Palo Alto

July 3, 19:01 PST

"Where am I?" I asked myself.

I was on the floor near Venus Flytrap-like plants and my head hurt.

"What am I wearing?" I asked again taking off my blazer. "And where are my scars?"

Watchtower

July 3, 14:21 EST

My dad asked us to come to the Watchtower that afternoon but he wasn't even there himself.

All our heads were down on the Meeting Room table even though we were trying not to fall asleep. All of our sleeping schedules were screwed since that fearful night.

"Mage, where's your dad?" Wally gave the muffled question.

"You'll have to ask him that yourself," I yawned.

As if on cue, the Meeting Room door slid open. We all lifted our heads up and scowled at him.

"Quit it with the grimaced looks," he chuckled. "Haven't you heard that normal people wake up in the morning?"

I rolled my eyes and laid my head back on the table.

"Mage?" my dad called.

"Yes, Mom?" the comment earned me snickers at the round table even though it was totally unintentional. "I mean, Dad."

"Cute," he deadpanned as I lifted my head up. "Anyway, some of you may know the seductive Queen Bee of Bialya, immortal villain Vandal Savage and the mortal but quite annoying villain Lex Luthor."

"Weren't they leading members of the Light?" Wally pointed out.

"Yeah, they were."

"And did you just compliment a villain, Dad?" I commented and smirked.

He turned a bright red before ignoring my question and going on.

"Anyways," he continued with a small ahem. "Luthor has a rare sickness that doctors can't diagnose so he will most likely hand what he has over to one of them."

"He could give it to one of his Light buddies or he could give it to Mercy," Malcolm said with his head back, slouched down in the chair with his eyes closed.

"Mercy?" I asked.

"Yeah," he answered sitting up. "She was Lex's assistant when the original Team was in commission and she still is."

"Well isn't that loyalty," Wally commented.

"Maybe too loyal," my dad pointed out with a chuckle.

"You think she was waiting for the right moment to do something to him?"

My dad laughed before answering with a, "Never mind."

"So, Dad," I yawned. "Why exactly did you call us here?"

"You four will be going to a Lexcorp Farm to take a tour today to see what operations are going on there."

"And the tour is what time?"

"4:30 PM Pacific Standard Time in Palo Alto and you will be staying after hours so dress lightly."

After he dismissed us, I went to change into my mission uniform then I put my civilian clothes over it.

Palo Alto

July 3, 16:25 PST

"My parents told me they used to live here when they got into Stanford together," Wally told us.

"What happened?" Marie asked even though it was a pretty obvious answer to it.

"Well when my dad 'died' she went to live with my grandmother then when she had me, we moved to El Paso."

We were waiting in front of the farming building burning up with the extra layers with my dad. He was required to come since we were minors.

I lightly elbowed Wally in the arm.

"Wally, what did you do with your arrows?" I whispered to him.

"You don't wanna know," he chuckled.

I grimaced at the thought as we were directed into the building.

"Welcome to our Palo Alto Lexcorp Farm!" greeted a super peppy lady. "My name's Joy and I'll of course be your tour guide and I must ask before we venture: are there any questions?"

Out of the huge lot of people that surprisingly came, no one had anything to say so we were quickly off.

We walked through rows and columns of vegetation as Joy explained what everything-a-ma-bob was, what it was helping to do and who the scientist were. I wasn't actually interested by what she had to say I was interested in how the light shined beautifully onto the overgrown plants from the skylight.

Everything seemed totally in the norm for those quick 2 hours until Marie grabbed my arm which caused me to let out a small yipe that no one seemed to notice.

"We're going to the bathroom," she whispered to me.

I nodded and we left my dad behind and went to the bathroom where we changed into our hero gear.

"What time does this place clear out?" I complained to Marie who was in the stall next to me. "I'm ready to get out and go home."

"In a few minutes, Mage, so, chill."

I sighed as a tele-message came in on my phone.

6:30 PM

Wally: Is it time 2 go?

Me: Wait a few minutes till the place clears out.

6:31 PM

Wally: What about now?

At that point all I could do was face-palm myself and ignore him until it was go time.

I look at the time and told Marie, "Time to go."

I strap on my holo-watch and went out the bathroom to meet up with the boys. A hologram of the floor plan that my dad gave us popped up and we looked it over.

"Okay," I whispered not wanting to alert the remaining scientist and security guards. "There's an office in the back of the building that holds info on this facility which means it's going to tell us what Lex is handing over to his successor."

They nodded as we made our way through the overgrown plants once again while dodging employees.

We finally came upon a 'STAFF ONLY' door as I checked the holo-watch again and I signaled the Team to enter.

"Mage," Marie called me through the mind link.

I was still looking down at my watch.

"Hm?"

"How are not seeing this?"

I looked up to see giant Venus Flytrap-like plants with weird teeth in various colors inside these… pods.

"What are they?" Wally asked with a pretty disgusted look on his face.

"Well, it's Luthor's place so we know it's nothing good," Malcolm sighed.

I hacked into the computer system in front of the row of pods containing the creatures. I began feeling disgusted in what I was looking at.

"Guys," I called. "The stats on these things are through the roof."

"What are the stats?" Marie asked.

"Growth at outrageous rates, infrared vision, and energy transference."

"Energy transference?"

I nodded and looked up at the brightly colored plants.

"Their cells consist of that of a Venus Flytrap's and was grown using… techno-magic?"

"What's that?" Marie asked.

I shrugged and looked at my holo-watch again.

"Wait," I said still looking down. "Why is this map so out of whack?"

"Maybe it was meant to be a trap."

"I… wait, who said that?"

"Psimon said it."

We all shared perplexed looks before Psimon said something else.

"Psimon says, forget!"

A spitting headache came at me faster than the Flash, even though I don't know how that's possible. I dropped to the ground holding my skull as it felt like my brain was running up against it.

I had blacked out from the pain after that and I woke up in a dark room where the only light came from a computer system and the light that was over deadly looking plants.

"Where am I?" I asked myself.

I was on the floor near costumed kids and Venus Flytrap-like plants and my head hurt.

"What am I wearing?" I asked again taking off my blazer. "And where are my scars?"