Present.
Gotham
"Well, that could've gone worse." Dante thought to himself as he lit another cigarette on his lips watching the Star Labs employees being quarantined, except a few that were killed as they were placed in body bags near the hole that he crawled out from surveying the damage on the old prison island.
"I gotta say, even though I'm a solo type, I kinda like this team up." Dante mused seeing the other heroes and Stevie climbing up to the top. Arthur Curry eyed the Dark Knight's custom and approved his sense of fashion with a bemused chuckle.
"Dressed like a bat. I dig it."
"It may be temporary." Batman grumbled to the Nephilim before turning his attention to the Atlantean Half Breed. "What changed your mind?"
"Fury. She took the Mother Box from Atlantis." Arthur informed them, leaving out the fact he got his ass kicked by her in the process. It was embarrassing.
"Then all they need now is the Box of Men." Wonder Woman said grimly.
"If they don't have it already." Batman muttered.
"They don't." Cyborg spoke behind them as he landed on the ground with a metal box container in his hands. "I do."
Stevie's eyes went wide when she saw what it had inside. "Oh Great."
XXXX
Pozharnov, Russia.
Desaad had a look of contempt as he was contacted by, projecting a holograph to the Daughter of Steppenwolf back at the Strong hold in the former USSR. "Fury. Have you completed the conquest?"
"No. But I bring news that may attract our master's attention. It is of grave importance." Fury told him point blank.
"What is it?" Desaad asked her.
"He has found it." Fury spoke bluntly, making the advisor puzzled by the vague words. "The Anti Life Equation is here. Carved on the surface of the world that fought back. It is Earth."
Desaad had look of shock when he was given the news. His master had searched for it in eons but was unable to locate it. If it's true, then it should be sufficient to let Steppenwolf return. "Are you certain? Did you believe your father's words when he told you of this discovery?"
Fury nodded a yes in confirmation. "My father is a lot of things, a schemer, conniver, general but a liar is not one of them."
Realizing that she was telling the truth, Desaad recited a prayer in Latin, summoning his master. "Domine que infernum conflegrit, aventi indulgem."
And soon enough, the Lord of Apokolips, the Evil Incarnate, the God of Darkness, Darkseid appeared, replacing his advisor as his mere presence made the Female Fury step back in awe at the sight of her lord and master.
"My lord." Fury bowed her head down in submission of seeing her master on one knee.
A deep guttural growl emitted from his chest, echoing through the old power plant. "Fury."
"My lord, I am simply a humble servant." Fury said.
"Can it be true that your father have found it?" Darkseid inquired.
Fury nodded a yes. "Yes, Great One. The Anti life is here on Earth."
"If it is redemption you seek for your father's sins, find the third box, synchronize the Unity and when this world is scorched, I will come to retrieve my great prize." Darkseid told her in no certain terms.
Her head perked up at the possibility of the Rule of Apokolips coming to this planet. "You will come to Earth?!"
Darkseid nodded. "I have turned one hundred thousand worlds to dust looking for Anti-Life. Looking for those who robbed me of my glory. I will stride across their bones and bask in the glow of Anti-Life. And all of existence shall be mine."
"It shall be so, my master." Fury complied, bowing her head once more.
XXXX
Gotham
Gotham Shipping Yard
The Super Hero team made it back to the Shipping Yard not far from the city into one of the many hangars owned by the Dark Knight. "So you're the guy that talks to fish, huh?" Dante said stepping out of the van along with everyone else.
Arthur scoffed. "That's a bit oversimplification."
"But it sure fits on a bumper sticker." Dante quipped. Arthur grunted in annoyance with an eye roll. Always with the fish jokes. Dante chuckled at his expensive while some heroes were a bit amused by the quip while Stevie giggled slightly. Even Bruce had hint of a smile on his lips while shaking his head. Dante reminded him of Dick Grayson, his late adoptive son in that moment. He always found a way to joke in most serious situations to elevate some tension.
Victor who didn't hear the joke, marveled at the prototype carrier dangling from the ceiling. "It wants to fly."
"You talk to Machines?" Arthur inquired, looking at him incredulously.
"I speak to Intelligence. This one says that it has a software issue but I can fix it in time."
Dante walked over to Stevie who had a moment to process what she just went through whilst sitting on a chair. She just got off the phone with a frantic Jo worrying about where she was. She quickly assured her she was fine and was somewhere safe. "You ok?"
Stevie gave him a look that pretty much said she wasn't. "Well, in the past 24 hours, I was kidnapped by Evil tinker bells, held hostage by Bullwinkle's awful big brother and his viking daughter, then I was rescued by a billionaire dressed like a bat, a living robot, Xena the warrior princess and a white haired biker. So yeah, everything is fine and dandy."
He chuckled at the sarcasm dipping in her words as he sat next to her. "Well, from what I can tell, you're holding up pretty well. Most girls I know would be shell shocked."
"I'm not like most girls."
He can see that. "Right. I'm Dante."
"Stevie but you already know that."
Dante smiled as he went to get a cigarette. "Can I have one?" Stevie requested surprising the nephilim. He handed a second to last cigarette to Stevie who took it between her fingers and lit it with his lighter before lighting his own.
Unbeknownst to them, Diana was watching the interaction with interest. She saw a bit of an attraction starting to form between the two and perhaps blossom into something more. Smiling to herself, she walked over to the table where other heroes were waiting.
XXXX
Victor placed the container on table for everyone to see. "There's a dark spot in my data stream but I can feel the other two boxes. Another awake. But I can't seem to find where they are."
"Yeah that'll be too easy of knowing where the base of their operations is." Dante muttered.
"Even if we knew, I've never seen a being as a strong as Steppenwolf." Diana said eyeing the box with curiosity before glancing up at the private Investigator. "Except you and..."
"Superman." Barry finished.
"As long as the third box is asleep, they can't see it. Only sense it." Victor explained. "We need to keep moving so they can't catch up."
Bruce shook his head no, shooting down the bad tactic. "No. That's just a strategy to lose more slowly. Not to win."
"Remind me, are flamethrowers not a thing? Why don't we just destroy it?" Barry suggested the most obvious one.
"You can't." Stevie told them, causing everyone to look at her in surprise. "Joanna told me that the box is made of unknown matter. They'll just absorb the fire like a punge consuming water, molting the core."
Victor nodded, confirming Stevie's explantation. "Exactly. they love the heat."
The Half Atlantean eyed the former Gotham U alumni with suspicion. "You know a lot about these boxes. Makes you think."
"Where'd you find the box, Vic?" Dante inquired.
Victor did not like where this was going. "Hold on, are you trying to say something?
"Oh, I'm saying it. How do we know you're not working for them?" Arthur asked him point blank.
"It's a long story."
Arthur shrugged. "You got somewhere else to be?"
Victor glanced at the George Town Alumni knowingly. "Wanna start or shall I?"
Stevie sighed as she began retelling the story that Joanna gave her as Victor projected a hologram showcased the origins of the box. "The box was discovered by the Nazis during World War 2, underneath a monastery in Northern Italy but was intercepted by the Allies during a convoy trip to Berlin. They brought it over to the States in 1944 just before the war ended and it had been collecting dust in Pentagon for over 70 years. Item 061982."
Victor picked up where she left off as he showed a footage of his father and shockingly Joanna, Stevie's childhood friend studying the mother box back at Star Labs in Metropolis. They also saw what was left of the upper body that belonged to a person with the head, chest and half of his left arm on the wall. "That was until D.O.D. began to study the Superman ship. The head researcher and the junior assistant at S.T.A.R. Labs made a connection between the ship and 61982. They understood they were both alien technologies. Different civilizations, similar properties. And though the box had slept for thousands of years, the researchers formulated a theory on how to awaken it, and so did."
Then they saw Joanna struggling to hold back Slias Stone from pulling down the level that would activate the black box. It was attached to two cables. "Then... I had an accident that should've killed me. But in an act of desperation or madness, the head researcher harnessed the power of the Motherbox."
"Dr. Stone. I cannot let you do this!" Jo grunted.
"Dr. Dalby. I have to!" Silas insisted, trying to outstretch his hands to the level but barley reaching.
"This is wrong! We don't know what it'll do to him!" She insisted.
"That's a chance I'm willing to take." Silas grunted, reaching the level with his finger tips, pulling it down. The Mother Box was activated and soon enough it gave Victor a cybernetic body to replace the one that he lost during the car accident, although it was a rather painful and excruciating transformation. Joanna watched in horror, unable to block out the former Quarterback's gut wrenching screams of agony.
"He unleashed an alien technology he didn't fully understand. He used that power to keep me alive." Victor finished, closing his eyes in remembrance. "A life... That turned into this. The Box went back to sleep, and he never returned it. That researcher was Silas Stone. My father."
The others were shocked to learn that the director of Star Labs used the box to grant him his cybernetic body.
"Jesus Christ. Your old man saved you with one of those boxes?" Dante breathed.
"A-Aren't they psycho murder machines?" Flash asked the question they all had in their heads in his words.
"They're Change Machines." Victor explained. "The Boxes don't think in terms of healing or killing, alive or dead. They rearrange matter at the will of their masters. Regenerate. Reinstate."
"Reinstate?" Diana repeated the last with a bewildered look.
"The Box has the power to reinstate anterior particle relationships."
Surprisingly, Barry was the first to follow Victor's line of explanation. "So you mean in the way that particles can't be created or destroyed, their relationships just transform?"
"Burn down the house, the particles still exist. Particles of house becomes particles of smoke." Victor said.
"Anybody with a match can turn the house to smoke." Diana supplied.
"But a Motherbox..." Dante said.
"Turns smoke back into a house." Bruce Finished.
The heroes glanced between one and other in a moment of understanding of what they were thinking.. "I know we're all thinking the same thing right now. Who's gonna say it? I'm not gonna say it." Barry said.
"Then I'll say it. You're gonna bring back Superman." Stevie spoke out seeing holograph of the Man of Steel taking off to the sky projected by the former Quarter back.
XXXX
A moment of silence fell upon in the Warehouse. The possibility of Superman coming back was mind blowing.
"You're not actually considering this? I mean what's dead is dead, right?" Dante inquired incredulously looking between the heroes.
"The box bought Victor back." Diana pointed.
"Yeah but the difference is that Vic was alive." Dante corrected.
The half Atlantean was in total agreement with the Half Angel. "Right. Life is either one or zero. It's to be or not to be. Not both."
"Can you operate this box, Victor?" Bruce asked the Gotham Alumni. Victor nodded.
"Of course. But we don't know enough about Kryptonian biology. There's no telling what's gonna happen."
The speedster was all for him."Okay, but...I mean, we have to try. Don't we? We have to try. What do we have to lose?"
"Lemme put you in this way, Speedy. When we activate the box, it sends out a beacon. The Enemy sees it and forms the unity. The end." Dante told him.
So basically what they have to lose is a planet to two murderous alien war lords. "That's good to know." Barry muttered.
"Even If we could bring Superman back, who's to say that he won't turn the tide?" Arthur said. The Half breed raised a vaild question.
"The Mother box did." Bruce said in a realization thinking about the timeline. "Victor's father activated a Mother Box more than a year ago when Superman was still alive. Didn't call out to Steppenwolf. None of the boxes did. Not until..."
"Superman died. It was if they were scared." Dante added, picking up the trail of thought. "Of him and me. Because they never expected a Nephilim to exist, considering that they thought they were all dead."
"Yes. They were afraid of him and you." Bruce said, looking at the box with intent. "This is the only way. There's six, not 7. There is no us without him."
XXXX
Smallville, Kansas
Diana had been through a lot in her prolonged life since she left Themsyirca. She fell in love and experienced heartbreak when she lost Steve Trevor during War World 1, fought friends turned enemies and lost allies. But never she would've thought to work alongside an Atlantean whose she and her fellow sisters went into war once and a Nephilim, the offspring between Angel and Human. Arthur Curry the Atlantean and Dante Fisher, the Nephilim. Life is indeed full of surprises.
The three outcasts and the Lovell University Dropout were watching the two youngest member Barry and Victor digging up the grave of one Clark Joseph Kent, once known to the world as Superman.
"An Amazon working with a Nephilim and an Atlantean." Diana mused. Stevie had forgotten that they were not completely human.
"Half Atlantean." Arthur clarified with some distaste in his voice. Something that did not go unnoticed by the Amazonian Exile.
"How many thousands of years since our people spoke?" Diana wondered.
Arthur shrugged. "I don't know. I'm not exactly close to mine. I hate Atlanteans as much as you Amazons do."
"And I'm a pariah amongst both angels and humans, So, fuck them all. " Dante added his two cents puffing out smoke from a cigarette he was holding in his hand.
"Hate is useless."
Seeing her point, Dante offered his cigarette to Diana. She declined, but she appreciated the gesture. "No, thank you."
Dante shrugged putting his cigarette seeing the two men using the gravels to dig up dirt. "You know, my mother told me about this saying in Heaven:" Stevie looked at him curious. "When All His Creations is shrouded in the Darkness, the only way to combat the darkness is by light."
Arthur chuckled, thinking about something his father told him when he was young.
"Funny, there's a similar one from Atlantis that my father told me: None are taken back in the darkness..."
"Not without giving one up in return." Diana finished with a stunned look. "We say the same thing."
In that moment a bond was formed between the three outcasts."How about that?" Arthur muttered with a hint of smirk.
Not wanting to be left out, Stevie added her two cents. "He saved my life, ya know." She told them, making the three glance at her in question. "Back in Metropolis when Zod invaded Earth. I was visiting Jo when everything took place. I was at the subway station talking to my dad on the phone when Superman and Zod burst through the ceiling. I tried to get away, but Zod had me by the throat and was about to incinerate me when Superman stopped him. Though I did not go entirely unscathed."
The trio followed Stevie's glance at the faint scar caused by Zod's Heat Vision on her right leg. "Pretty." Arthur commented.
"Yeah, not exactly a memorabilia I wanted to have." Stevie quipped.
"Amen to that." Dante replied.
XXXX
After digging up the wooden casket from the ground and placed it into the van, they were heading back to Metropolis where the kryptonian Scout Ship was still residing at Star Labs HQ.
Dante was reading a part of her mother's manuscript with Stevie resting her head on his shoulder. Arthur, Victor and Diana sat across the two.
"It's easy to hate someone whether it's out of fear, prejudice, confusion or lack of understanding. But I've seen what hatred does to a person. How it blinds you and turns into poison in your veins. It can severe your family ties to the point where you have no one to be with you because you've shunned them away."
"How Profound." Dante thought to himself as he continued reading.
XXXX
Metropolis
Star Labs
After passing through the check point, the team stepped out of the van wearing their typical superheroes excluding Dante and Stevie before dragging the casket into a metal bier, Victor having removed his hoodie held the box in his hand. The Batman jumped down from the rooftop of Star Labs by using his grapple to soften the landing and walked up to them.
"Still wearing that cut?" Aquaman commented seeing Dante readjusting his cut.
"I got nothing to hide." Dante quipped. "So sue me."
"Victor, clear this place up." Batman told him ignoring the banter.
"Done." Victor used his inbulit cybernetic hacking to set off the emergency alarm allowing the heroes to walk through the front door while the site was being evacuated.
Curious, Dante took a peek inside the casket and saw the Kryptonian's well preserved body. There was no no sign of any decompensation despite it's been a year since he died. Dante noted that as he was heading through the corridor with the others.
XXXX
Scout Ship 0344
After passing by Silas and Joanna who was relieved to see Stevie in one piece as the evacuation was almost complete,(Silas had a understanding when he laid his eyes on the casket and the container that had the Black Box in it so he made sure the employers stayed clear in case something went array. ) the team of heroes were heading down the walkway of the Kryptonian Scout Ship. Even though she had been there previously, Stevie still couldn't help admire the advanced structure. They made it to the core of the ship where Lex created Doomsday last year.
"Whoa." Stevie breathed, seeing a real life drone hovering below the amber liquid pool.
"It's amazing." Victor commented on the ship.
"This is crazy." Arthur said.
"Oh, now you think this is crazy?" Flash replied.
"You two lunatics better know what you're doing." Aquaman said. He's got a bad feeling about this.
Taking a deep breath, Dante walked over to the casket, opening the lid and lifted the body up, carrying Superman to the liquid pool with Stevie staying close, pushing the body down.
"He looks peaceful." Stevie commented seeing the serene look on Superman's face before spotting a picture of Clark's late adoptive father. Picking it up, she smiled at it before tucking it. She'd give it to him when he's brought back. The two walked back up and rejoined the others. Victor removed the Mother Box from the container and activated the ship with a simple scan from his cybernetic eye.
"Systems coming online." The computer told them while Victor placed his palm on the panel. "Welcome, Victor. Would you like to assume command?"
"I'm in." Victor said to everyone and closed his eyes as they watched the light on his head flashed red and blue for a minute before he reopened them. "The ship says the Mother Box is hostile. I can override the security protocols, but there's no time to repair all the electrical damage that Luthor's power surges caused to the primary capacitors."
"What does that mean?" Stevie inquired.
"There's not enough charge to wake the box."
Flash understood what that meant as he rubbed his face, offering his assistance to solve this particular problem. "I might be able to do it. I mean, I might be able to jumpstart it. I don't like to break this rule, but when I approach the speed of light, things happen to time. But if I do it, I create massive electrical power. I could backtrack, if I get enough distance, I can conduct a significant electrical current. I might be able to wake the box, if that's...that's still what we want?"
"It is. Do it." Batman nodded in encouragement. The Speedster took off running to the other end of the ship.
"Are you sure this is a good idea, Bats?" Dante asked the Dark Knight hearing the Ship's AI discouraging the heroes to not follow through because the mother box is hostile from the speakers. "Because something tells me that it's not a good idea."
"If we don't, the entire planet could be lost." Batman insisted. "It's the only way."
"I see engines, so...this must be the end of the line. So I'm-I'm in position." The Flash reported into their commons. A drone picked up the Mother Box above the room, carrying it over the water. Dante sighed as he walked out of the room and into the doorway.
"Ok, Speedy. On the count of five, we're waking Snow White up from his beauty sleep." Dante shouted to the Speedster. "Five!"
"Five." The Flash repeated, mentally preparing himself from the other end.
"This is a bad idea." Arthur stated, getting a bad feeling as well.
"No it isn't. Keep going." Batman persisted. They've come too far to even consider backing out.
"Four!"
"We need to abort now!" Arthur demanded.
"Just do it." Batman hissed.
"Three!"
Stevie had an anxious look on her face while her heart was racing. "Two." She whispered quietly.
"This course is irreversible."
"One."
"This action is irreversible."
"Go!"
Green Light. Everyone watched the Mother Box being dropped to the water. The Flash sped through the ship, building up the charge for the box as time slowed down for everyone except the speedster speeding into the core just as the Black Box began rising from the water. The Flash touched the box with the tip of his index finger, activating it. But he went flying across the ship and ended up smacking against the front of the ship.
"The future has taken root in the present."
Stevie gulped in fear, hearing the ominous message. "That doesn't sound good."
The Atlantean Half breed couldn't agree more with her assessment. "Nope."
Victor's eyes went wide when he saw the box being powered up by the charge. "Get down!" He cried as it exploded.
The outburst was so massive, it blew the roof off and sent the Mother box including Superman body flying back up into the sky, forcing the group to shield their eyes from the pillar of light it emitted.
The team looked upwards the hole in the ceiling with a rather concerned look on their faces. "Oh, that can't be good." Dante piped up uneasily.
XXXX
5 minutes later
Heroes Park
"Bru...Batman. Wake up."
Laying on the grass at the epicenter of the Kryptonian Invasion, Batman opened his eyes to see Stevie standing above him. "You ok? You took a nasty hit."
Batman grunted, gritting his teeth as he slowly got back on his feet by his own will. He saw Dante helping up Wonder Woman and the other heroes, looking completely fine. He also noted the memorials being partially destroyed along with military SUVS being on fire. "I've survived worse." He replied. "What happened?"
"Well, after waking the Man of Steel up from the dead," Stevie began recapping what just took place. "You guys followed him to the park trying to snap him out of confusion but something went wrong and the next well... you know..."
"That explains the ribs." Batman gritted his teeth, massaging his bruised left side of the rib cage. The events of what had occurred was steadily coming back to him.
"Then someone named Lois stepped in and managed to reach out to him before they took off."
"That was his fiancée. Lois Lane." Batman supplied the info of who she was to Stevie.
"The Pulitzer Price winner?"
"The same." Batman confirmed.
They heard the guttural roar from the parking lot outside of Star Labs. Wonder Woman had a grim look as she recognized the voice. "Steppenwolf. He must have sensed the Mother Box awaking."
"Where is it?" Dante wondered.
Stevie had an A-ha moment when she figured out where the box was. "Oh no." She ran back to the lab in a hurry, leaving the heroes curious of where she was going.
Dante was the first to understand where she was heading. "Shit, the box is back at the lab." He muttered. "Shit!" He ran to catch up with her.
XXXX
"Attention, security breach detected. Sector Four, Level Three. Implement lockdown procedures immediately."
Back at the Lab, Silas carried the mother box he took from the hood of a car at the parking lot into a one of the test chambers while Joanna followed him puzzled of what he was going to do. He typed a few commands on keyboard that activated the laser inside a test chamber before going inside, placing the box on a pedestal.
"What are you doing?" Joanna asked. "You can't destroy the box. We already tried it."
"I'm not trying to." Silas told her of his intentions. "I'm going to superheat the core with the laser inside so it'll give out a heat signature on the thermal scan."
Her eyes went wide in realizing the implications. "But it will kill you. The temperature inside the chamber will be equivalent to a volcano. You'll be dissolved in seconds."
"When it comes to saving mankind from possible extinction, the health risks are the least of your worries."
Joanna tried to persuade him from not going through this fatal procedure. "Please, Silas. You gotta think about your son. He already lost his mother, he can't lose his father too."
That plea made him pause for a bit as he recalled the long hours he put into his work, so much so that it put a severe strain on his relationship with his son and his late wife Eleanor. She threatened to give him the divorce papers if he didn't stop working the long shifts at Star Labs the day before the fatal car accident. There wasn't a day he thought about how things went sour before her death. But he resolved himself and pushed through. "I already lost him. Look after him for me, Joanna."
Realizing that she couldn't change his mind, there was one left thing to do. She picked up a microscope from a table and bashed his head in, knocking him out and went inside the test chamber, taking his place.
XXXX
Stevie ran as fast as she could following the direction of where the alarm was and stopped in her tracks of what she was seeing. Silas lying on the floor unconscious and Joanna inside the test chamber.
"Joanna!" Stevie ran towards the chambers, banging on the glass frantically. "Wait! Don't!"
Her implores fell on deaf ears while she watched in horror as Joanna Dalby had bombarded the box with the laser, heating the core with a push of a button. But in the process, she killed herself in front of her eyes, becoming nothing more but ashes due to the extreme heat the chamber was in. Her death was quick and painless. Stevie grew numb of losing one of her closest friends.
Like moths to a flame, Steppenwolf bust through the roof and didn't even spare a glance at the mourning friend before smashing his fist through the plexiglass and took the Mother Box from the pedestal. At last. The Unity shall be accomplished.
"So begins the end." He stated ominously before being beamed up back to his Stronghold as the heroes doubled back to the lab a little too late.
"What happened?" Dante asked, having a bad feeling about what went down here. "Stevie?"
The woman in question stared blankly at where her childhood friend once stood. "She's dead." She whispered quietly.
The Nephilim was a bit taken back by how broken she sounded."What?"
"Joanna. I tried to stop her. But I couldn't." She stumbled towards where the box was and the ashes of what was once Joanna Dalby, her walk resembled a drunk before crumpling to her knees, sobbing silently. The heroes looked at her solemnly when they understood her words.
"Oh my God." Flash murmured in horror. Dante put his hands behind his head as the severity of the situation started to sink in. This has gotten way out of hand.
Arthur let out a sharp breath while glancing at the Amazon critically as Victor went to wake his father up from his unexpected nap. He knew this was gonna happen. He just knew it. "Her friend is dead 'cause of us. I told you waking that box was a bad idea."
"It wasn't a bad idea! We needed Superman. We still do." She insisted. Behind her, Silas came to and it only took a second for him to realize what happened. He bowed his head down in grief. It should've been him. Not her. Not Joanna.
He scoffed. "Well, whatever returned? It isn't Superman. His body and powers, maybe. But it ain't him."
"It is him. He recognized Lois Lane." Batman said knowingly, walking through the broken door.
"Who?" Arthur inquired, not. knowing who she is.
"The woman he loves. He remembers her." Wonder Woman told him.
"Nah. He went to her 'cause she wasn't afraid of him. It's called instinct, Diana." Arthur stated.
"Where did Steppenwolf go?" Flash inquired.
"Back to his base to assemble the three boxes." Wonder Woman said knowingly.
"Which we still don't know where they are. By the time we figure it out, the Unity is formed..." Dante stated.
"End of the World." Aquaman finished.
"Actually we do." Silas spoke up solemnly, getting the heroes' and his son's attention. "Before she died, Dr Dalby superheated the box with the laser, turning the core into the hottest object on Earth outside a nuclear reactor. Anything else will..."
"Break off the charts on the thermal imagining system." Batman finished, catching on. "Joanna sacrificed herself to mark that box. We have to get back to my lab and use the satellites to scan the earth for thermal anomalies."
The Flash had a bewildered look. "I'm sorry but you have a satellite?"
"I have six." Batman replied.
Dante kneeled beside Stevie, picking her up by her arms gently. "C'mon. You can grief for her later. Right now we got a planet to save."
Sniffing, she wiped the tears off her cheeks as she was being led out of the lab.
