Chapter 32
A/N: I just own this story.
/comm/
Telepathy
'Bee's voice
Cantral City, November 11
"HAPPY BIRTHDAY!" Erica screamed jumping on her cousin's bed.
"Erica," he groaned.
"What? I figured I'd be the first to congratulate you!" she exclaimed hugging him.
"Thanks…wait…is that snow?! Awesome!" he cheered.
"Yep, now hurry up! Breakfast is almost ready!" she called running downstairs.
"Happy Birthday Wally," Mrs. West said setting down the last plate as her son came down.
"My favorite breakfast! Heaping piles of everything!" he exclaimed. "Thanks Mom."
As they all began eating Mr. West chuckled. "You know Wally, if you ever come up for air I can take you to the DMV to get your driver's liscence. This weather will be a good proving ground."
"Not really in a big rush to drive Dad," he said swallowing, "cause, ya know, I'm me."
"Meaning you can run faster than traffic," Erica reminded.
"Also true! Besides can't go anyways because the team is throwing a big surprise party this afternoon at the cave."
"Wha—you weren't supposed to know about that!" Erica growled tossing a french toast stick at his head.
"At school today, ask your teachers for the definition of surprise," Mr. West said.
"You want surprise? Just watch Miss Martian's expression when I collect my birthday kiss," Wally grinned as Erica smacked her forehead.
"Well, I have a surprise for you," his mom said turning on the TV, "or at least your Aunt Iris does."
"And a special shoutout to my nephew Wally, wishing him a very happy sixteenth birthday," their aunt said.
"Awesome!"
"Now for school closures. The fallowing schools have declared today a snow day: Debuke Elementary, Speezack Jr High, Central City High, Keystone High…"
"SWEET!" the two cousins exclaimed high-fiving.
-.-
Mt. Justice
"Recognized: Kid Flash—B04, Emerald Lantern—B03. Zetatube network now offline due to extreme atmospheric conditions."
"Looks like we made it just in the nick of time," Erica said brushing some stray snow out of her braid.
"Yea," Wally agreed as they walked into the living room. "It'd be a tragedy if I missed my own…"
"SURPRISE!" everyone shouted as the lights turned on.
"What? Aw, you guys, you shouldn't have," he said.
"Please, like you didn't already hear it from Bulkhead," Arcee said.
"Hey!"
"I made two cakes!" M'gann said setting out all the food.
"Sweet! What will you guys eat?"
"We get the one I cooked," Erica said. "Make a wish dummy."
"Way ahead of you!" he said blowing out his candles.
"So what'd you wish for?" Megan asked.
"If I tell you my wish, it won't come true, but if you guess…" he trailed off as the Martian girl handed him a slice. "Nope guess again."
"Happy birthday," Megan said kissing his forehead.
"You said you wanted a kiss, you didn't specify where," Erica whispered.
"Shut up."
Laughing she grabbed a piece of cake and joined 'Bee, Robin, and Zatanna. "You settling in ok?" Robin asked.
"Oh yea, just like home," she muttered.
"We know it's all new and really intimidating," Erica said putting a hand on her shoulder, "but someday, you'll get used to watching my cousin eat."
"Think we should tell him?" Artemis asked and they all looked over.
"Getting warmer babe, but I can make you warmer still."
"Yes, please, I'm dying to see his reaction."
Erica elbowed her friend. "You are so mean."
"And this is coming from the girl who socked her own cousin in the face with two-dozen dodgeballs?"
"I hate you."
"Love you too Erica."
"Allow me," Artemis said walking over, sitting next to Wally she whispered it in his ear.
"Aw man!"
/Attention team, suit up. Polar stealth. Mission briefing in five/
-.-
"Where's Flash?" KF asked as they looked at Batman on the video-screen.
/Flash, Red Tornado, Arcee, and Bulkhead, already have their assignments/ Batman stated. /A massive ice storm has paralyized North Amerca from coast to coast. Satellite imagery has detected five flying ice fortresses, source unknown that seem to be responsible and must be stopped/
"Can't the Watchtower blow those things out of the sky?" Wally asked.
"What's the Watchtower?" Zatanna asked.
Batman sighed. /The League's orbiting headquarters is not weaponized, and with two of our three Green Lanterns off world we need all hands-on-deck/
"Wait…is this what I think this is?" Emerald asked. "A League-Team team-up?"
"Whoa! Really?!" Robin and Kid said high-fiving.
/Superboy, take the supercycle to rondezvous with the Batplane at ice fortress one, you'll drop off Robin and Aqualad. Then you and Emerald Lantern will rendezvous with Black Canary and Red Tornado at ice fortress two. Zatanna, Miss Martian, and Artemis rendezvous with Martian Manhunter and Green Arrow at ice fortress three. Bumblebee, Ratchet will be sending you a bridge to rendezvous with the Autobots at ice fortress four. Other leaguers will handle five. Sending coordinates now/
"Uh Batman, you forgot me!" Wally reminded.
/Kid Flash, a young girl in Seattle is in desperate need of a heart transplant. A with all conventional air traffic grounded by the storm you'll need to pick up the heart in Boston and transport it across country/
"Why can't we send it through the groundbridge?"
"The heart would be vulnerable to the low-level radiation emitted by the bridge, it can't travel through human skin and is harmless. However, the heart would not have a prodective epidermis and the container would not block the radiation. In the end the heart would have significant problems later on or would die in transit," Bumblebee explained.
"What about Zeta-Tubes?"
"Offline," Robin reminded.
"Right…then how can I say no," he said tapping his symbol and his uniform turned back to normal. "Guess I won't be needing stealth. Speedy delivery boy, at your service."
/Law enforcement across the country has been alerted to you mission and is clearing your route/ Batman informed.
"Good luck," Erica said patting her cousin on the back as they took off.
-.-
Boston
Wally ran past cars pulled off along the side of the road as he raced to the hospital, turning some corners he skid to a stop in front of the doctors. "Someone order a pizza?"
"What you're delivering is considerably more precious to the girl whose life depends on it."
"Duh, I meant did anyone order a pizza for me? A guy burns a lot of calories running at the speed of sound," he scoffed, putting on the backpack.
"Sorry, no," the doctor replied. "Now listen, this pack is heavily isulated for shock absorbtion, but that doesn't mean the organ within needs any extraneous jostling. Your PDA." Wally held up his arm and she put a time in. "You have four hours to deliver the heart, after that it is no longer viable. Am I clear?"
"As crystal."
"Then go," she said.
Nodding he took off and tapped into the Watchtower feed as he ran.
-.-
Ice Fortress 1
Batman jumped out of the Batplane onto the fortress as Robin leapt up, spinning in midair, landing on a gun where he placed a bomb and jumped off as it exploded.
Aqualad and Aquaman ran forwards towards another gun. Kaldur ducked behind a wall and Aquaman pulled part of the metal fortress up, providing cover as his protégé leapt over and used his waterbearer to swing a whip down and destroy the gun. Flash ran past and ran around one as it tried to fallow him before it twisted itself off.
-.-
Somewhere in the Midwest
"C'mon! Robin and Aqualad fighting with Batman, Aquaman, and Flash! Who's missing from the picture here?!" he groaned. Looking up he grimaced and leapt onto a bunch of crashed cars. Making a detour he ran through the city he was in, desperately trying to ignore all the wonderful food options surrounding him. Turning back onto the highway he got back onto the designated path.
"He's due past here any minute."
"Perfect." Looking up the officers froze as they saw an imposing man in silver armor. "Now all in need to to is get his attention." With a sadistic grin, Megatron landed in front of them and hit one, sending the cop flying back. The others charged, and the ex-gladiator, stabbed his claws into one, tossing him into another man, before picking up another and pulling out his sword.
Kid Flash ran through a snowy fog, out of the corner of his eye he saw a flash of silver and the form of a cop being held up in the air. Turning around, he ran back towards them to see it was none other than the Decepticon head-hancho himself. "Megatron? What's he doing here?" he muttered.
Seeing him coming, Megatron loosened his stance and sidestepped the incoming speedster. Seeing that he had successfully gotten his target's attention he crushed the man's neck, he was useless to him now anyways.
Megatron laughed seeing the absolutely horrified look on the child's face before seeing it switch to rage. This was too easy.
"Go! Get outta here! I deal with Bucket Head!" Kid Flash ordered.
The gladiator just laughed again, before pulling out his sword and stabbing the ground where Wally was a heartbeat before. "You? You think you can handle me?" he grinned. "Child, I am out of your league. Not even Optimus Prime has been able to defeat me, what makes you think a mere human like yourself can?"
With a roaring battle cry, Wally charged forwards, barely ducking under the deadly sword the Decepticon wield. Jumping up he flipped in the air, and kicked off the back of Megatron's bucket head.
Spinning around, Megatron managed to swipe at KF, catching his legs and tossing him back. doing another flip, Wally landed on his feet and slid back. "When I heard authorities were closing off this highway for a speedster, I was expecting a real hero, not his pathetic duplicate. You are hardly worth the effort it will take to kill you."
Wally ground his teeth together, this guy was really getting on his nerves.
-.-
Ice Fortress 2
The Supercycle flew down towards the fortess dodging the incoming shots. Canary released a cry, making cracks in the hull.
Jumping out, Superboy grabbed onto a gun, and pulled it out before tossing it to Red Tornado who sent it flying into another gun down below.
Emerald flew up and made a shield andoung her before flying down and through one of the ship engines, before coming back up to see Moonknight and Wolf tearing apart the wires of one of the guns.
"Superboy!" she called as he removed the gun. Making a baseball bat, he smiled and tossed it and she hit it right through another part of the fortress.
-.-
South Dakota
Kid Flash charged full speed at Megatron, getting into a crouch, Megatron jumped over and flipped slashing with his sword. Rolling, Wally skid away, peering behind him to see if the man had breached the container, luckily he only slashed his shoulder and missed the bag.
Hearing a beep he looked down at his watch to see that he had two hours left. Groaning at his own stupidity, he turned and ran just as a blast almost hit him.
Megatron continued firing till the boy was out of range, lowering his gun, he checked his chronometer. "It should suffice," he scowled. "Soundwave, send a groundbridge. I'm freezing my sparkplugs off out here! And contact our friends to set up phase two."
Closing the comm he strolled towards the blue vortex as it opened.
"This is the last time I agree to do something for Savage just because my teleporter is better."
Reaching Montana, Wally looked down at his clock. "Wasted about fifteen minutes on Megatron, but I can still make it on time!" he resolved before checking his snack compartment, and frowned seeing it was empty. "Fantastic, this is what I get for fighting the Lord of Buckets…why was he there anyways?"
-.-
Ice Fortress 3
The Bioship swooped down and fired a beam, vaporizing one of the guns.
On the surface Green Arrow and Artemis fired arrows at several guns, making them explode.
Martain Manhunter and his niece flew below the fortress and forced the snow back, clogging the engine and making them explode.
"Yortsed eht gniniamer senigne!" Zatanna spoke from where she stood on a magic platform, and the remaining three engines set fire and exploded as the fortress began falling to the ground.
-.-
Seattle
Running up to the hospital, Kid slipped and slid up to the entrance, removing the backpack he held it up to the doctor who ran out. "I made it! I'm here!"
"I'm…I'm sorry. You're too late."
"What?! I still have twenty minutes to spare!" he exclaimed.
"I know, but she passed away twelve minutes ago."
"Tw-Twelve minutes?" he gasped, if he hadn't stopped to fight Megatron...she would still be alive…
"Perhaps another recipient can be found," the doctor said going back inside.
Taking a breath, he hung his head and went inside, berating himself for his failure.
"Kid Flash! We've been waiting for you!" several people said rushing over. "Where's the Queen's heart?"
"Wait, the girl's dead so now it's going to a queen?" he asked.
"The girl is the queen, Queen Perdita of Lativa age ten, and she's not dead but she is dying!" the doctor explained.
"Scrap!" he cursed shooting to his feet. Looking towards an elevator he saw the doctor that took the heart. Growling he looked at the direction it was heading and raced down the stairs.
-.-
Ice Fortress 4
Bulkhead ripped off one of the cannons and swung it through part of the fortress. "Arcee!"
Swinging inside, Arcee crawled through the interior and reached the engine panel. /Alright guys, give me directions on which engine to turn off/
Optimus ducked a shot and looked over the edge, "Arcee, turn off the engines in divisions three and four."
The gun aimed for the Prime and Bumblebee jumped in front, deflecting the shots off his armor, before jumping over the barrel and bending it back, causing it to explode when it fired.
"Bumblebee! Maneuver six," Optimus called through the bond. Nodding the scout leapt towards him and took his hand. Spinning, the Prime sent his son flying towards one of the guns where he slid under, grabbed the barrel and landed on top, pushing the barrel down, before he flipped off, ripping out the gun and tossing it to Bulkhead to used his wrecking ball to crush it and another cannon.
The engines deactivated and it pitched away from the city it was flying towards, heading down towards the desert below.
"Another crash landing? Arcee, this is the last time we let you fly."
/You act as if I'm pioleting this thing in the first place!/
-.-
Seattle
Seeing the man about to get into a car, Wally raced past, snatching the precious bundle from his grip. The false doctor pulled a gun from his coat, and two more men stepped out of the car and began shooting at him. Dodging the shots he growled as he saw them blocking the stairs, feeling a breeze he ran towards the parking garage's exit, when a feeling of verigo hit him. Stumbling to his knees, he started to crawl away.
Count Vertigo scoffed. "Crawling away, is the young hero reduced to that?"
"Hey, I'm not proud," he grunted. Why did he say that to his enemy? Oh well, time to irritate the living slag outta him. "I don't get it Vertigo, you were locked up with the rest of the Injustice League, how come you aren't in Belle Reve with the rest of your putrid pals?"
Vertigo smiled. "As a member of the Latavin royal family, I have diplomatic immunity. As long as no crimes against Lativa can be proven against me."
"But when the Queen needed a heart Cold Count Soulless saw opportunity knock! The ice fortresses were all part of the plan to murder you niece! And you got someone just as heartless as you to stall me!"
"It's nice to have friends," Vertigo smiled pulling out his sword. "Now, let's see if I can kill two hearts with one blow."
"Take your best shot, Megatron already tried, but then again, he wasn't cheating like you!"
The Count growled and stopped his attack, raising his sword to stab him; which was exactly what KF was counting on. Sliding the heart away, he rolled over his injured shoulder onto his feet, happily punching the Count in the face. Was that a tooth that fell loose? Running over he slammed into the other gunmen, ignoring the growing pain from Megatron's slash.
"Enough!" Vertigo exclaimed and sent another vertigo wave at the speedster, pushing through it, Wally slammed into the count and ripped off the headpiece that gave him his power.
"Sorry Count, but you aren't worth the time," he growled running over to the heart and taking it to the doctors. "Go! Now!" he exclaimed watching the doctors leave before he finally passed out from his wounds and sheer exhaustion.
-.-
November 12
Kid Flash groaned as consciousness returned to him, looking up he glared at the man standing at the end of his hospital bed. "Count Vertigo."
"That's King Vertigo to you peasant," he sneered.
"King?"
"Perdita is dead, and the beauty of it is: I didn't lay a hand on her."
"And now no one can lay a hand on you," Wally growled.
"As King of Lativa, I'm untouchable."
"Let's test that theory!" he snarled trying to sit up, but fell back as pain shot up his side.
"Now, now little hero, you'll pull your sitches. Besides, she died on the operating table, all that planning, all that effort, neither of us had to bother with it," Vertigo stated.
"And now it must kill you to know you owe favors to Megatron and what? Five ice villians? For nothing!"
The king shrugged. "Not at all, they played their roles in my attempt to rid Lativa of Perdita, we couldn't have known it was unnecessary."
"So you still deserve credit for attempted murder?"
"It's called regicide."
KF grinned. "It's called…YOU'RE BUSTED!" he exclaimed ripping back the curtain revealing two agents, Vertigo's niece, and Orion Pax holding a recorder.
"It's called regicide," the recorder repeated.
"Count Virmir Vertigo, as Queen of Lativa, I hereby assuce you of high treason against the crown and revoke your diplomatic immunity," she said.
"No!" he exclaimed pulling out his sword.
Orion Pax pulled out a pistol and used it to block the sword, before he swept the man's feet out from under him. Pulling out a pair of handcuffs, he cuffed the man and yanked him to his feet. "Get ready for a status change, Belle Reve doesn't provide royal treatment," he stated coldly, before giving a gentle smile to Perdita. "My Queen, I hope you recover well."
"Well played children, well played, this round goes to you! And by all means allow the victory to go to your heads!" Vertigo called as the UN advisor hefted him over his shoulder and carried him out like a sack of potatoes.
Groaning, Wally got to his feet and picked up the sword the Count dropped. Sheathing it, he offered it to the queen. "Thank you, your plan worked perfectly," she said.
"Well when I woke-up and heard you were in recovery, I knew he was going to try again. Unless, A: he thought you were dead, and B: he lost that darn immunity and was sent away for good," he replied holding out the sword.
Perdita shook her head with a smile. "That sword is an heirloom to my country, not to the Count. I would be pleased for you to have it, as a reward? Or perhaps a souvenir?"
-.-
Belle Reve
Batman and Optimus stood in front of Hugo Strange, the new warden of Belle Reve. "The League failed to capture whomever was behind the attack. But our most likely suspects are Captain Cold, Killer Frost, Icicle Jr and Sr, and Mr. Freeze," Batman stated.
"That's impossible," Strange replied turning the monitor and accessing the security feeds from that timeframe. "All five were in their cells for the duration of the crisis."
Optimus and Batman looked at each other with the same bad feeling developing in their gut.
-.-
Mt. Justice
Wally set down the container for the heart on the souvenir case. He had to admit the sword was cool, but he insisted the Queen take it, showing how this one was better; to say she was surprised was an understatement, but seeing her smile in gratitiude and happiness was worth it.
"Dude! Great job! You just saved an entire country!" Erica exclaimed hugging him.
"What can I say? I'm the man," he grinned cockily.
"Dude, that is a sick birthday present!" Robin said high-fiving him as they walked out.
"He didn't keep the sword."
Emerald smiled as Bumblebee stepped out of the shadows. "Probably because he got something better."
