AN: Thanks for all the comments! You guys rock!

Where we left off: Diana and Clark travel to the city to find a huge fight erupting with Lobo at the center of it. After Lobo managed to capture Diana and Steve Trevor in some strange place, Superman follows them hoping to rescue them.

Clark tried to launch into the air and managed a wobbly stance in the sky before tumbling right back down to the heated sands of the strange planet. As he tumbled down to the ground he panicked at seeing he was wearing some kind of body tight suit. He scratched at it but it would not rip. The black suit fit him like a wet suit would, it smelled of chemicals, and Clark had no recognition of putting it on.

He took a deep breath, ignoring the panic at seeing the foreign fabric on his skin and tried to launch up again. This launch lasted long enough for him to see the dilapidated buildings behind the huge sand dunes, but his flight ended in a wobbly fall back to the planet. His bloody arm was now oozing but before he could comprehend his new mortality, Clark's focus was broken by a scream, "Superman!"

Steve Trevor stood humped over on the top of a dune near Clark, waving manically. He wore the same body tight Clark was wearing.

"She's crushed under a ton of debris! I can't lift it." Steve was trying to be quiet, and his voice sounded coarse and cracked. His voice was so dry it made Clark thirsty.

Clark attempted to fly towards Steve but was only able to levitate a few seconds in the air before coming to his own rough landing in the sands. Clark settled for leaps, but it was a frustrating amount of time before he reached Steve.

"No offense, but you and Wonder Woman seem to have a hard time following directions with the whole 'get out of here' thing I tried to push." Steve was jogging over to where Diana was. Clark followed behind.

"What the hell was that supposed to mean?"

"It means, if you listened, you wouldn't be here."

Clark stared at Steve; it was an evasive answer and the soldier was smart enough to know it was. Clark decided he did not have time for this in the moment. He just jogged ahead of Steve and stood at the top of another dune, looking down into the basin of broken down buildings.

"Didn't know you could bleed," Steve pointed at Clark's bloodied arm. Clark gave no response and the talkative soldier kept pushing it, "You know—now that I think about it, you really don't know where we are, and you don't give us the surprise element we need when you launch into the sky and boom down like that."

And Clark snapped, "Are you going to make yourself useful in helping me find her, or just criticize me while she dies?"

Steve looked at Superman in frustration before walking on. Steve doubted that Superman ever had to go into a battle assuming he would be the underdog, but as a soldier that was Steve's immediate assumption. The entire situation of being somewhere he'd never been with no weapons pushed some unpleasant memories in Steve's head; to Steve, Superman's nonchalant showiness was anxiety inducing.

He probably thinks I'm being cocky with him. Keep it cool Steve, keep it to yourself man. Steve thought.

It was uncomfortably silent for minutes as they traveled over another dune to the broken down buildings. Once they reached the top of this dune Clark stopped walking and tried to focus enough to hear her heartbeat. The world around him broke into indistinguishable cacophony. He heard sand grains twirling in the wind, parts of buildings slowly falling, lizard like creatures scurrying along the grounds, but he could not focus enough to hear her. He had to stop before it gave him a migraine.

"Just enjoying the wind in a little moment romantic moment there? Just gave me a damn speech about wasting time." Steve murmured the comment more to himself than to Superman.

"I'm trying to find her heartbeat. I—I can't hear it. But my powers seem weakened here so it could be that." The tough guy Clark was playing disappeared for a moment as he let fear shine through; Steve picked up on it.

"Or—"

Or she's dead. Clark thought. Just let this asshole suggest she's dead so I have a real reason to punch him.

Steve began but he stopped seeing the look on Clark's face.

"Let's just keep going I'm sure she's fine. I had to leave her to get help but it was so damn hard, I had to keep circling back every ten minutes 'cus it's just everything looks the same here. And I saw you floundering in the sky and decided it was a better option than knowing exactly where she is and just watching her die. It's chilling, I felt like someone was watching me or—"

Then, a shuffle in the buildings and a guttural scream from an area to their left cracked the dry air. Diana.

Clark whipped his head to the sound and attempted to fly to its location before he lost it. His flying failed and he continuously hit the ground hard with sand flying in large booms around him. His flying yet again devolved into some form of large leaps before he reached Diana.

Her body was buried under piles of rubble and each breath was clearly a painful struggle. She was pushing up against the ground with one shaky elbow in attempt to make breathing easier. Her eyes were caked shut with the dust from the buildings and desert sands. She recoiled at his touch, unsure of who it was.

"Diana, it's me, Kal, Diana. I'm getting you out, hang in." He started pulling things off her desperately tossing them as far as he could manage.

Everything felt heavy and Clark was sweating in a matter of seconds; it was an uncomfortable feeling but Clark hid the pain. As Clark reached the last layer on her, Steve came over and helped lift it off. Diana's arm was bent at a wrong angle and the rest of her was bloodied and bruised. Clark gently scooped her into his arms and cleared the debris from her eyes and face. She gently blinked her eyes against his hands and opened them.

For a second Clark was taken aback by how blue her eyes were. Perhaps it was just the contract with the black sands that caked her face.

"Steve. Steve is here too. Is he here? He helped me earlier, is he safe?" She asked in a slurred voice.

"Here, and honored you thought of me princess." Steve walked into her frame of sight.

Diana, though injured, still managed to roll her eyes at that name and Clark internally smiled thinking of their little joke with the word. Diana was wearing the same body tight black suit he and Steve were wearing.

Diana recoiled for a second when she realized her clothes had changed and her lasso was gone, "Where the hell are we? What are we wearing?" She was barely conscious and her words were garbled. She fidgeted with her broken arm using her intact one and suddenly stopped as her nails hit her bracers.

"They left my bracers. Kal, take my bracers off and step away." She commanded with sudden clarity.

Clark managed to run his x-ray vision over it for a few seconds, "Your arm popped out of the socket. You have broken ribs."

"Pop the arm back. Take off the bracers. Step away, both of you." She gritted her teeth, barely capable to sustain the pain.

"Diana that would hurt like hell. You are barely lucid right now."

"If you don't, I will."

"Diana, you don't have the x-ray vision here."

"Kal. Put it back, it'll heal quicker. Take off the bracers and step away. If I could do it myself right now I would." Diana's words were so vitriolic Clark decided to do what she asked in the moment and ask more questions later.

Clark sighed and quickly snapped her bone back into place. Diana gasped and squirmed in his arms before settling and attempting to stand on her own. She managed a shaky stance and Clark took her bracers off and stepped aside.

Clark was not expecting anything to happen, but the second he removed the bracers, the air around them dropped what felt like 20 degrees. The sky became a grey soup and all Clark could manage to say was a tentative, "Diana…"

Diana eyes flashed blood red and she collapsed the ground. Her veins appeared grayish under her now pale skin. Lightening struck and burned the sands beside her.

Diana twitched and shook with disjointed movements. She looked like she was trying to hold something back. Wind around them picked up and Steve noticed bones rattling up through the sands and blowing in the winds. They looked oddly human; Steve calmly looked across to Superman trying to read his expressions, but Superman was gawking at the events taking place around him expressionlessly.

Clark watched in astonishment as Diana's cracked bones healed themselves through the flashes of x-ray vision he could manage.

Diana started clawing at the ground, Clark assumed, for her bracers. The vein on Diana's neck was protruding and her eyes were now completely black, she was starting to look like a monster created by Hades instead of the angelic daughter of Zeus.

Clark inched towards her to help get the bracers on, but she screamed "Stay away! Both of you!" in a coarse voice neither of the two men wanted to hear again. Her warning was too late as Steve had already gotten too close when he grabbed a bracer gliding across the sands and moved to throw it to her feet.

Almost instantly, Steve fell to his knees as if compelled by some force; his eyes turned to black and kept moving back and forth in his head. He looked as though he was suppressing a scream.

"Let me help you Diana!" Clark screamed, terrified she would kill the soldier and would never be able to live it down.

Diana was panicking. Steve was just trying to help her and she was tearing his brain apart and could not stop. She had no control. She was not going to hurt Clark as well "No! I'll kill you. I'll kill you, get away. Stay away."

Tears were streaming down her face. "I'm hurting him. Oh god Clark. I'm hurting him. I don't know what I'm doing." Steve was now foaming at the mouth.

She screamed and attempted to crawl further from Steve to no affect on his state "I have no control. I'm going to kill him. I'm killing him."

"Diana, calm down and get the bracers on." Clark was screaming over the winds whipping around them.

Diana turned to Clark, "I have so much power Kal." She stared at him blankly and Clark was scared the Diana he knew was gone. Clark stumbled with words; when he looked at Diana he just saw a ruthless thirst for power he'd never dreamed of seeing on her face. He could not form a sentence.

After a silence that felt like hours, Diana shakily managed to get the bracers back on and she stood shivering as the dust she caused settled.

Steve swallowed a gasp of air and collapsed. Diana ran to him and helped him up, but she was disgusted by the fact that he flinched when she touched him. She was disgusted with her power and role as God of War.

Steve opened his eyes and smirked at seeing her huddled over him with concern. "I'm fine doll face." Steve reached out reflexively to wipe the tear that left a line of tan skin on her black-sand covered face. Diana was so concerned about Steve, she did not even process the fact he'd wiped her tear.

Steve felt Clark's eyes piercing him. Steve brushed himself off as if nothing had happened.

Clark angrily asked, "What the hell was that Diana? What happened to you Steve?"

Steve stated, "She put these images in my mind. It was of here; a lot of people have died here. Fighting, I don't know if they were 'people' as in humans, but they all looked different, alien almost. It was overwhelming, it took over my mind; I couldn't stop it. Loud, disturbing. Could've gone without the extra dose of PTSD, but I'm not hurt."

Diana nervously added in, "I saw it too. I am sorry, I never should have done that. I will never do that again. I was just in so much pain I was selfish in wanting to heal, and I thought this would work. It was not like this when I tried it on Earth. I lost control here. I could have hurt you, I could have—"

"You didn't hun. Don't worry about it." Steve was speaking plainly; his mind was obviously still on the images he saw. "Listen though, if you are going to put me through that shit I just went through, I have the right to know what the hell that was. We are all stuck here and need to trust each other." Steve was plain-spoken and blunt.

Clark sarcastically chortled, funny for Steve to be talking about how they all need to trust one another. Steve was the one who seemed to know about the shady dealings that got them stuck here in the first place. "Diana…I don't think you owe him anything, but you should explain what you can." Clark interjected gently.

Diana fidgeted with her bracers, "I don't know what I can explain. For one, I am God of War. You are a soldier, that's why, I think, it affected you more. And the bones around us are of those fallen while fighting. When I let go of my powers like that I just felt a drive to create an army, and I think I started pulling the dead out to form an army. I had no control. The images I saw came with the bones. I think they were stories of those who fell here. They came to me, I couldn't stop them."

"Holy hell, America's sweetheart has a dark secret doesn't she?" Steve noticed Diana still stood beside him as if she expected him to collapse at any second.

Steve felt uncomfortable standing next to her. Her body tight suit made her infinitely attractive, her blue eyes and beautiful black hair drove Steve crazy. "I'm fine beautiful, I really am. No need to helicopter around me." Diana bit her lip nervously and took a few steps away, confused by his insistence on giving him space.

"You use the names condescendingly." Diana said in a matter-of-fact tone.

"What names?" Steve inquired.

"Beautiful, hon—"

"Old habit, not condescending, and should not be a primary concern in your mind after that shitstorm." Steve felt bad for snapping at her, and turned away from all of them. He squatted, rubbing his eyes as if trying to erase the images Diana forced upon him. It was still flashing in his brain, and he just wanted them to leave so he had some time.

Diana closed her eyes as if it would make the images go away, as if it would make the image of Steve foaming at the mouth on his knees go away.

There was silence for a second and Clark eyed Diana, almost scared by how much being God of War has affected her and how little he knew about it. Clark thought he knew everything about her, and now he wondered how much was just a mask she put on for the world. He lost a lot of his trust in her in that moment.

To add to Clark's distrust, he was nervous about if Steve was hiding something from them all.

He must know something more. He knew Lobo wanted us, he must know where we are. He must be part of their plan, whatever it is. Clark thought.

Then suddenly, Clark felt Steve slam him into the ground and heard a spear whizz over where he was standing. Clark and Steve were now protected by the walls of a fallen building. The spear abruptly exploded and then several more came raining down from all around the little basin the three of them were in.

"This is why stealth is important." Steve screamed over the sound of the explosives going off. Steve started ranting, "Aren't you the one with the god damn super powers here, you couldn't even see the spear about to kill you and—"

Diana rushed over to their cover behind the building. "Sorry to interrupt, but gentlemen, I think these shooters would have information useful to us. So how about we kick some ass and get out of here?"

Clark laughed gently, "Elegant battle strategy Diana. Let's get it done." He gently held her arm and asked, "Are you okay now? In the house, you promised me we'd talk about this whole God of War mess." With genuine care, he looked into her eyes.

"Yes, I am fine. We will talk about it if we live long enough to." She shrugged Clark's concern off because the truth is, she was scared. She did not want to talk about something that scared her; she was brought up to be fearless.

So, she shifted her attention to the soldier, "Steve, I promise I am not so vile with the bracers on. Trust right? Let's start building it today." And with that, Diana threw herself into the battle with a cry.