LSH: The Battle For The Universe
By Bruce Wayne
Disclaimer: I don't own these characters, I'm just borrowing then for a while.
The characters are owned by DC Comics and I'm writing this just for the fun of
it.
CHAPTER 16 - THE HUNT FOR THE VILLIAN
It was the next day and they were back at the Legion clubhouse,
using equipment in Brainiac 5's laboratory. There were four monitor screens
attended by four Legionnaires at present. The monitors were connected to
a huge computer that in itself was connected to satellites in space.
"The basic principle is simple," explained Brainiac 5. "There are four
synchronous satellites around the world. What we are doing is utilizing a 'spy-
ray,' you might call it."
He patted an electronic box that fed signals into the system.
"This invention of mine works on the principle that each person on
Earth has his own special brain-wave pattern, as distinctively different as
one person's fingerprints are from other people's prints. Now, we have a
database of all the different types of brain waves from people who hail from
Earth, as well as members of the United Planets. For example, my brain-
wave pattern is different from an Earth human because I am from the planet
Colu. Now Tazz is from a planet that is not in the database. He can't disguise
his brain-wave. So, his brain-wave should stand out like the well-known
sore thumb from the characteristic patterns of minds in the database."
Brainy pushed a function button on a computer keyboard and an
image flashed on a large monitor screen on the wall of the lab. It appeared
to be a chart of various human brain-wave patterns that were in flowing
waves, differing minutely in the height of the curves, their closeness together,
and the dips or peaks of the full string.
"Tazz's brain waves will be totally different than anything in our
database," said Brainy. "I don't know what they'll look like, but if some-
thing comes up just watch for any freakish distorted pattern and we'll have
Tazz nailed down, no matter where he's hiding. Each of you is attuned to a
separate syncom satellite which covers a different broad region of Earth.
The four of you will cover the world with our monitor screens."
"Every square inch, Braino?" asked Matter-Eater Lad in wonder.
"Yes," replied Brainiac 5. "The computer does most of the work and
will only alert you if it spots something odd. This spy-ray system could be
tuned, if we wished, to finding one blue microbe out of a trillion red ones.
Take my word for it that as it scans the world, every person's brain wave
in the area that its looking at will be registered on your screen. The computer
will sort out any number of patterns, even millions at the same time."
"I don't understand a word of it," confessed Sun Boy. "You mean I
could tune in my own mind and see a Sun Boy brain pattern?"
"No, you'd just get a blank," said Shrinking Violet slyly. "He said a
BRAIN pattern."
"Then take Colossal Boy," retaliated Sun Boy. "I understand when
he grows to giant size, his brain reduces to ant size."
"Oh, you made me think of Big Gim standing guard all alone at the
sea bottom, I miss him so."
"Hah. That's like missing the Rigelian Fever --" Dirk stopped, seeing
the girl was looking sad. "Sorry, Vi. I guess I was hitting below the belt."
"Let's get to work!" barked Invisible Kid, turning to his own monitor
screen.
"It will be a hard job," warned Brainiac 5. "When the computer alerts
you of an odd brain pattern, just punch it up and look at it. If in doubt, just call
me."
Silence fell as each of them concentrated on their computer screens,
watching the lightning fast changing patterns of brain waves that sprayed onto
the screen constantly. Could they comb the world this way, picking one alien
brain wave out of all the billions of people on Earth?
***
It was night and cool in the bedroom. Jan Arrah held Nura Nal. For
a few minutes of peace, Jan floated in the soft darkness of ecstasy, without
thought, without memory, and -- most importantly -- without horror or rage.
Conscious only of sensation, he heard his breathing and Nura's breathing in
one sound, as if the darkness outside of him and the darkness within breathed
in one rhythm.
The sensation flowered and became a mosaic of perceptions: the
warmth of Nura's thigh against his face, the throb of her femoral artery, the
caress of her hand on his leg.
Sensations without thought. Sensations defining the form of his body,
where his body touched Nura, where his body touched the wadded and
tangled sheets of the bed. For minutes, he existed only as a form defined
by sensations.
Then he remembered their pleasure. The sweatslick flesh of Nura's
thighs, his fingers clawing into her flesh, her muscles snapping taut like steel
cables as she spasmed in ecstasy, her cries and gasps, his breathing locked
with hers. The rhythm and tempo had intoxicated them, her arms gripping
him, pulling him against her as if urging him to plunge deeper into the center
of herself, her hands jerking him against her, and then his climax.
Her tongue touched him again, the spin of her tongue stopping his
memories. He groaned and moved in the bed. "Oh .. no. Can't"
"Let's make it number five."
"Five?"
"Four so far."
"Impossible ..."
"What?"
"This is amazing."
"We're just decharging from our missions."
Jan thought back to what had occurred in the Antarctic. He felt his
identity returning, the fears and hatreds and horrible, shuddering memories
rushing into the pleasure-drained void of his mind, like a flight of bats crowding
through the eye sockets of a skull.
"Please don't talk," he requested.
"Who wants to talk?" she giggled. Her legs circled him. She locked
her ankles behind him. He smelled the intoxicating fragrance of her platinum-
hair. The bed began to rock. Once again he started to slam into her.
Laughing, she responded to his violence with a slow, sensuous
writhing of her hips. But after a minute of his body slamming her, she
whispered, "Easy. Easy. Slow down. Easy."
He continued slamming her. She told him, "Stop it. Slow down,
you're hurting me."
Grabbing her hips in his hands, he continued, not seeking to give
or gain but only desperately wanting unconsciousness.
Nura defended herself. Grasping his head in both hands, she pressed
her sharp thumbnails against his closed eyes. She put only slight pressure
against the eyelids as she warned him, "Stop now!"
Jan threw himself aside, twisting his face away from the knives of
her thumbnails, reflexively straightarming Nura away to a safe distance. His
breath came in gasps as he leaned against the headboard.
"What's wrong? What's going on with you?" Nura said. "One minute
you're a lover and the next, you're ... you're berserk."
"Nothing. I just got too rough. I'm sorry."
"No, Jan. I don't mean just now. I mean all night. This afternoon.
You're here, then you're not. You're someplace else. You see things. Your
face goes hard, like you're ready to attack something. Someone."
"Me? Do that?" He forced a laugh.
"Sometimes you are a scary guy," she said.
Jan laughed at the understatement. Some of his teammates --
especially Matter-Eater Lad and Bouncing Boy -- also thought of him
as a scary guy.
"You are five different kinds of scary, scary dude" to quote Tenzil.
"I am," he finally told her, laughing as if he joked. "I am a very scary
guy. I even scare myself."
"You may be, but you're decent first. A good guy. You're easy to like.
I liked you ever since the day we met. I ever tell you that?" Nura said.
"What? You don't know anything about me. Not who I am or
was --"
"Yes, I do. I've read your Legion file numerous times. I know all
about you," she told him. Nura knew Jan was always one of the most powerful
members of the Legion, and one of the most withdrawn. His mental discipline,
which guarded him from accidentally killing people with a stray thought,
allowed few people to get close to him. Nura had always wanted to know
what really made him tick.
"Is that why you came on to me on the planet ...?"
"Oh, puuleeeze!" she laughed. "I come on to all the guys, you know
that!"
Jan laughed. "I feel like what the people on Earth once called 'a
mail order bride.' Dude by dossier."
"Yes," she said. "I've read about all the operations and missions
that you've been on. Though there wasn't much on the personal stuff. Nothing
about --"
"Oh. Then you don't know."
"I can guess. I've heard a little of what happened to you."
Jan rolled in the bed and held her, "My past has been very extreme."
"Was it? Tell me. I only heard the stories."
Jan sat up again. He reached out for a glass of water beside the
bed..
Nura's hand massaged his chest and shoulder. Her fingers traced
the rope-like scar on his side. Her fingers found other scars that marked his
body.
"You don't get scars like these working in an office."
"I'm a Legionnaire," he said proudly. "You can get hurt when some
would-be world-dominator throws you against a wall."
She traced what looked like a recent-moon welt with a finger.
"You get this in Antarctica?"
"Playing in the snow. I fell and --"
"N'ass."
"Really, I fell down on --"
"Jan," she interrupted. "You joke and you laugh. But it isn't funny
to see you. You're haunted. It's like you've got different people moving
inside of you. What happened to you?"
"You don't want to know," he said as he gulped down some more
water.
"Does it have anything to do with what happened to Trom?"
"You don't want to know."
"I'm a Legionnaire just like you, Jan! I'm willing to risk my life
for you and the others. But I want to know the people I'm taking that
risk for. I --"
"Oh, God, no ..." Jan groaned. He left Nura's bed, and paced the
room. "Why are you doing this?"
A moment later, he turned to her and began speaking rapidly, "I'll
tell you this ... Don't put any credits in the bank. Don't buy life insurance,
even though Imra says we can't get any anyway, buy the best clothes, the
best shoes. Buy anything that'll give you a laugh."
"It's dangerous. Is that what you're telling me? Being a Legionnaire
is dangerous? Do you want to protect me? You think I will die?"
"Getting killed isn't it ..." Jan pointed to his right eye. "It's what you
see. After that, dying, thinking about dying isn't the same. You recognize
the advantages of being dead. No memories. No thinking --"
"What happened to you, Jan?!"
"You really want to know? The truth?"
"Yes!" she screamed.
Jan stood naked in the darkness. He looked at the walls and
furniture trying to decide what to tell her.
He finally calmed down and sat on the edge of the bed. And
Element Lad and Dream Girl talked until sunrise.
Nura listened to all the horror and inhumanity and suffering he had
felt.
She listened to how Jan explained that the people who had once been
on his homeworld had the ability to create as much wealth as they could possibly
want with their powers. But that the Trommites had a disdain for wealth and
instead used their powers to create a highly spiritual society. They always had
refused requests and demands to use their powers for the material benefit
of others, and so it was when Roxxas the Butcher made such a demand. Roxxas,
who apparently did not fully understand the small size of Trom's population,
killed everyone ... except Jan, who was on a ship in space at the time.
"What do you think?" Jan concluded. "Is this what you want to do
with your life?"
"People all over the galaxy are alive because of us, right?"
"Yeah, I think about that a lot. That's what makes being a Legionnaire
worth it."
"Do you think it would be any different for me? I've seen some of
what you've seen, but I couldn't do anything about it. I may not have the
type of power you have ... but you don't have to dream some of the night-
mares that I do, either. But the Legion makes a difference. What greater
opportunity could I hope for?"
He told her, "The villians -- there's always more. We defeat one,
a hundred come. We defeat the hundred, and Mordru raises another army.
There's no end to the killing and suffering."
"And if we didn't fight?" she asked.
"The likes of Tazz and Mordru conquer the universe," he answered.
"Then we fight ..."
Jan nodded. He put his arms around Nura and held her, the rise
and fall of her chest soft against his muscles. He tasted the sweat-salt in
her hair and pushed a few strands away from her beautiful face. He closed
his eyes and wished he knew the future. But he did not, could not and
would not even ask Dream Girl if she knew when or if some kind of
violence would end his life.
When he died, he died. But now, in this moment of life and pleasure,
he held a girl he deeply cared about.
***
Later that morning, Invisible Kid read the latest news from his
omnicon. And the news was grim. In fact, the news was alarming. He
just read bits and pieces. "Earth undergoing fantastic change ... Ocean
level up five feet ... Dikes in European sector threatened ... More volcanoes
erupting in the Pacific region ... Violent high-altitude wind disrupting air
travel ... Giant comet plunging toward Earth on possible collision course."
"The four Earth dooms of Tazz," muttered Saturn Girl. "Building up
to their cataclysmic finale -- only three days away now. And we can't locate
Tazz. I've tried. We've tried and nothing seems to work."
Five hours later, the Legionnaires in Brainiac 5's lab had nearly
covered the entire world with his brain-wave scanner. Invisible Kid was
frowning worriedly. "With only a few patches of Earth left to scan, is it
possible that ..." His voice trailed away as he punched the keys on the
computer keyboard.
After a while, all the Legionnaires in the lab looked away from the
computer screens and stared at one another, dumbfounded.
Star Boy finally said it aloud: "Tazz is nowhere on Earth. Or else
he devised some way of hiding and eluding the spy-ray."
"Impossible," said Brainiac 5. "Impossible, I tell you! This spy-
ray works on the telepathic principle, and nothing can stop telepathic
waves from coming through."
With uncharacteristic anger, Brainy punched the keys on his
keyboard hard in frustration. His monitor showed a single brain-wave
pattern ribboning across the screen. "There's the brain wave of Colossal
Boy, seven and a half miles deep under countless tons of sea water. The
deepest mine shaft ... the heart of a solid stone mountain ... the inside of
a nuclear reactor -- none of those could prevent Tazz's brain waves from
being radiated and picked up by the spy-ray."
Brainac 5 stared at the screen, trying to think up another angle.
"Tazz is somewhere on Earth -- and yet he isn't. It's incredible, inexplicable,
inconceivable."
"Translation -- nutty," said Star Boy. "Too bad, Brainy, but your
gizmo didn't work."
"Don't blame Brainy," defended Invisible Kid. "If Tazz is still on
Earth, he must have picked out some clever hiding place we never
suspected ... wherever that could be."
Brainiac 5 suddenly jumped up. "Wait ... think once. Where is the
one place on Earth we would least expect him to be? The last place we
would think of?"
"Huh?" said Matter-Eater Lad blankly.
Brainy turned and ran from the main lab. He then began looking
through room after room in another section of the clubhouse complex
where he had set up his series of labs and science workshops. Most of
the labs were dark and unoccupied. With his handheld sensor and
detector on, Brainiac 5 paused outside one closed door on sub level
one that was labeled: SCIENCE HALL. It was used only by Brainiac 5
himself for top-priority science jobs, containing the finest and most prized
tools of research. A lot of time travel research was carried out in this room.
Brainy looked at the sensor in his hand. It was picking up a
telltale metabolic warmth of a living form beyond the door. The door
was locked. He went down the hall to an intercom communicator on
the wall. He punched the button, "Intruder alert! Science Hall!" he said.
Within moments, nearly a dozen Legionnaires had joined him outside
the door to the Science Hall.
"What do we do?" asked Matter-Eater Lad.
"This!" replied Ferro Lad as he rammed through the door.
Within the room, a man with frosty eyes turned from the workbench.
"Tazz!" screeched Tenzil. "You were here all the time in the Legion
clubhouse, the one place we didn't think of!"
"Naturally," mocked the villian. "It was elementary to outwit you dull-
brained humans."
The other Legionnaires had crowded into the room, and they stared
open-mouthed.
"How do you like that?" groaned Princess Projectra. "We look for him
all over the world ... in places twelve thousand miles away. Yet, all the while he
was practically sitting in our laps. Well, we've got him now."
"Oh, no you don't, Regal One," said Tazz cooly. "In the past week
while hiding here, I took the liberty of utilizing the lab's rather crude -- by my
standards -- equipment. I constructed two 40th century devices. Only the first
need concern you now ..."
"Grab him, quick," yelled Invisible Kid, and all the Legionnaires rushed
forward.
But they all seized empty air, as the leering Tazz turned transparent.
They could now see the new kind of belt he wore, which glowed with an
eerie blue luminescence.
"A fourth-dimensional transporter," came the fading voice of Tazz.
"It allows me to slip through the fourth dimension and whisk anywhere on
Earth in the wink of an eye. In a moment, I'll be back in my undersea
dome .. without the necessity of going past your Colossal Oaf guard at
the sea-hatch door. I'll just go through the walls."
His form faded to nothingness with a last derisive laugh.
"Gim," moaned Violet. "He'll be in danger, not knowing that Tazz
will materialize out of thin air, behind his back ..."
"Tinya!" cried Invisible Kid.
"Lyle, I can go into the fourth dimension," Phantom Girl explained, "but
I don't have a transporter like he described. I can try to follow him, if you
want."
He grabbed Phantom Girl's arm. "Under no circumstances try to
take on Tazz alone by yourself. Just follow him and, if need be, warn Gim.
We'll get a team there as soon as possible."
She nodded in understanding and faded out.
***
Dozing, but ready to awaken at the slightest noise outside the sea-hatch
door, Colossal Boy awoke uneasily. He had the feeling that something was
wrong ... that someone was in the dome with him.
"Impossible," he told himself. "Now don't lose your marbles over the
dead silence and loneliness. You've got too many people to disgrace -- above
all, yourself . Keep hold of your nerves, big guy ..."
"Colossal Fool!" rang out an insulting voice. "Come up here."
Colossal Boy sat up so violently that he crashed his head against a low
crossbeam.
"Tazz!" he gasped dizzily. "His voice came from the apex room!"
Shaking off his dizziness, Colossal Boy raced up the nearest stairway,
moving faster than anybody one-tenth of his weight could. Bursting into the
apex chamber, he faced the grinning villian.
"How did you get in?" roared Gim Allon, his mind reeling. "I sat
before the sea hatch day and night ..."
"What good did that do?" cackled Tazz, "when I oozed in through
the wall? Now listen to this story of where I was hiding for a week -- It'll
kill you!"
It very nearly did. Colossal Boy felt as horribly shocked as the
other Legionnaires had been when they realized how the villian had duped
them with such diabolic cunning. But Gim had noticed no force-field aura
around Tazz ... and he now strode forward heavily, huge hands outstretched.
"Well! He who laughs last, laughs last, I always say. I'm going to grab you
and hold onto you for the next forty-five hours, if I have to, or until the
others get here ... Uh?"
Colossal Boy had stopped in mid-stride. Tazz had whipped a head-
band around his forehead, to which was attached a concave-like mirror that
shone a violet-green glow into Gim's eyes. At the same time, Tazz ordered:
"Stop, Colossal Boy. You are under my mental control."
Sweating and straining, Colossal Boy tried to fight the overwhelming
hypnotic force that beat at his brain. But then his body relaxed into a slump-
shouldered sag, eyes blank, face wooden. Like a zombie, he intoned,"It will
be done as you command master."
"Good," Tazz muttered, a murderous look in his eyes. "When the
other Legionnaires arrive, they will find the biggest and one of the strongest
Legionnaires blocking their way, opposing them, fighting them. What will
you do to them, Colossal Boy?"
"I'll wade into them before they know what is happening," recited
Gim, following unvoiced telepathic suggestions radiated by Tazz. The giant
teen's eyes blazed fiercely. "And then ... I'll kill them!"
"That is right, Colossal Boy," voiced Tazz in sinister glee. "Now we
will wait for your friends to enter my trap."
To be continued ...
By Bruce Wayne
Disclaimer: I don't own these characters, I'm just borrowing then for a while.
The characters are owned by DC Comics and I'm writing this just for the fun of
it.
CHAPTER 16 - THE HUNT FOR THE VILLIAN
It was the next day and they were back at the Legion clubhouse,
using equipment in Brainiac 5's laboratory. There were four monitor screens
attended by four Legionnaires at present. The monitors were connected to
a huge computer that in itself was connected to satellites in space.
"The basic principle is simple," explained Brainiac 5. "There are four
synchronous satellites around the world. What we are doing is utilizing a 'spy-
ray,' you might call it."
He patted an electronic box that fed signals into the system.
"This invention of mine works on the principle that each person on
Earth has his own special brain-wave pattern, as distinctively different as
one person's fingerprints are from other people's prints. Now, we have a
database of all the different types of brain waves from people who hail from
Earth, as well as members of the United Planets. For example, my brain-
wave pattern is different from an Earth human because I am from the planet
Colu. Now Tazz is from a planet that is not in the database. He can't disguise
his brain-wave. So, his brain-wave should stand out like the well-known
sore thumb from the characteristic patterns of minds in the database."
Brainy pushed a function button on a computer keyboard and an
image flashed on a large monitor screen on the wall of the lab. It appeared
to be a chart of various human brain-wave patterns that were in flowing
waves, differing minutely in the height of the curves, their closeness together,
and the dips or peaks of the full string.
"Tazz's brain waves will be totally different than anything in our
database," said Brainy. "I don't know what they'll look like, but if some-
thing comes up just watch for any freakish distorted pattern and we'll have
Tazz nailed down, no matter where he's hiding. Each of you is attuned to a
separate syncom satellite which covers a different broad region of Earth.
The four of you will cover the world with our monitor screens."
"Every square inch, Braino?" asked Matter-Eater Lad in wonder.
"Yes," replied Brainiac 5. "The computer does most of the work and
will only alert you if it spots something odd. This spy-ray system could be
tuned, if we wished, to finding one blue microbe out of a trillion red ones.
Take my word for it that as it scans the world, every person's brain wave
in the area that its looking at will be registered on your screen. The computer
will sort out any number of patterns, even millions at the same time."
"I don't understand a word of it," confessed Sun Boy. "You mean I
could tune in my own mind and see a Sun Boy brain pattern?"
"No, you'd just get a blank," said Shrinking Violet slyly. "He said a
BRAIN pattern."
"Then take Colossal Boy," retaliated Sun Boy. "I understand when
he grows to giant size, his brain reduces to ant size."
"Oh, you made me think of Big Gim standing guard all alone at the
sea bottom, I miss him so."
"Hah. That's like missing the Rigelian Fever --" Dirk stopped, seeing
the girl was looking sad. "Sorry, Vi. I guess I was hitting below the belt."
"Let's get to work!" barked Invisible Kid, turning to his own monitor
screen.
"It will be a hard job," warned Brainiac 5. "When the computer alerts
you of an odd brain pattern, just punch it up and look at it. If in doubt, just call
me."
Silence fell as each of them concentrated on their computer screens,
watching the lightning fast changing patterns of brain waves that sprayed onto
the screen constantly. Could they comb the world this way, picking one alien
brain wave out of all the billions of people on Earth?
***
It was night and cool in the bedroom. Jan Arrah held Nura Nal. For
a few minutes of peace, Jan floated in the soft darkness of ecstasy, without
thought, without memory, and -- most importantly -- without horror or rage.
Conscious only of sensation, he heard his breathing and Nura's breathing in
one sound, as if the darkness outside of him and the darkness within breathed
in one rhythm.
The sensation flowered and became a mosaic of perceptions: the
warmth of Nura's thigh against his face, the throb of her femoral artery, the
caress of her hand on his leg.
Sensations without thought. Sensations defining the form of his body,
where his body touched Nura, where his body touched the wadded and
tangled sheets of the bed. For minutes, he existed only as a form defined
by sensations.
Then he remembered their pleasure. The sweatslick flesh of Nura's
thighs, his fingers clawing into her flesh, her muscles snapping taut like steel
cables as she spasmed in ecstasy, her cries and gasps, his breathing locked
with hers. The rhythm and tempo had intoxicated them, her arms gripping
him, pulling him against her as if urging him to plunge deeper into the center
of herself, her hands jerking him against her, and then his climax.
Her tongue touched him again, the spin of her tongue stopping his
memories. He groaned and moved in the bed. "Oh .. no. Can't"
"Let's make it number five."
"Five?"
"Four so far."
"Impossible ..."
"What?"
"This is amazing."
"We're just decharging from our missions."
Jan thought back to what had occurred in the Antarctic. He felt his
identity returning, the fears and hatreds and horrible, shuddering memories
rushing into the pleasure-drained void of his mind, like a flight of bats crowding
through the eye sockets of a skull.
"Please don't talk," he requested.
"Who wants to talk?" she giggled. Her legs circled him. She locked
her ankles behind him. He smelled the intoxicating fragrance of her platinum-
hair. The bed began to rock. Once again he started to slam into her.
Laughing, she responded to his violence with a slow, sensuous
writhing of her hips. But after a minute of his body slamming her, she
whispered, "Easy. Easy. Slow down. Easy."
He continued slamming her. She told him, "Stop it. Slow down,
you're hurting me."
Grabbing her hips in his hands, he continued, not seeking to give
or gain but only desperately wanting unconsciousness.
Nura defended herself. Grasping his head in both hands, she pressed
her sharp thumbnails against his closed eyes. She put only slight pressure
against the eyelids as she warned him, "Stop now!"
Jan threw himself aside, twisting his face away from the knives of
her thumbnails, reflexively straightarming Nura away to a safe distance. His
breath came in gasps as he leaned against the headboard.
"What's wrong? What's going on with you?" Nura said. "One minute
you're a lover and the next, you're ... you're berserk."
"Nothing. I just got too rough. I'm sorry."
"No, Jan. I don't mean just now. I mean all night. This afternoon.
You're here, then you're not. You're someplace else. You see things. Your
face goes hard, like you're ready to attack something. Someone."
"Me? Do that?" He forced a laugh.
"Sometimes you are a scary guy," she said.
Jan laughed at the understatement. Some of his teammates --
especially Matter-Eater Lad and Bouncing Boy -- also thought of him
as a scary guy.
"You are five different kinds of scary, scary dude" to quote Tenzil.
"I am," he finally told her, laughing as if he joked. "I am a very scary
guy. I even scare myself."
"You may be, but you're decent first. A good guy. You're easy to like.
I liked you ever since the day we met. I ever tell you that?" Nura said.
"What? You don't know anything about me. Not who I am or
was --"
"Yes, I do. I've read your Legion file numerous times. I know all
about you," she told him. Nura knew Jan was always one of the most powerful
members of the Legion, and one of the most withdrawn. His mental discipline,
which guarded him from accidentally killing people with a stray thought,
allowed few people to get close to him. Nura had always wanted to know
what really made him tick.
"Is that why you came on to me on the planet ...?"
"Oh, puuleeeze!" she laughed. "I come on to all the guys, you know
that!"
Jan laughed. "I feel like what the people on Earth once called 'a
mail order bride.' Dude by dossier."
"Yes," she said. "I've read about all the operations and missions
that you've been on. Though there wasn't much on the personal stuff. Nothing
about --"
"Oh. Then you don't know."
"I can guess. I've heard a little of what happened to you."
Jan rolled in the bed and held her, "My past has been very extreme."
"Was it? Tell me. I only heard the stories."
Jan sat up again. He reached out for a glass of water beside the
bed..
Nura's hand massaged his chest and shoulder. Her fingers traced
the rope-like scar on his side. Her fingers found other scars that marked his
body.
"You don't get scars like these working in an office."
"I'm a Legionnaire," he said proudly. "You can get hurt when some
would-be world-dominator throws you against a wall."
She traced what looked like a recent-moon welt with a finger.
"You get this in Antarctica?"
"Playing in the snow. I fell and --"
"N'ass."
"Really, I fell down on --"
"Jan," she interrupted. "You joke and you laugh. But it isn't funny
to see you. You're haunted. It's like you've got different people moving
inside of you. What happened to you?"
"You don't want to know," he said as he gulped down some more
water.
"Does it have anything to do with what happened to Trom?"
"You don't want to know."
"I'm a Legionnaire just like you, Jan! I'm willing to risk my life
for you and the others. But I want to know the people I'm taking that
risk for. I --"
"Oh, God, no ..." Jan groaned. He left Nura's bed, and paced the
room. "Why are you doing this?"
A moment later, he turned to her and began speaking rapidly, "I'll
tell you this ... Don't put any credits in the bank. Don't buy life insurance,
even though Imra says we can't get any anyway, buy the best clothes, the
best shoes. Buy anything that'll give you a laugh."
"It's dangerous. Is that what you're telling me? Being a Legionnaire
is dangerous? Do you want to protect me? You think I will die?"
"Getting killed isn't it ..." Jan pointed to his right eye. "It's what you
see. After that, dying, thinking about dying isn't the same. You recognize
the advantages of being dead. No memories. No thinking --"
"What happened to you, Jan?!"
"You really want to know? The truth?"
"Yes!" she screamed.
Jan stood naked in the darkness. He looked at the walls and
furniture trying to decide what to tell her.
He finally calmed down and sat on the edge of the bed. And
Element Lad and Dream Girl talked until sunrise.
Nura listened to all the horror and inhumanity and suffering he had
felt.
She listened to how Jan explained that the people who had once been
on his homeworld had the ability to create as much wealth as they could possibly
want with their powers. But that the Trommites had a disdain for wealth and
instead used their powers to create a highly spiritual society. They always had
refused requests and demands to use their powers for the material benefit
of others, and so it was when Roxxas the Butcher made such a demand. Roxxas,
who apparently did not fully understand the small size of Trom's population,
killed everyone ... except Jan, who was on a ship in space at the time.
"What do you think?" Jan concluded. "Is this what you want to do
with your life?"
"People all over the galaxy are alive because of us, right?"
"Yeah, I think about that a lot. That's what makes being a Legionnaire
worth it."
"Do you think it would be any different for me? I've seen some of
what you've seen, but I couldn't do anything about it. I may not have the
type of power you have ... but you don't have to dream some of the night-
mares that I do, either. But the Legion makes a difference. What greater
opportunity could I hope for?"
He told her, "The villians -- there's always more. We defeat one,
a hundred come. We defeat the hundred, and Mordru raises another army.
There's no end to the killing and suffering."
"And if we didn't fight?" she asked.
"The likes of Tazz and Mordru conquer the universe," he answered.
"Then we fight ..."
Jan nodded. He put his arms around Nura and held her, the rise
and fall of her chest soft against his muscles. He tasted the sweat-salt in
her hair and pushed a few strands away from her beautiful face. He closed
his eyes and wished he knew the future. But he did not, could not and
would not even ask Dream Girl if she knew when or if some kind of
violence would end his life.
When he died, he died. But now, in this moment of life and pleasure,
he held a girl he deeply cared about.
***
Later that morning, Invisible Kid read the latest news from his
omnicon. And the news was grim. In fact, the news was alarming. He
just read bits and pieces. "Earth undergoing fantastic change ... Ocean
level up five feet ... Dikes in European sector threatened ... More volcanoes
erupting in the Pacific region ... Violent high-altitude wind disrupting air
travel ... Giant comet plunging toward Earth on possible collision course."
"The four Earth dooms of Tazz," muttered Saturn Girl. "Building up
to their cataclysmic finale -- only three days away now. And we can't locate
Tazz. I've tried. We've tried and nothing seems to work."
Five hours later, the Legionnaires in Brainiac 5's lab had nearly
covered the entire world with his brain-wave scanner. Invisible Kid was
frowning worriedly. "With only a few patches of Earth left to scan, is it
possible that ..." His voice trailed away as he punched the keys on the
computer keyboard.
After a while, all the Legionnaires in the lab looked away from the
computer screens and stared at one another, dumbfounded.
Star Boy finally said it aloud: "Tazz is nowhere on Earth. Or else
he devised some way of hiding and eluding the spy-ray."
"Impossible," said Brainiac 5. "Impossible, I tell you! This spy-
ray works on the telepathic principle, and nothing can stop telepathic
waves from coming through."
With uncharacteristic anger, Brainy punched the keys on his
keyboard hard in frustration. His monitor showed a single brain-wave
pattern ribboning across the screen. "There's the brain wave of Colossal
Boy, seven and a half miles deep under countless tons of sea water. The
deepest mine shaft ... the heart of a solid stone mountain ... the inside of
a nuclear reactor -- none of those could prevent Tazz's brain waves from
being radiated and picked up by the spy-ray."
Brainac 5 stared at the screen, trying to think up another angle.
"Tazz is somewhere on Earth -- and yet he isn't. It's incredible, inexplicable,
inconceivable."
"Translation -- nutty," said Star Boy. "Too bad, Brainy, but your
gizmo didn't work."
"Don't blame Brainy," defended Invisible Kid. "If Tazz is still on
Earth, he must have picked out some clever hiding place we never
suspected ... wherever that could be."
Brainiac 5 suddenly jumped up. "Wait ... think once. Where is the
one place on Earth we would least expect him to be? The last place we
would think of?"
"Huh?" said Matter-Eater Lad blankly.
Brainy turned and ran from the main lab. He then began looking
through room after room in another section of the clubhouse complex
where he had set up his series of labs and science workshops. Most of
the labs were dark and unoccupied. With his handheld sensor and
detector on, Brainiac 5 paused outside one closed door on sub level
one that was labeled: SCIENCE HALL. It was used only by Brainiac 5
himself for top-priority science jobs, containing the finest and most prized
tools of research. A lot of time travel research was carried out in this room.
Brainy looked at the sensor in his hand. It was picking up a
telltale metabolic warmth of a living form beyond the door. The door
was locked. He went down the hall to an intercom communicator on
the wall. He punched the button, "Intruder alert! Science Hall!" he said.
Within moments, nearly a dozen Legionnaires had joined him outside
the door to the Science Hall.
"What do we do?" asked Matter-Eater Lad.
"This!" replied Ferro Lad as he rammed through the door.
Within the room, a man with frosty eyes turned from the workbench.
"Tazz!" screeched Tenzil. "You were here all the time in the Legion
clubhouse, the one place we didn't think of!"
"Naturally," mocked the villian. "It was elementary to outwit you dull-
brained humans."
The other Legionnaires had crowded into the room, and they stared
open-mouthed.
"How do you like that?" groaned Princess Projectra. "We look for him
all over the world ... in places twelve thousand miles away. Yet, all the while he
was practically sitting in our laps. Well, we've got him now."
"Oh, no you don't, Regal One," said Tazz cooly. "In the past week
while hiding here, I took the liberty of utilizing the lab's rather crude -- by my
standards -- equipment. I constructed two 40th century devices. Only the first
need concern you now ..."
"Grab him, quick," yelled Invisible Kid, and all the Legionnaires rushed
forward.
But they all seized empty air, as the leering Tazz turned transparent.
They could now see the new kind of belt he wore, which glowed with an
eerie blue luminescence.
"A fourth-dimensional transporter," came the fading voice of Tazz.
"It allows me to slip through the fourth dimension and whisk anywhere on
Earth in the wink of an eye. In a moment, I'll be back in my undersea
dome .. without the necessity of going past your Colossal Oaf guard at
the sea-hatch door. I'll just go through the walls."
His form faded to nothingness with a last derisive laugh.
"Gim," moaned Violet. "He'll be in danger, not knowing that Tazz
will materialize out of thin air, behind his back ..."
"Tinya!" cried Invisible Kid.
"Lyle, I can go into the fourth dimension," Phantom Girl explained, "but
I don't have a transporter like he described. I can try to follow him, if you
want."
He grabbed Phantom Girl's arm. "Under no circumstances try to
take on Tazz alone by yourself. Just follow him and, if need be, warn Gim.
We'll get a team there as soon as possible."
She nodded in understanding and faded out.
***
Dozing, but ready to awaken at the slightest noise outside the sea-hatch
door, Colossal Boy awoke uneasily. He had the feeling that something was
wrong ... that someone was in the dome with him.
"Impossible," he told himself. "Now don't lose your marbles over the
dead silence and loneliness. You've got too many people to disgrace -- above
all, yourself . Keep hold of your nerves, big guy ..."
"Colossal Fool!" rang out an insulting voice. "Come up here."
Colossal Boy sat up so violently that he crashed his head against a low
crossbeam.
"Tazz!" he gasped dizzily. "His voice came from the apex room!"
Shaking off his dizziness, Colossal Boy raced up the nearest stairway,
moving faster than anybody one-tenth of his weight could. Bursting into the
apex chamber, he faced the grinning villian.
"How did you get in?" roared Gim Allon, his mind reeling. "I sat
before the sea hatch day and night ..."
"What good did that do?" cackled Tazz, "when I oozed in through
the wall? Now listen to this story of where I was hiding for a week -- It'll
kill you!"
It very nearly did. Colossal Boy felt as horribly shocked as the
other Legionnaires had been when they realized how the villian had duped
them with such diabolic cunning. But Gim had noticed no force-field aura
around Tazz ... and he now strode forward heavily, huge hands outstretched.
"Well! He who laughs last, laughs last, I always say. I'm going to grab you
and hold onto you for the next forty-five hours, if I have to, or until the
others get here ... Uh?"
Colossal Boy had stopped in mid-stride. Tazz had whipped a head-
band around his forehead, to which was attached a concave-like mirror that
shone a violet-green glow into Gim's eyes. At the same time, Tazz ordered:
"Stop, Colossal Boy. You are under my mental control."
Sweating and straining, Colossal Boy tried to fight the overwhelming
hypnotic force that beat at his brain. But then his body relaxed into a slump-
shouldered sag, eyes blank, face wooden. Like a zombie, he intoned,"It will
be done as you command master."
"Good," Tazz muttered, a murderous look in his eyes. "When the
other Legionnaires arrive, they will find the biggest and one of the strongest
Legionnaires blocking their way, opposing them, fighting them. What will
you do to them, Colossal Boy?"
"I'll wade into them before they know what is happening," recited
Gim, following unvoiced telepathic suggestions radiated by Tazz. The giant
teen's eyes blazed fiercely. "And then ... I'll kill them!"
"That is right, Colossal Boy," voiced Tazz in sinister glee. "Now we
will wait for your friends to enter my trap."
To be continued ...