Trinity Issue 2
The Fourth World Saga Part 2
"Intergang" Part 2 of 3
Written by Bodhi Ouellette
"Where there is good, there is evil. Where there is a paradise built to be looked upon as the destination for all mortals to achieve, there is an opposite of that paradise… a hell that spews nothing but hate and misery. Like the gods and the myths before us, we stand at the crossroad. Eternally at war, forever and ever… if only it could end…"
One Week Later
Wayne Enterprise Basement:
After a week of studying the footage and his only lead being that a small source of light shines out at select spots where his technology is being stolen from, Bruce can now take matters into his own hands. He is sitting up top on a metal bar high above the room. Built within the cowl was a video camera, along with built in infrared and night vision, that he was using to record the whole deal, and a small mic that was able to focus specifically on the people talking down below. When the deal goes further in, he'll get the drop on them.
Luckily, because of the infrared and night vision built inside his cowl, he was able to see the large swirling portal of red and yellow open up behind the piece of tech. Two men step out of the portal and immediately grab the tech. Before they could re enter the portal, they were stopped by a swoop of a batarang that knocked them both down. Batman jumped down from the pole to land on the ground at the spot where the scene of the crime is happening. The two thugs immediately get back up, reluctant, rather than fleeing the scene and getting back into the portal, they fight. The first thug throws a punch at Batman, but he quickly dodges the attack. With the thug now opened, Batman elbows him in the stomach and pulls his head down to his knee, socking him in the chin, and knocking him back into a crate. The other thug wises up and begins to flee into the portal, but Batman, as quickly as he can, pulls out his Batclaw and shoots it out at the fleeing thug, attaching to his shirt, and he pulled him in towards him, punching him down. Spitting out blood and a broken tooth, Batman pulled the thug back up and smashed him up against the wall of stacked crates.
Batman scolds at him. "I'll give you one chance, punk. Why have you been stealing Wayne Technology?" demanded Batman.
The Thug, scared at first, quickly grew a grin at Batman. "I'll never tell you, Batman," said the thug. "You think I'm stupid enough to tell you what I know- Euaggghh!"
His index and middle finger broke under the pressure Batman was giving it on with little ease. The thug screamed in agony. "Your ring finger and pinkie next if you don't tell me what you're doing with this tech."
"... I can deal with the pain... Soon I won't ever have to feel pain again."
"What makes you think that way?"
"... Come say that to me… when you witness the red skies and the fire burning across the land…" The thug passed out. Batman looked down to see that he had a small metal box clipped onto his belt. He pulled the device off and evaluated it, recognizing what it is. "Another one of those boxes…" he uttered. Bruce pressed a button on the box, and the portal closed. Batman placed the box aside, and he pulled out some cuffs to apprehend the two thugs. "I'll leave you two for the Police," he said to them. And on that note, he left.
Global Communications HQ; Metropolis:
An excited Jimmy Olsen burst open the doors leading into the main floor of the Global Communications headquarters where their network is stationed. Lois follows behind him, and Clark follows Lois, as they both look out, astounded by the location they're seeing. Jimmy especially, is blown away by the place, to the point where he is nerdgasming at every little thing he sees, especially with the cameras. "Oh man!" he expresses. "Lois, Clark, look! They have Fix System 1080p 35mm cameras! They're one of the best on the market! Oh I can't wait to handle one of these!"
"Your enthusiasm astounds me, Jimmy," commented Clark. "You don't seem the least bit disappointed to leave the Daily Planet."
"I'm just so overwhelmed, that's all. Of course I'm sad to say goodbye to the Planet, but hey, this is a step up in all of our careers, right? Why not embrace our new jobs!"
"Good point," said Lois, who pulled out almost five pages dedicated to explaining the program she will be hosting. "I've mapped out everything I want my segments to be; according to Edge, we have about 30 minutes dedicated to us, so, I'll pick a topic, and we'll come up with the story of the week from there. Sound like a plan?"
"Works for me," said Clark.
"Same here, Lois!"
"Now, the only thing I couldn't think of was a name for our segment… any ideas?"
"How about… Around the Universe, with Lois Lane?"
"It's a start. I like where that's going, though. Keep thinking of stuff, Jimmy."
"Will do!"
Their presence attracted the attention of Morgan Edge, who noticed them talking, and called them over to him. The three walked over to Morgan Edge to shake hands with him. "Welcome to our station, you three," said Edge. "Hope everything is up to standards."
"The place is great, Morgan," Lois complemented. "It's no Daily Planet, but it'll manage."
"Well, I hope you enjoy your stay. Here, I want you guys to meet someone." Morgan called over a man, looks to be in his 40s, with big ginger hair that was combed back and grey hairlines on the side of his head, wearing a grey suit and red tie, a signature for him. He came over to Morgan. "Guys, I'm pleased for you to meet my top anchor for the channel. G. Gordon Godfrey."
The three shook hands with Godfrey. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Godfrey," greeted Lois.
"Likewise. I'm glad you all decided to join us and our staff here at Global Communications."
"The offer came up, and we couldn't say no to it," spoke Clark.
"Flattering. I'm exquisitely excited to see what you three have to offer here on GCN. My segment starts in a minute, so I must go. See you around." Gordon left to return to his news seat at the set, while the makeup crew ply on the makeup before airing.
"Stick around, you three," said Edge. "I think you'll enjoy what he has to offer."
As the clock ticked down, the assistant director called it live time, and now the segment was about to begin. Near them, they could see what the segment looks like on a television screen as it's being broadcast, with the inclusions of the music, intro and fancy graphics to go along. Then, the segment began.
"Goooooooooood morning, viewers of GCN!" introduced Godfrey. "I, as always, am your host, G. Gordon Godfrey! Today, we start a new crusade across the world. Something that has resurfaced to modern days and is an issue everyone has to deal with; Superheroes."
"Oh, great…" whispered Clark.
"Contrary to what most of the American people think, I am personally not a fan of these so called heroes. Sure, they may do good things; save lives, beat up super villains and all that other nonsense they do. And to be honest, I have no problems with them doing those things. After all, that's what heroes do! No, my main quarrel with heroes is that now that we've gotten to know more about these heroes, and their stance in our culture has been made… have they gotten unheroic?"
Jimmy was on the verge of lashing out at Godfrey, but Clark held him back. Clark, compelled to hear what Gordon had to say, listens on him as he continues. Lois was continuously rolling her eyes throughout his segment.
"What do I mean when I say they have become unheroic, you may ask? Well, as they've elevated to being more than just celebrities, they've now become celebrities. And I can only put the sole blame on one thing and one thing only… The Justice League."
Beside him, a screen began showing clips of the Justice League in action. All of them are in the middle of stopping Starro from consuming London. "This is recent footage from the Justice League's fight against that weird mind controlling Starfish that they had to deal with yet again!" Then he began to air footage of the Green Lantern cutting a tentacle off Starro and landing in the middle of a street. Green Lantern then comes down and sees a swarm of fangirls comfort him. He makes an attempt to sign some autographs before having to leave again. "Do you see that? The Green Lantern, of all people, stopped to sign autographs, when there's a giant starfish consuming London! Not to mention he arrogantly cut the tentacle off and not do something to cause less damage by softening the blow!"
"Goddamnit, Hal…" thought an embarrassed Clark.
"This is just one of many instances on the battlefield that these Justice Leaguers have done. Oh, and don't get me started on how the Justice League Corporation is using the success of the team to milk it out to no end. T-Shirts, Toys, Video Games, Food Items, Sponsorship left and right! How is this benefiting the heroes in any way? Do they get paid to do this hero stuff?"
Gordon sits back down. At this point, Clark is not focusing on Gordon on the set, but rather on the Monitor that he can see a few feet away. "These are the questions I ask myself every day on this topic. Ever since the JLA disbanded and reformed into being independent from the US Government, they have taken on a new life, and it is hurting the meaning of being a superhero. Before I go, I want to ask my viewers a question… Do you think that this kind of behavior is good for the heroes, and shows them in a positive light… Or a negative one…"
Suddenly, Clark could notice something pop up in front of Gordon's face on the monitor. It wasn't very big, just covering some of his head, and it was barely noticeable, but Clark's keen eye could see it as clear as day. It looked to be of an alien symbol, like a variation of the Greek letter of Alpha, but it's been mangled, and numbers and equations circled around the letter. This gave Clark bad vibes all around. Clark looked back at the set to see the ending call for the segment.
"See you all tomorrow, as we continue to discuss the superhero problem that we are facing. Have a good day, viewers." The bell rung and they were no longer live. Clark glanced over at Lois and Jimmy, and their faces were pure red, full of rage at Gordon. Morgan Edge inched towards them. "He's a hoot, isn't he?" he cheerfully asked.
"Yeah. A hoot he is indeed…" Lois said through her teeth. Morgan Edge left them be, as Clark still thought about the symbol he could see on the screen. Lois calmed down a little bit and looked up at Clark. "What's wrong?" she asked. "You look like as you've seen a ghost."
"I… it's nothing, Lois, really."
Lois trusted Clark's word. "Man, if I ever saw more of a pompous person in my life, it's Gordon Godfrey… I'm gonna be reworking the show a little bit if that's ok with you, Clark."
"I guess. What's it gonna be about now?"
"I wanna upstage G. Gordon Loudmouth and instead talk about a show that puts the positive side of Superheroes, instead of how he ridiculed you and your friends on the news."
"I'm ok with that."
"Good. I'm going to write our first segment today." Lois began to rub her palms maniacally. "Oh-h-h-h-h-hoooo, this is gonna be good…"
Johanne's All in One; Washington, D.C.:
Like what it says on the title, Johanne's All in One serves all kinds of foods; Italian, Greek, Asian, even a simple American Burger; you name it, they have it, and more. It quickly became the hotspot restaurant for people from diverse origins. It's Diana's favorite place to go for that exact reason.
It's about six o'clock, and Diana is already seated at her table, waiting for her boyfriend to come. She checks her phone to see if he left a text saying if he was on his way, but there was nothing. Diana continued to wait for her date to arrive, as her waitress arrived with a bottle of champagne. Soon enough, her date had arrived, fixing his ginger hair and fixing up his red button up shirt. He took his seat opposite of Diana. "Sorry that I'm late, Diana," he said. "I had work that took longer than usual to complete."
"It's fine, Owen," assured Diana. "You're here now, so let's enjoy a great dinner and concert."
"Right on that." Owen poured himself a glass of champagne, and did so for Diana, who thanked him for his kindness. "It's almost a month we've been dating," pointed out Owen.
"You say that like it's something special," said Diana.
"Probably because I can never keep a relationship going for a full month. Work always gets in the way, and my dates usually end up staging me for it."
"You must be a busy man," joked Diana.
"Just a little bit, yeah." They laughed. "So I want to ask… where are you from? What's your backstory?"
Diana was caught off guard from that question. She knew if he told him the real truth about being an Amazonian superhero, her date would be baffled. Instead, she found a way to keep her story vague enough that it still made sense. "My parents were from Greece," started Diana. "They had immigrated to America in the seventies, just before I was born. But once I was born, my father left my mother, so she was left to raise me, along with a friend of hers. I was secluded, for the most part. I had gone to an all girls private school for the majority of my life. After a while, I had gotten tired of my sheltering, and once I was a fully-fledged adult, I left that life behind, and moved her in Washington. So far, my life's been much better now that I am able to experience the world in all its glory."
"I had something similar to me happen too," said Owen. "I was adopted when I was very young. Apparently, from what my new parents told me, my real ones had been abusers. They treated their older children like animals, and the time came that they took custody away from us. So they found a nice family for me to live with for now on. I never really got to know my real parents. I don't even know where they are, but from what I've been told… I would have hated them. So, looks like we've got parent problems it seems."
"Yes. I… that's unfortunate to hear, Owen. Having to be born to such awful people, like many other children in this world."
"Trust me, Diana. They're worse than any other parent out there now." He took a sip of his drink. "But I'm glad I didn't get to know them. You said you were from Greece, right?"
"My parents were, but you might as well call me full blown Greek if you see my house."
"I hear this place has some excellent Greek food. I haven't tried it yet."
"Oh, it's excellent, alright…"
The Griffin Theater:
The concert was about to start, and Diana and Owen had made their way to the bottom row, where most of the crowd was cluttered around. The two of them were tall, so they had no issues of seeing the stage. Owen leaned into Diana. "You're going to love these guys," said Owen.
The staged cleared away. The lights in the room dimmed, as the stage lights were off. Then, purple lights spun around the stage, building up to the entrance of the band. A song was playing in the background. Then, with wondrous explosion of light and smoke, the Forever People appeared on stage with their respective instruments. The lead singer, Mark Moonrider, pumped his fist in the air, with the microphone in his other hand.
"What's up, Washington, D.C. can you hear me?!" Moonrider said, followed by a thunder of screams from the audience. "We are the Forever People! Vykin shredding on guitar, Big Bear on the bass, Beautiful Dreamer playing the keyboard, and my man Serifan smacking on the drums! Are you ready to ROCK?!" followed by even louder screams. "Then let's rock!"
The concert was over, and Diana and Owen were now backstage to meet up with the band. Diana was blown away by their performance. There was no definite genre Diana could label them as; they had a mix of everything in their music, but their songs blew Diana away. She was excited to meet the Forever People. Owen approached the Break Room, knocking on the door. It opens up to reveal Drake, the Forever People's manager. "Owen!" said Drake as he and Owen embrace in a manly hug. "S'good to see you again, man. How's it been?"
"Fine. The jobs still keeping me active, as always. I brought a lovely friend along with me. Mind if we talk with the other guys?"
"No problem. Come in." Drake allowed Owen and Diana into the room, where the Forever People were all relaxing on couches and chairs, drinking soft drinks and talking about old stories they had. Drake then asked for their attention. "Listen up, folks!" said Drake. "An old friend of ours came to visit."
All of the Forever People jumped out of their seats and scrambled around Owen, giving him hugs, even kisses, all glad that their old friend has returned. "Looks like you're good friends with them," said Diana.
"I told you I knew these guys well," replied Owen.
"Oh, man, It's great to see you again, man!" cried Big Bear, patting his friend on the back.
"Were you in the crowd tonight, Ori- Owen?" stumbled Serifan.
"That I was," answered Owen. "Diana was my date tonight, and when I found out you guys were gonna be performing here, I couldn't pass it up. She loved you guys, by the way."
"I did," assured Diana. "Your music was excellent."
"Well, I'm glad you like our stuff," said Mark Moonrider.
"How long have you been touring?" asked Owen.
"Just for a few days," said Beautiful Dreamer. "We started up in New England and we're making our way across the country. Then we'll be going global and performing across the world."
"After that, we'll be starting to make a new album," added Vykin. "We've already got tons of ideas of songs in our heads."
"Can't wait to hear them," said Owen.
"You're damn right about that, old buddy!" burst Big Bear.
"Ok, Bear, calm down," said Mark Moonrider. "Hey, since you liked our music so much, would you like to have one of our albums?"
"Sure," said Diana. Beautiful Dreamer dug through a bag and pulled out one of their newer albums, called The Lucid Dreamers. "Thanks."
"Anytime," smiled Beautiful Dreamer.
"Well, we best be heading home, it's getting late. Plus, you need to get yourselves ready to hit the road tomorrow."
"See ya later, Owen! It was nice to meet you Diana!" said Beautiful Dreamer.
"Safe travels!" said Drake.
"Likewise!" replied back Owen.
Metropolis:
Superman flew through the night sky high above the streets of Metropolis, minding his own business, watching for any onset crime that may be occurring in the city. Suddenly, his earpiece notified him of an incoming call, so Superman pressed the button on the small earpiece. "This is Superman."
"Clark, I need your assistance," boldly asked Batman through the call.
"What's up?"
"You remember when we fought Mantis last week and I took in the box he was using to try to escape?"
"Yeah."
"Well I found another one, here in Gotham. Two thugs have been assisting in stealing Wayne Tech by creating portals and pulling them inside of it. I managed to take down the two suspects and one of them had an identical box as the one Mantis used."
"Hm… that's strange. You think there might be a connection to the two?"
"Not sure. I've managed to study the box and I found out after reverse engineering the device, which we can track where this kind of tech could be located. I've already implemented the tracking device in the Batcomputer, so we can detect where in the world someone has another one of these boxes… something just popped up."
"What is it?"
"There's a signal coming from Washington, D.C.. Somewhere in that city there's another one of these boxes."
"Think we should bring Diana into this?"
"She's having her date with that Owen person, remember?"
"Oh yeah. I forgot."
"We can take care of this. If all else fails, we'll call Diana for help. I'm already on route to D.C.. You should too."
"Got it. See you there, Bruce."
Superman then turned his trajectory around as he started to fly the opposite way, heading to Washington, D.C….
Batman and Superman are on the case! What will they encounter when they find another one of those boxes? How will Diana's date night end? What secrets will be revealed in the next part of The Fourth World Saga? Follow this story to find out when the next chapter hits! Favorite this story, and leave a review as well! The Fourth World Saga is only just beginning!