Chapter 5 – A Mother Scorned

Diana Trevor landed onto the factory roof with the grace and intensity of an Olympic gymnast. It was as if the past 20 years had never happened. Here she was, her raven hair oscillating in the air, the white snow falling slowly in suspended animation, her heart pumping rich oxygenated blood throughout her body. She was a combustion engine, a furnace. She felt alive again.

And all this time she had been a mother to a family: a 9-to-5 work day, Sunday morning breakfast, PTA meetings. She didn't want to say it: but this felt so much better.

"Clark," said Diana, motioning towards the entrance latch on the rooftop. "Over here."

"It's locked," said Clark, picking up the chain tied around on the hatch handle. "Did you bring any bolt cutters?

"Bolt cutters? Clark, darling, you must be joking—?"

Diana snapped apart the chain as if it were a doughy pretzel. Clark looked at her meekly.

Diana inhaled a lungful of the cold snowy air; the cold was delicious against the burning building of lactate in her chest.

"Let's go." She climbed down the hatch.

The air changed rapidly as they descended. Thick, viscous vapours obscured their vision, clung to their skin, and made breathing an arduous labor.

As they entered the main manufacturing plant, Clark fell into a bout of coughing. Diana threw him a dirty look.

"W—what?" he said. "It's not my f—fault."

"Why don't you throw up a big sign that we're here?" she said, annoyed.

They heard the commotion of movement within minutes. Thousands of footsoldiers crossing steel catwalks that extended a hundred feet in the air. At the bottom were the main vats, where men in chemical suits poured barrels of chemicals into the reactor vessels.

"Look," said Clark quietly. "In the corner."

Soldiers loaded dozens of sealed barrels on pallets onto large semi-trucks. Clearly, those barrels were the finished product—Roland's serum that turned average people into super mutated monsters.

"We're too late," said Clark. "He's already shipped it out."

"Cut off the head of the snake," said Diana firmly. "Once Roland is out of the picture, we can leave the clean-up duties to the authorities."

"Right," said Clark, although he did not sound convinced.

Up ahead were two footsoldiers leaning on a railing. Their faces were slick with sweat and steam.

"I just don't understand why we don't do it already," said one of the soldiers. He sipped on a coffee as he rubbed his forehead. "We've been making tons of this stuff for weeks."

"He's waiting," said the other soldier. He lit up a cigar as he spoke.

"Waiting? Waiting for what? For the freak from Metropolis to show up? And that other one – the Amazon."

"He's waiting for backup. Roland says without it, we don't stand a chance."

"Please," said the other soldier, laughing. "This stuff Roland gave us makes us invincible. I swear, I would have loved to have been at ACE chemicals when that woman attacked. I give her one minute against me."

"Typical man," said Diana, stepping out of the shadows. "Always lying about how long he can last."

The soldier sipping the coffee spit it out in surprise. But that's all he had time to do. Diana flew forward and smacked his head against the railing with enough force to crack a baseball bat.

The coffee cup fell to the ground, spilling its brown liquid on the floor.

The other soldier still had the cigar in his mouth. He pulled on the cigar for several seconds before breathing out the smoke.

"I suppose it was only a matter of time before you two showed up here," he said, eyeing his unconscious partner on the floor.

Clark came up on the other side of the man. "Where's your boss? Where's Roland?"

"He's everywhere, and nowhere. He's all around us."

Diana grabbed the soldier's lapels and lifted him off the ground. "I need more specific coordinates than that."

But the soldier kept smoking his cigar. "You don't understand. He's already won. There's nothing you can do."

"I think there's a few things I can do," said Diana. "Like tear this entire factory down."

"Do it," smirked the smoking soldier. "Burn your entire city while you look for one man. It's what he wants."

The anger whipped up in Diana, she heard her fingers crank down on the soldier's skin.

"Di," said Clark in a low voice. "Be careful."

"You think he's the first enemy who laughed in my face?" whispered Diana. "I've been alive for a millennial, fool, and I've destroyed demons from your worst nightmares. Roland is just a man with a protein shake. He'll fall, like all the rest."

The soldier squirmed in pain as her fingers dug into his chest, but still that defiance remained in his eye. "That's where your wrong, Roland is not just a man—he's two."

Suddenly, a loud banshee alarm went off in the factory. The cigar soldier was smiling, and he had a small button in his hand.

"Dammit, Di!" yelled Clark over the commotion. "They're onto us."

But Diana was staring in confusion at the soldier's face: two? What did that mean.

"There are two Rolands?" she yelled over the noise.

The smirking soldier remained silent. The embers of his cigar burned in the fog.

"Di!" yelled Clark again. "They're forming on the catwalks."

Diana threw her elbow into the smirking soldier's face; his unconscious body fell to the floor. "Then let's not keep our guests waiting."

Diana leapt onto the steel catwalk where the footsoldiers waited for them. The fight couldn't have been more perfect for her: the enemy lined up in narrow file along the catwalk, and Diana plowed through them like a furious dervish.

Clark was doing similarly well, but he opted for simply breaking the catwalk off at one end, and tossing the catwalk over itself, which threw all the soldiers overboard.

In the steam and vapors of the factory, it rained grey bodies. And the Justice League was the source of the storm.

At the end of the catwalk, Diana grabbed another soldier by the lapels. She dangled him over one side.

"Roland," she growled. "Where is he?"

"Everywhere, and nowhere."

"Where the is your boss—dammit, I don't have time for this."

And she dropped the soldier; his screams died in the vapors as he plummeted to the ground.

"Di," said Clark's concerned voice behind her. "Be careful."

"You know these soldiers, Clark. They're enhanced. They're not human."

"Then what does that make us, Di?"

Diana turned around to face Clark. She hated that look of concern on his face, like the father she had never had. "We're the good guys, Clark."

"And in their minds, so are they," said Clark. "Everyone thinks they are doing the right thing."

"What's your point, Clark? You want us to go easy on them? You've seen what they can do."

"I'm saying we should remember that they are sick," said Clark. "It's not their fault, Di. Roland's serum made them that way."

"They chose to drink it," said Diana dispassionately.

"What about your son?" said Clark quietly. "Did he 'choose?'"

Diana flashed him a look of pure fury. Clark never flinched. He believed he was right. And he would always try to do the right thing.

"Help me or leave me," said Diana, "but don't waste my time, Clark. I have a job to do."

She traveled deeper into the factory, where she encountered more and more of the soldiers. That let her know she was on the right track to Roland.

Finally, she reached the main control room. Here there were dozens of levers and gauges that controlled the entire factory. And there was one man standing at the controls.

A man in a grey cloak with a sword at his hip. He had his grey hood lowered, exposing a scarred brown face and a silvery ponytail. His name was Roland, and he had poisoned her son.

"You are very persistent, Princess," said Roland in his Latin accent. "But I am afraid you will find no vengeance here."

"I'm not interested in word games," said Diana. She drew her sword. "You have two options: give me the cure to your serum, and you die quickly. Or I take the cure from you, and you die painfully."

"I do like a woman who gets straight to the point," said Roland. He drew his sword. "But you are mistaken: there is no cure for my serum. My serum is the cure—for humanity."

She flew at him with a fencer's jab. He parried it with a neat flick of his wrist.

"There's always a cure," said Diana, circling around him. "Always a contingency plan."

"Even if that were true," said Roland, mirroring her exact movements. "Why would I hand you the means of undoing my work?"

"Because you're a monster," said Diana. "And in the end, good always overtakes bad."

"In your fairy tales, maybe," said Roland, sneering. "But where I come from, the bad is like an endless night. We haven't seen the sun in years."

She charged forward again, this time with an overarching swing. Roland side stepped gracefully and jabbed the tip of his sword at her belly.

"You are telegraphing your attacks," warned Roland, reprimanding her like a fencing tutor. "I thought you had learned your lesson from last time."

"Maybe," said Diana, smiling. "Or maybe I wanted to get closer to this side of the control board."

Roland's face froze. Just as Diana smashed her fists into the control panel.

An alarm went off throughout the factory, this one louder and more mechanical than the first. And a sudden shaking seemed to erupt from the center of the factory, as if a giant monster was waking from an ancient slumber.

"Idiota" snarled Roland. "You are going to destroy this building—thousands will be killed in the explosion!"

"That's the benefit from your little Martial Law," said Diana. "Everyone is off the streets. Leaving only the bad guys to stew in the pot."

All throughout the factory the alarm sounded: evacuate the area, evacuate the area.

Roland stole a glance at the exit from the control panel. Diana knew what he was thinking.

"You are better than me at strategy," confessed Diana, "but I can run faster than you."

Roland lunged for the doorway, just as Diana threw herself at his feet. They both rolled on the ground. Roland fought like a wild man, and he knew how to make his punches hurt. But Diana knew that she didn't have to win the fight; she just had to stop him from leaving.

So she rolled on the ground as he clawed at her ribs and ears: it hurt terribly, but she knew she could take the punishment. And Roland knew it, too.

"My soldiers," gasped Roland, "they'll come for us."

"W—what do you think the Superman is doing?" answered Diana, grinning.

Outside of the control room, Clark swooped through the air like a bird of prey, picking off any and all soldiers who tried to come to their leader's aid.

"The cure," said Diana again, keeping her death grip around Roland's bicep. "Give it to me."

This close, Diana saw the genuine panic in Roland's eyes. But that's not all she saw; his eyes were not green like Talia's, nor where they black like his serum. They were hazel—oddly enough, they were the color of Emma and William's eyes.

"There is . . . no . . . cure," whispered Roland as Diana squeezed the air out of his lungs.

"Then you'll die," she said dispassionately. "As will your army."

She twisted his bicep, and Roland's head snapped back in agony.

A broken humerus. The first of many injuries to come.

Diana wrapped her leg around his knee. She jerked her whole body to one side.

A torn meniscus. Roland howled with pain.

"I told you," she whispered to him below the cacophony of the dying factory, "die painfully, or die quickly. Your choice."

"There is. No. cure." He responded, but his eyes were wide with the pain throbbing throughout his body.

"So be it," she said. She flipped him over, so that she was on top. He threw one useless arm up at her. She swatted it away like an annoying fly.

"You poisoned my son," she said, standing up at a squat. She kicked Roland at the ribs and tossed him onto his belly. "You threatened my family."

"A—all part of the plan," he managed to moan.

"So is this," she said hatefully.

She picked him up by the scruff off his neck and waistband. She lifted him up in the air like a barbell. For a moment, she savored that position, her victorious pose, her enemy lifeless and helpless in her clutches.

She slammed his body down onto her squatted knee. A terrifying crack rent the air.

A broken spinal cord.

Roland uttered a single gasp, as if he had been punched in the stomach. He rolled onto the ground, and there he remained. Immobile, helpless—defeated.

"Now," she said. "About that cure."

She patted him down; starting at his toes and working her way up. A little above his abdomen, her fingers found something solid. She discovered a small container, no bigger than a box for a ring. When she opened it up, she discovered a small vial of clear liquid.

Diana pocketed the box behind her chest plate. Satisfaction flooded her body like a drug.

"I told you," she said to him. "Die painfully."

He was still somewhat conscious. He stared up at her, his hazel eyes wide and in shock. Like he couldn't belief he had lost.

She stepped over him, and walked out of the control room.

Outside, Clark was still fighting a few remnants of the soldiers, but it seemed like many of the soldiers had heeded the emergency warning.

"Well?" he said to her over the noise of the dying factory.

"It's done," she said, tapping the box in her chest plate. "Let's go."

Clark glanced through the window of the control panel. His face lost all of its color.

"Good god, Di, we can't leave him like that—"

"Actually, we can," she said firmly. "There are consequences to this game, Clark."

"Game!?" exclaimed Clark. "What are you a child!? This isn't a game, Di. This is real life. We aren't murders."

"Did I kill him?" she demanded angrily. "Did you kill him? No, I defeated him. There's a difference."

"And you're leaving him to die in this place!"

"I'm leaving, Clark. You can stay in this place if you want."

Clark flew towards the control panel, ready to save Roland, but suddenly, the loud moaning of twisted metal rent the air.

"Look out!" screamed a voice.

A giant portion of steel catwalk broke into two; the two pieces swung wildly a hundred feet in the air. And about a dozen grey soldiers clung to the steel for dear life.

"Dammit," growled Clark. He glanced between Roland and the dozen soldiers.

"They'll survive the fall," said Diana dispassionately.

On cue, the factory floor erupted into blue and green flames—molecular reactions from all of the spilled chemicals on the floor.

"They won't survive falling into an inferno," said Clark angrily.

She desperately wanted to leave the soldiers to their fate, but even she couldn't stomach leaving a dozen soldiers to die such a horrible fate. And Clark's early words rang in her ear: the grey soldiers were addicted to the serum, whether they agreed with Roland or not.

Truth be told, she couldn't help but see her own son in the faces of the grey soldiers. So many of them were so young—naïve, foolish. She couldn't punish them for that.

"I'll get the left side!" she yelled over the crumbling factory.

Clark nodded. "I'll rescue the right."

They went to their work. Diana landed at the top of the steel landing, where the steel catwalk hung by a singular welded joint.

"Hold tight!" she ordered the half dozen soldiers beneath her.

"W—what!?" demanded a particularly youthful boy—he looked of Egyptian descent.

Diana brought her fists down on the welded joint—bang, bang, bang! The catwalk was giving way.

"NO!" screamed the youth. "Please, lady! Don't kill us! Please!"

The youth climbed up the catwalk and batted away her arm.

"No, I'm not going to kill you!" she insisted. "I'm trying to save you. Stop! Stop moving!"

Below, the fire on the floor erupted into a terrible inferno. Blue and green flames devoured the factory.

"No!" he pleaded, now using both hands to fight her off. "I don't want to die! I don't want to die!"

Sweat collected all over Diana's face from the heat. She was being roasted alive.

"P—please," she yelled at him; her voice was cracking from the heat. "I'm going to get you out!"

"I only joined to save my brother!" pleaded the youth. "Please! Don't kill me."

She grabbed his sweaty wrist; she pulled him upward. Finally, the youth seemed to understand.

"Tell your comrades to stop struggling," she yelled to him. "I'm going to rip the catwalk off and carry you out all on it. Ok?"

The youth nodded. "I'll tell them—"

The inferno suddenly snarled with heat, and the youth's wrists, so sweaty from the heat, slipped through her fingers.

"NO!" she screamed.

The last thing she saw was the youth's shocked face. He didn't know what was happening.

WHOOSH!

Something fast, something black, something supernaturally agile flew by her and caught the boy mid-fall. Then the two disappeared underneath the catwalks.

It was Clark. Diana, for a moment, breathed a sigh of relief.

"DI!" yelled Clark's angry voice. "What are you waiting for!? This place is going to fall! Let's go!"

Diana froze. Clark was above her, holding his catwalk in one hand with all of the grey soldiers clutched to it. But if Clark was above her . . .

Diana looked back down at the fire beneath her: who had just saved the youth?

"DI!" hollered Clark. "LOOK!"

The flames licked dangerously at the boots of a grey soldier at the bottom of the catwalk. The man was howling with pain.

"Open us up an exit!" she yelled at Clark. She grabbed both sides of the catwalk and heaved.

The welding broke, just as the factory began to crumble in on itself. Pieces of concrete roofing fell into the blaze as Clark burned a wide hole in the center of the room.

"Let's go!"

Diana grabbed the railing securely in her two hands; she squatted and pointed herself at the exit hole. She had one chance at this. If she overshot it, she would splatter herself and the men against the ceiling, if she undershot it, she would plummet down into the fire.

Just before she jumped, in that moment of clarity that danger and adrenaline afford a warrior, Diana had the briefest déjà vu about the person who had swooped down and saved that youth from the fire. She had seen such an action before—twenty years ago, the Batman plunging in a nosedive to save a falling victim.

But it was impossible; a thought brought on by dehydration. The Batman had died a long time ago. And so would she if she didn't save herself and the men from the factory.

"Lady!" screamed a soldier clutching the railing. "Are you going to stand there while we cook like sausages—!?"

She launched herself at the hole—the soldiers screamed in fear as they flew through smoke, sweat, and heat. But suddenly, as if they had simply stepped out of a hot sauna, the heat died away. Cold, crisp air blew in their eyes. They had made it through the hole. And now the cold air of the blizzard kissed their burnt faces as Diana and the soldiers rolled onto the snow covered rooftop of the factory.

Clark was already on the rooftop of an adjacent building. He motioned toward her.

"Di! The roof is going to collapse!"

The grey soldiers did not need to be told twice; they were already jumping over the concrete railing of the rooftop as Diana got to her feet. So much for gratitude.

Behind her, the factory let out its final death rattle—a low, guttural shriek as concrete, steel, and fire all consummated their dangerous affair.

Diana leapt off the rooftop, just as the ground opened up underneath her like a sinkhole. As she sailed through the air, she heard the factory collapsing in on itself. She was surprised how good it made her feel.

Clark stared at the destruction of the factor for a long time. The reflection of the blue and green flames of the fire flickered in his eyes.

"Di," he began seriously. "This shouldn't have happened like this."

"But it did," she said. "And we got what we came for."

She held up the box she had taken off Roland. Clark looked at it with disgust.

"You think that justifies this? We killed a man—killed several men, all of the ones who didn't get out."

"I saved my son's life," said Diana coldly, "and I saved this city from god knows how many more kidnappings and poisonings. I did my job, Clark. As a mother and as a guardian of peace."

"Peace!?" said Clark angrily. "How many mothers won't see their sons ever again because of you? You saw how young those soldiers were. What about their mothers? Did you help them!?"

Diana was quiet for a moment. He had a point. Even if she wouldn't admit it.

"I'm going home," said Diana. "I'm going to give this to Lucius to prepare for William."

"And what am I supposed to do?" said Clark angrily. "I'm supposed to explain all this?"

"What's to explain?" said Diana, walking away from him. "We stopped Roland. We saved the city. Tell the Mayor to send the flowers to my home."

"Di! Wait! Di!" yelled Clark's indignant voice. "This isn't over!"

But Diana didn't care. The warm, comforting buzz of conviction was coursing throughout her body. She had saved her son; she had saved her city. Now things could finally return to normal: birthday parties, board-meetings—maybe a roadtrip or two. She could hang up her sword and shield again, this time for good. Tomorrow, everything would be okay.

Diana had no idea how wrong she was.