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Legal disclaimer: I tend to liberally "borrow" character profiles and art from the Earth-27 wikia created by Roy Westerman with principle art coming from digital artist Phil Cho. Other creators and artists are found there as well and I will specifically list any creations with creator citations as I utilize them. In short, this is the single most comprehensive retelling of all things DC and beyond I have encountered. It's worth your time to explore.
Cover art provided by Martina Havlikova.
Free, commercial use art by her can be found at the following URL: martinahavlikova84 | Pixabay
She is also available for private commissions. Her art can previously be seen as covers of Renfri for Evil Queen, Hellequin for Hellequin and the Paragons, Oracle for Oracle and Oracle Sees All, Enchantress for Enchantress in Peril,Ace of Blades for Blades Free, Killer Frost for Killer Frost: Blades in the Heart, Dorothy Gale for Wickedest Witch, Goldilocks forInjustice Reigns, Hellequin again for Marian Drews, Renfri again for Evil Delights, Dorothy Gale in Something Wicked,Patti O'Brien in Plastic Woman, Claire Connelly in Repo Men, Disco Mummyin the Disco Mummy Strikes, Oracle for Oracle Undercover, Wendy Harris for Super Friends-Super Powers Continued Pt1: Wendy Harris, Jayna for Super Friends-Super Powers Continued Pt2: Jayna Penny Lark for Super Friends-Super Powers Continued Pt3: Penny, Clock Queen for Injustice for all, Dazaar for Dazaar the Arch Fiend,Li Harper for the Red Hood,Priscilla Rich for Super Friends-Super Powers Continued Pt4: Cheetahand now with Nazi era Ace of Blades for Frosted Blades,Rose/Ravager for Beryl & Rose: Date Night,Kalea-El for Family Struggles. Dorothy Gale again with Domino Lady here and now with more yet to come.
That having been said, the properties, and their variations belong to DC Comics through WarnerMediaand its former parent, AT&T, with notable exceptions. More on that in the footnote. I do not own DC characters or their interpretations and reimaginings. My own characters are implied Public Domain since I have not included a copyright notice as required by the 1974 revisions of the copyright statutes and regulations. While an intellectual copyright is implied without the due symbols and language, all such considerations are generally voided under CC-BY-SA, which governs this site, unless duly noted otherwise.
Furthermore, in unsurprising news from the cash starved AT&T, they "offloaded" WarnerMedia (think DC, Warner Bros. Warner Animation, the HBO empire) in a "merger" with the Discovery empire. Giving all creative control to Discovery. Will DC print comics survive? Not bloody likely...
Open Source attributionsare listed after the story concluded to satisfy legalese requirements. And all "super" characters other than Open Source have been seen in comic books before barring any original characters coming from the Earth-27 Wiki or myself. You can look into Public Domain Superheroes Wiki and the DC Database Wiki's own vaults to verify this.
Although this is primarily set in the DCAU, I incorporate attributes of dozens of interpretations of each character, comic telling era, and medium into the telling.
Several insurance, refinance, and even major loan institutions and companies had pooled their considerable agency, corporations, and resources to attract, through invitations, a host of likely reciprocal clients Super Buddies' way through this gala launched by Queen Consolidated. The local level bonds-bailment ranks were included as well. Michael Jon Carter and Ted Kord attended in full Booster Gold and Blue Beetle regalia.
"So where are the wives, gentlemen? We need representation," one potential client asked. Beetle coughed his wine out while Booster slapped him on the back a few times.
"Ol' Beetle here isn't married and neither is my sister, Goldstar," Booster explained, "My wife avoids these events."
Which was true enough. Super Buddies Repo Agency had never thrown together an event like this. Even so, word of mouth out on their little operation was on the corporate radar for getting the job done. If it was exotic tech or super villain trophies, Super Buddies was there to save the day and reclaim the whatever it was item.
Booster's wife, a transwoman, was happier tending to her dog, Fido, than schmoozing with potential clients. Despite her gender realignment over with, the topic still distrcted gatherings intro two groups of peope. One embraced Claire's journey. Others blindly lashed out in hate and jealousy. Booster's twin, Michelle Carter vanished when the invitations were handed out.
Goldstar needed an income like the rest of them but attending such a benefit was harder than stealing a whisper tank back from Red Alice and her Wonderland Army.
Finance companies were finding 2010 to be a boom year in defaulting on loans and absconding with the item they'd used as collateral. Even corporate giants were having tech stolen from them to be bartered away with a super villain client or two.
As the finance companies over extended themselves, so the Auctioneer's traveling sales events were booming business. LuthorCorp turned LexCorp turned Mercy Corp and finally returned LuthorCorp had their own quasi-legal agents to return items taken from them. No one else wanted to invest in their own meta-agents and renting a Everyman Project meta or gen-active or two or three was cost prohibitive when dealing with untested and inexperienced gen actives. Especially when Super Buddies had two ex-Justice League members who were field tested and found to be more flexible with costs.
Blue Beetle had been texting appointment times with interested company spokespeople at the other end, Claire was keeping him advised of the when, where, and who were all ending up on the schedule. It seemed the Super Buddies had more prospective clients then they could satisfy. But everyone would get a fair hearing and the schedule jumbled about to see about when clients could expect a profitable return of their items.. The Queen Consolidated investment bankers that had coordinated this outing oversaw vast portfolios that were being raided. The monetary numbers could usually be restored. But the physical assets needed to be tracked down and Blue and Gold had recently obtained a sizable portion of the missing goods. After the last few outings, Claire had demanded to be let out of field work and man the desks at Super Buddies.
she was a blacklisted nanotech engineer that Lena Luthor herself had been the one to accuse Claire of stealing her own technology in order for LuthorCorp to continue to have free access to the tech in general and royalty-free from having to pay Claire for her patents. It was all a legal game to Lena but it meant Claire's livelihood and after several harrowing escapes with the recovered items, Claire was done.
Before Batman and the second Wonder Woman wnet into self-imposed exiles, they'd revealed seeing great potential in Booster. Booster and Claire had joined Blue Beetle and Goldstar and Rip Hunter of the Time Masters to derail unimaginable threats to the time line. Of course Diana was named Queen of Themiscyra for her exile. Batman vanished without a word to anyone by the time Booster and Claire returned to the post-Crises New Universe. Even the Vanishing Point had been annihilated by the time Crisis of the Multiverse destroyed the Prime Universe in Final Crisis. But Glorith put events that she was most familiar with back into the blossoming Rebirth that created the New Universe. So the former Time Masters all remembered the Multiverse alongside the New History of the New Earth.
One woman caught Blue Beetle's eyes. She rarely engaged in conversation and seemed to be relatively unknown to the party crowd of exclusives.
"Cover me, I'm going in," Blue Beetle told Booster.
"What?" was Booster's eloquent reply.
"You don't seem the party type," Blue Beetle said to the stranger.
"Neither do you," she chuckled softly, "But from the look of things you'll be invited to hundreds of soirees like this from now. It's the price of success," she told him.
"And you know this how?" Blue Beetle wondered.
"It's the price of my success," she laughed which was delivered with a tinkling of good natured humor, "You see I'm
inadvertently your competition."
"How so?" Beetle again wondered.
"Most of these potential clients of yours are beginning to be sloshed enough to offer details of what they want returned and how big of a fee they'll hand over for it or its' return," the blonde told him, "I'm just opportunistic enough to get there before you."
"Who are you?" Blue Beetle wondered yet again.
"I just told you. I'm your competition," the blonde laughed again. But this time the laugh was directed against him rather for mutual gratification"See ya around,"
She deftly got through the crowd with efficiency and ease. Ted Kord found it impossible to follow her.
"Booster!" Blue Beetle was at his friend's side in seconds.
"She shot you down?" Booster asked.
"Worse. She's scalp hunting repo marks to be had here," Blue Beetle explained, "But she just vanished."
"How hard can it be to spot a blonde with a page boy cut?" Booster scoffed.
"Try it," Blue Beetle grated.
Booster looked the room over, "Damn! She's gone."
"Not feeling so smug now, I get it?" Blue Beetle rubbed his nose it.
The next week passed by with Claire overseeing scheduling and negotiating fees. Booster, Goldstar, and Blue Beetle's were filled with easy successes and unnerving pratfalls pushing their fortunes as they were discovered at the midway point of retrieving the collateral that had been forfeited on paper but the Super Buddies still had to physically retrieve them despite going through threat or violence and the next week. While still awash with somewhat predictable success, Blue Beetle found the blonde cracking the safe whose contents Super Buddies had contracted to repossess. It was certainly the same woman with an added domino mask.
"Well, well, I see we agree that neither one of us should return with these properties," she remarked.
"Who the hell are you, anyway?" Blue Beetle was tired of her flirtatious evasions.
"Call me Domino Lady," she said with a flourish. She was licking her lips suggestively not unlike a cat playing around with a mouse it would kill for sport. But Domino Lady already had the safe open and was cleaning it out when Blue Beetle came upon her. He realized she'd been the one to trip an alarm. Booster and Goldstar were outside the manor house fending off security. He was legally contracted to repossesses the many gems Domino Lady was now wearing.
"It's all about the chase, isn't it?" she flashed him a lurid smile. The guards burst in and Domino Lady took two of their number down before they could even register her presence. Blue Beetle, on the other hand, was looking at the guilty party when the guards attacked him. While Domino Lady turned to face the embattled Blue Beetle, she waited until he remade eye contact. She only offered him a whimsical shrug and blew him a kiss as she winked at him. Then she vanished deeper into the manor house leaving him to deal the thoroughly pissed off guards.
Blue Beetle affected a slight retreat back towards the window down the hall that enabled him to enter while Bug floated beyond reach. Booster and Goldstar fended the outer sentries off and two loud explosions had occurred as the twins super heated parked vehicles until their gas tanks detonated. Blue Beetle used his strobe flash gun to impair the guards upstairs with him.
Then he broke and ran straight down the hall window, snagging the hanging ladder. He sent a signal to the awaiting Bug to retract the ladder. That activated a secondary protocol that caused the Bug to vector thrust and begin to rise.
Booster and Goldstar lent their ability to shield Beetle as the thugs below redirected their fire away from Booster's force field and at the unimaginably vulnerable Blue Beetle.
The ladder returned to its coiled and stored state of being rolled around a spool. Goldstar cleared the hatch as soon Blue Beetle ran to the cockpit. Booster came through and sealed the upper hatch. He boosted the craft for better surveillance of when and where Domino Lady would emerge.
"Ted! Did you get it?" Booster asked.
"No. But I know who has it for us now," Blue Beetle ground out between clenched jaws.
"What?" Goldstar yelped.
"Michelle, I need you to tap into the Hall of Justice. Booster and I are still reserve members. That'll buy us access," Blue Beetle began instructing her, "Look up any references on a 'Domino Lady'."
"That woman snaked our repo right in front of you?" Booster was aghast, "And left us looking guilty while she got away."
"Even Sherlock Holmes had an Irene Adler," Blue Beetle told him, "She is the pageboy blonde from the party."
"She can't be that good," Goldstar ventured.
"She waited until we were all involved before she tripped the upstairs alarms. She covered her escape by making us the only targets in sight," Blue Beetle wasn't calming down.
"Damn," Goldstar grunted, "Neither the MLJ nor the WEB Agency have anything on a 'Domino Lady'."
"She's too good be an amateur and she's good enough not have been caught yet," Blue Beetle reasoned it aloud.
"So what or who do we call?" Goldstar wondered.
"Catwoman. If the Domino Lady has any dirt to throw back on her, I'm willing to wager Selina Kyle or Holly Robinson know everything useful we can dig up on our larcenous pre-empter," Blue Beetle explained.
"How did she get passed you anyway?" Booster asked.
"She was busy flirting with me as she engaged an alarm and assaulted the first two guards entering the room. She hid behind the door while security focused me as the obvious perp and she flirtatiously slipped out," Blue Beetle was still irked by it.
"That does sound like someone Selina or Holly would've crossed pasts with," Goldstar accepted the truth of it.
"Claire's probably already on task but I don't want to spin her into this until we have a helluva lot more to go on," Booster was protecting his wife from slavishly trying to solve the puzzle.
Claire was the certified genius in the agency and he knew she'd spent the day receiving and verifying contracts for Super Buddies to reclaim the properties in question.
"Call Selina," Blue Beetle decided, "We'll start with our first Catwoman and if she draws a blank we call on Holly next."
"And Catgirl?" Booster asked.
"She's easy enough to find at the K Star Ranch with the other Young Justice plebes learning the particulars of how to stop gen factored criminals" Booster shrugged.
The Bug rerouted Claire's future inquiries passed on to Booster.
despite his attempt at being jovial, Claire saw through the dark glass clearly to intuit how badly things had gone.
He was still speaking to her when he exited the Bug and used his Legion of Superheroes flight ring to join her at their home in Manhattan.
"Selina said she use to hear rumours about a 'Domino Lady' as she was exiting the game. Holly had a few run-ins. She is upstate at the K-Star to review a development there," Goldstar told Blue Beetle.
"What kind of incident could they possibly have?" he wondered.
"A male student turned himself female to get past Roxy's defense and s/he destroyed Roxy's servers.
"Damn," Blue Beetle could manage to say.
"Instead, she rehoused herself into a brain dead patient and got herself back to the ranch to accuse her assailant," Goldstar dutifully reported.
"Jack Biceps and Shirlee Peeches got out during the confusion. But now its anyone's guess which binary gender Sinistro is right now. But Roxy has a personal stake in this so she's moving forward while the Justice Society plans to deploy all of the JSA and Young Justicers." Goldstar reported, "I have Holly online and waiting."
"Tell her we'd appreciate any help Catwoman can offer," Blue Beetle replied, "And find out if she can get Catgirl to help us as well."
"Kitrina back away from a potential fight?" Goldstar laughed, "You must be thinking of another Kitrina Falcone."
"Got all of that, Holl?" Goldstar asked her friend.
"Enough to watch Beetle get skewered by Catgirl later," Catwoman laughed.
"Can't wait fior that," Goldstar snickered.
Blue Beetle stayed clear of the conversation because he was the presumed target of a hot tempered adolescent. He wondered if Jaime Reyes suffered as much grief when Jaime and his Reach-built scarab activated to become the newest Blue Beetle. With the JSA and Young Justice deployed nationwide, it was left to the paraplegic Paula Nguyen and former Tigress to deliver Catgirl as the Bug floated on its RCS thrusters to allow stationary aerial clock keeping,
Catwoman was first at the hatch and climbed up inot the Bug. Catgirl easily vaulted herself up the rungs. As the Bug turned, Catwoman advised a specific course, a rather celebratory course for the Domino Lady.
It seemed she was a California party girl and after a successful heist, would undergo a pub crawl that could begin in Los Angeles and end in any state or country that the mob of clinger-on-ers wanted to go.
Pirate Blue and her Syndicate Underground associates felt Domino Lady shouldn't operate outside their purview. One of the many reasons why Pirate Blue was pressuring the legislators in seven states to pass Knightfall's proposed legislation package as modified by the state legislatures and avoid a rash of governors' vetoes.
But first, Catwoman had some bad news to impart, "Our mysterious 'Domino Lady' has been contracted to get ahead of Super Buddies' efforts to reclaim valuables by stealing specifically pinpoint targeted efforts. In other words, this was a first for her too."
"Who's the employer?" Blue Beetle asked.
"Julia Sazia," Catwoman name dropped.
"So it's a test of sorts," Goldstar deduced.
"A test to see if her reach gioes as far as she's been implying," Catwoman answered, "And the property will open Intergang up in a racket by taking h repo business by as much storm as Super Buddies already has."
"More of an audition," Catgirl clarified.
"So how hard was it to get Catgirl detached to you while the rest of the Justicers and JSAers are spreading across the country looking for Sinistro and his girl friends?" Goldstar asked.
"Well, since Selina and I are Kitrina's sponsors, it was pretty damn easy," Catwoman chuckled.
"That and that creepy Sandman guy has been bossing people about since he came back from the dead," Catgirl shrugged, "He and Dr. Fate agreed I should sit this one out with you guys."
"Ted here ever give you guys that kinda grief?" Catwoman asked.
"Not as long as he wants to keep on breathing," Goldstar smirked.
"I am sitting here," Blue Beetle complained while he piloted the Bug back down south again. For Domino Lady to effectively strike she had to have had to have gotten into the Super Buddies computers. Their recently expanded client list after the party the other nightmare Claire refused to go on the basis that trans men and women stole the evening away from a conversation and made the evening's nosiness all about transgenders and even more, question Booster's ability to get a "real" wife.
After attending just one client scouts evening Blue Beetle and Booster Gold had decided that one, maybe, of these things would be worth attending demenading on the degree of work that was asked of them.
Right now, Claire and Booster were overhauling the computers' security she'd demanded to review at once and defered sleep until later.
Fido was obsessing over Booster even though all of Fido's needs would forever be met by Claire. Which boasted Claire's transition into womanhood vastly exceeding Fido's male obsessed world and left with the oft-sided compliment that she was a woman in every accord not requiring birth organs. Instead Claire simply rolled her eyes and smoothed over Booster's "insult" of ignoring Fido's desire to be close to Booster even more than he wanted Claire, which she smoothed over Fido's despondent approach of trying to seem saddled with woes and cares. Booster ignored those too.
Claire couldn't get with the program that Booster was being narcissistic again. He just wasn't a dog person and wouldn't consider switching loyalties and make Fido's dreams come true.
"One thing about Domino Lady's collecting on warrants you're been hired to collect from, she'll always choose something small and shiny," Catwoman explained.
"Claire, what did Domino Lady snake from underneath us?" Blue Beetle asked.
"A laser altered, Berlentti styled ruby that was put up as collateral while who'd stolen it back when they were bankrupted with Veronica Cale," Claire explained.
"And Cale is the client," Blue Beetle had already deduced.
"You must do this for a living," Booster chuckled.
"Word is Cale optioned the ruby for material and personnel. But when the time came to repay the Auctioneer, she herself had already lost the gem to Intergang when she tried to get herself a larger buy in and therefore a higher pay out where she'd been beholden to the Auctioneer for the money she'd already spent. Julie Sazia simply seized hold of the stone as an object lesson," Catwoman recited the gory details, "So Cale wants the gem stone in order to appease the Auctioneer."
"She gets whatever surplus is tacked in during the auction minus her original loan and estimated value," Blue Beetle understood it now, "And whatever is engraved within the gem's matrix."
"Which is purported to worth more than the billions of dollars worth using the various bank's numbered accounts like the Bertinellis did," Catwoman happily divulged.
"So...what is it engraved inside the ruby?" Blue Beetle wasn't afraid to be the first to ask.
"A formula," Catgirl blurted, "Right now everyone is breaking each other apart to get super-soldier formulas, regenerative serums, and longevity serums. Cale, or one of her flunkies, delivered a single formula to grant anyone the same powers the Axis looked for all in one dose."
"That's a helluva bargaining chip," Goldster whistled.
"And safer than taking the four originals," Catgirl preened.
"Someone's hitting the books," Catwoman praised Catgirl's determination.
"So when is the Auctioneer's next auction going to be?" Blue Beetle asked.
"New York City, tonight at Trump Tower," Catwoman decided to give him that one.
"I take it the Donald will fire everyone and get all the loot," Goldstar offered.
"He's just mad and power hungry enough to do it after his colossal loss of running for President during the election run off that made her President again. Even Lex Luthor got a bigger voter share," Blue Beetle was enjoying this.
"We need better back up," Catwoman decided, "I'm calling the MLJ inro this"
The Mighty Crusaders couldn' remember Darkling's death before the Crises. Dora Keane had died and passd her abilities on to an unsuspecing Darla Lang. Only now after Rebirth had that event been altered so that Dora Keane was the only Darkling. She'd threatened Shazam once or twice but she happily joined the Mighty Crusaders. The Shadow Crusaders barely existed now after Rebirth. The first and second Hangman and Mr. Justice being the sole contingent left. In the New Earth, the Shadow Crusaders had never developed. But Mr. Justice and the Hangman were supernatural reservists. Just as there was only one Web but he'd created the WEB Agency again for the MLJ to absorb. But even the Mighty Crusaders were too busy today to assist.
So Catwoman contacted the Sec. for Homeland Security. No one had ever expected Bones to ever become anything but a two-bit failed criminal but he'd surprised Amanda Waller with his administrative talents that made it possible for him to review and revise agencies he'd been inducted into. Bones headed the DEO while he was also the United Nation's SHADE director overseeing the Creature Commandos..
Only Katherine Webb-Kane had achieved as much success when heading up Spyral. When the UN shuttered the DEO, Spyral, and SHADE, there were more loose agents and directors suddenly thrust into the global market loosed from their oaths looking for working. Most but not quite all turning to being criminals rather fighting back againt global threats instead they were the global threats. But they dismissed the Justice League Task Force after a few massacres killing almost a thousand people over all. But the UN kept the THUNDER Agents and the supporting THUNDER Squad.
But Secretary-General Lex Luthor wanted more from the collective body now that International Operations had merged with the United Nations. So IO not only employed diplomats but also meta-humans. IO was the master program that the newly established Global Guardians and THUNDER Agents answered to. But the MLJ and Homeland Security wanted to avoid the UN's clause in their new "Emergent Gen Active" identity roster.
POTUS Olivia McKay used every regulatory stance in the UN Charter to establish that they didn't have a right to burden the US' sovereignty even she chose the way of most rogue nations and loudly ignored Sec-Gen Luthor's mandates. She'd spent months dismantling his fail safes and expunging his loyalists in the White House.
The Agents of SMASH found only those with recriminating evidence chose to defy Congress' own edict to course correct Luthor's loyalties in the Congress. Rebrandinbg the UN's IO section back to being the Global Guardians had been a wild success for Luthor and Black Adam.
Luthor gathered support in the UN and Black Adam force fed the benefits of allying themselves inside the UN within IO's rhetoric. IO was still a geopolitical enforcement agency. Luthor was demanding that Knightfall's programs be accepted within the United States and governed by IO.
She'd receive a relative royalty payment of a billion a year for Knightfall beginning the fire that even Pres. McKay couldn't seem able to sway the public's rabid fomenting within governments across the world. Luthor had already promised the General Assembly that the UN would publish every masked vigilantes' secret identities and copies would be free for everyone world-wide to get the files and freely distribute them. Wikileaks gone commercial. Those "heroes" resistant to the UN's identity blowing whistle had created a definitive division between types of vigilantes. Even thse deputized to operate by US sanction were ordered to publically reveal their identities.
Those that didn't show up for the unveiling or abandon their extracurricular activities as a costume hero-type would become criminals with the out that it would take before the official lists of outlaws had been drafted because Luthor would subject themselves before the world. While everyone else was to be branded a terrorist.
Actual terrorists would be exonerated as long as they kept to their geopolitical intentions as licensed by the Secretary-General himself. Queen Audrey had pacified the Kaznian civil war with a power sharing agreement. But there were still those that wanted a "Now or Nothing" cold war to begin. Audrey herself the principle target of their wrath of being held out of the negotiations that Audrey held with public offices, court supporters, and radicals of every size, share, and even over time. Labeled as the "Great Experiment", others called it Audrey's unforgivable sin.
Brion Markov was one such detractor from his fellow small Balkan state since leaving adventuring behind, Geo-Force had become an ultra-nationalist. Princess Tara Markova, known to the world as Terra, had unfinished business with the Justice League, Justice Society, Young Justice, and Justice League Outsiders.
Luthor was ready to politically offer an olive branch ansd deputize the Justice League Unlimited into Justice League Action or Justice League International. Superman disavowed Luthor's offer with a derisive snort and storming off. He'd been outvoted by the Flash, Shayera Hol-Stweart, John Stewart, Col. (Ret.) Steve Trevor, and Sue Dibney while Ralph whined about being excluded.
Something Sheriff John Jones admitted to upon visiting and sensors detecting his Green Martian DNA. J'onn Jonzz wouldn't explain his survival and long days of healing. M'gann M'orzz knew but he'd sworn her to secrecy but even healinmg up, he ran for County Sheriff in Arizona, and now had an obligation to those citizens in particular.
But he did inform them that he would stand beside them during any future Crises that included a Belazurian invasion.
"M'arzz has been beseiged by Belazurian Empire for months now. But their scouts including the Empress' personal favorite. Her name is Erica and she led a cadre of the finest Battle Woman of Belazur to Earth. But she's never checked in. None of the Battle Woman assigned to scouting Earth have. They seemingly vanished," J'onn Jonzz, the Martian Manhunter filled them in on recent history off of Eartrh itself.
"Is there anyone else that knows this war had been ongoing?" Shayera knew of the Belazurian forces for years.
"There are surviving Green Martians, White Martians, and a small contogent of Red Martians. The Reds' queen Dejah Thoris married a human from the failed human colony on M'arzz as John Carter as the Warlord of M'arzz and to its queen, Dejah Thoris. I transported their daughter here ot Earth. Tharia of M'arzz."
"So humans survived on M'arzz?" Trevor was astonished by this secret history.
Shayera scowled, "The Red Martians and Green Martians are sacrificing their lives against the Belzurian killers.
even the White Martians never fought a genocidal war."
"Until now," John Jones told them before expressing his sorrow that Superman, Queen Diana, and Batman weren't showing up. Sue soft soaped it but two them had retired from conflicting with criminals. Superman was seeking advice from Lois.
Lois was transmitting everything she'd learned about the ruling class Red Martians.
"Good to have you back, Ted," Lois acknowledged Blue Beetle. Others had shorter ranged take aways.
"Tharia?" Catgirl sputtered, "Effin' Tharia is a Martian?"
Half-Martian," Lois' hologram chided her, "And the rightfiul heir to her mother. Tharia was meant to lead us past the Martians caste system and openm everything up to form ameritocracy rather than an DNA fluctuation that could make any Martian capable of bringing selected aliens sexually viable as a Martian, And who better to mingle with then your T'erran neighbors?"
"How is any of this relate to our situation?" Catwoman voclaized.
"Because the financier backing Domino Lady is an unwitting stooge to the Balzurian Empress. Possibly any survivor from Erica's touchdown on Earth," Lois added.
"That rules out almost no one," Blue Beetle groaned.
"My suspect is Julie Sazia," Lois piped up, "With Intergang tied up in a secretive civil war allies like the Belzurian Empress would be critical sine most of Intergang's metas have gone underground after Brains and the Gang openly defied Sazia and called out for the 100 to shake their chains binding them to Intergang and shrugged them off herself.
Brains' revolt was backed by Knightfall, the Veiled Lady, Queenie Hart, and most of the female 100 members. most of the gen factored agents had also swung their allegiance to Brains. In a surprising turn the original Clock, the third Black Hand, and Jenny Elsewhere allied themselves with Brains. Jaina Hudson and White Rabbit had traveled across the country espousing the merits of Knightfall's licensing virtue and vice in the program. The goal of pacifying criminals by strengthening the bonded acts of violence that had been licensed between conflicting cartels. On the street, the battle seemed lofty and most street thugs were immune to the charms of support management. Those entitled to sit as a reduced membership Intergang table realized Knightfall meant for her allies to still remain loyal and strong to dividing up criminal clashes, licensed of course, but decimating the power and personnel of each faction only to be swallowed whole by Intergang or the Syndicate Underground."
Malik al Thaka, the Brain Emperor, had dissolved his Evil Brain Trust to re-enter the embrace of the Syndicate Undergroud. Pirate Blue yearned to be under the ocean when Brain Emperor announced his decision. Many of his followers simply retired, having enough through criminal acts to support themselves in style.
The Global Concern's Gen Active department didn't exist on paper but it was the Global Concern's money maker. Licensing and targeting scores for the criminals to take over the delivery of cash, precious metals and gem stones.
Ariel Pryde, better known as Domino, led that ethereal department. It was tangible until law enforcement began pouring over the employment records and financial documents concerning income brackets only to find the Gen Access division didn't even exist on paper. When it was all Domino's engineering and steering the crimes through remote access that led fourth-rate stumble bums through the encounters with masked vigilantes. But Domino's two roles were to hire specific mercenaries and place them with specialty based contracts that best suited their skills and desires. Second, Domino was supposed to walk petty criminals in to postions that they could get arrested, flash the licenses, and resume looting wherever they'd been found. The primary purpose of it all was that Domino was utilizing comms to steer others away from the primaries and their protective details and "protection" wasn't in the past tense. It was always present tense and ongoing for as long as the contracts remained employed and lines of credit were not available. Ariel Pryde had developed her own roll playing and beyond game for mass consumption when she was thirteen years old. like E. Nygma and the Riddler before her, Domino saw the world through the lens of playing a game. Domino despised losing to anyone but like Roulette and Lady Doom, she'd discovered some people would do anything to secure the safe houses and enjoy the perks of their larceny.
Just before Knightfall would fan the flames the probationary licenses. Especially when both boasted men and women who already assigned to kill off the opposition. Leaving the unlicensed in fear of what could happen if the stakes were slightly enlarged.
NYC and Metropolis had already begun issuing their licenses. leaving the question of boundaries and borders to play it all out. Knightfall responded to the mayors' and aldermans' questions by showing what the regional permit looked like. Regional permits oversaw the Three Cities but only licensed for one venture. The criminal underbelly could commit one crime per license and have immunity to prosecution in each of the three for that specified crime. The internal strife Intergang was in the thrall of were the only such permits to condone actual murders.
When the survivors emerged, Arkham Knight had been contracted for the Outlaws to finish off what was left and Knightfall would employ Empress Penguin to help them facilitate the mass extinction Intergang would suffer regardless which of the three cities that they would still operate within.
Pirate Blue and Malik al Thaka would petition Knightfall for a cease fire. The Syndicate Underground would get to keep the west past the Rockies in exchange for special dispensation. Leaving Empress Penguin opportunity to salvage Intergang's former territorial claims in weeks rather than months and years.
The massive ruby Domino Lady was desperate to find detailed all of the accounts Intergang had laundered through banks across the planet. It also narrowed down the formula for the Ultra Deluxe Soldier Serum and what it really was and where samples lay dormant.
Equally unknown was how the last shard of the Black Diamond existed taking host over host until it met Jean Lorring. Her life destroyed and she was kept in Arkham inside a soundproofed cell. So knowing the identities of every JLer and inside the JSA was useless to her. But joined, Jean and the Black Diamond shard would have words with the Evil Queen before she mounted a military-styled incursion into the New Universe.
And even after a 14 billion year life span, Renfri was still far from patient. She'd recalled her ablest commander, sub-commanders, chief lieutenants, and summoned forth New Earth's foul creatures. They all converged in the Realm of Existence at the Castle of Blackest Heart atop a rock shelf carved into the Andes before even the Evil Queen had arrived at the scene lay this Realm's Blackest Heart duplicate.
But the JLU aligned with residents of other-dimensional origins had deposed the Evil Queen from the original Castle of the Blackest Heart. Snow White did not take the throne. Rather she left that choice up to Rose Red. Snow White had been sired by Cain himself. So Snow was Cain's first Vampyr that he personally sired in centuries and as the Undead, Snow had to relinquish her secondary objective to take back her family's throne in the Realm of Fables.
Now it was Rose Red's turn to do just that. Snow White's unbeating heart still rolled and roiled around vengeance. Renfri's command forces halted their invasions of Twelve Realms. They fell back for the first time in any invasion. But then the Multiverse and then this New Universe had expelled the Evil Queen twice now. So the New Earth became her personal pet project. Earth Prime had cleansed it vamparic populstion. But Cain, Andrew Bennent, and Mary Seward came to Earth Prime just weeks before the Crises rendered history destroyed and Cain brought all of his Turned from Earth-49.
So the Vampyr Nation was being rebuilt on New Earth. Only this time Cain sired Bennet and Seward and they had turned Drakul rather than the other route under their history. Cain didn't understand Glorith's reasoning until now. The slower Cain's plans trudged on all for long, she would destroy the Lord of Chaos that sponsored the Vampyr and ten centuries from that point would be filled allies such as the Kal-El Superboy and Insect Queen, to deflect the Legion of Superheroes long enough for M'Onel to embrace his destiny and kill Mordru.
Mordru was the Lord of Chaos Glorith's loyal LSHers would protect both Glorith and M'Onel to shed any impairments from the Daxamite killing the ascended human.
"I pinged the jewel," Goldstar suddenly announced
"You can 'ping' it?" Catgirl was confused. The gemologists that inserted the codes to the data stores that had been embedded in the gem stone also served like a beacon to electromagnetic wave forms.
"It's on the move," Blue Beetle had his scanners display showing the ruby's rapid exit out of the Intergang's top secret vault in Metropolis. Sazia held the diamond now. Which if they'd tapped into the data stored the gem they now had the results of two hundred years of collating research and actually provide a maximum and controled yield fro,m said data. Eilling's youngest daughtrt used a US developed version that she had stolen and reformulated to become the superhuman known as the General.
The injection of the formula to transform her into the hulking General wore off more quickly with the elixir bonding to her cells. But under considerable stress she could burn through the formula in hours rather than days. Sazia wouldn't lash out against Doino Lady switched hand ofs to the General who technically neutral in Intergang's internal strife. The Eiling and the rest of the Injustice Society were avoiding the conflict and shielding the citizens of Superior City from its wake. Domino Lady simply went with the highest in this clandestine conflict. Making three clean up missions out of a single repo job.
"They've got her," Blue Beetle shuddered.
"Who got them?" Goldstar looked at one of her own displays, "Shit!"
"Care to share with the rest of the uncomfortable Bug?" Catwoman asked.
"The Jokerz. Now Punchline can work her ego driven murder sprees longer, harder, and stronger," Blue Beetle interpreted..
"And the Jokerz will facilitate aiding and abetting with angry relish," Catwoman sighed.
"So we hit them first," Catgirl growled.
"The Justice League Outsiders are doing just that," Blue Beetle retorted.
"Wait for it," Goldstatr advised. The actual Justice League International had come together to cede one of Luthor's demands. The General Assembly rarely if ever make a unanimously broad decision before but allowing the Justice League and others could retain their secret identities or go public like the first Flash had done as Jay Garrick a few years ago.
"Now we have plan and a purpose," Catgirl smirked, "You distract everyone waving your little repo slip while I get the gem."
"It's so stupid it's practically flawless," Catwoman chuckled. The Bug descended to float a few meters off of the ground. everyone but Catgirl got out to inform Superman and Wonder Woman, the Donna Troy version, recoiled as Blue Beetle thrust his contract in front of them. Goldstar distracted many JLers by scrutinizing the downed Jokerz.
Catwoman did the same on the other side of the street. Superman was too angry to listen to Catgirl's cable dropped off at the unattended stone sitting on a closed dumpster. Catgirl made a face at Superman's back as she used her cable to retract and take her back to the rooftops. She would head due east. So the Bug and its crew could pick her up there unknowingly to the Justce Leage factions. Catgirl was underway. It just take a few more minutes of haggling to get it gratis.
"No," Superman decicded. Donna was releived because that her decision as well
"As long as we have the stone the more you'll learn about your mysterious client and his purposes for it," Superman declared to end the pointless discussion.
"Ever hear of 'client confidentiality" Beetle wondered.
"Just say super villain," Artemis, the third Wonder Woman sneered at him.. The fifth Wonder Woman led the Outsiders. Dionna Troy was les s than pleased with the Super Buddies' arrival.
What the?" Superman turned to face the still closed dumpster but was lacking the stone that had set upon it.
"Where's Catgirl?" Superman angrily asked.
"I don't know," Blue Beetle shrugged, "How do you like working all this way to to finally get them only to have your master, Luthor, demandwith full UN support to release the stone into their car and get it yanked away from you rather rudely?"
"Hello again, Donna," Goldstar came out of the Bug.
"Michelle?" Wonder Woman could hardly believe it.
"The Time Masters are pretty useless at this point so I joined up with Michael and Ted here. Trust in ne if you can't in them. We only deliver to reputable bail bonds agents."
"That's hard to beieve. The bonds people tend to be more super villainous than their clients," Donna protested. That being requested Wonder Woman was now conflicted on how to proceed.
Superman alighted in front Catgirl. So closely that she couldn't stop running and collided with him.
"You have something I want," Superman warned her.
"Go ahead. Flash me with your X-Ray vision," Catgirl said smugly. He'd already done so and wondered where she could planted it. There wasn't a single scraping of lead along her path. The stone was just gone.
"Stay here," he flew back to face Blue Beetle, and Goldstar. now Catwoman was being a bit risque.
"Stay here. Everyone and that means twice as much to you, Beetle," Superman ordered.
"And who gave you the authority to detain us when we clearly don't have the stone?" Blue Beetle asked. They searched the area and found no trace of the gigormous ruby.
"You can go but we'll escort you back to your agency office," that led to a few hours of boredom before Wonder Woman departed and took her Outsiders as well. The JLI did the same although Supeman was still grouchy. After every one was certified as 'gone' Catgirl phoned Jenny Elsewhere. A portal opened and the pink haired emo Asian handed the ruby back to Catgirl.
"I owe you a lot," Catgirl was relieved to finally have the stone in hand.
"You're right. And I'll make certain our rendezvous is ready to go when I come a'callin'," Jenny said.
"A lot of people are looking this gem. Why?" Catwoman asked.
"Ever hear of the the various 'super human' serims? This stone has a formula to replace the four effective serums with and it even has zero side effects?" Jenny asked, "`cause that's the truly hidden fortune the stone reveals."
"Luthor looking for the equation. He probably contracted you to get it for him," Jenny shrugged.
"And if it disappears for good?" Blue Beetle asked while Booster and Claire were getting up to speed on the night's events.
"Then the inevitable gets replaced with the certainly impossible," Jenny smirked.
"Could you send it into the Sun?" Blue Beetle asked.
"Good choice," Jenny's smirk was insufferably pleased with its maker. A small portal opened and the air began sucking into the vacuum of space.
"Throw it already!" Jenny yelled. Catgirl snatch the ruby from Goldstar's hands and threw it through portsal. Jenny collapsed it as soon the gem cleared the portal itself.
"Now, I leave the Domino Lady to you," Jenny opened a wide and high portal and stepped though as it collapsed behind he.r
"Booster and I have been working on a contingency just for this," Claire proidly informed the others. Even Fido looked happy.
"Thanks to Rip Hunter leaving us the silicate particles to create just about anything with our specialized printer. We made a copy of the stone using our 3D printer, Everything is the same only the correct data was enevr imprinyed on thjsi"
"But fake trails, accounts and formulas have been imrinted in it," Booster smirked.
"So we lure Domino Lady in here and let her take the gem?" Catwoman was confused.
"But we don't make it look easy," Claire added the final detail.
"I think you can handle it. In the meatime Kitrina and I will hit the town and see if we ever get uninvited visitors or find out you're being ignored," Catwoman offered.
"It's as good a suggestion as any others," Blue Beetle shrugged.
"There's dressing rooms in the Bug," Blue Beetle encouraged them
"Follow me," Goldstar offered.
"And someone can finally tell me what role Jenny Elswhere had today and apparently other days before this," Catwoman cuffed Catgirl's head.
"Hey!" Catgirl's arms and hands flailed about to escape Catwoman's criticism.
Goldstar returned, "We need my brother in this"
"He and Claire need some alone time. We'd barely come back from the first try at the ruby just to find out what it really is and we've seen dozens versions to what started today. Claire will run herself into the ground chasing leads on the opposition so we need to let her rest and Booster is the only one propoerly able to confine her to quarters," Blue Beetle explained.
"So we're investigating and setting traps in our own offices?" Goldstar wasn't certain she appreciated that fact.
"Looks like," Beetle shrugged.
"I contacted Bruce Wyne," Catwoman stated, "He won't publically endorse this measure but he will have displayed alomg with another few rare gem stones from his family's vaults and displayed at the Gotham Art and Assembly."
Goldstar realized that Wayne hadn't organized anything.
he'd left Selina in his will and merely envoked the proper clauses and and biometric security. All the locks had been changed to Selina's ID. It seemed Alfred Pennyworth still had some influence with Wayne now that he worked for Selina and the Cat Family.
Alfred had regreted dismissing himself from Bruce's service but he was now employed bny Selina as she was about to give birth to Bruce's child. Bruce had even shut down the Bat Cave. No one, especially not even Alfred knew that Selina's baby would be second in the line to inherit. Elissa Prince was Bruce's first in line for the proverbial throne. Damien Wayne had been first one killed by Supreme himself. But the Daxamite had died of lead poisoning just a week afterwards. after that death, Darkseid had sent Luthor Brutaal, the very same Daxamite that had been killed but groomed to be one of Darkseid's elite on Apokolips in Granny Goodness' Orphanage. The Daxamite doppelganger to Dev Em (Supreme) instantly fell deep into lust over Lashina and this version of Dev Em. He was still a boy toy bottom while Lashina was greedily a top.
They heard vehicles arriving outside the Super Buddies parking spaces. The front door's automatic opening cycle activated.
Oracle wheeled in her chair, "Don't shoot! Or whatever it is you do!"
"And you are?" Catwoman asked.
"Oracle," she happily answered. Guy Gardner smashed through the large froisted glass. Arkham Knight moved around and went to the actual open door.
"If I had my ring," Gardner growled.
"You rely on it for too much," Arkham Knight chastised him then tossed the yellow power ring into Gardner's lap. With Fear Lanterns in operation, the original yellow ring Sinestro had forged and carried was ignored by the Fear Lanterns. But Gardner removed the ring after fighting crooks all across the planet then it simply waited it out after a recharge in Guy's pocket.
"Guy, what the hell are doing?" Claire was usually the only Super Buddy willing to give him a chance and she and Booster were happily safely on their way...until now.
"I wuz doin' some snoopin when Deedle Dee and Duddle Dum caught me usin' the ol' drinkin' glass against the larger window ta listen in," he smugly confessed, "An' I knew ya'd need my help."
"That's it! I'm done . Do what you want with him," Claire snapped.
"Hey, ya mouthy tranny bitch, there are things that people can still throw at you and get results by pickin' over your corpse-sickles," Gardner grated.
"Like what?" Blue Beetle stifled a yawn
"Luthor ain't behind this. Ya got Fu Manchu gunnin' for that formula and Manchu is after it and my ring," Gardner told them all.
"Dr. Fu would be set on this kind of prize," Goldstar allowed.
"Especially since the Injustice Society just fought the Legion of Doom in Superior City," Booster grudginly agreed, "The Legion took significant losses but then again, so did the Injusticers when Geo-Mancer and Killer Wasp were killed/."
"Anyhoo, the 'Immortal' Fu Manchu wants yer ruby pretty damn badly," Guy informed them. Portals opened under the Super Buddies and Outlaws' feet and they fell in to their new destination with the portals being closed as soon as the last victiom cleared the traps. Oracle was kindly left behind. There wasn'y going to be soft landing and Oracle would get hurt. The Super Buddies froze in place as Booster, Beetle, and Goldstar found them selves somwhere tropical and they were surrounded by Outlaws.
In the center of the circle stood Jenny Elswhere, Brains, and her Gang comprised of Kong, Ms. Mesmer, and Bulldozer with White Rabbit and Jaina Hudson were joining in as well.
Jinx and her Penguin Patrol worked the exterior perimeter around every one but Bird of Paradise was still guardng the reopening of the Iceberg Lounge. Pussy Katnip was Empress Penguin's personal bodyguard.
Bird of Paradise got to keep her interior security guards. between those sentries and Pussy Katnip, Plastic Woman, Nancy Morgan, and Black Siren were liberated to go forth and determine why and how Knightfall predicted this. Knightfall and Pussy were portal dropped in when the shouting had stopped into an unforgiving detente.
"Good. We're assembled now," Knightfall chuckled.
"The hell?" Gardner groaned as the concussion grenade effects wore off.
"No time to be subtle," Domino Lady told his ringing ears before she backhanded him with pistol in hand.
"And for you two," Domino Lady looked pleased, "My intelligence source said you had a crowd here. I guess he was counting insects as well"
Fido barked once at her as Claire had checked him out after the dinning of the explosive charge that had flattened everyone was beginning to wear off.
"Ruby?" Domino Lady growled at Oracle.
"Get a little closer and ask that," Oacle snarled.
"Okay, you tell me and I won't shoot her," Domino Lady reversed it so that Oracle was being threatened and Claire still experienced ringing ears
"So? What'cha want to do?" Domino Lady asked, "I prefer bloodless but will swing with it today."
"No, you won't," Plastic Woman announced as she, Morgan and Black Siren were late arrivals
"Well, they're only under a little of threat. She plucked the gem off of Goldstar's desk, "And now I can get back to life, Super Screw Ups."
Her call went forth but it wasn't to Jenny Elsewhere. A boom tube opened and she was whisked awahy to the Vanishing Isles. The same Vanishing Islands that South Seas Girl ruled and accommodated the Hall of Doom's presence and occupants for the exchange of a cash flow to her remote Pacific Island Ring of Fire occupants.
The Isles themselves currently had two active volcanoes. South Seas Girl needed all the commonly traded cash flow to repatriate her citizens. Fu Manchu promised the queen she could have the ruby's wealthy accounts while he received the serum formula and unlocked its secrets.
Domino Lady just had learned that the Super Buddies were her adversaries in this contest of skill and will power. Adversaries also hired by Fu Manchu's representatives but even then, the stone was valued by her, the Super Buddies, and now the Outlaws, Empress Penguin, and Jenny Elsewhere?
So there had to a trick to leaving the gem unguarded. Unless you count Claire Connelly, Oracle, and Fido as a trio of compentent or capabl guatrds smiths. Suddenly, Oracle drew a firearm hidden with the storage bag Oracle had on her lap and being a precise shooter enabled her to shoot the fake gem without harming Domino Lady.
Gardner was unsteadally getting to his feet as Domino Lady was making her getaway. She kneed him the balls with force of her body running flat out. Gardner went down again and started retching rather loudly and miserably.
"And now they'll think the damage to the gem stone will be recoverable data...some years from now," Oracle was well and truly pleased. Claire reminded herself never to piss Oracle off
the portal that formed in the back of the agency's offices kindly deposited everyone back indoors.
"And you destroyed it already?" Knightfall inquired of Jenny
"You could fund a trip to the sun and find out," Jenny was feeling snarky now.
"You'll find bonuses attached to your accounts," Knightfall informed everyone, "The desire was to destroy the gem before it was turned over to me."
"So you weren't after anything from it?" Oracle was confused
"I wanted it to be a symbol of hope and cooperation within the Legion of Doom and the South Seas Girl," Knightfall said it rather humorlessly, "But my intent was never to deliver the actual stone to them. They wanted it too badly. And anything that they wanted to make a deal with me was definetly off of the delivery request. When Catgirl called Jenny in, I knew we still had a chance. And printing of a fake resin stone and encrypting garbage into was brilliant."
"Thank Guy," Oracle told her, "His ring did the coding within the colored resin we employed."
"I have the perfect gift," Knightfall was increasingly full of herself this early morning.
Ice pushed her way through the milling about rest of the occupants
"Guy, it's me," she was resting on her knees.
"Tora?" he hesitatant
"It's me," she said again. He sobbed into her lap.
"Something we should aware of?" Booster asked.
"Tora Olafsdottir was allowed to leave the Ice Kingdom but her father came after to support the toyalty to his subjects. Fire went after her and Guy was in was in deep space," Knightfall informed them.
"Fire returned with her when the subjects learned about Tora's adventures in the outer world and they basically gave up any hope they had reasoning with mere-mortals.
"My agents intercepted Fire and I learned of Ice's decision to stay with her people for a while longer," Knightfall continued explaining, "So set a watch to look for Ice's return. And we found her loocking for Fire and Guy Gardner. She just finished reconnecting with Fire and so here we are at last."
"But we had an Ice in the Justice League," Arkham Knight interjected.
"Another woman from the Ice Kingdom who went by the moniker 'Ice Maiden'. She stepped in and played at being Ice while she was away. Now Ice Maiden cam go home and verify Ice's claims of the outer world."
"But Fire and Guy thought she'd be gone forever," Blue Beetle deduced.
"Exactly," Knightfall concured
"And what's your price for bringing Ice back into our world?" Goldstar asked.
"None," Knightfall surprised her, "But if I ever require one favor and I ask with a 'please' that'll be enough to settle our mutual indebtedness."
"You make it sound reciprical," Catgirl noted.
"Because I owe them something that's been handled. Now I'm under the same rule they are," Knightfall explained.
"But you can't erase the debt with the other debt?" Claire asked.
"Not with this kind of debt," Knightfall shrugged, "It's an action rather than something one possesses."
"I'll make it easy fer ya ta bring me on this,," Guy was still shaken by overealming gratitude, "Any time, any place, and I'll settle up wit ya but frankly it would take a lifetime."
"Or one simple act under my orders," Knightfall clarified
"I'm still in," Guy advised her.
"Then wait for my call and you can settle up in one decisisve moment," Knightfall stipulated.
Guy and Ice went out so Tora could explain her absence and just when did the Ice Maiden take over Tora's abandoned life
"Jenny, we need to go," Knightfall decided.
"We're coming with you," the Gang informed their ally in Intergang's 100
"Now what?" Goldstar ponmdered
Now we close up like we ordinarily would," Blue Beetle stated
"We can't let Domino Lady know she's falling into a trap," Booster added.
"Act like its trash and throw it away," Claire shared, "Because we're probably being watched."
Goldstar vacuumed the shard fragments that had been sucked away from Domino Lady as she sprinted all out to reach the awaiting boom tube with fragments going into a fresh garbage bag, tied it up and Booster took the trash bag out and threw in the dumpster.
"Now we hope we're being monitored," Goldstar caught on. They locked every door and shuttered every window and the remote locks were controlled by a key fob, or four of the same
the Bug lifted off of the roof and sped everyone to their various homes.
"Fine. I'll live with that," Domino Lady didn't expect to wait for very long. She'd expected to throw victory at last booze thrown intro Lightning Raider's face. But that couldn't happen with a flawed retrieval that could take years rather than hours or days to interpret. But the outcome would still remain for the patient piece mealing the stone. Meanwhile Domino Lady had a new agenda. She'd tried being a vigilante in Hollywood and the LA metro area
But she'd turned to crime because everyone in Los Angeles' power structures, politically, wealthily, entertainment-wise, and morally seemed bankrupted. San Francisco was a proving ground to the Global Concern for test trials. Especially now that the Justice League Outsiders were moved in. Once the Outsiders caught wind of Domino Lady's prodigeous theiving, Air Wave would call in Lightning Raider and then Domino Lady would lay out her game changing idea and they'd race around the city perpetuating crimes. The first to be done with their list claimed the stolen goods. And Lightning Raider was going soft so she couldn't tell the Outsiders any word of what she was doing and was entirely on Lightning Raider's head if she won to either keep the spoils of war or to return it all, Which is what Domino Lady expected Lightning Raider to do. So that was what drove Domino Lady to travel to San Fran to stir infinitely more trouble.