn't time to think. So many people were about to die, so many people were already dead, were currently dying and Clarity could still feel it all. Still sense everything, it was really very distracting.
Once she was close enough she dove tackling Savage from behind throwing off his aim just as he pulled the trigger, the gun flying from his hands as Clarity sent the immortals face, along with the rest of his body smashing into the concrete. The blast didn't hit Miranda like Savage had intended instead burning a hole inbetween the circular grating that had entrapped them. They were all small enough, they'd be able to squeeze through the two conjoined holes.
Clarity looked back at Mac and Perry. They were being swarmed by Savages soldiers. Mac could fit if she was able to get over here,but there was no way Perry could with his muscular build and even then would he even listen to her? He seemed intent on ending Savage right now.
However luckily, Mac got to Perry one look from her being all it took for him to realize just how bad of a plan attacking Savage like this was. She threw up a circular object stolen from a nearby guard. A flash grenade, Clarity realized as it went off. And the two retreated, slinking low and fast through the swarm of soldiers as the light blinded them. They weren't trained for such random changes in decisions.
Clarity took advantage of the flash grenade too, wordlessly ushering Miranda and Jonas through the small hole. Thus, the five of them escaped. Though their situation really wasn't any safer.
And this is where this chapter ends cause as you all know I am a very evil author hehehe. It's been so long I'm not even sure I know what I want to say to you all because sorry does not even begin to cut it. Can't tell you how many times this chapter got rewritten because I wasn't happy with it, but there really just comes a time in every authors life where you just go F it and post the damn thing and hope for the best so I can move on from this rut and get to the good stuff. Like oh I don't know books 2-5? 😁 so anywho here are the questions! Please answer them if you don't mind! I do love the feedback guys!
1. What did you think of this chapter? How'd it make you feel? Was it worth waiting forever?
2. Who are you shipping Clarity with? And why? Give a few reasons to support your shipping choice!
3. If Clarity was a candy what would she be and why?
4. What do you love most about Clarity?
5. Which character(s) out of the new legends (S2-5 characters) are you most excited for Clarity to meet and interact with and why?
crossover event are you most excited to see Clarity in? And why?
7. Is there anything you want to know more about regarding Clarity or other legends characters in this story?
8. Where do you think all the legends fall in this alignment?
9. Which characters do you think Clarity should interact with more and why?
10. What are you most excited for next chapter?
11. How should I celebrate Glitch surpassing 100k? Like what would you guys like me to do? Any suggestions?
12. Finish this sentence, "Clarity Springs is..."
13.
14. Anything else you'd like to ask, rant or tell me!