Chapter 14: The Battle of Ankara

ANKARA
JUNE 13, 19:28 TRT

The Turkish Armed Forces had followed the message from the Justice League, and the League's suspicions were correct. Only ten minutes had passed since Darkseid launched his contingency attack on Ankara, and already the battle was becoming one where the line of defense was holding but fading fast. The 200,000 soldiers fighting in Ankara, led by General Osman Marangoz, were standing valiantly against the oncoming hordes of Parademons and war machines from Apokolips. But by now, the Justice League was desperately needed.

"We are throwing all we have at these monsters, but we can only hold the line for an hour!" General Marangoz shouted into his comlink over the noise of battle. "We need you, Justice League! Lüften, bize yardim et!"

No sooner had the general finished his message than he and his platoon saw a horde of Parademons bearing down on them, howling their war cry: "For Darkseid!" General Marangoz and his men fired on them with pulsating orb cannons and took most of the first wave down, but the next wave of Parademons was larger than the first and the aid from Captain Halil Solak and 1st Lieutenant Rasim Binici wasn't enough to bring the whole wave of Parademons down. But just when it looked like the Turkish army would lose ground, the Justice League's Sigma Squad arrived.

Red Tornado was leading the squad to aid in the defense of Ankara, and he was followed by two unexpected allies: his "siblings" Red Torpedo and Red Inferno. The Red androids were followed closely by Green Beetle, and the League had also recruited some allies for Sigma Squad in the form of the sideline team known as the Doom Patrol: Negative Man, Robotman, Elasti-Woman, and Ambush Bug. The Turkish soldiers cheered and saluted them, and then they pushed all their strength against Darkseid's invasion force with the Justice League's aid.

As the next wave of Parademons descended on General Marangoz and his men, Red Tornado led the squad into battle and caught the monsters in a raging whirlwind. He blew them away and sent several more Parademons and even Doom Hawks sailing to the outskirts of Ankara. He patched a message through to the rest of the Justice League and then contacted General Halil Sakarya of the Turkish Air Force.

"Sigma Squad has engaged, General," Tornado said.

"We are on our way now," replied the general.

Sure enough, the Turkish Air Force arrived to combat the Apokoliptan threat with F-4 Phantoms, F-16 Fighting Falcons, and several of the new F-40 Phoenixs. They stormed through the sky like streaks of lightning and blasted every Parademon and Doom Hawk in their path with rapid-fire laser cannons and liquid-nitrogen missiles. The Parademons that weren't hit pursued the fighters, managing to bring down a few at a time, but most of them found themselves on the receiving end of several surprise attacks.

As the Justice League's Sigma Squad moved into battle, Red Tornado found himself faced with hundreds of Parademons, all of them armed with vibro-pikes, Agony Gauntlets, fire whips, and energy disks. As they came at him with screeching roars and readied their weapons to strike, the android hero did not flinch. Without a word, Red Tornado raised a hand and formed a colossal hurricane that pulled thousands of the Parademons as well as a few thousand Doom Hawks into its raging updraft at breakneck speed. When another horde of Darkseid's Parademons prepared to attack the Turkish troops on the south flank, he generated a pair of twisters from his fists that blew them across the sky and into a number of skyscrapers. He also generated several smaller cyclones that pushed a few hundred Hell Hounds along the streets of Ankara and eventually broke them at their essential joints. When General Marangoz and his men were forced to pull the enhanced quad-laser tanks back as another battalion of Draco-Tanks lumbered up the streets, burning each building they passed. However, before the Apokoliptan war machines could go any further, Red Tornado released a tornado that measured at EF3 on the Fujita scale. It pulled up rubble, downed lampposts, and abandoned vehicles into the air as it went and soon broke through the enemy line. The Turkish soldiers in its range took cover until Red Tornado dissolved his super-twister, and they gave a rousing cheer for him when they saw that the Draco-Tanks had been ripped apart.

"Adalet Ligi! Adalet Ligi!" the men chanted before resuming their positions for battle.

However, while Red Tornado continued fending off Parademon attacks in the air, several more of the creatures made for the streets and began tearing into the Turkish forces from the southwest. Captain Adnan Nacar and his forces were firing on the Parademons with laser turrets mounted on makeshift walls of rubble from damaged buildings when more of them came in the sky. But the Parademons in the air never made it to the ground, for several manholes hiding water pipes suddenly blew open like cold geysers and formed a whirling swath of water that washed the incoming Parademons away. Captain Nacar and his men looked behind them and saw Red Torpedo standing on a small wave, and right away they saluted him for saving their lives. Red Torpedo saluted in reply and then attacked a large squad of Doom Hawks with waves that caught them when they neared the ground. He washed several Hell Hounds away with tidal waves and even formed whirlpools that damaged many more Draco-Tanks beyond repair.

On the north side of the battleground, troops led by 2nd Lieutenant Hakim Burakgazi were facing another wave of Parademons and Draco-Tanks. They were about to fall back when a ball of fire came soaring and hit the first Draco-Tank, which exploded into a heap of flaming metal. High above, Red Inferno was now fighting back and pushing the attackers back from the Turkish lines. She hurled fireballs and shot beams of fire at Darkseid's Parademons and Doom Hawks and blasted them out of the sky. She also released streams of flame on the Draco-Tanks as they rumbled through the outer edge of Ankara, prompting the soldiers to fight on. Suddenly, Red Tornado and the other heroes and the soldiers of Turkey paused when they heard the blaring of battle horns and saw large swaths of Parademons heading toward the nearby Ankara River. In a moment, the defenders saw a sight that aroused surprise and gladness in them.

The Amazons had arrived at last, and they were already marching into Ankara to help the Justice League and their allies defend against this next contingency attack from Darkseid. In about a minute, the Amazons had formed their ranks and were prepared for Darkseid's attack force to send another wave. Queen Hippolyta stood at the front line, and as the Apokoliptan invaders rushed upon them, the Amazon queen beat the flat of her shortsword on her shield and shouted, "Take them now! No mercy!"

At that signal, the Amazons ran headlong at the landing Parademons with their weapons ready to strike. Their footfalls pounded fiercely as they came and in an instant, the air was pierced with warriors' shouts and the clanging of swords and spears. Hippolyta led the charge with her general Antiope and Artemis, her best warrior after her daughter, and the Amazons began attacking every Parademon in sight with neither delight nor lust for battle, but justified anger. When they had seen the destruction that was beginning to fall on Ankara, they realized the severity of the situation and immediately rushed to fight not merely beside men, but for the outside world of men and women. In only a few minutes, the Amazons had felled enough Parademons and Doom Hawks to fill the streets of Ankara with heaps of their metallic remains. They had even taken down Hell Hounds and Draco-Tanks and left them in several pieces, and still they were standing by the men of Turkey and fighting with all the strength they could muster. In the meantime, the Justice League and their allies were persisting in the defense of Earth's sanctity.

The northwest flank under Captain Ahmed Kartal and Lieutenant Omar Baris was fending off another Parademon attack when Green Beetle engaged the foe himself. Being a Martian as well as a Beetle warrior, he proved to be a greater challenge for the Apokoliptan invaders than even the enhanced armaments of the Turkish military. Green Beetle used his sonic cannons and plasma cannons against hundreds of the Parademons and also used his scythes against those of them that were armed. He had no need to use his scarab's more advanced weaponry; his natural Martian powers were more than enough. As a few Doom Hawks and Hell Hounds came on, Green Beetle telekinetically dismantled them or pushed them back into the ones behind them. He shapeshifted so he could fight with extra limbs or morphed his body into stronger forms to bring them down.

Meanwhile, the Doom Patrol was also giving their fair share of contribution to the defense of Earth. Elasti-Woman was leading them at first and was taking down Parademons left and right. She expanded her fists to punch several of them away from the soldiers, occasionally using her arms to fuel the strength of her blows as if they were spring-loaded boxing gloves. She bounced high to avoid attacks from Doom Hawks, tripped a few Hell Hounds, and she even used her own body to jam the wheels of a Draco-Tank which caused it to collide with another, eventually causing a massive traffic jam.

Negative Man was in the thick of the battle as well. As another horde of Parademons came at him, he released his "soul-self" of radioactive energy and attacked them. The moment the creatures tried to seize the glowing form in front of them, its touch caused their forms to combust. Negative Man had to constantly retract his radioactive ghost form into his body constantly, but every time a Parademon tried to attack him, he projected his power and obliterated that creature.

Robotman was fighting alongside Elasti-Woman and already had several Parademons on the ropes. He moved swiftly to dodge their attacks and each one that got close to him was seized by the arm or the neck and slammed them into the ground. As more Parademons armed with Apokoliptan weapons tried to attack him, he released heat coils from the palms of his hands which wrapped around their weapons and generated heat strong enough to melt the metal. Robotman also didn't need reaction time to take down any opponents. He simply turned his upper body and walloped a few Doom Hawks to the ground, then punched through the armor of several Parademons, and even melted the wheel treads of several Draco-Tanks. As for Ambush Bug, his teleportation suit allowed him to throw his attackers off the track. He teleported to the top of an apartment complex and beamed away so a Draco-Tank's blast hit some incoming Doom Hawks, lured some more Parademons down a manhole where their flaming breath caused several wires to catch fire, and he even caused another traffic jam of Darkseid's Hell Hounds.

The Justice League and their allies fought valiantly here as well, and then the heroes and the Turkish military got an extra boost of help when at least eight hundred members of the Green Lanterns showed up and diverted a large portion of the contingency attack on Ankara. A few seconds later, a few more wormholes opened and from them came enhanced planes from Greece, Italy, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and the United Arab Emirates. They wove in and out of the aerial attacks and launched their counterattack, turning the dark clouds into a thunderstorm of explosions. It seemed that Darkseid's conquest of Earth was running into more trouble than anticipated, but the fight was not over by a long shot.


A/N: This chapter goes out to our friends in the Near East. Love to you all, and feel free to enjoy my other fanfictions at your leisure.

Translations:

Lüften, bize yardim et!- Please, help us!
Adalet Ligi- Justice League

I hope everyone who read this chapter liked the Justice League in action once more. Chapter 15 will be up soon with more of your favorite DC supers in action!