Hey guys! Glitch is back! Sorry, I know a week later than I said it would be up, but I made a last minute decision to switch the order of some scenes and combine ch's 40 and 41 into one single chapter and I think it came out better for it so anyways enjoy! Vote, comment, I think you all know the drill by this point!
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"The Leviathan's are encountering resistance." A woman sitting at a computer screen inside the the bunker informed Savage.
"Impossible." Savage glared rising from his chair. The monitor creating a small blue person labeled as the Glitch, beside her a giant blue form the same size as the four leviathans labeled itself as the Atom.
"Dr. Palmer." Savage sneered, Ray of course being viewed as, quite literally, the bigger threat in comparison to Clarity. "Clever."
"Sir?" The same woman asked turning her head to Savage awaiting orders.
"The threat may have grown but our objective has not changed. Kill these rebels and show no mercy. Make sure the Glitch goes down this time." Savage glared. "As an old friend once told me she always gets in the way."
"Okay. Come on. Ray, Clarity, you got this." Jax breathed out as he looked at all of Ray's sensors in his suit. Beside that scan Claritys vitals were all visible on the screen just like they usually were back at Star labs when Barry and Clarity would go out in the field. Jax playing quarterback once again wishing that Stein would finish healing up so he could actually fly out there and help. Even if he couldn't damage the leviathan that well with his fire, he could at least help Clarity get around easier. Teleporting all over the place was fine when you had somewhere to land, but those leviathans were taller than sky scrapers meaning the distance from the top of them to the ground was extremely far, further than Clarity was used to glitching while fighting which made it tiring for Clarity to constantly Glitch between them. Jax despised being sidelined like this. If only he could help, do more than just stare at some screen as his friends risked their lives.
Clarity jumped off the Waverider glitching onto the nearest leviathan's shoulder lightning bursting from her hands circling around the leviathans left wrist. She then pressed her hands to the leviathans neck just below its jaw the stream disconnecting from her palms reattaching to the spot she touched. The leviathan's fist which was originally headed to smash the Waverider swerved just before it could touch the ship as if there was a force pushing against it preventing the bot from so much as brushing the roof of the ship with its fingertips. The robots hand now going to punch itself in the face instead Clarity having magnetized the metal of the robots jaw with her lightning. However, the robots fist flew at its face far faster than the Glitch thought it would. Her powers being far more unruly and wild than she anticipated. Clarity shrieking as she glitched off it's shoulder to dodge the punch, not wanting to get flattened by its fist and get squished on the robots cheek, only to have another leviathan come up from behind and punch her mid air, the wind getting knocked out of her as if a wrecking ball had just crashed into her full swing. Clarity screaming in pain as the Glitch was sent flying, hurtling, wind biting harshly at her skin, as she flew through the air.
"Clarity!" Ray kicked the leviathan he'd been tussling with in the gut, Ray thought it was the third one but he couldn't be sure, and really at the moment he didn't care which one it was, shoving it away from him sending it crashing into the robot Clarity'd been fighting that now had its left fist permanently stuck to its face. The two robots getting knocked to the ground like a pair of dominoes. The Atom diving to catch Clarity in his cupped hands, skidding on his stomach dirt swirling around. He would have had badly skinned his elbows if not for his suits armor, even then the atom suit was going to need a new paint job.
"Clarity, hey are you okay?" Ray asked her cradling her in his cupped hands as if she was a hurt butterfly he found in his moms garden.
"I think so?"Clarity groaned wincing in pain trying to sit up pausing halfway to grip her side as pain flared. Ray gently ushered her to his left palm, offering her his right pointer finger to grab onto to help her up. "Thanks for the sa-" Clarity grabbed onto his finger only for a tremble in the ground to make her lose her balance, lose her grip on his finger and fall right back down. Her eyes wide as she saw a shadow looming across them. "Ray look out!"
Ray rolled out of the way just in time as the Leviathan's right foot went crashing down where he'd just been laying a crater now in the ground. A move that would have surely broken his back if not for Clarity's warning. But the dodge wasn't enough, the leviathan was quickly on top of him. A hand grabbing at his head forcing it into the dirt with a slam. Clarity glitching to help him but the leviathan was quick to swat her to the ground as well.
With both heroes momentarily down, occupied with the second leviathan. Ray being held down, Clarity struggling to get out of a forcefield it had just placed around her, the waverider was momentarily undefended left wide open to be attacked by the other leviathans. The two toppled ones already getting back up.
"Gideon evasive maneuvers!" Miranda ordered, the ship flying sharply downwards twisting and spinning through the air to avoid getting grabbed by the leftmost leviathan. "Attention everyone you're going to want to hang on, things are going to get rough from here." With that said Miranda clicked the intercom off. All that extra power being diverted to the coms of those fighting. "It's damn good that's just how I like things."
"Does Rip know you like it that way?" Jax asked raising an eyebrow grinning slightly as he clung to the console. With Stein sleeping through the pain there was no one around to tell him to focus or berate him for his question.
"Oh, he knows." Miranda smiled to herself, "don't you dear?" However, she got no reply from Rip, the sound of static greeting her. Worry instantly pitted in her stomach. She clutched the lever just a bit tighter. "Rip? Come in." Nothing but static. "Status report, did you all make it? Are you alright, love?" Still no answer. "Rip Hunter, You answer me right now." Miranda snapped into the coms, but still she got no reply whatsoever.
"Sara? Snart? Does anybody copy over there?" Jax tried, wondering if maybe it was just Rip's com offline. Still they received no response. Static filling the coms.
-meanwhile inside the leviathan-
"Damnit external coms are down," Rip tapped at his now useless earpiece getting nothing but static. Rip fiddled with Clarity's good luck charm bracelet on his wrist that he'd still yet to gift back to her. "We've lost contact with the outside."
"Great, so now we get to crawl through this iron giant without all the unnecessary flirting between you and the Mrs." Snart said adjusting his gun on his leg. "What a disaster. How long til we get moving?"
"We've also lost contact with Clarity and Ray." Sara pointed out one hand on her hip. "They're not going to know when they can safely take this leviathan down without killing us all if we can't reach them."
"They're smart. The super nerds'll figure something out." Mick replied. "We shouldn't waste time yapping. Haircut messed up and threw us too low, he was supposed to aim for the head."
"M, we need a map."Perry told the red haired woman resting a hand on her shoulder nodding to a control panel. "Go do your thing."
M nodded walking over ripping open the panel. She flipped open a bracelet on her wrist revealing a hidden keypad inside plugging a wire into a port beginning to hack into the system to download a map of the robot's interior.
"You'd risk alerting my father to our infiltration?" Cassandra asked Perry. "I'm all the map you rebels need. This is a waste of time."
"Forgive me if I don't trust Vandals daughter to lead us anywhere." Perry replied with a glare. "There was a time when I felt he was more of a father to me than my own. I know the loyalty that man inspires."
"She's not just his daughter." Kendra spoke up in her child's defense. "She's mine too. If she says she can get us to him without being spotted, that she's on our side, then I believe her."
"And you of all people know the loyalty that a mother can inspire, Perdegaton." Rip replied looking pointedly at Perdegaton though if Rip was being honest with himself. He didn't trust Cassandra Savage either.
"Yeah, by the way feathers are we going to talk about that?" Todd wondered. "You're gonna have her with that immortal psychopath."
"He coerced my memoryless future self into a relationship with him. Wouldn't be the first life he's tried to be with me." Kendra replied trying to erase the thought from her mind. She could only hope that her future self didn't have her memory's. "What more is there to talk about?"
"Perhaps the fact that she isn't even his daughter." M spoke up as she typed away.
"Impossible," Cassandra denied narrowing her eyes.
"M, those were just rumors." Perdegaton shook his head.
"Rumors?" Rip asked, or perhaps he was just genuinely curious having been away and out of the loop for so long. "What rumors?"
"Around the time that Cassie here-"
"Don't call me that." She glared.
"Fine full god awful name it is then. No wonder you hate your father with a name like that-"
"P, get to the point." M interrupted, "I'm almost done over here."
"When the lady Cassandra," Perdegaton purposefully used the title, "Was born there were talks among the soldiers. M and I'd listen in sometimes, try to see if they said anything of importance about troop movements. Apparently, the adjunct to lord Savage was caught having some sort of relations with the lady Savage a few months prior. No one knows what happened to him after though. Most likely he's dead in a ditch somewhere."
"If it is true it wouldn't be the first life I've been stuck in a relationship with him and cheated." Kendra took off her helmet turning to Mac. "Are you going to be a lot longer? The coms seem like the bigger problem. My daughter already agreed to guide us to the bunker."
"The JSA did just fine without all your fancy gadgets when we'd get separated." Todd spoke up. "You people rely too much on all this tech crap. It might be useful but it holds you back."
"That may be Mr. Rice, but Miss Lance is right without a way to make contact with the outside I fear there is no way for them to safely bring this leviathan down." Rip replied. "Not without killing us all in the process."
"So, what are you suggesting we do?" Snart asked with an incline of his head. "Splitting up doesn't seem like a bright idea. This place is crawling with more soldiers than a swarm of killer bees, we fan out into smaller groups we're more likely to be discovered and if that happens we won't have the numbers to fight them off before they can alert Savage."
"Which is why we stay together." Rip confirmed as he studied the map that was 99.9% downloaded on Mac's arm. "Fortunately it appears Savage's bunker is located near the brain. That's exactly where the signal will be jammed from. We split up when we get there. Let's move."
Unfortunately Rip should not have put his hand on the wall where he did when he went to stand up because the man set off one of Savage's many silent alarm pressure sensors.
"One of our sensors was just tripped. The lower hulls been breached. I'm counting nine unauthorized unknowns. What would you like me to do? Sir?" A random computer lackey in the bunker asked. Savage looked back at him calmly despite the rage he was feeling at being opposed. So that had been what Dr. Palmer had thrown, not a failed lightning based attack from Clarity, but his team encased in a sphere of lightning to infiltrate his base.
"Do nothing. Let them come. I've heard and witnessed all I need to defeat them." Savage replied head held high. Confident in his abilities to sew discourse between them all.
"What? But sir-"
"You dare to question me?" Vandal glared so hard at the man it was a miracle he didn't burst into flames right there. "The game has just begun."
-back outside-
"Clarity, we've lost contact with Rip and the others inside." Miranda continued to fret. "Gideon's tried fixing it, but something is jamming the signal from going in. Can you force it through?"
"No, sorry, my control isn't what it usually is right now. I could blow them up by mistake if I overload them. And even if I could, I'm a little busy right now!" Clarity replied as she dangled precariously from Handface's jaw having just magnetized it's other hand to its face as well. The metal painfully digging into Claritys fingers blood trickling down her arms as she clung to the sharpened edge. Her legs kicking struggling to get any footing on the leviathans surface.
Clarity let go falling until she kicked off the leviathans chest getting some distance, she flipped through the air as soon as she faced the right way her arms crossed in opposite directions straight out in front of her, fingers splayed and curled, lightning striking around her hurtling towards the leviathan in an uncontrollable surge. The bolts flew in between the leviathans skull as Clarity focused with all her might, the sound of metal crunching tore threw the air as the fists met in the middle in a fist bump the head smushed in between them, green liquid spurting like a geiser splattering the ground with green goopy liquid. The first leviathan of the night falling to the ground in a useless crash.
"One down three to go." Clarity gasped out, struggling to reign her lightning back in, glitching to go after another leviathan. Of course she couldn't do the same thing twice. The giant robots learning and studying both her and Ray's movements. Getting smarter with each passing second, absorbing any lightning from Clarity each time she landed on one. Not to mention her powers were so raw and wild she was having major difficulties using them the way she wanted to. Her whole body ached a headache pounding in her skull. Was it just her or was the air kind of thin up in the sky like she was?
"Ray, you listening man? Don't just wrestle with him. Remember, you got laser blasters." Jax reminded as he leaned on the console looking over Ray and Claritys vitals. Ray's were normals and Claritys...Jax wasn't entirely sure what was going on there but she seemed fineish. The atom still pinned to the ground by a leviathan. The other remaining two busy trying to crush the waverider and kill Clarity.
"Actually, they're compressed light beams." Ray corrected Jax using his rocket boots to zip on out from under the robot, he was too big to fly, so his back scraped painfully against the ground, even with the suits exoskeleton it was painful, especially when a broken tree found its way into his shoulder, Ray crying out in pain as it stabbed him, but it was worth it to get himself into a standing position even if his legs were shaking, well they weren't, the atom suit providing maximum stability, but if Ray didn't have on the suit his legs would definitely be shaking. The genius pulling the branch out of his shoulder blood trickling down his back under his suit. Not a feeling that Ray enjoyed.
"Well, whatever they're called, just hit him with them." Jax told him. Ray did as Jax advised, pointing both arms in front of him aiming at the leviathans chest sending the leviathan staggering back falling onto its back. Ray shot it not letting up until there was a gaping hole in its neck, head detaching from its body rolling off like a stray bowling ball, green grossness trickling out in a stream.
"Oh, come on! Yeah!" Jax cheered, Jonas clapping his hands the biggest grin on his face. Unfortunately that excitement was short lived.
"Bollocks." Miranda swore under her breath, low enough that Jonas hadn't heard, as the ship was hit with a menacing blast from one of the leviathans. The entire waverider shaking and rocking.
"Gideon!" Miranda's heart raced. "Systems diagnostic, where were we hit?"
"Time Drive failure, Commander. The mains are offline." Gideon informed her, regret clear in her voice. Miranda risked a moment to look back at Jonas, her little boy, then to Jax who was very focused on what was happening with the others outside. No she wouldn't risk herself. Jonas needed her and Jax must have known what he signed on for agreeing to go on this mission.
"Jax. I'm going to need your assistance in fixing the Time Drive." Miranda called over her shoulder.
"Wait, what if Jax can't get the ship moving again?" Ray frowned, as he kicked the dismembered leviathan's head like a soccer ball at the one Clarity was currently fighting. Successfully throwing off its concentration so it couldn't grab her like it almost had.
"Oh, thanks for the vote of confidence." Jax dryly replied, shaking his head.
"Sorry," Ray apologized. "What I meant was that if the time drive can't be repaired, we can't enter the Time Stream. We'll be Marooned in World War 3."
"Yeah, uh, lets not do that!" Clarity pleaded tears gathering in her eyes blurring her vision. Her whole body bursting with power, lightning crackling all over her skin which you'd think was a good thing given the predicament they were in, but it hurt. It hurt so bad. With every pulse of her lightning came a throb of pain. Her body still wasn't used to being in such a futuristic environment and as a result her nerves were terribly overstimulated. Not to mention, she'd absorbed far too much power when the leviathan had exploded. They'd only been here three days and for most of the days her powers had been forced down, suppressed with a dampener. Now that they were free? Her powers were seemingly untamable. Clarity struggling to keep her lightning under control, her combat boots starting to loose their tread as the black bottoms started to melt from her powers. "I can't stay here. I really really can't. My powers-"
"One problem at a time. Calm down. No need to worry. As I'm sure my husband has told you countless times before the Jumpship is equipped with an auxiliary Time Drive, capable of a one-time jump back to 2016 where you're all from. Jax, do you need me to talk you through it?"
"No, you focus on keeping us in the air. Rip, has been teaching me about the ship a little bit and I already read the manual cover to cover so I'll do my best." Jax nodded to Miranda, ruffling Jonas's hair. "Keep an eye the screen little guy. I'll be back."
"That's the spirit." Miranda grinned, but it was quick to fall. She only hoped it would go over well. "God help us."
-back with Savage squad-
"Why are all the snacks in the future sugar-free?" Mick complained as he ate a cupcake.
"Where did you even get that?" Kendra wondered as she turned around to look at Mick.
"We passed the guard break room a few corridors back." Todd replied munching on a cookie of his own.
"So much for progress." Snart complained, grabbing Todd's wrist, leaning into Todd's personal space stealing a bite of his.
"Are you seriously eating snacks right now? Clarity is fighting for her life out there." Sara looked to the trio a small frown tugging at her lips. As more of an after thought she added. "Miranda and Ray are too."
"The blonde is...is that chocolate chip?" Perry pointed to an uneaten cookie in Mick's hand.
"Ugh, P! Now is not the time for cookies!" M slapped his arm. "Focus!"
"Quiet all of you." Rip ordered, "We've got company up ahead."
"9 guards." Perry counted peering around the corner of a hall.
"One for each us." Sara nodded her head picking out her mark separating her staff into her batons.
"We all have to strike at the same time so none of them can alert Savage. Ready?" Rip pulled out his gun, voice low and whispered. "Go!" At least that's what would have happened if the door hadn't 'malfunctioned' Sara getting trapped in with the nine of them. Little did they know Savage was watching them all, orchestrating this whole thing, he'd seen how Rip relied on Sara's input. She'd accompanied him many a time in his efforts to thwart him. Time to sew some doubt there.
"Guess I'm doing this on my own." Sara twirled her staffs running to take out the nearest the soldier. The button to open the doors on the other side of the hall. She winced as there was a shrill sound in her com and then she heard Savage's voice crystal clear in her ear.
"Have you spoken with your sister Laurel lately?" Sara's gut churned as the immortal said her sisters name. Guess they'd lost the element of surprise.
"How do you know so much about us?" Sara demanded as she broke one guards neck. Springing at another his helmet cracking as it met her knee after bouncing his head into a wall.
"Oh, I've only had 191 years to research my enemies." Savage replied calmly watching Sara fight on the screen. The assassin taking out soldier after soldier with practiced skill.
"Well, then you'd know I don't scare that easily." Sara replied, taking a single moment to look back at the door. She could hear banging and guns blasting no doubt her teammates were trying to get through.
"You should be scared... of Captain Hunter. His obsession to save his family will be the death of you all." Savage warned.
"Thanks for the tip." Sara replied. "Enjoy being alive for the next 10 minutes. We're coming for you."
"Captain Hunter lies to you so often, and still you persist in believing him. You do know why he selected all of you for this endeavor, don't you?" Savage asked pacing in front of his bunkers ginormous screen arms clasped behind him.
"Great bone structure?" Sara proposed, as she broke a soldiers leg sending him falling into the pile of bodies littering the floor.
"He chose people he could manipulate, people that would believe his lies." Savage replied as if he hadn't even heard Sara's comment.
"Well, the lies I don't believe are yours." Sara replied finishing off the last guard with a swift high kick to his throat.
"Do you blame him for putting his family's lives first?" Savage proposed planting one last seed which would grow into distrust. "Or are you ashamed that you left your family without your own protection?"
"I'd tell you to go to hell, but you'd probably just feel at home there." Sara finally made it through the guards. Punching the button that would release the doors. The com line going dead and staticky once again.
"Nicely done Miss Lance." Rip told her.
"Yeah, well not nice enough. Savage knows we're here. He's not just jamming our coms. He's hijacking them." Sara told him. "Him and I just had a chat."
"We've got to hurry, let's pick up the pace. Does he know Cassandra is with us?" Rip asked grabbing her arm.
"I don't think so." Sara replied shaking her head.
"Good." Rip nodded. "Obsidian block the cameras with your smoke. Mr. Snart, Mr. Rory, Ice and burn the walls as we go. Whatever sensors this leviathan holds shouldn't be able to track us that way."
"Should've been doing that from the start." Kendra muttered under her breath.
-Back outside-
"Okay, I've got eyes on the Time Drive." Jax informed, as he peered at it. "There seems to be a large crack in it."
"Well, if the housing's intact, you should be all right. Listen closely now, You're going to need to re-route the power from the secondary manifold, but as soon as you do that you have to get out of there quickly and stay low. Dive out the door if you have to. There may be a surge and you do not want to get hit with temporal radiation."
"Okay." Jax nodded, focusing on his task. "I'm on it. "
"Standing so tall with the stench of defeat written all over you." Savage sneered his voice clear as day in Ray's com. "You're a smart man are you not, Dr. Palmer? I must warn you to give up now. You will not like what will befall you if this continues."
"Trying to get under my skin? Is that it?" Ray panted as he stood in front of the two remaining leviathans. Blood dripping from a cut on his forehead, his glass visor cracked. Clarity standing safely on top of the waverider catching her breath as she shook, doubled over clutching at her sides. Her powers weren't content with being let out in small bursts like she was doing, the excess energy she'd absorbed from the first battle was finally catching up with her now that the dampener was gone and it wanted out, but Clarity was unsure if she'd be able to control it when it did. "Got your little game figured out."
"For all your intelligence," Savage began to mock. "You still didn't manage to save your dearest Anna. I married my love in this life. Wouldn't you rather do the same with yours? Why waste time fighting me when you could go save her?"
"I wouldn't expect a psychopath like you to understand." Ray glared. "Kendra is free to do what she wants. She shouldn't be forced to be with you." Ray grunted locking arms with the third leviathan, the waverider busy dodging the leviathan that contained Savages bunker. "I know Kendra, I've seen the look in her eyes whenever you're mentioned and she doesn't deserve what you've put her through."
"You know what I see when I look at you? I see weakness masquerading as goodness. You may think you know her in this life, but I know Chay-Ara, better than she even knows herself. And I know the man who stands between you and your love has stood between me and mine for millennia." Savage explained head held high. "We're actually quite alike, you and I."
"We're nothing alike." Ray seethed, kneeing the leviathan in the gut. "You're insane."
"But yet Chay-Ara once loved me as your Anna once professed to love you. Oh, you didn't know that, did you? I expect not. I don't even think Chay-Ara remembers, but 4,000 years ago I discovered that my Chay-Ara had been reborn but with no memory of what had happened." Vandal reminisced.
"Like you murdering her and Carter." Ray shook his head. Wheezing as the leviathan punched him in the side.
"True. She had no recollection of my... my crime of passion. And she fell in love with me, very deeply. And I with her. We even had a child."
"That is perverse." Ray denied punching the leviathan back.
"No, that is fact. That is history. And we were happy, Dr. Palmer, very happy. None of us blinded by our cursed past until he stole the happiness that we shared because he could not get over what I had not yet done, Dr. Palmer."
"No. No." Ray denied, "Rip is a good man. All he is trying to do is save his family. And you are my only enemy."
"Am I?" Savage chuckled, these imbeciles still having no idea he was aligned with the time masters. "Or am I just a man experiencing the same things as you are right now?"
"I'm not the one trapped in a metal behemoth about to topple over." Ray replied, even though in a way he really was.
"Well, if it weren't for this behemoth as you so adequately described my leviathan, you wouldn't have that trepidacious look on your face."
"You think I'm afraid of you?" Ray stared into the leviathans eyes.
"No. I know you are." Savage replied, Ray threw punch after punch at the leviathan he was fighting anger clouding his head. Leaving him open for an attack.
"Oh...You feel better now, Dr. Palmer?" Savage grinned his hand hovering over a menacing button.
"Not even close." Ray replied even as parts of his suit sparked and blood dripped from his temple.
"And I thought you were nothing like me." Savage slammed his hand down on the big red button. The leviathan's jaw dropped open and Ray was hit with an enormous energy blast that knocked him to the ground on the verge of unconsciousness a burnt hole denting his atom suit.
"Ray!" Clarity yelled her hands clasped over her mouth in horror as the leviathan turned in her direction.
"I'll leave you to contemplate on that." Savage told him. "I have more pressing matters to attend to." Of course those pressing matters were merely speaking with Clarity now so she would be too distracted to help Ray. The third leviathan going after her now as it sought a new target.
"What a disappointment you have turned out to be." Savage's voice rang through Clarity's com. "When I first encountered you I admit I was fascinated, such power inside of you, but now I have come to see how wasted that power truly was on a woman who simply cannot handle the gift she was given. So much potential squandered on the likes of a Glitch, a fitting name for such a mistake as yourself."
Clarity didn't reply her hand going to her com trying to disrupt the signal get Savage out of her ear, but she didn't have enough time, having to Glitch again as she almost got squashed like an ant by the third leviathans foot. She spotted a nearby electrical tower a good distance away. She glitched to that hanging on to it in an attempt to catch her breath as the leviathan stalked towards her. The waverider still struggling to dodge the fourth, Ray struggling to regain consciousness.
"You don't know what you're talking about monkey man." Clarity rested her forehead against the cool metal. Sweat clinging to her skin she closed her eyes for a second trying to maintain her focus.
"Don't I?" Savage prodded, "I know better than most what it is like to be given a power fallen from the sky that you do not yet understand. Tell me Clarity does your precious team know what you've done? Because I do, a fast friend of mine once told me. That's the thing about past lives, timelines that have altered can be remembered with millennia of practice."
"Fast friend?" Clarity whispered in confusion, he couldn't be talking about Thawne could he? Her grip tightening on the metal structure as she watched the leviathan closing in on her. She had to think of a plan to take it down like she did the others but she wasn't as big and strong as Ray was. To make matters worse her curiosity getting the better of her even now. "What are you talking about?"
"December 13th, the year 2013. Flight 4582 departed its destination at 6:00am with approximately 169 passengers on board. Men, Women, children, two babes so new the world they did not yet have any names aside from their parents last. But it did not reach its destination did it, Clarity?"
"Stop." Clarity told him, her blood running cold, she didn't want to think about that. Not ever again, just like how she didn't want to think about what she felt the leviathan had done to all those people, except worse because it hadn't been a leviathan who stopped those peoples hums on that plane, sparks shooting out of the cell tower, lightning running in waves along it.
"You masquerade yourself as a hero, but inside you are just as much of a monster as I am." Savage continued on as if he hadn't heard Clarity say anything at all. "Join me, Clarity. Embrace the true nature of your abilities as they were meant to be used. I can help you reach your full potential just as-"
"Don't. I never want to hear his name again! You once thought I was insane? Well, all these years of reincarnation must have turned you senile if you think I'd ever join you." Claritys lightning tore out of her from all sides in an uncontrollable surge unable to hold the power in any longer. The metal tower she was a top of rose into the air, the metal melting, bending twisting, breaking apart into tiny bits and pieces swirling around as the lightning grew longer and and higher Clarity forming a giant lightning body to stand against the leviathan. The only problem? The construct was already falling apart a stray lightning bolt dangerously close to striking the waverider.
"Last chance, Vandy. You better go find a banana if you don't have one. Pretty sure they don't have those in hell and that's exactly where you're going." Clarity's lightning structure, that kind of formed a giant lightning person if you were squinting really hard, but really looked more like a swirling flickery blob thing that looked much cooler in Clarity's imagination, moving to take on the third leviathan and bring it down.
-back in Savage's leviathan-
"Quite the reversal of fortune, isn't it, Gareeb?4,000 years ago it was you who embarked on a mission to save your child." Savage's voice chimed in Rips ear, as the time master now walked along the brain of the leviathan to get into position. While doing so, he noticed something quite odd about the technology. "And now it is I who am endeavoring to save mine. Ever since I met you again, I've always wondered how you managed to escape."
"Another time, perhaps." Rip replied his fists clenching, the dictator was just trying to get a rise out of him. He couldn't lose his head, not now and certainly not here. Not when he'd just discovered something so significant. Mac downloading the brains schematics on her arm as everyone rushed to get into position to surround all of Savage's possible escape routes.
"For the moment, I'm more interested in this. The brains to your robot super-weapon. At least a century more advanced than anything to be found in 2166."
"Do you have something to ask me?" Savage grinned.
"How did you obtain the ability to travel through time?" Rip demanded fist clenching.
"From you." Savage replied as if the answer was simple. "When I saw you again in 1975, I realized that time travel was the only explanation. You showed a caveman fire. And I had almost 200 years to figure out how to strike the flame."
"All this time, I've been wondering why it was so difficult to locate you throughout history. Because you've been moving through history." Rip realized, stalling really. Waiting for everyone to signal that they were in position. Savage was most exposed in his bunker. They couldn't afford to have him take cover in a winding hall.
"Well, you'll come to learn that this is just one of many things we have in common, Gareeb. We're both doing what we must to save the world." Savage replied.
"Subjugating the world to your rule is not saving it. You would create a wasteland and call it peace." Rip quoted, his nails digging into his palm now. Kendra was almost in position up above, Snart icing the outer layer of the bunker ceiling so she could break through and catch Savage off guard.
"Do not misquote Tacitus to me. I knew him well. I have lived long enough to watch civilizations rise and fall. You weep for your son. I have held dozens of my children as they perished from old age. You might be a Time Master, but I'm a master of time." Savage told Rip, as soon as he finished with things here then he would go kill Miranda and Jonas. That he was certain of. "And I play a far deeper game than you could ever hope to comprehend."
"I'd imagine so father." Cassandra spoke up stepping out of the shadows into the bunker everybody finally in their places.
"I've been so worried." Savage cleared the distance between him and his daughter"How did you..."
"I am your daughter." Cassandra replied as Savage chuckled, but there was something in her eyes now. A lingering uncertainty that maybe just maybe...Vandal wasn't her father after all. Though Cassandra did her very best to hide it. "Did you really think some rabble could hold me captive? It was easy to slip away once I tricked them to get me inside."
"Rabble? These are the time travelers I warned you of." Savage grabbed her wrist noticing the missing bracelet.
"Father?" Cassandra asked feigning confusion. She knew all too well what he was so upset about. It had been her mother's afterall.
"Your bracelet. It's gone." Savage looked at her with the fury of a thousand suns.
"I-I must have lost it in my escape."she replied, a second of hesitation, where there shouldn't have been any. She was trained better than that and yet she couldn't fight back that stammer.
"Ah." Savage tightened his grip on her wrist. "As the person who tutored you in the art of deceit, you cannot fool me, Cassandra."
"Like you fooled me? You told me my mother died from the Armageddon Virus. But you were the one who released it. Tell me it isn't true. I might even pretend to believe you."
"Let me go." Cassandra told him trying to twist her wrist out of her fathers hold as it grew painful.
"Call them. Call the ones that you no doubt helped gain access to my bunker." Savage demanded."
"No need to trouble yourself, Miss Savage." Rip announced as they all took their cue dramatically walking into the bunker from various directions save for Kendra who was still trying to hype herself up to take Savage down. "We're already here."
"Oh, I admire your command of irony, Gareeb... Using my own child against me." Savage greeted, he threw knives at his lackeys about to off the computer staff so they could not be used against him like his daughter had been. Their knowledge of the robot even greater than Cassandra's. However none of the knives hit their intended targets like Savage intended, Perdegaton leaping over catching every single one. He dropped each one to the ground metal clinking against the floor.
"M, get our coms working again." Perdegaton told her. M nodded, doing as Perdegaton told her. "If my people value my protection from this menace they'll help you."
"Your people?" Savage demanded as he glared.
"Mr. Savage you remember Perdegaton." Rip nodded his head smirking lightly as Perry pulled down his red scarf so it rested on his neck making his face visible. Rip felt a certain pride stirring within him. Clarity had been right about making Perdegaton an obstacle it was actually paying off. "The pupil whose life, whose family, you'd destroyed in your conquest for more power. He's on our side now."
"I was deceived." Savage snarled in realization looking murderously at Perry seeing that it was in fact the pupil that he thought was long since dead.
"Sorry to say it didn't take much." Snart pointed his gun towards the soldiers that all started to gather.
"Not to mention your cookies suck." Todd added, smoke swirling around him. "They didn't have any sugar."
"None at all, you ass." Mick stared the dictator down his fire gun flaming up. Contemplating murdering him himself just for the crappy food.
"They showed me the truth of what you've done." Cassandra growled.
"Just as they did for me." Perry chimed Atobot knife in hand. "My parents, all the people who've suffered by your hands. All the ones who I couldn't save...this is the day they shall be avenged."
"The innocent..." Cassandra started only to be angrily cut off by her father.
"Do not speak as if either of you know anything about ruling a people." Savage berated, his tone that of a disobeyed teacher at his wits end. "Do you really want to align your fate with these... pretenders? They're nothing but grains of sand in the desert of time."
"You are a monster." Cassandra snapped ripping her arm out of her fathers hold going to stand by Perry as a sharp cracking noise was heard.
"She's here. I can sense her." Savage feeling Kendra near. He chuckled arms out facing the legends. "You do realize that she can do me no harm?"
"Clearly, you didn't get the memo." Mick told Savage as Sara extended her batons. Guards rushing into the room.
"Aah!" Kendra broke through the ceiling wings flapping, her mace dangling as she tackled Savage closer to the back of the room away from the teammates. She landed on her feet wings sliding back into her body. She slammed her mace into his arm which Savage grabbed, his face a mixture of pained and enraged.
-back outside-
"Get up, Ray. Get up." Jax told him back at the monitor having successfully dodged the surge thanks to Miranda's warning. "We all need you man. It's the final inning right now. You can't quit, you took a hit but there's no time to stay down and die. You got a choice to make right now. You got to choose to get up and fight. You got to choose to live." Ray struggled to his feet his eyes snapping open. He sprinted at the third leviathan, Clarity holding it with her lightning, struggling to keep it in place away from the waverider, as giant tendrils of lightning latched onto it, wrapping and traveling around its arms and legs, Clarity barely keeping herself in the air as she stood on a cluster of scrap metal magnetized to the robots chest. With all of his might Ray punched the leviathans head clean off its shoulder.
"Whoo! Come on!" Jax jumped up drumming his hands on the console. "That's what I'm talking about, baby!"
-back inside Savage's Leviathan-
"I had it covered." Snart told Cassandra as she threw a knife at a soldier who was about to kill him. Mick having already body tackled a soldier going for Sara. Todd doing his best to pin fallen soldiers down with his smoke so they couldn't get back up again.
"Sure, you did." Cassandra replied, just as Perdegaton saved her from being taken out.
"I'm sure you had that covered, Cassie." Perry winked at her turning his attention to Mac. "M how we doing on those coms?"
"Almost got it," Mac replied as she typed, "Damnit, there's interference-from there's nothing around to make this thing go on the fritz!" M slammed her hands down on the keyboard in frustration.
"Keep trying, you'll get through." Rip told her as he punched a soldier with his gun. "I'm sure Miranda's having Gideon try as well."
"This is for Carter." Kendra went to finish off Savage but a guard soon got in between them. Kendra and the guard fought and he was the one who ended up on the ground his helmet falling off revealing his identity.
"Your love..." Savage grunted rising from the floor as Kendra kneeled by Carters side. "Reincarnated. He doesn't even remember who he was... and he never will."
"What?" Kendra demanded her eyes flashing red.
"When I first discovered him, when I found out that he had no idea about his real identity, I took my precautions and I locked his mind away."
"You brainwashed him!" Kendra screamed her wings springing out as she slashed at Savage's chest throwing him back.
"Come on!" Savage goaded her. "Strike me down. Kill me. But do so knowing that I am the only one holding the key to his mind."
"Kendra, what are you waiting for? Finish him!" Rip yelled are her.
"Destroy me, and you doom him." Savage reminded thinking he had more than enough leverage to save himself.
"It's Carter." Kendra nodded to the fallen soldier.
"The reinforcements are coming!" Sara pointed out as the sound of rushing soldiers could be heard coming towards them.
"Whatever you plan on doing, Kendra, do it!" Mick exclaimed as he punched a guy, the soldier dropping.
"If I kill Savage, his mind will be lost." Kendra replied as she warred with herself over what to do now. That little rumor Perdegaton has heard making so much more sense now.
"And if you don't, I will lose my wife and son." Rip reminded her, hoping praying that Kendra would make the right decision. She'd had hundreds of years of happiness with Carter. Thousands of lives...could he not spend his one with his wife and child?
"Well, my love, what's it gonna be, huh? Come on!" Savage goaded her, Kendra looked between Savage and Carter, making her choice. She went to take the swing, believing that their love was strong enough to overcome Savage as it was in every life. That they'd always come back to each other and they'd have the chance to truly be together, get married, have children of their own who wouldn't meet a grisly fate. That she'd avenge them all right here, avenge herself, avenge Carter, finally kill this bastard, but she was thrown off her feet as her mace magnetized to the wall. Clarity having lost control of her lightning outside as her construct broke apart. Savage's Leviathan being brought down right along with the waverider. Ray shrinking all the way down to his tiny atom size to dodge the menacing bolts, growing just in time to normal size to catch an unconscious Clarity.
Rip coughed, groaning in pain on the floor. Todd having wrapped as much of the team as he could in his smoke to cushion the fall. Normal smoke filling the damaged room. "Kendra, you've got to-got to kill him. He can't-"
"I can't. I'm so sorry, Rip. I can't." Kendra was by his side helping him up. "Savage, he's gone I don't know where he went."
Little did Kendra know then but Savage had taken the jumpship hidden with the leviathan in the commotion and had gone to kill Miranda and Jonas. You all saw how that turned out with Clarity and Perdegaton already.
"We need to get back to the ship!" Rip called to the infiltration group. Hoping beyond hoping that the rest of his team outside, Clarity, Miranda and Jonas were alright as well.
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And that's a wrap for chapter 40! I hope you enjoyed it! I know it was fun to write mixing everything up like I did. Next chapter is kind of going to be the same in a way, Mixing canon dialogue and original scenes all around cause I found the finale kind of boring but don't worry that won't be the case here! Now as always, here are questions for you to answer!
1. Should I save Snart? Why or why not?
2. Should I kill Miranda and or Jonas why or why not?
3. What did you think of this chapter? Be honest. How did it make you feel? What did you like and/or hate about it? I'd love to know!
4. If I made a Clarity drawing contest would you enter?
5. If you could spend the day with Clarity what would you do?
6. Who do you think hurt Clarity more her ex or eobard and why?
7. Who are you shipping Clarity with? Why are you shipping this person with Clarity? Why do you want them to be together so badly? What makes you think they'd be so good together? Why do you ship them? I wanna know peoples!
8. If Clarity got a pet on a legends mission what do you think it would be?
9. What do you think Claritys strengths and weaknesses are?
10. In what ways do you think I could improve this or even future Glitch stories?
11. What would you like to see Clarity wear more than anything?
12. Finish this sentence, "Glitch is..."
13. How are you holding up?
14. Anything else you'd like to ask, rant and or tell me?