S/N: More twists ahead, plus some familiar yet not the same characters appear....
It is decided that Galatea is not enough to face down the 'threat' of the Outsiders so a new generation of Ultimen are brought out of stasis plus another project of Waller's from the Arizona facility. The first among them possesses pyrokinetic abilities and the second, a female is known for ferrokinesis. The one to the first male's left is a taller guy who claims he as stronger as a Kryptonian, some serious ego boost, and the third man on the team is highly flexible to say the least. The most mysterious of them is a dark haired girl while is the youngest is also thought perhaps the most powerful of the five.
As a team they are called the Templar Initiative or just Templar for short. It is time to put them to the test is the call by Cadmus' administrative branch. Waller's opinion that they are upping the ante too quickly is ignored, so where could they be planning to send this bigger army. As she uses what carefully kept favors she has garnered in recent years, she goes digging into the really classified files and discovers the one thing she did not want to believe this organization would to stop the costumes plus obliterate the former Superman in the process. The destruction of a quiet little corner in America's heartland, a town called Smallville.
She knows she must warn someone though she also had to quickly erase her access points following a quick download of the plan. As she prepares to leave Eiling joins her on the elevator heading up to the surface. The general seems suspicious of her though of course she realizes someone might have been keeping tabs on her of all people too.
"I kindly suggest you hand over that disc Waller."
"What disc would you referring to as I'm carrying quite a few?"
"You know what I mean Amanda now hand it over before Cadmus Security beats you for it."
"You were spying on me."
"We spy on everyone, heck why do you think Hardcastle is a dead man now."
"I would never go along with a plan to destroy a town just to stop the costumes."
"You can't make omelets without breaking eggs, acceptable losses."
"How many people does it take before it becomes wrong?"
"I'm sorry you feel that way, now turn over the disc!"
She slugs the older man then fakes out on the nearest guards that the general tried to assault her and it is true up to the point that she hit him. As she finally gets out of range, she realizes that only Eiling seem to know what she was up to and now it would be her neck on the line just to warn the people of Smallville. Once in her car, she jolts a little noticing who is sitting next to her, it was him of all people.
"King Faraday at your service, Mrs. Waller," says the voice.
"I know who you are Faraday, just as I know you have been helping the Outsiders, but we have another problem, now I'm driving out of here, we can't discuss this here."
"I know, sneaking in here, about as much fun as I have had tonight."
As they drive, he pulls out a palm computer and inserts the disc Waller hands him. The plan is disturbingly well thought out given that they could blame it on the Kryptonians.
"You have got to be joking with this."
"No joke, some elements in Cadmus and the government are not satisfied with the handling of the Outsiders situation. They think that all these missions by them are leading up to another takeover and given various situations like the ongoing Kasnian Civil War, they believe we must take action by killing them all when they congregate in Smallville. A fairly good number of them are there already. The only remaining missing ones are the ones probably staying with Dr. Fate and a certain romantic duo sneaking Ra's daughter back to America with her newborn."
"I can only hope that the Outsiders don't totally lose it at this revelation."
"They know the government is afraid obviously, but returning to costume for many of them is a bad idea."
"What else would you have them do when people go hunting for them out of costume?"
"I don't know, but the fact remains that all the Lords are back."
"Stewart can't use his ring, Hol can't tap Thanagarian technology, J'onn is stuck in Martian form, but of course you are on about Wayne, Diana, and the former Superman."
"The fact is they are ignoring or just avoiding the signs that the Society is up to something worse than usual."
"They also seem to forget the old saying keep your friends close, but your enemies closer. At the same time there is also believing nothing that you see and only half of what you hear."
"So how are we going to warn them then?"
"Next turn off."
"What do you mean?"
"You'll see."
A strange vortex appears in front of the car as she makes the turn off and then both are gone.
***
Faraday's organization had made the freighter look pretty badly banged up by still sea worthy in appearance only. Before arriving in Paris, Bruce had passed word about the new weakness so the organization made certain that there is a science lab aboard the freighter. Once aboard Bruce spent a great deal of time in it whereas Diana takes the opportunity to shower after resisting leaving the bed since he went down to the lab. She felt better than usual while showering especially with her hair recovering from the singe damage. However the messy way that she had gotten into bed with Bruce after departure was enough to floor him literally as she had pinned on the deck after locking the stateroom door.
He had been very slow to take off any of her clothes so the last thing she had on were the stockings she thought of trying out, something Audrey had suggested to her before they left Kasnia. He kept surprising her with how inventive he could be with finding ways to excite her before they did it. She thought about trying to wear them or something similar again some time to see how he would react to that look on her. After getting dressed she decides to pay Talia a visit to see how she and the baby are doing at this point.
"Hello Talia… how is your son?"
"He is sleeping again, my quick tussle with Ubu woke him, but fortunate for me, I trained myself more than my father knows against attackers. I shared your panic and fear from the night you and Bruce came for me."
"It was a deadly fight to say the least, Kal froze his legs and burnt my hair a little."
"He did to proposition me once after father brought him back to our reality."
"Ra's broke him out, but how?"
"Vandal Savage built an approximate duplicate device to the one father believes Bruce used to connect to that other reality."
"How do so many know of this other reality we went to?"
"You recall that Bruce had to dupe the military police into letting him take the League back into custody before they went back to fight you. In Arkham, they fought Kal's robotic doubles, those robots had built in cameras obviously for sight, but he had recovered a few though connections I didn't even know of."
"So the cameras had footage of the League fighting the robots and once it had become clear that the Lords were not around aside from Bruce going on trial for his activities as Batman. He suspected that the League had gone back yet something happened to ensure that you might never return."
"They were very hesitant for years to allow us to come back here. Their Luthor fired a power disruptor at me and the others, but his first target was Kal. The goddesses elected to forgive me after my return to Themyscira."
"What about the others?"
"They are all hesitant to have powers or abilities back especially J'onn. "
"I would suspect all of five including you and Bruce are trying to live up to whatever you feel guilty about while Kal is definitely."
"No, it is a sad thing, but I fear that we may have to disable his powers again."
"Even as a mortal he would still try to kill you, kill Bruce, or both."
"We'll lock him away, but we won't kill, the last time we killed the world turned into something that the governments are so afraid that they won't stop until they 'stop' us."
"You can try your way, but if what he almost did you and Bruce is any indication, he won't go down easy."
"If we can get blue Kryptonite, we'll be able to handle him."
"I hope you are right for all our…"
The freighter tips sending them sprawling to the floor and then Talia rushes to catch the awakening Darius who is now crying. Alarms are going off like mad, something damaged the ship, and it is taking on water fast. Faraday's associates hurry the three of them to an escape craft yet Diana tries to force her way back to find Bruce. He emerges in torn clothing with several samples of what could be blue Kryptonite made altering green Kryptonite. She pulls him along towards the launch bay. At that moment, Kal smashes through the bulkhead after flying through the hull at Bruce and speeding away from Diana.
He still had at least a sliver of blue Kryptonite. Kal fumbles dropping Bruce just before crash tumbling down the corridor into the engine room, and as Bruce realizes how close he is to the engines, he starts to run. He can hear her calling out to him and he shouts back in response yet he smells something burning, Kal set off the fuel lines, the ship will blow in mere minutes.
"Diana get out of here, it is going to blow up!"
"I'm not leaving without you!"
"You are going to have to, I'm too far inside!"
"No, not like this!" she yells.
Diana races through the ship trying to get to him, but as she rounds the corridor that puts less than a sprint away from Bruce, the ship implodes, which throws her skyward into the ceiling. A powder smoke trail follows her limp body as it hits the water. As she floats, someone puts her onto the escape launch boat, it is Talia. Faraday's associates are at the controls.
There is no sign of Bruce, it is too much, she had made a promise to keep him alive, he could not die, they still had too much to do, too much to live for, the tears were flowing and the sobs too loud to ignore even for Faraday's men. Talia wraps a blanket around the weeping Diana and then Kal reappears from beneath the waves, he yanks a piece of something jabbed into him. It is not ship debris, it is…
As Diana sees the wound bleeding, she knows Bruce must have stabbed him with it before the ship exploded or something to like that. He flies towards her but along the way lets off two streams of ice at Faraday's people. They are dead before they can even whimper. Both women pull out the blue Kryptonite then as he nears, he starts feeling weak again, and curses that it must be anti-Kryptonite. How did he know unless he overheard once he got his super-hearing back except he was wrong, but only they knew that. He dives into the water causing the boat to rise on a tidal wave he causes just to get away from the radiation from the rock.
She thinks this is not over by a long shot and if Bruce is really gone, you are next Kal, not because I'm vengeful or angry, only because you'll kill us all unless we stop you soon.
The freighter wreckage has been sinking for awhile now yet a patrol of Atlantean crafts take interest. They would check to be sure no one is in it and there are no weapons aboard that could be lethal to the underwater world. Word is sent back to the underwater capital because of a certain discovery about who was traveling on the sunken vessel, so that is when Aquaman knows he must go to verify this. The surface is plunging into anarchy and chaos so who is involved and the risks to his domain must be known.
Elsewhere the tossed escape boat drifts into something, but not solid. Diana knows what happen as the island had always been hidden especially in times of great trouble in the outside world. She no longer calls it Man's world, because it is not only men that have some stake and part in what is happening there. She hears a voice from the other side of the tipped over hull and it is very familiar.
"Who is in there? Are any of you hurt?" says a female voice.
"No injuries, just wave tossed is all," she answers.
As the boat is set right, Diana climbs out onto the longboat to see someone she had not seen in a long while either, her 'little' sister, who went by the name Donna Troy. Her appearance is significantly similar to Diana except there are discernible differences especially now with Diana having aged the years she was gone and still aging now.
"I was sorry to have missed your return several months ago. I heard many were very forgiving especially after that speech you gave about the mortal heroes of long ago generations. I was also told you are no longer immortal as a part of the Goddesses' forgiveness."
"Yes I agreed to it because there is more important things in life that being immortal. True immortality is in knowing, pursuing, and occasionally having what you want in life."
"I heard a certain man also came with you, is here with you now?"
"We were separated when the ship exploded after Kal attacked us again."
"Should we search for him?"
"I don't think he could survive that kind of an explosion, but you can look, I will be looking too though right now I'm tired, I need to be alone, please look after Talia and her baby."
"It has been many years since we had a baby on this island."
Talia is resistant to the Sisters at first, but she realizes she needs the help anyway. As for who to console Diana that is uncertain so the task falls to Hippolyta once she hears of what happen only miles from one of the portal barriers to the Island. As Hippolyta nears the grove where Diana is, a hand clasps her shoulder, it is Persephone.
"I think someone else needs to do this."
"Who would else other than me her mother?" asks Hippolyta.
"I think she means me your majesty," speaks a male voice.
"You brought him up from the afterlife?"
"He is a better candidate for the moment."
"I granted him a temporary pass to this plane so that he may spend these trying hours with her."
"What of Bruce Wayne?"
"Only time will tell… but his task does not end with her."
"What do you mean?"
"This is all I can tell you for now."
He walks over to her and as she sees first only his legs she wonders if it is Bruce somehow here with her even though the ship blew up. As she looks up further she sees that is Wally. He is carrying Iced Mochas. He hands one to her, she is surprised how solid and real it feels while also knowing she had not gone to the afterlife again.
"Hello Wondy, I mean, Diana."
"It is okay you can call me whatever you want, we are friends remember."
"Right, well I thought you could use the company, I know it hurts like hell right or should I say Tartarus."
In between the tears, she cracks up laughing for a few minutes before wiping her eyes. He hands her a handkerchief next. She rests her head on his shoulder and he gives her a long hug.
"So how are you here?"
"I got a free pass to be here for awhile. I mean you would be surprised how many perks you get when you are a hero in that place."
"I know you are afraid to say when you have gone onto the land of the dead."
"Right-o, well I'm going to tell you something that you already know. Bats is too stubborn to die, y'hear me. Now enjoy the mocha and soon as you are done, you'll start feeling better Wondy."
What could she say, the redhead Wally West was usually right about a lot of things including the rush from the mocha. She smiles and hugs him back, they sat like this for awhile as Hippolyta knows her daughter is in good company. However there is no way one can tell a woman in love not to worry about the other, it is part of the bond.
A/N 1: Templar Initiative, Lords reality counterpart to the League reality's one time Royal Flush Gang except they never met in Vegas like the League met Royal Flush Gang. If you'll remember I had Vegas incidentally happen earlier in this reality, now if you thought they fought the Gang equivalent then. Nope, so why were they in Vegas, I haven't exactly worked that out yet besides the fact that they were there.
A/N 2: I actually really planned this one out from scribbles I was writing this afternoon. Cadmus, where art thou? That is the question. Anyway Waller makes a pretty heavy discovery in this segment, a very nasty one at that. Faraday is on the case as usual and the purplish vortex, Fate of course.
A/N 3: Not only does Faraday's organization have people everywhere, but they have got top notch resources too well if you want keep up with Cadmus, you need the tools at least. Blue Kryptonite makes a nice dagger for starters and silly old Kal mistakes it for anti-Kryptonite because he like Ra's still believes that is the weakness. In anger or some other emotion, he ignites the ship's fuel lines. Ship goes boom tossing Diana, Talia pulls her out the water, and the two fend off Kal with Blue Kryptonite that Bruce gave her before Kal aka Mr. Battering Ram shows up.
A/N 4: Now Wally's gone 'topside' for a bit instead of someone coming to him. Heroes can probably get passes to the living for a bit, think of as I don't thinking or believing in angels or spirits. I got this particular idea from an episode of Stargate SG-1 where Daniel as ascended being visits Jack during an emotionally/physically trying experience while being held prisoner by the System Lord Ba'al. As for Bruce, he's too stubborn to die right, anyway Atlanteans are on the scene, sure enough Aquaman has some idea of what's happening with surface dwellers.