Chapter 45
The next morning father and daughter are up bright and early as usual and at the breakfast table. Clark had to say she looked brighter and she said she was fine…mostly so he raises what he put off last night and that is what exactly happened. "So tell me what you remember of this man and his companion," he requests.
Mia frowns. "My memory of it still isn't entirely clear," she cautions. "But I think Chloe and Oliver stumbled onto something accidentally during their date. They stole someone's reservation…and I remember now. There was a phone call. That was where the woman screaming came from. I followed it but she was already dead. As for the guy I can't even remember his face clearly. Sorry."
"No. Don't apologise," Clark assures her not to blame herself. He then takes several moments to think. "I wonder if this is related to my investigation," he ponders aloud.
"Investigation?" Mia asks, interested. She's always interested in seeing her father work and learning more of the man she otherwise never knew.
"A public works worker found a pile of bodies last night. Looked like the work of a serial killer."
"You think it's the guy I met who is responsible?"
"Possibly. I'm leaning against it being a coincidence. I'm hoping to get the autopsy reports this morning to review and see if I can find a connection between the victims."
"Can I help?" Mia asks, eager to help her father.
"I want you to check up on Oliver and Chloe. Make sure they're alright first and foremost. Then I want you to follow them."
"What? Why?" she queries because that is not what she meaning by help.
"Because I know them. If they have stumbled into this case they'll investigate, possibly from a different angle. With luck one of us will track this back to the killer."
"Just as long as I get one clean shot at the dreg," Mia wishes threateningly.
"Just be careful," Clark advises. "You said it yourself the man wasn't alone."
"I don't remember much about her either…except she was superhumanly strong."
"Then be doubly careful. In fact if you find them call me," he requests/orders.
"I can handle them!" she insists vigorously.
"I'm not doubting that," he insists. "But I'm also trying to work on this team concept. In fact it just occurs to me you know more about that than me, don't you?"
Mia smiles sheepishly.
"Mia, I do have faith in you but…"
"I know. I know. Teamwork," she grudgingly accepts.
Metropolis…
Mia had found Oliver and Chloe were indeed still alive and well as she stands on the rooftop opposite Oliver's apartment. Though she oft wishes she had her father's telescopic and x-ray vision. All she can rely on is her superhearing.
Turns out her father was correct. They seemingly have stumbled into the same investigation. What are the odds?
Mia closes her eyes and keeps listening as Oliver and Chloe discuss heading over to Club Desaad.
Her eyes snap open.
Desaad.
That guy is Desaad.
That's why he seemed familiar. Though he does look different from the images she has seen. Clearly he changes in the next 20 years. She's not sure how that happens…which just goes to show that her well-worn phrase of not being Encyclopaedia of future events remains true.
But now…now…
Her hands come to her head and as she pushes against the throbbing pain forming there as, like the previous night, two different version of her life flash before her eyes. It takes a tremendous effort on her part but she manages to push them back and regain focus. What the hell did that dreg do to her? She's going to get answers even if she has to beat it out of him. In fact part of her really hopes she does have to beat it out of him.
The sound of a car starting kicks her out of her introspection. Chloe and Oliver. She lifts off the rooftop and proceeds to follow them.
The Daily Planet…
Clark was at his desk looking through all the info he had on the murder victims, trying to find a connection but if one did exist he wasn't seeing it. He leans back in his chair, rubs his eyes and blows out a breath.
"So where's the little blond leech?"
Clark cracks an eye open to find Lois, leaning against his desk, drinking a coffee. One thing he had just had to learn to deal with is the fact he works at the same place as his ex-girlfriend and that said ex doesn't have the same issues with personal space or regard for the fact that it is awkward in any way as he does. "Leech is a little bit harsh," he argues.
Lois scoffs. "You only say that because she didn't manage to sink her teeth into you. If she had you would already be sucked dry."
Clark sighs. "Cat is not as bad as you are making her out to be," he defends their fellow reporter. Yeah, Cat is not someone he finds it easy to get along with but she isn't that bad. "Didn't you say she helped you escape the VRA when they came to arrest you?" he reminds her.
Lois groans. "You have to find that one redeeming feature don't you," she grumbles.
"How long have you known me again?" he asks rhetorically.
"Point," she concedes as she pinches his dohnut off his desk. No amount of glaring on his part stops her stuffing it into her face. "So what you working on?" she inquires, interested.
"The multiple bodies found last night," he replies.
Lois makes a face of disgust. "Ugh. Some people are just sick."
"I'm trying to find some commonality between them."
"No luck," she guesses form his tone.
He shakes his head.
Lois flips through the crime scene photos. "Then you need to look harder, Smallville," she critiques.
"Hmm?"
She points at the ink stamp on each of their hands.
Clark jumps up to his feet. "I must be slipping," he criticises himself.
"Must be," Lois teases him.
"When I was at the hospital last night I only saw a few dots. Must have been some sort of relief pattern. It matches the stamp right there."
Lois peers at the coroner photos. "That's only a fraction of a centimetre. How would you be able to see that?" she asks, confused.
"Microvision."
"'Micro' vision?" she queries in disbelief.
"It's my power. I can call it whatever I want," he says defensively which makes Lois roll her eyes. "Point is the coroner wasn't examining those bodies."
"He was covering his tracks," Lois gets. The coroner was cleaning the stamps off.
Well, despite his stupidity at least Clark has a lead now.
Club Desaad…
Mia was still following Oliver and Chloe as they tried to find a way into the building. She was just waiting for her moment.
"No one's answering up front," Oliver reports to Chloe about his attempts to get an answer at the door. You don't know that won't work until you try.
"Yeah, and the last thing we want is for a billionaire superhero ex-fugitive to get caught kicking in the front door of a sex club," Chloe remarks.
"Yeah, not today, anyway. We sure this is the right place?" the blond man wants to be sure.
"Yeah, it's owned by a guy named Desaad. The feds have been keeping an eye on it for weeks. Some guy from the bureau came in here for a little bit of relaxation, and at his check-up the next week..."
"There was an Omega on his skull," Oliver guesses from what he and Chloe discovered last night. That the FBI were onto the Omega symbols on people's skulls and were trying to discover the cause. They are way, way out of their league.
"Yeah. Right. Turns out he wasn't the only one. Every one of those x-rays belongs to someone who was a visitor at this club. You know, the Joneses may have gotten made, but they had no idea what they were getting themselves into… Hey!" she shouts at him as he is suddenly scaling up the drainpipe and in through a window.
"Right. Which is why it's our job to get Mr. Jones out of it," Oliver insists, his Green Arrow persona coming to the fore over the playboy billionaire. 'Mr and Mrs Jones' being the incredibly unoriginal aliases the undercover FBI agents were using.
"Well, don't leave Goldilocks out in the cold," Chloe requests on whatever it is he is planning.
"If the darkness has anything to do with this, the last thing I want is for you to get caught in the crossfire," he says and before Chloe can argue he's gone from sight. She is so going to give him a piece of her mind later.
"Hands where I can see them!"
"Come on. Again?" Chloe complains because the FBI tried to arrest her and Oliver last night already. They managed to escape. "Mr. Jones. Er, agent...?" she queries with her hands up.
"Vactor. And whoever you are, you're under arrest for impeding a federal investigation," the federal agent informs her.
"Listen, you have no idea what you're dealing with here," she tries to appeal to him
"No, what you don't understand ..." what the man is about to say is cut off as his eyes start to bleed and Desaad himself appears behind the federal agent who collapses to the ground dying.
"Finally," Supergirl remarks from her position on the roof. This is just what she was waiting for.
"Couldn't have said it better myself."
Supergirl spins round to be met by a powerful kick which sends her flying off the rooftop. She lands in a heap on the ground as a short distance away her attacker lands on the ground with a loud CRUCH!. Supergirl blows out a breath as she gets her first good look at the large, robust woman. As she walks forward Mia can hear a sort of electric fizzle from the woman's boots. "Stompa," she says the name of the Female Fury as she gets back to her feet.
"Interesting how you know her name," Desaad comments.
Supergirl sees him out of the corner of her eye, carrying a now unconscious Chloe. Her eyes flicker upward to where Oliver is.
Desaad notices. "Don't you worry about him. I've sent his mind on a little trip to napsville," he chuckles. "His time will come. Your time is now."
"You think you can take me?" Supergirl scoffs at the notion, perhaps showing off her arrogance.
"You think you can name all my friends?" the New God retorts as starting to surround Supergirl comes half a dozen more women.
Knife. Swords. Whips. Claws. Hammer. Bow and Arrow(they just let anyone be an archer these days!). Yeah, Mia has to say they look familiar yet different from the images she has seen. Like with Desaad himself. Clearly something…changes them in the next 20 years. What that is Mia has no clue. She guesses that is what she gets for not finding more time to review all those files the League has on their foes. Sue her. She's not the academic type.
"Take her down," Desaad orders and the 7 women attack.
Supergirl is almost caught off-guard by how swiftly they move. She can't even use her main advantage of flight before she is barely blocking the attack by the blond with the swords using her bracelets to deflect the blows.
That, however, leaves her distracted from the blow from the large brunette with the hammer…and there is no way in hell is that an ordinary hammer because it sends Supergirl reeling. She manages to retain enough of her awareness to flip over a strike from the short brunette with the knife.
Before Supergirl can propel herself upward further a whip wraps around her ankle, shocking her before she gets yanked back down right into a powerful boot to her face courtesy of Stompa. She crashes into a parked car, crumpling it around her body.
Arrows impact around her and it takes Mia a moment to realise they weren't trying to hit her. They were hitting her cape, pinning her to the car.
Claws are then flying right at her face. Mia manages to grab the two wrist before the claws can impact.
"Aw, come now. It'll only hurt forever," Claw girl cackles insanely.
Mia's eyes narrow at the streaks of green dye in the hair as the person in front of her gains a familiarity in her brain. "Mad Harriet?" she queries before wondering why the hell she is bothering asking. She pushes a foot into the woman's stomach and pushes her away.
The women close in as Supergirl is still pinned to the car. She fires up her fists and shoots at them with her energy blasts, forcing them to dodge and giving her a moment to free herself and spot the hole in her blue cape. "This is my favourite cape," she grinds out in annoyance. "It's my only cape!" she snaps in anger.
Her temper now thoroughly stoked she slips into superspeed slamming lefts and rights as she goes into every face in her way. By the time she skids to a halt her foes are flying through the air at various speeds and directions.
"That all you got, dregs?" Supergirl taunts them, once again allowing her arrogance to show through. She watches them get to their feet, visibly pissed.
"Hardly," Lashina says from between gritted teeth, once again being repelled by this pathetic, weak, primate body she is currently trapped in. Those meteor enhancements just aren't enough. If only she was still in her original form she would teach this little brat a lesson that would make Hell seem like a paradise by comparison.
The current leader of the Furies charges in, looking to prove herself as the rightful leader regardless of whether Granny finds Barda or not. Striking with her whips, Supergirl dodges until there is one even she can't and by instinct raises her right arm. The whip wraps around and electricity once more surges through the Latino superhero's body.
Supergirl grits her teeth, grabs the whip with her left hand and pulls hard, yanking Lashina off her to feet but instead of the left hook Mia was planning her opponent manages to get one foot down just enough to flip herself upward and land atop Supergirl's shoulders where she then proceeds to smash punch after punch into the stunned hero's face before locking her legs in, falling backwards and flipping Supergirl head first into the asphalt.
Lashina smashes her foot hard into the back of Supergirl's head, driving her face deeper. "This is where you belong, you insolent brat. Under my feet."
"Hmmph…hmmph…hmmph," is the muffled reply.
"What was that? I can't hear you!" Lashina mocks in a loud voice, smirking. By Darkseid it has been far too long since she had this kind of fun.
The ground then begins to tremble before Supergirl explodes upward, sending Lashina tumbling head over heels. The half-Kryptonian floats several feet above the ground, her hands glowing with angry red energy. "I said I'm going to strangle you with your own whips!" she rages.
"Oh please. Try," Lashina begs her. By now the other girls have recovered from Supergirl's last attack and gather below.
Supergirl's body tenses up as she readies herself to renew the fight…only to be struck in the back by energy blast from a weapon most assuredly not of this Earth which propels her deep into the ground, carving out a large crater.
Looking up, floating on two metallic disks is a large woman with dark hair holding a metal rod.
"Barda," Lashina says with a hateful sneer.
"Lashina," Barda returns it with the same hateful sneer. Needless to say it is clear the two do not like each other.
"Ah so good to see you again my dear," Desaad remarks. "I'm so glad Granny managed to find you. Your timing is excellent."
"I'd say she was late," Lashina critiques.
Barda glares at the whip wielding woman. "I needed to stop off on Apokolips first," she gives her explanation as she smacks the rod into the palm of her hand in agitation while also indicating what it was she went to get from their homeworld.
"Apokolips?" Mad Harriet queries, her eyes lit up at the mention of their homeworld. "You mean...it's…"
"Will be here. Soon," Desaad fills in. "That's all you need to know. Now, before all this ruckus attracts unwanted attention please pick up our little wannabe hero there and bring her," he points at the now clearly unconscious form of Supergirl.
Two of the Furies retrieve Supergirl and the group depart. They do so as a groggy looking Oliver has just about managed to drag himself to the window he climbed in and catches both Chloe and Supergirl being carried off. In his current state all the blond man can manage is a, "Well...crap."
Author's Note: Told you back during my take on Abandoned that we'd see the Furies again and here we go. Thanks to everyone who wrote reviews.
