Chapter Ten: ...Make the Axis Fold—Part One...

Place: Offices of DC Comics, New York City

Year: 1986

"George, I was thinking about what you said right now about making Wonder Woman stronger," said Schwartz. "Aren't you afraid of making her too strong? Even Magoon there has trouble with Superman on that part."

Perez heard Maggin grumble about it being power vs. dilemmas and felt a stab of sympathy for the man—the curmudgeon never got his name right. "It'll be OK Mr. Schwartz. Back in the Golden Age, Marston said that the bracelets keep an Amazon's strength in check lest she abuse it. That was why back in the old days, we said that if she ever took off her bracelets an Amazon would go be possessed by insane berserker rage. I could work with that.

"Besides, while she'll be getting Superman's strength she won't be getting his invulnerability. Remember the scene where she survives machine gun fire only to be left aching all over for a week? Lack of invulnerability means she can't use her full strength anyways without hurting herself." He checked his notes. "Example, in #302 she was trapped in a cave and had to wrap her fists in her lasso before she could punch her way out."

"Steel hand, glass jaw?" asked Schwartz.

"Pretty much. She might need that strength with what she'll be up against. I plan on Cheetah being able to lacerate Superman with her claws and if she can do that, a direct hit on Wonder Woman would leave her guts splattered on the pavement."

"That's not right," protested Gerry Conway. "I created the current Cheetah, she could never do that."

Perez smiled. "She can now. Like I said before, it's time to go on to the villains. Honestly, without a bad guy to fight, what's the hero going to do all day? I want to reinvigorate Diana's rogues' gallery which, honestly, never really recovered after the Golden Age. The Silver Age failed to use them and the Bronze Age really only had one heavy hitter, Ares—except back then we all called him Mars. Everyone else was a repeat cheapie like Mouse Man or a Golden Age great who made one appearance before fading back into obscurity.

"Not this time, however," he said after leaning in over the table.

The other writers smiled and kidded with each other about that. They still remembered Perez acting out the big battle between Wonder Woman and Ares' forces. They were hoping for another good one!

"Like I said before, I initially wanted to start everything all over and I still think it would have been a good idea but if we're going to build on the past instead of rejecting it, let's do it right. Wonder Woman's rogues gallery will have its time to shine either by retooling exist villains or by creating new versions whole cloth.

"The first on our tour is Ares. When all's said and done, Ares, or Mars as we've called him, has always been our chief villain. He has to be. He was the god most reviled by the old Greeks for bringing suffering and death, for feeding on human misery. Ignoring the stories I've planned and focusing on what's already published, however, we've only seen his full potential for evil in the Denny O'Neil story I mentioned earlier. With a grim script and an artwork that made him look ready to tear the head off a newborn baby and eat it like an apple while his mother watched, that was perhaps the most intimidating version of Ares to date.

"I've decided to play on that and the copy boy here is distributing drawings I've made to show how I imagine him." Schwartz visibly winced when he saw the monster wearing blue/black hoplite armor adorned with spikes and skulls. A helmet kept his face in shadow except for glowing red eyes. When the old man heard that Ares was so evil that you'd want to kill just by looking at him, he believed it. "It's worth saying that in Marston's original version, Diana was sent to save the world from Ares and the second world war that he, in part, had created. I plan to bring that back, the idea that he is the reason that Diana even exists. It was Ares who is ultimately responsible for the destruction of the original Amazon nation and thus indirectly responsible for the Amazon nation as it exists today.

Schwartz laid down the horrific drawings and challenged Perez. "Aren't you forgetting something George, that Ares is, um, you know DEAD?" the man asked sarcastically

"But Mr. Schwartz you've gotta know that nobody ever really dies in our business! Yes he is currently suffering in Hades at the hands of everyone his wars ever killed, but he'll be back. But until then, we'll focus on his children but he'll always be in the background until the time is right for his inevitable and horrific return."

Schwartz smiled. The response was acceptable.

"To this we meet the minions. In the myth, Ares was mostly aided by his daughter Eris, goddess of Discord, and his sons, Phobos and Deimos, gods of fear and terror, and yes they made an appearance in O'Neil's story. In the comics, Mars/Ares' classic minions are the Duke of Deception, the Lord of Conquest, and the Earl of Greed. Since the Marston Era they've made cameos but mostly 'Dukie' who Kanigher recast as an actual Martian out to invade Earth." Perez noticed the looks people gave and said, "Marston had Ares operating on planet Mars so I suppose it's not that big a jump." A conspiratorial look suddenly came across his face. "In fact, the Duke was green now that I think about it…"

Leaving his idea hanging, Perez resumed his talking. "Now, if part of this new DC Universe we're constructing means building on the past instead of rejecting it, then why not combine the two versions? It could work. In the story that reintroduces them, the one where he attacks Washington DC we see Ares calling his kids. 'Enter Phobos, the Lord of Conquest; enter Deimos, the Earl of Greed, enter Eris the Duke,' at which point the Duke who had been a crippled old man morphs with a flourish into a woman, 'or Duchess of Deception.' The last one especially works with how both sow pain and division by their lies. Revealing that Eris had successfully disguised herself as a man all these years shows just how good a liar she is.

"As recorded in the myths Eris was the worst of the war god's brood because she turned brother against brother. Half her father's wars are wars she started. Every act of bigotry, every act of hatred, anything that divides humans and sets them against each other is her doing. Human lives are just toys to her and she plays rough.

"Thus once the intro story with Ares is done we see her and her brothers on the run; with how they crossed the line and contributed to his son's death, grandpa Zeus is out to get them. (In her case, perhaps the contribution was deliberate…) Eris knows that if he went easy on them before it was for Ares' sake but that now its suicide if they show their faces on Olympus. None of the other pantheons will take them in for fear of incurring Zeus' wrath; if anything, they'd capture Eris and turn her in. The Sons of Ares terrorist group held the only people who'd take them in and the SoA was completely destroyed in the Washington debacle. Half are dead and half are in jail.

"Desperate, they hide out in their old base dad built into Mars's Olympus Mons which truth be told not even she has used in years. Eris wistfully remembers that he was a bit of a ham. She also remembers how she and dad enjoyed quality bonding by instigating a Martian world war that destroyed all life on that planet. Well almost as the Manhunter is on Earth now. Maybe she even morphs into her old green skin Duke of Deception guise as she recalls this. That's the same with destroying a world; you can only do it once. Eris, Phobos, and Deimos can't even stay on Mars much longer as they know that Diana is coming.

"As a war goddess, Eris is no pushover; she has the requisite super strength, magic, etc, of any deity and was trained by her father in every act of violence he knew. A goddess of strife's greatest strength is her craftiness, however. Of the three Children of Ares, Eris is the brains so she figures that they have to lay low either by disguising themselves as mortals or by possessing the bodies of mortal hosts. You might say they have secret identities; Eris is working behind a desk with her brothers as field agents gleefully sowing pain and misery all night long."

"I don't get it," said Conway as he shifted in his seat. "Wouldn't Wonder Woman figure it out?"

Perez shrugged his shoulders. "Not at first though; Eris is too smart to leave incriminating evidence. Besides," he sighed, "considering man's inhumanity to man, why would Diana get suspicious? Recent authors have shown her as somewhat jaded by Man's World." If I had my way, however, I'd reboot her from scratch and be the total innocent that would get suspicious.

"Eris is forced work on the sly as a publisher of trashy tabloids and gossip rags, not that she minds, however. Ruining lives is her bread and butter. Erin Bellona, gossip monger, corporate shark, and regarded by every newspaper in the DC Universe as the sleazy queen of yellow journalists. Worth saying, however, that unlike how I reimagine Priscilla Rich, Eris's corporate schemes will only ever be a means to an end, six minutes of her day, maybe less. For example, when Wonder Woman decides to invite outside observers to see Paradise Island, Eris has her agents secretly mix in Apples of Discord—the kind she used to start the Trojan War—to see them tear each other apart. She might go to Ireland and fund both sides in the Protestant/Catholic struggles."

Roy Thomas asked, "Why? Doesn't she want someone to win?"

Perez shrugged his shoulders. "No. She helps all sides because she doesn't want anybody to win. She keeps it going to keep raising the body count. We might also see her working behind the scenes helping out oppressive regimes like North Korea or terrorists like those Mujahedeen wackos in Afghanistan."

"What!?" Miller shot up from his seat and roared. "Listen up hippy, I don't know what crackpot rags you've been reading but you take that back!" O'Neil grabbed his sleeve to pull him down and furiously told him to stop but his words were ignored. "Denny I know you're alright but don't think I'm going to let that feminist trash talk the Afghans. They're real heroes fighting to free their country from Soviet Union."

"Okay, fine, Eris isn't backing the Mujahedeen but maybe she's backing thugs like Shining Path, the Contras, or the Tamil Tigers. How about that? Is that ok Frank!?" On seeing the man grumble something about liberals, an irate Perez shook his head and reviewed his notes. If he could read O'Neil's thoughts, he wouldn't have been surprised.

I don't about anyone else, but now I know that Frank voted for Reagan. Another thought then crossed the Bat-editor's mind. "What about Sons of Ares? Who are they and will Eris be recruiting them?"

"She won't Denny for two reasons. Firstly, it's too obvious; like I said, for most of my run I plan on her laying low. Secondly, I want the SoA to be a force in its own right; I'll give more details later on. For example, now that I'll be having Diana move past just supporting the status quo to changing the world, part of Eris' laying low is her starting an anti-Wonder Woman smear campaign. Done right, if she protests non-violently, how could Diana oppose her? I can imagine a conservative leader objecting to Wonder Woman's perceived left wing meddling working hand in hand with Eris/Erin Bellona who objects to Wonder Woman being there at all. Bootleggers and Baptists as the saying goes."

That was Perez' intent but it was a later writer named Greg Rucka who finally had Erin Bellona challenge Diana to public debate. "How dare you?" asked gleeful the war goddess as she feigned outrage. "Superman doesn't tell people how to vote but here you are playing missionary and telling them how to live their lives! Go on, say it! Tell the audience watching that they're so wretched that they can't solve their own problems. If not then leave ordinary humans alone you Mary Sue!" Facing that Catch-22 proved instrumental in an ever later writer—Gail Simone—reviving Wonder Woman's Diana Prince identity. (And though it took over fifteen years to see the light of day, yes, Rucka had Diana, who of course was above such tawdry pop culture references, look up the phrase Mary Sue after the debate.)

Back in the present, Perez said, "An example of just how evil Eris really is seen with how she 'created' Edgar Cizko, AKA Dr. Psyhco." He paused before continuing. "Ms. Kahn I really want to bring back Wonder Woman's Sensation Comics so I can tell origin and side stories like this without slowing down the momentum of the main book. It worked for Teen Titans."

"And I only gave the go ahead for Tales of the New Teen Titans after the main book made it." She pursed her lips. "If Wonder Woman works, I'd be glad to approve an extra book but not before. But back to the story, what about Dr. Psycho?"

He inwardly sighed on hearing that. "His first post Golden Age appearance was in Wonder Woman # 160 where he was effectively a joke character. That's a disappointment as he can be much more. Building on both his Golden Age origin and what Roy here said a few years ago when he wrote Diana," a pleased Roy Thomas flashed a grin, "his story begins as such.

"He was born Edgar Cisko and suffered a terrible childhood due to his various deformities. He was short and physically ugly and while his family loved him, the world did not. He was constantly bullied and humiliated growing up; it was the girls' taunts that hurt him the most, though. He ignored their insults by burying himself in his studies and ultimately passed medical school with flying colors.

"For a time, he enjoyed success. He had money—doctors, even ugly ones, are always rich. He had fame—he was the scientist who proved beyond any reasonable doubt the existence of telepathy and other psychic powers. What he didn't have, was love. Though he had long ago resigned himself to his fate, professional friendships and occasional admirers weren't enough to fill his heart. That's when Marva Jane Gray came.

"She loved him. She admired his contributions to society and his cheerful personality. She even found his physical deficiencies attractive; she said it was because it was because she was tired off all the he-men that kept throwing themselves at her. She was his right hand and helped him develop his latent telepathic powers. They were soon engaged and this, by far was the happiest time in Edgar Cisko's life. It was almost like a dream, like it was too good to be true. The tragedy was that yes, it was too good to be true.

"It all came crashing down when he saw Marva cheating on him with professional athlete Ben Bradley whom she urges to steal millions from the college lab. On top of it, she frames Cisko for it, convicts him with her testimony, and takes advantage of his giving her bank account to steal his money! She even rubs it in by saying money was the only reason she thought to marry him.

"Thus, the innocent Cisko seethed behind bars for years, planning his revenge while developing an intense hatred of all women. It was only compounded by how his expanding mental powers forced the thoughts of every thief, murderer, drug dealer, and rapist in that prison into his mind and drove him mad. The first thing Cisko (or Psycho as we should call him) did on escaping was to torture then kill Bradley; the second was kidnap Marva and then hypnotically force her to marry him. It was their original wedding date and if he couldn't have what was promised to him in love, he would then take by force. Even if her body was frozen, her mind was completely clear through the entire ordeal."

Perez saw his editor-in-chief wince at those words. Which woman wouldn't? "Psycho continued his descent into madness and dragged his sham wife down by subjecting her to daily occult experiments to expand his power. Mind reading, mind control, mind rape, he's like Freddy Krueger except he doesn't have to wait for you start sleeping! He enters her mind, beats her half to death, and when he goes back to the real world, he sees her covered in blood and bruises. The experiment was a success then.

"She eventually dies but on piecing it altogether, he sees that the Marva he violated was not the one who wronged him. The second Marva was completely innocent; she'd never even seen him prior to the day he knocked on her door!" He snorted. "Not that Psycho cared by that point. Even so he was determined to find the real Marva.

"He eventually learned that it was the war goddess Eris—sower of strife—that did it; not a big leap for someone who had always believed in magic and the gods. On confronting her with all this, however, she doesn't understand. She's ruined thousands of lives and asks if he could be more specific? When Psycho whimpers, 'You don't even remember?' she knows there's only one thing to do.

"She said, 'No Ed, I don't remember though from how you describe it I probably was me and as for why, it was for the hell of it. I'm the goddess of strife; making people miserable is the only thing I know how to do! As for you in particular, well why not? When I want to ruin someone's day, I go eenie-meenie-miny mo and you're just the poor dumb sap I picked. Listen and listen good because this is the only time I'm ever going to pay attention to you. The day I destroyed your life was the worst day of your life but for me… it was Tuesday.'"

Marv Wolfman fumed. "That evil b—!"

"No, no!" interrupted Miller jovially. He looked across the round table. "We gotta keep clean for the kiddies, don't we Mr. Schwartz?"

The old man just rolled his eyes at Miller's sarcastic remark. "Thanks Frank, have a nice day, but seriously George, Eris is shaping into a real nightmare!" He raised a water bottle and said, "Here's to seeing Wonder Woman putting her in her place." Perez was glad to see Marv and a few others raise their bottles too. Schwartz took a drink and then paused for a moment. "A toast to Dr. Psycho too!"

"Rock and roll!"

"Long live the midget!"

"Yeah, long live the crack head munchkin!"

Wolfman just shook his head. He set his water bottle on the table and said, "C'mon George, tell us what happens next?"

"No problem old friend. On hearing this, the bottom falls out of Cisko's world. He had thought that as wretched as his life was that there had been a reason, maybe he didn't like it but there had to be some kind of purpose! Now, to hear that his life was just some cosmic joke is the last straw. Love, hope, compassion, they're all lies. Dr. Edgar Cisko is dead and only Dr. Psycho, a grotesque monster deformed in body and soul, is left.

"And that leads into Silver Swan. Who remembers her!"

"I do." Roy Thomas had been paying close attention, especially when Perez said Hippolyta had been the JSA's Wonder Woman. I'm going to have to change that, he thought. If an Amazon was there in the war, then Fury can keep her classic origin but not if that Amazon is Hippy. "After all, I made her. Conway was a big help though. Two things. One, you're keeping Psycho's appearance in her origin story, right? Two, since Silver Swan was supposed to be the perfect woman are you going to continue what I did, and contrast her against the misogynist Psycho?

"Pretty much," replied Perez. "Dr. Psycho's Silver Age appearances are provisional; only his appearance in the recent #288 is iron clad. As for the Swan… Helena Alexandros was a nice young girl with the sweetest voice you ever heard and the dance skills to match. Unfortunately, most men were too shallow to see that and could only see her ugliness. She's dumpy, she has acne, and stutters when she speaks normally." He saw the confused look on their faces and Schwartz make a keep-going hand gesture. "I've done the research; some people do stutter but sing well."

He cleared his throat and reviewed his notes before continuing. "She was the ugly duckling who cried herself to sleep, wishing she could be the swan. Ballet was her only way out but after overhearing the director refusing to put her in the lead role on account of her ugliness, despite being the best dancer, she stormed off and raged against any god who would listen. Unfortunately, that god happened to be Ares, her very distant relative; he revealed to her that she was a direct descendant of Helen of Troy, originally Helen of Sparta.

"Ares gave his great niece her mother's beauty and sonic attack. Not that Roy knew anything about this neat little mythological tidbit about her magical voice; no, he'd never do the research!" Thomas innocently fiddled his thumbs at that friendly ribbing; he'd told Perez of his extensive personal library. "The war god even gave Helen control of birds by tapping into her bestiality."

Keith Giffen looked around the room furtively on hearing that. "George, what exactly do you mean by 'bestiality'?"

"Zeus was in animal form when he mated with Helen's mother." Perez wryly grinned. "Can you guess which animal?" He chuckled when he saw the looks of disgust on everyone's faces.

"I wonder why nobody why nobody worships the Olympians anymore," Schwartz sarcastically commented. "Any comments on that George? Seriously, though."

…I honestly didn't see that last part coming. "I… do have plans for the role of religion but later. Well, aside from the above powers, she also has, or had flight, control of men, and super-strength. Ares took it all away when she failed to kill Wonder Woman. That's what Roy said and it makes for a great back story to what I say. Helen won't be there until maybe the sixth issue of my run but when we next see her, we will see a woman willing to do anything in order to beautiful again… even dealing with Dr. Psycho."

"That little freak!" snapped Kahn. "George, you must be crazy to write that…"

"I'd like to think crazy like a fox. Sad to say we don't have many superheroines; even Diana is only rated as a great female hero. That's like saying Diana is only good for a girl. Instead, women in comics are often just passive love interests and never characters in their own right. If there is a woman superhero, she succeeds by being sexualized because if she isn't she either turns into a sidekick or a corpse."

"Hey, I get it!" Thomas snapped his fingers. "Silver Swan can be strong and beautiful but only in a man's service. She wants to have it all, to be sexy, to be strong, to be gutsy; she wants to live out some power fantasy. Male comics fans have their power fantasy in every hero but—!"

"But a woman sees herself treated like a sex object." Kahn smiled. "So I'm guessing that makes Dr. Psycho a comment on sexist writers who will let their creations be their own women but only if they prance around half naked for the audience's lurid pleasure." She leaned across the round table and held her hands in front of her chest. "Prancing around with breasts this big, eh Wally!"

Wally Wood silently hung his head at his boss's laughter. The bruise still hurt.

Diana's new writer snickered. "You got me figured out boss lady. Psycho uses his ectoplasmic powers and contracts cybernetic experts to turn Helen into his Frankenstein sex toy. I plan on plotting and drawing Wonder Woman's main book but if I get Sensation Comics I plan on Rob Liefield drawing Silver Swan right there.

"Liefield? Who the heck is that?"

"I admit he hasn't officially done anything for any publisher Ms. Kahn but he's shown me his work at the last con and I brought samples of his female characters." He motioned for the copyboy to pass some papers out and saw the horrified looks that came across everyone's faces, Jeanette Kahn especially. Good!

Waists smaller than their necks, breasts bigger than their heads, curves so "curvy" that the woman should be hospitalized for spinal injury, and so scantily clad that you could see every deformity… Schwartz felt his blood pressure rising. "If this hack had shown me his porno," thundered the editor, "I'd have had him shot!"

Kahn steadied the old man. "Julie, wait." She took another look at the picture and grinned as she realized the truth. "This Liefield is a hack… but I think that's the idea. Liefield is Psycho is every greasy fanboy…" She pointed towards Perez. "We have Eris right here!" (When fans praised Liefield "ingenious" Silver Swan commentary on the sexualization and objectification of women in comics years later, he honestly didn't know what they were talking about. Dark Age of Comics, indeed.) "Aw man, I'm actually starting to feel sorry for him with how you're going to set him up!"

"Don't. At least this way we can put his 'talents' to use in a way that actually makes sense."

Schwartz let his anger cool, but …Making something deliberately bad! If this Liefield guy is coming in, I'm glad I'm going out! "George, with how you're making Silver Swan so sympathetic I'm guessing she's going to reform by the end. Maybe you draw the story where she reforms and she goes back to her original looks, not a supermodel but much more beautiful than the freak Liefield will be drawing." He saw the man nod. "Great, wonderful, but what about Sons of Ares? You've been talking about them but nothing concrete. This is the villains' time to shine."

He saw Schwartz' face visibly lighten as her left Silver Swan behind. Can't please everyone I guess. "Like I've said, Sons of Ares is a religious fanatic terrorist group with a long history of serving as the war god's personal army. They didn't start out that way, though.

"In ancient Greece they were most common in Thrace and Sparta as soldiers and anyone else who made a living through violence. They were killers but they weren't necessarily evil any more than an infantryman in the Army or the Marines is evil. Its best summed up by Plato: Only the dead have seen the end of war. Every Son of Ares, whether a good man or bad, whispered a prayer to him when he went into battle because what Ares represented, war itself, had to be respected for its power to shape civilizations. Of course, you should offer a sacrifice or two to Athena but in the end, war was her brother's domain. She, after all, merely aids victory; war will happen with or without the passive goddess.

"This changed with the adoption of Christianity, more on the interplay of religion after the villains. Across the Greco Roman world, people renounced their old gods, Ares included, in favor of Jesus. The more selfish of Ares' worshippers continued their killing sprees; they never saw him as more than a symbol. The nobler continued their soldiering, though now as God's soldiers under His regent, the Byzantine Emperor. As everyone else went away, all that was left of the Sons of Ares was the hardcore that killed for the pleasure of killing and to offer Ares blood sacrifice.

"The Sons hung on until the time of Emperor Justinian the Great. By that time, Christianity, or the Eastern Orthodox version of it, was the only legal religion in the Greek heartland of the surviving Eastern Roman Empire. Sons of Ares waited until Justinian sought to forcibly retake the western provinces the barbarians had stolen in the 400s to launch their own attack. Rape, looting, murder, church burnings, the Sons threw everything they had at the Greeks in an attempt to destroy Christian civilization. They failed.

"The man whom the Emperor chose to combat them, General Belisarius, ultimately defeated those heathen savages and took bloody vengeance. Of those captured, he had nine out of every ten tortured half to death and then mutilated. Every tenth man received the same punishment except he was blinded in only one eye to either 1) feebly help his friends, or 2) let them suffer as he tried to abandon them. Nobody escaped though and they were ultimately brought to Constantinople were they were paraded through the streets. It ended before the new church, Hagia Sophia, where they were forced to renounce Ares before they died.

"Belisarius raised his bloody sword in salute to Jesus Christ who gave him his victory. He then told Ares, 'Hear me evil spirit, I know you're real for it was your black magic that my enemies used against me. Know this and despair that you cannot win against me for I have the True God as my side… and because, next to me, you're a wuss!' With that the Christian general fetishistically licked the gore off his sword."

Perez smiled. "That was the last time in a long time that Ares interfered in the mortal world."

Responses ranged from Frank Miller cheering to sounds of agnostic John Ostrander groaning in disgust. "And my parents wondered why I left seminary," he muttered under his breath.

"The Sons were repeatedly destroyed over the centuries," said Perez, "but they're like rats; no matter how many you kill, a few always escape to start a new infestation. Throughout the early modern age, for example, they sold their services as mercenaries to the kings of Europe and Turkish Sultans, often at the same time. In World War II, their agents saw their biggest opportunity with the Axis powers but were ultimately stopped by the Golden Age Wonder Woman.

"The current incarnation began in the late 60s as a terrorist group made of embittered men looking for someone to blame, worshippers seeking to give glory to their god, and sometimes people who just like killing. With the focus of the current group, Deimos the terror god is accorded greater veneration than ever before; ditto for Eris. At this point in time, however, relatively few Sons are true believers; in the eyes of many Sons, even the 'Ares' who appeared in the Washington battle is seen as just a super powered actor playing the role of team mascot. Regardless, most all believe in what the war god represents: violence, sadism, and that the strong should oppress the weak.

"They way I plan on using them is simple. Every villain can use minions and whenever Ares needs some, the Sons are right there. They literally think he's (a) god! It's the same thing when Diana needs generic cannon fodder; the Sons worship Ares but have their own agendas besides waiting for him to tell them what to do. They might be selling drugs, serving as muscle for any local dictator, teaching an angry young man how to make bombs in his kitchen, or indulging in school shootings. As free agents, they're potentially a threat to the whole DC Universe…"

Marv Wolfman remembered a story he wrote with Perez and shook his head. "I'm guessing that the Church of Blood has nothing on these guys, eh George?"

"They give the Kobra the shivers!"

Author's Notes: Firstly, I do know that the correct lyrics from the Lynda Carter show asks Wonder Woman to "Make the Axis fall" but I hope I can be forgiven. Making the Axis fold rhymes with stopping a bullet cold. And sadly, I did the research and school shootings have a long tragic history. Having the Sons of Ares do it in the 80s would therefore not be anachronistic. :'-(

As I promised, however, the villains. :-) You might have noticed that the title says Part 1; this chapter went on for longer than I planned so I split in two. Here, the villains are mostly either cannon fodder (SoA) or schemers (Eris). Next chapter will be the bruisers. Unlike here, however, I actually have it plotted out; I hope it will be faster. So without further ado...

Wolvmbm: Boobie windows? What would Rob Liefield say about that! We see a hint of Fury's future origin here and don't worry about Donna Troy. The Justice League of Detroit... let's just say that something's not right when the greatest threat the DCU ever faced was met by the weakest League it ever had...

"Anonymous": Your comments are always interesting to read and I'm glad you like the story.

Taintedtamt: Always glad to have new blood. Welcome aboard! Thanks for you kind words and as for the JLA (and the JSA ;-), I most definitely have a chapter with their name on it. Haven't thought about stories like Nightfall or Infinite Crisis being affected by this though.

Sir Thames: To paraphrase female muscle madman David C. Matthews, there was indeed a time when Rachel McLish was considered too muscular. Nowadays, she'd be laughed off the stage as a 90 pound weakling! ...And yes, I'd love to see Diana drawn like Cory Everson too. Either on her own show or playing Atalanta on Hercules: The Legendary Journey, Everson was a childhood crush of mine!

BTW I dare everyone to go here ?q=wonder+woman+robb+phipps or ?q=wonder+woman+muscle&offset=0 or ?q=wonder+woman+muscular&offset=0

There be men drunk on the elixir of madness!

MarkMark: You have a good point; the reason I delayed a bit was because I rewrote the intro to reflect that! About Wood... I guess I called in the Black Lantern Corps! ^_^;

As always thanks for writing and I hope to see you all again very soon. Remember, any questions or comments, just PM me. :-D