"I didn't think we were supposed to be drowning her," Barry yelled out to the rest of the team as a stream of water rose from the depths of the Metropolis Bay at Arthur's command, knocking Claire out of the air and sending her crashing into the water, only to have her shoot up into the sky aagain within a matter of seconds. "I feel like we're a little short-staffed here!"
"Back on the bridge," Arthur roared, gesturing with his weapon of choice - an old, ornate trident - at the Metro-Narrows Bridge, where they had now moved the fight to minimize collateral damage to the city of Metropolis. Sure enough, Diana Prince had just arrived on the scene, with the Batmobile carrying Bruce and Lex Luthor arriving just moments after.
Just as they arrived, a blast erupted from Claire's hands, intended to fire straight at the bridge but deflected with a deftly timed blast of water from the Bay, directed by Arthur's trident so that instead, it hit the high rocky knoll lining the bay, taking a large chunk out of the hillside which went crashing into the sea.
"Anytime now, guys," Vic roared over the din, struggling to contribute to the fight with the Mother Box tucked underneath one arm. "Clock's ticking!"
Bruce got out of the driver's side of his car, stepping around and throwing open the door on the other side, yanking Lex out unceremoniously and pushing him towards the railing so that he could see the scene beneath them.
"There's only one person who stands a chance of getting through to her," Diana said, standing back a short distance as Lex looked down at the fight - at the woman he loved, soaring and causing havoc like everything he hated. Seeing her become one of them - seeing her become like these men in the sky - made him feel sick to his stomach.
"I've told you what we need to do," Bruce said without pretense. "There's only going to be one chance, Luthor. Get ready."
"Hm," Lex said, crossing his arms and staring down at the fight raging beneath them, below the Metro-Narrows Bridge. He gave a forced huf of a laugh through his nostrils before taking a step back from the railing and looking back at Bruce and Diana. "You're the heroes here. Isn't it your job to handle saving the damsels in distress?"
"You disgusting coward."
In what seemed like the blink of an eye, Diana Prince had closed the space between herself and Lex Luthor, lifting him off the floor by the collar of his shirt and paying no mind to his desperate grasping at her hands to release him. "That woman is no damsel in distress - that woman is wise and good and kind and she sacrificed her life, her future for you. She was prepared to die for a coward like you," Diana said in a near-hiss, her voice laced with disgust. Bruce looked on, stoic but surprised at the sudden show of rage from the Amazonian woman. "And if you do not help us, Lex Luthor, we will have no choice but to destroy her."
With his face contorted into a sneer at the indignity of being hoisted around like a rag doll, Lex dropped his arms to his sides, prompting Diana to lower him to the ground again. Oddly, as she lowered her hands to her sides again, Bruce's hand gently closed over her shoulder for a brief few moments in a rare comforting gesture before he withdrew it yet again.
The thought of Claire Branigan being willing to die for him was not something Lex had ever prepared himself for. His belief that humans were selfish and self-serving and that in the end, one remained completely alone was something that for many years had been his only survival. It was wise to trust no one, because in the end, no one would be loyal.
And somehow, gentle Claire had entered his life like a mighty gust of wind and reduced that belief to rubble. It was, in a strange way, a deep loss. The loss of his ability to say that he had no one was something that shook him to his very deepest core. He had built an empire on this idea of being alone.
"Can you guarantee she'll come out alive?" Lex asked in a voice that was so weak - almost pleading - that it left Diana momentarily stunned. They had known that Claire loved Lex Luthor, but only in this moment did the possibility present itself in both Bruce and Diana's mind that he deeply, genuinely cared for this woman as well.
"...I cannot," Diana admitted honestly. "I can only guarantee that if you do not act, Mister Luthor, that she will die."
To hear it put so simply and concretely seemed to be more than Lex Luthor could handle - again came the familiar feeling of his body tensing, his hands curling into fists at his sides, his shoulders shaking. And Claire was here. She was so close. She should have been there to stop the shaking, to lull the loudness in his head into peace. But she was not. And if he did not act - if he did not comply with the requests of people whom he had all along associated with unilateral, undeserved power, with abuse, with exploitation - she would never be again.
"Do you understand?" Bruce pressed, his voice deep and stoic. "There is no man in the sky that's going to be able to save her. No one else. If you want power, this may be the most power you ever have. Darkseid is going to be stopped, one way or another. But you decide if she gets destroyed in the process."
Lex had come to terms with the fact that it had not been his call that brought Darkseid to Earth. He realized that he did wield such power. The small semblance of power he'd felt had dissipated into a realization that this was all vanity.
"Are we doing this or not?" Vic's voice roared from down below, right before another concussive blast from Claire's hands shot downward into the water, causing a massive wave that crashed against the shore, upending the boats docked in the marina.
"Your time is running out, Luthor," Diana spoke up, already steadying herself with a heavy heart to launch into action, accepting the possibility that perhaps Lex Luthor was truly unwilling. "She has to be -"
"I'll do it."
There was a momentary beat before Diana looked briefly back at Bruce, sharing a nod with him before taking her lasso from its holster at her waist. Lex fliinched as Diana hurled the lasso so the loop fell over his head, tightening it around his ribs and stepping closer to him.
"You will be safe. We need you in one piece for this," Diana said with a gentle irk of her eyebrow, reading the suspicion in Lex's face. Holding the end of the lasso, she stepped to the railing of the bridge and called out. "Get her into position!"
Having evidently prepared for this scenario, the team leapt into action. Arthur immediately lifted his trident and began whirling it around his head, calling up a cone-shaped whirlpool of water from the bay that surrounded Claire, while Barry began circling in a scarlet-colored blur, around the whirlpool almost as though he were running on the cone of water itself, the collective momentum of the water and Barry's speed hoisting Claire up into air in the center of the storm, spread-eagled as though all of her limbs were being pulled outward - she was in the middle of a centrifuge, threatening to tear her apart.
Meanwhile, Bruce removed a grappling hook from his utility belt, shooting it over a support cable of the Metro-Narrows Bridge so that it made a graceful arc before falling in front of Vic below, who grabbed a hold and allowed himself to be hoisted up to the top of the bridge, placed just above the opening of the cyclone - he gave a thumbs up signal, now holding the Mother Box with both hands, prepared to ask.
"You don't have much time," Diana said to Lex, securing the loop around his midsection, looping it around a support pole, and then around her own waist then moving as close to the edge of the bridge as she could. "I will bring you into the cyclone, but only you can get through to her." She removed the shield from her back and nodded to edge. "We jump."
And for reasons he could not pinpoint, he willingly jumped alongside Diana Prince into the heart of the cyclone, nearly colliding with her in mid-air. She secured an arm around his waist, using her shield to stop the cyclone from pulling them into the center, instead suspended in the violent flurry of wind and water, directly in front of Claire who was still held, splayed in front of them, attempting to get free.
Lex saw the red glow in her eyes and felt for a moment that this was a lost cause - it was a battle that could not be won. This was not his Claire. He did not see her anywhere. However, because the lasso fastened around his ribs was no ordinary rope, he was compelled not to keep quiet. To not pretend that this was not his Claire or that he did not have hope she could hear.
"Claire!" he found himself unable to restrain himself from calling out over the roaring wind. "You can't die. You can't leave me. Not like this."
"Claire is gone. She was weak. She has left you," came the voice out of Claire's body, the red glow of the eyes glowing brighter. "I have destroyed her."
"Claire!" Lex continued calling out, "I - I don't understand - I don't -"
The frantic, cracking tone in Lex's voice seemed to stir something within the body - the glimmering red eyes flickered, and the head thrashed as though fighting back against something. Claire was attempting to regain to control.
"Get out of here!" The shrill cry was one that Lex and Diana both knew had to have come from Claire. "Lex, get out - get away from here -"
"You're going to die here, Claire -"
"I know."
The statement seemed to wash over Lex like ice - she knew this would kill her. She had no intentions of surviving. She had taken this being into her body with no intention of making it out alive, only to spare Lex from doing the same. "No," Lex said, thrashing against the lasso, his voice erupting into a shrill laugh. "No. You're not going to do this. I - I need you to live, Claire. I need you."
It was a confession that never would have come without the compulsion of the Lasso of Truth - and Diana had known because while she did not know Lex Luthor, she had lived too much of a life to not know that men like him would not speak their deepest truths without some use of force. The red glow in Claire's eyes flickered more violently, and it became evident that the fight between Claire and Darkseid for control was growing more impassioned. Diana finally looked upward at Vic, who stood atop the bridge in wait.
"Now!" Diana roared, and Vic held the Mother Box out in front of himself. Seemingly energized by the presence of the man it considered a master, it began to glow a radiant white, even through its cracks and dents, and when Vic released it from its hands, it lowered itself into the cyclone as though it were following his will, filling the cone of wind with warm white light.
A loud, agonized roar escaped from Claire's lips as the red glow returned into her eyes, her body still being pulled in all directions, but once the white light washed over her, the area around them became so bright that it was blinding. Lex shut his eyes against the light, unable to see anything, only hearing the same roaring sound of the wind and water now accompanied by a high-pitched squeal coming from the Mother Box, and the cry of Claire's voice that didn't belong to her.
The noise grew louder and louder until suddenly, with a shuddering boom of energy, the white light erupted outward and dispelled the cyclone with such concussive force that it seemed to throw Barry and Arthur aside like rag dolls. Diana released her hold on Lex Luthor, and like a pulley, he was hoisted upward back towards the bridge - the lasso, as though moving with its own mind, unwound itself from his waist, and as he flew upward, he was pulled from the sky, yanked so that he rolled onto his side back onto the bridge with a thud.
He still had the wind knocked out of him from the impact when the white light dissipated and the roaring noise died away, leaving an almost eerie silence around them. Lex forced himself to his feet and hurried to edge of the bridge, looking down into the water to see Diana in the water below, swimming and pulling a motionless Claire Branigan to shore.
Lex found himself still stunned and motionless while both Bruce and Victor rushed past him to join the others - he stayed behind as they gathered around Claire, unconscious and pale on the shore. A short way off, debris from the now-destroyed Mother Box bobbed for a few moments before disappearing, sinking into the depths.
He had failed. He was sure of it. Fate was reminding him that he was still powerless, that he was still tiny and inconsequential and did not have the power he wished. He'd failed. If Darkseid was vanquished, he was only temporarily vanquished. And Claire... Claire was...
"She's alive," Diana said, sounding shocked herself at the fact. "We need to get her to Dr. Thompkins."
Lex's eyes widened upon hearing the words faintly in the distance. Claire had lived. He had done it.
But, Lex now realized, he had done it by working alongside everything he purported to hate. And now, she was in their hands. This was something he could not face. He could not be one of them. They were still the enemy. He couldn't be here with them. In what felt a great deal like shame for having been weak enough to stand side by side with the beings he'd considered monsters, Lex ran off, away from the bridge and away from them.
Diana, meanwhile, had gotten to her feet while Victor - physically the strongest among them - had gathered the unconscious Claire into his arms to carry her away. Diana felt a heaviness in her heart, seeing Lex run away and knowing that he simply could not accept having for once not been enemies with what he so loathed. Diana of all people knew that wars such as these in which sides had to be taken could easily tear apart even the most real of loves. She had felt it. She had experienced it. And now, she feared that Claire would have to feel the same pain - but she was a mere human.
That, however, was secondary. For now, they had to hope that they could simply make sure she survived.
A/N
Action scenes are something I struggle with, so I hope that wasn't like pulling teeth! But this is just the beginning. Lex and Claire have a lot to go through, and the next couple chapters will see some very big changes. How they push through, you'll just have to wait and see. Again, like always, all of your messages and feedback are amazing and well-appreciated, even if I can't reply individually all the time. I have a couple messages to reply to still, but I really wanted to get this update to all of you before my busy long weekend of moving! Until next update, cheers!