Justice Society of Japan

by Edrobot

A chance encounter leads to the formation of Japan's newest super-team. But between between government conspiracies, an evil sorceress, aliens and a time-traveling assassin, do they even stand a chance? A crossover between the DCU and more Anime and Video Games than I can count. But especially Gurren Lagann, Final Fantasy XIII, Xenoblade Chronicles, Madoka Magica, Code Geass.

4. Chapter 4

[COVER: The Justice Society of Japan logo is awkwardly covered up by a new logo that appears to be cast from gold and decorated with sparkling gems, reading "Electra Pendragon". Below is a subtitle that reads "The Savior of our Era" in cursive text. The scene itself depicts said character, a teenage girl with fair skin, red eyes and platinum blonde hair, wearing a suit of golden plate armor decorated with blue patterns as well as a red cape. She is currently trying to pose in an a smug yet elegant manner, but her efforts have been hindered by Hope, who is trying to use Electra as a stepladder (against her will, of course) in order to cover up the Electra Pendragon logo with a crudely-made sign drawn on a piece of cardboard. The sign reads "HOPE" with the subtitle "GREATEST HEROEVAR!" [sic]. Some text off to the side reads, "NOT A DREAM! NOT AN IMAGINARY STORY! A mysterious new heroine joins the Justice Society!" and a block of text below that reads "Also featuring: Deathstroke the Terminator" followed by a little chibi head of Deathstroke glaring at the reader.]

---

At the crack of dawn, A single ray of light shined through Hope's cell, illuminating her face, pulling her out of a deep sleep. But her awakening was far from peaceful; the walls echoed with the cacophonous din of endless incomprehensible Japanese. Groggily, she forced her eyes open to search for the source of the noise, and found it to be coming from the pocket TV the detectives had given her.

"[Mmm. Musta fallen asleep...]" She yawned, and thought about how she had tried to stay up all night watching weird game shows. But while last night the screen was lit up with the antics of hapless contestants running from mascots wielding neon pink baseball bats, now all that was left was an infomercial featuring a sketchy, middle-aged guy who appeared to be desperately trying to sell oven mitts.

She twisted the volume knob down a bit so she could think. "[Alright...]" she tried to stretch out her palms to try and crack her knuckles, but just ended up with sore fingers. "[I overshot my target, but that's okay. I just gotta let Dad's men take me to California, then all I need to do is escape and I can hitchhike the rest of the way!]"

But even with her plan in mind, Hope wasn't quite so confident it would work. So to relieve some stress, she did a headstand on the cell bench to let her worries drain out of her body, and into her head. Or at least that's what she tried tried to do. Despite her efforts Hope fell off the bench and broke her neck, though thanks to her healing factor she recovered from this normally debilitating injury in just a matter of seconds. She didn't even scream, as Hope had long ago built up a remarkable tolerance to pain as a result of repeatedly testing her limits by doing stupidly reckless things (such as trying to stand on one's head to relieve stress).

"[AAAGH!]" she tantrumed, flailing her legs around in the air, "[This is gonna take FOREVER.]" Starved for entertainment, she grabbed the TV, turned up the volume, and began to flick through channels at random, passing channel after channel without understanding a word of what was being said. "[Stupid teleporter... Why couldn't I end up somewhere that speaks American?]"

As if to answer her prayers, the very next channel she turned to Channel 52, an English-speaking international news network. A man with a British accent wearing a tweed jacket was reporting from what appeared to be a park crowded with people of every shape and size, wearing any number of colorful costumes.

"[Thank you, Calender Man]" said the guy in the Tweed Jacket. "[I'm here at the Hamarikyu Gardens in Tokyo, following up on your report of the new super team known as 'The Justice Society of Japan'.]" He gestured to the multitudes behind him. "[It's been just one day since the roster was announced, and already the team's recruitment drive is off to a smashing success. I mean just LOOK at all those brave young men, women, genderless aliens, cyborgs, and combinations of the above. I don't think I've seen this many crime-fighters in one place since Super Young Team's own recruitment drive.]"

The camera then panned over to reveal a busty young woman with blonde hair, sporting a Power Girl costume and a domino mask. It was a pretty good impression, actually, though hope noted that the real Power Girl was considerably more buff.

Tweed-jacket, meanwhile continued to speak. "[Anyway, today I'm speaking with the group's publicist, who despite not being a crime-fighter herself has nevertheless decided to hide her true identity for safety reasons.]" He pointed the microphone at the young woman. "[Now tell me, how many new members are you recruiting?]"

["It's hard to say, really."] the young woman replied, "[But we're estimating somewhere around two, maybe three.]"

"[So you're saying most of these folks will be going home disappointed?]"

"[Sadly. But it's not often that the Japanese hero community gets together like this, so I'd like to feel like they'll be going home with something, at least.]"

"[Well then, would you like to share with the audience what you expect out of a new recruit?]"

"[By all means!]" the young lady smiled. "[We're looking for someone driven. Someone anxious to go out and save the day each morning. Someone enthusiastic, animated, a real force of personality.]" her smile then turned into sort of a smirk. ["And of course, bringing something new to the table wouldn't hurt."]

"[Well that's about all the time we have, miss!"] said Mr. Tweed Jacket. ["Back to you, Snow."]

The scene then cut back to a newsroom, where an anchorwoman was sitting at her desk. "[Thank you, Doctor. Coming up, the world's leading Paleontologists discuss the so-called "Hollow Earth" theory. But first, here's Joseph Coyne with the latest on Wall Street...]"

Hope turned off the TV, lied down on her back, and began to stare at the ceiling.

"[...I wonder how far away that Hamarikyu place is?"] she asked aloud. She then rolled over onto her stomach, letting her hands hold up her face. ["Too bad I'm locked up in here. Else I might just take a little detour..."]

She looked at her fingernails. Then at the wall, and then at her fingernails again. Instantly, she sharpened them into claws.

"[Hmm...]"

---

"...you know, ever since I was a kid I've always wondered what a superhero meeting actually looked like." Simon frowned at his half-eaten omelette. "This... isn't what I imagined."

Shirley nodded silently. Breakfast at a "Big Belly Burger" franchise wasn't exactly the kind of place that screamed out for superheroic feats, made worse by all the stares they were getting due to their costumes; even Shinji was trying to hide his identity by wearing a flimsy plastic sentai mask he bought at a dollar store. Still, it was the one place everyone could agree on for lunch.

"Yeah, well, beggars can't be choosers." Lightning bit off the end of her french fry. "So, first things first; the HQ isn't up. What do we do until then?"

"Maybe we should recruit some more members?" Simon shrugged.

"We've got six guys as it is, not to mention a support staff..." said Shulk. "How many more do we need?"

"I dunno. As many as we want to join."

"That's helpful..." Lightning said.

Shinji, meanwhile was too transfixed on Shirley and her chicken salad. Not because he found her particularly attractive (though that probably helped), but more that there was a nagging question in the back of his mind. "Um... Girborg?" He asked.

Shirley looked to the side.

"I... I don't mean to be rude," Shinji stammered "...but aren't you a robot?"

Still chewing her food, Shirley nodded.

"So... why do you need to eat?"

Shirley's antennae twitched. She took a moment to swallow before replying. "I don't know. Nina says that my body contains a complete digestive system, but she isn't sure if I'm actually getting energy from it, or if my brain just thinks I still need food..." Putting down her fork, she looked at her hand and sighed.

An array of things Shinji could have said flew through his mind, such as "Is something wrong?", "Don't worry about it." or even "I think you are a very beautiful young lady even if you are a few years older than me and are a robot please by my girlfriend."

Instead, he changed the subject. "So... yeah! Recruitment! That would be cool! Lets do that. Like, we'll get posters and set up a booth in the park or something..."

Lightning shook her head. "We can't do that. The logistics would be a nightmare. We'd need to rent a venue, contact everyone, find a way to guarantee everyone's safety should they show up..."

Simon looked at his phone. "I dunno, Milly seems to be doing a pretty good job on her own..." He held the phone up for everyone to see, revealing a picture of Milly, Nia and Dr. Summers at a desk with a yellow tablecloth in front of a large crowd of people with Lelouch and Rivalz in the background, keeping things orderly.

Lightning snatched the phone away. "Give me that..." She tapped it a couple times to reveal the Twitter client Simon was using. The picture had apparently come from " OfficalJSJ", and the accompanying post read "didn't think there'd be such a turnout, LOL #JusticeSocietyJapan".

She then shoved the phone back in Simon's face. "What the hell is this?"

"Well, Milly wanted to do some recruiting so I said she could..."

"...put your girlfriend in danger by sending unarmed teenagers to solicit strangers for help in broad daylight where some revenge-seeking psycho could get to her!? Are you out of your mind?! Why didn't you tell me about this?!"

"Uhhhhhhh..." Simon said. "Well, Girlborg said she was okay with it..."

"What? No!" Shirley panicked. "Milly just... popped this question out of nowhere and I told her to ask you!" she pointed back at Simon.

Lightning facepalmed "...great. Just great. Why don't we just put Ashford in charge of the team for all the good our so-called leaders are doing?"

"You worry too much, Light." said Simon. "I mean, we're not even a team yet. What's the worst thing that could happen?"

---

Slade Wilson was one of the best assassins in the world. Guns, swords, poisons, it didn't matter how you wanted someone killed, Deathstroke the Terminator could do it. So he was very surprised this morning when he received a contract not to kill, but to "save".

Of course he used the term "save" loosely, since as far as he could tell his targets, Lelouch and Nunnally Lamperouge, a scrawny young fop and his cripple of a sister, were exactly where they wanted to be, and of their own free will to boot. He was almost willing to write the whole thing off as the rantings of an upper-class twit who thought that just because he had a fancy title that he could send assassins to pick up the milk, when he saw just how muchhe was being offered. Not to mention the little detail that they were being guarded by another assassin with a strange power that made the mission that much more... interesting.

But to the world at large, today he was not Deathstroke the Terminator, or even Slade Wilson. He was Hiro Miyamoto, a bedraggled salaryman who always seemed to be in a rush because he was too cheap to afford public transportation. It was one of the many roles Slade had prepared when he did business in Japan, not unlike the ninja of old. The realninja, that is, the ones more concerned with killing people than ludicrous martial arts techniques. All it took to complete the illusion was some makeup, a worn-out suit, a change in posture, and a glass eye. The eye was the important part; everyone was so used to seeing Deathstroke without one that even Batman might skip over Slade if he was doing his job right.

And speaking of his job, Hiro was late to a very important meeting, so he disregarded his usual ban on taking the train in order to get there faster. The fact that Hiro's route just happened to match the way that Deathstroke's targets took went unnoticed by all.

Eventually, Hiro arrived at a park at the same time Lelouch did. And just as Lelouch had stopped in order to man some kind of booth, so too did Hiro realize that maybe he wasn't as late as he thought he was, and maybe his boss wouldn't be too mad if he bought a hot dog wandered the park for a while. And if he was an assassin, then instead of looking quizzically at the gaggle of costumed youths gathered around the booth, he would have been sizing them up, trying to decide how many he could take should it come down to a confrontation.

And while Hiro and not Deathstroke read his newspaper and didn't perform calculations in his head on just whom he could get away with killing, he walked straight into a caucasian girl with platinum blonde hair and piercing red eyes. She was wearing bright golden armor that looked made for appearance rather than practicality, and was equipped with over a dozen sheaths holding everything from daggers to greatswords. Some even larger weaponry was strapped to her back, and also carried a pair of pearl-handled silver revolvers that didn't even look like they had ever been used.

"Watch where you're going, plebeian." the girl said, pushing back at the perceived salaryman with enough force to knock him over. "You're lucky that I haven't made a name for myself yet, else I would demand more respect!"

Hero bowed as a quick apology, but the girl wouldn't even stick around to acknowledge this. If he were an assassin, Hiro would have been adding the girl her to his mental checklist of "people I need to kill before I die". Instead, he just hung his head solemnly and mumbled something about "kids these days".

---

"Milly. How did you get so many people here at once in such a short time?" Lightning was doing her best to stay tranquil.

"It was easy!" Milly turned in her seat to look back at Lightning. "All I did was stir up some hype on some messageboards, and word of mouth did the rest!"

Dr. Summers, meanwhile was too busy talking to the applicants to say anything while Nia took notes. "...yes that is impressive, but I'm afraid that's not really a superpower... no this is not a cosplay contest... erm, do put that down; you could really hurt someone waving it around like that... I don't think that costume is really appropriate..."

Lightning performed the rare double-facepalm and shook her head. "Please tell me you didn't tell any of them 'yes'..."

"Just one." The group turned to find a red-haired boy that none of them remembered seeing at any of the other meetings. "A newly-minted magical girl named Sayaka, though she hasn't picked a code name yet."

Lightning stared at the newcomer, sizing him up. "Do we know you?"

"I'm Shirou." he said. "Shirou Emiya. I was at the museum, remember?"

"Oh yeaaaah!" said Simon. "You were the guy who tried to shoot a sword out of a bow, right?"

"Yeah, I kinda panicked." He laughed. "I tried to think of something pointy to use, and I guess I made a mistake..."

"Don't feel too hard on yourself." said Shulk "You were untrained, in a tight spot, and I'm not sure if Projection would have done much good anyway..."

"Projection?" said Shirley.

"Conjuring things out of mid-air." said Shulk. "It's a form of Magecraft. It can be convenient at times, but it's not all that efficient."

"Well, careers have been built out of worse gimmicks..." Simon replied.

"Oh, you've got it all rong, I'm just here on the support staff." Said Shirou. "I mean, you guys saved me, it's only fair that I help you save as many lives as possible!"

"Now that's the spirit!" a blue-haired girl around Shinji's age dropped down from a nearby tree. She was wearing a blue outfit that looked more suited for a medieval adventurer than a child, with a blue bustier that looked constructed more like a breastplate, a cape, gloves, a belt with glowing red gem on it, a blue dress, and white stockings worn underneath a pair of brown boots.

"Sorry for the belated introduction, but wanted to climb a tree and I had to help her up." She pointed over her shoulder, and from tree branch a pink-haired girl waved back. "Anyway, as carrot-top over here said, I'm Sayaka! Haven't picked out a code name yet but I'm sure I'll come up with it eventually!"

Lightning looked back at Milly. "...may I ask?"

"Well, we're probably going to have a magical girl on our team eventually. And her powers arepretty good, especially for someone so inexperienced..."

"Swordplay and healing magic!" Sayaka unsheathed her blade and waved it around a bit. "I'm just about unstoppable!"

Lightning ignored for the moment that she had the exact same skill set and then some.

"...okay, that's fine..." said Simon. "But we wouldn't want your time with the Society to interfere with your duty to stop the emperor of darkness from stealing the sun or whatever."

"Ah, but that's just it!" she beamed. "While there are these monsters called 'Witches' that I need to fight, there's not really a time limit. Besides, Kyubey said I could get outside help if I needed it..."

"Kyubey?" said Simon.

"Yeah! He's the one who made me a magical girl in the first place!" She made a gesture as if she was grabbing something off her shoulder, and then holding it out for the group to see. "Can any of you see him?"

"Uhhhhhhh..." Simon looked nervously at Lightning, who just shook her head.

Shinji raised his hand slightly. "I can." he squeaked. The whole group turned their attention to him. "He's... um..." Shinji tugged at his collar. "...kind of a weasel-y thing? White fur? Beady red eyes? Erm..."

A voice rang out in everyone's head. "That's completely correct!"

Suddenly, whinin Sayaka's hands, a strange creature popped into existence. Just as Shinji said, it indeed looked kind of like a weasel, but with a bulbous head and a long, bushy tail, a sort of cat-like grin, and a floppy pair of... antenna things sticking out of his ears.

"Most people can't see me of course, and we only communicate by telepathy."the creature "said" in everyone else's mind. "But since we'll be working together for the foreseeable future, I figured I might as well reveal myself!"

"...how far does your telepathy reach?" asked Shulk.

"Several light years. Why?"

"I've heard the Martian Manhunter relays telepathic signals between Justice League members. Can you do that?"

"Of course! You only have to ask!"

"Well I'm sold." said Simon. "Consider yourselves members of the Justice Society!"

"...on a trial basis." added Lightning. "Look, this is all going a bit too fast. Nearly half our team is underage and just at a glance I suspect most of them have some serious psychological issues. If we're going to recruit anyone else we're going to need to run background checks, gather psychological profiles and you're not listening to me are you?"

"Now this, you see, is my Soul Gem! It's the source of my power, and when I change out of my costume it turns into this little egg-shaped thing. If I used too much magic it gets all cloudy, so I need to hunt Witches and collect their grief seeds to clean it..."

Simon was too busy listening to Sayaka's explanation to pay attention to anything Lightning had to say. Instead, she looked around the park to see what the others were doing. Shinji was trying to make himself scarce hiding behind a tree, Shulk was scanning the crowd because he had nothing better to do, and Shirley was standing in place, looking unsure of herself.

Lightning decided to take a risk and approach Shirley first. "Hey. Girlborg." Lightning said. "You feeling alright?"

"Huh...?" Shirley looked at Lightning. "Oh, yeah. Sorry." Shirley's hands began to tremble. "I'm okay. Really."

Lightning watched Shirley's eyes for a bit. Though they wandered constantly, every so often they would inevitably turn to look directly at Lelouch, who at that moment was talking to a costumed vigilante who was apparently dressed like a giant lobster.

"It's boy trouble, isn't it?"

"No! No! Of course not! No." Shirley lowered her head to avoid Lightning's gaze.

Lightning had never seen such a terrible liar. "Well, then what is it?"

Shirley was silent for a moment, and then looked up at Lightning and said "I... don't really know. I mean..." she looked at the crowd. "...all these people here wanting to get in... it's kind of overwhelming."

"You do realize we're only going to pick two or three if we pick any at all, right?"

"But those guys are going to be the best out of all of them! But I'm not amazing, I'm just a girl with an over-enthusiastic agent..."

"Well for one thing, my guess is that they'll be looking more at Simon than at you. Secondly, if they're looking to join a team in the first place, most of the time it's because they either lack the direction to do things by themselves, or that they're independent enough that they hadn't thought of forming their own team." Lightning put her hand on Girlborg's shoulder. "How about we try something simple. Once we're done recruiting, how about we gather up the rookies and I'll show you how to go on patrol?"

"...thanks." But despite her words, Shirley didn't seem any more cheerful. "...I'm just worried that-"

"Good news, everybody!" Milly said as she approached the pair, with a short, blonde teenager in golden armor in tow. Simon and Shulk immediately dropped what they were doing to see what all the hubbub was about. "I've just gathered another new member!" She gestured to the girl in gold. "This is-"

"I believe I can introduce myself, Lady Ashford." the girl said. "I am princess Electra Pendragon, and I have come from the far future with the purpose of averting a disaster that destroyed the world. And on this very year, in fact."

"Princess?" Lightning raised an eyebrow.

"Yes. Princess. Why? Do you think something's funny about princesses?"

"Erm, of course not, you majesty." Shulk put down the Monado for a second as he tried to remember how he was trained to act in the off-chance that hever met royalty. "But what royal family are you exactly a part of?"

"That's none of your business!" snapped Electra. "All you need to know is that my father is the greatest hero of this, or any other era."

"...you mean Superman?"

Electra's face turned red. "NO! I do NOT mean Superman!" Her red eyes almost seemed to glow as she said this. "That tyrant is an arrogant blowhard with a god complex! Such a 'man' pales in comparison to my father!"

"Soooooo... Batman, then."

"An egotistic plebeian who doesn't know his place! Do you have any more stupid guesses?"

"...Booster Gold?"

"...give us a moment." Lightning pulled the others away. "(Okay, what's the deal here?)" she whispered. "(This girl seems more like a villain than a hero...)"

"(Well every team needs an anti-hero.)" Milly replied. "(The Justice League has Batman, the JSA had Magog...)"

"(...and did you ever notice how nobody liked Magog?)" Lightning gave Milly an annoyed look.

"(And besides, I thought Light filled that role.)" Lightning shot another glare at Simon as he said this.

Shirley looked back and forth between the two. "(Wait, who's Magog?)"

"(An idiot who's now dead. That's all you need to know.)" Lightning looked back at Milly. "(Any more bright ideas?)"

"(...well, maybe we should at least give her a chance. Just for a day or two.)" said Shulk.

"(Why on earth would we do that?)"

"(Well, maybe she just wants to do good and just doesn't know how. In fact, if we left her alone, she might become a real villain instead of a pretend hero.)"

"(...and if she turns out to be an unrepentant sociopath?)"

"(Then she'll end up surrounded by people with superpowers who have been watching her all day. So they'll know exactly how she fights, and exactly how her powers work.)"

"(That's... actually a good point.)" Lightning admitted. "(I mean it's not as if her personality's going to win them over...)"

"I'm WAITING!" shouted Electra. "It isn't polite to keep a princess busy, you know."

"(You can say that again...)" Simon winced looked over his shoulder. "(But what if she lies about her powers? I mean, it could all be part of some kinda plan...)"

"(Well you could say that about any of us, but we're not yet famous enough to worry about conspiracies.)"

Shirley raised her hand. "(Uh... what about that whole 'end of the world' thing?)"

"(Another good point.)" Shulk nodded. "(Her backstory might be sketchy and unverifiable, but with a claim like that we can't throw out the possibility that she's telling the truth. Not yet at least.)"

"(...all right, but I'm keeping her in sight at all times.)" Lightning looked back at Electra for a moment. "(Shirley and I'll take Ikari and the new kid on patrol. Just promise me you won't commit to any new recruits until we get back.)"

("Uh... yeah! What she said.") said Shirley.

"(Got it.)" said Simon. "(Good luck, Light, miss Vice Chairman.)"

("Heh... you're welcome.") Shirley blushed with embarrassment.

"(Oh! One other thing!)" Milly pointed to the Tree that Sayaka had left her friend. "(Miki made me promise to induct her friend Madoka as an honorary member, kind of like a team sidekick. Think you could bring her on patrol?)"

"(No.)" Lightning moved her hand horizontally. "(Look, I might be willing to allow a loose cannon onto an unproven team, but if there's one thing I'm not doing, it's bringing a civilian on patrol.)"

---

"So, Madoka! Howya liken' going on patrol?" Sayaka began to walk backwards as she asked this question.

"Well, it's pretty nice so far." Madoka Kamine looked down at the city through a pair of binoculars she had rented. "I don't think I've ever been to the Tokyo Tower before!" She turned to Shinji and grinned, her smiling face sporting a purple domino mask borrowed from Milly that did absolutely nothing to hide her fluorescent pink hair with pigtails, and would have have fooled absolutely no one had anyone actually been looking for her. "You should see this, it's really cool!"

"Um... Okay." Shinji tried to look through the binoculars while wearing his own mask, but he just couldn't get the eyes to line up correctly. "Um... it's great!" he lied, "I can even see my house from here."

If Madoka noticed any deception going on, she didn't show it, instead Giggling at Shinji's words. "Well, where is it?"

"It's, uh." he waved his hand in a vaguely eastward direction. "It's kind of... over there, I guess."

"Let me see if I can spot it!" she took the binoculars back and started scanning the area. "Is it that big, weird looking building over there?"

"...I think that's a temple."

"...well, is it in that huge skyscraper?"

"...no..."

"...well, is it near the park?"

"Um... you're getting colder."

Lightning watched the two, arms crossed. Madoka's presence was keeping the group from doing anything that could put the team in actual danger, turning what was intended to be a training session where Lightning could gauge everyone's strengths and weaknesses into a glorified field trip. Even Shirley was in danger of being assimilated into the group, as even though she remained silent she was standing near enough to imply that she could join in at any moment.

It was Electra, ironically enough, who was the only one treating this trip with any amount of seriousness. Instead of goofing around, she was instead hard at work staring through something that looked like a diamond encrusted sextant. She apparently called it "The Apoco-Scope", though she remained mum on what exactly she was looking for.

"...then again, perhaps the kids have the right idea."Lightning found a nearby bench to sit on. "I am getting a bit high strung lately..."She put her hands behind her head, closed her eyes, and relaxed. "Perhaps a bit of time to clear my head would do me some good..."

And then after a few minutes she heard the unmistakable sound of someone jumping through a sheet of glass.

"Of course."thought Lightning as she opened her eyes. "Something just has to go wrong today, doesn't it?"She looked up, and noticed that Electra was no longer present. Instead, there was a vaguely person-sized hole in the window, and a crowd had begun to gather.

As she got up, Lightning pulled out her wallet, and flipped it open to reveal her police badge. "Police! Nobody move!" she said. She turned to Shirley. "Shinji, what happened here?"

"Well, she just out of nowhere and said 'Ah-ha!'. And then she looked at us, said something along the lines of 'follow my lead', and then she jumped out the window." he pointed at the broken glass, grimacing. "Um... is this my fault?"

Lightning shrugged. "Madoka, give me the binoculars." After the girl complied, Lightning then looked down at the crater that Electra left in her wake, then looked panned ahead to see Electra, completely unharmed, chasing after an unseen figure with surprising deftness given her weighty armor. Lightning then looked at Shirley. "Girlborg, there are traffic cameras at every intersection. Can you hack into them and see if you can track down who exactly our golden girl is chasing after?"

Shirley flinched, "I- I don't know! I've never tried that before!"

"First time for everything. If you can control a robot, a camera should be a piece of cake."

"O-okay then..." Shirley put her fingertips to her forehead, mimicking a stance she's seen psychics take on television to boost their mental concentration. "Come on... cameras... I need to see cameras..."

Almost instantly, Shirley was no longer watching the backs of her own eyelids. Rather, her vision had become one with Tokyo itself. Not content with mere traffic cameras, her technopathic powers had reached out to every networked camera in the Minato district. Phones, satellites, security cameras, all of these and more were interconnected with each other to form an unbroken panorama, all witnessed simultaneously and in real time. "Intoxicating" was too small a word for the feeling; "Ambrosic" might have fit better if such a term has existed to describe near-omniscience.

A more ambitious mortal perhaps would have had suffered delusions of godhood if given such an opportunity. But to Shirley the experience was frightening beyond compare. With a sudden gasp, she snapped back to reality.

"I am never going to close my eyes again..." Shirley whimpered.

"...I'm sorry?" said Lightning.

"I found her!" gasped Shirley, "The girl! The person. I think it's a girl. Heading towards tennis court. Young. Black cloak... kind that were popular a few years ago... Organization... I think..." She fell onto the floor. "Sorry... that was just... I think I overdid it..."

"Hm..."Lightning put one of her hands on her hips. "That must have taken too much out of her. Probably not as powerful as I hoped..." She then approached the hole in the wall, pushed a couple glass shards out of the way, and slipped on over to the other side. "You guys stay here with Girlborg. I'll be back soon." she then pointed out the window, down towards the ground, and said. "Don't follow me."

Lightning then lept through the broken window, out the observation deck, and landed on the northern corner of the Tower. Sparks flew from her footwear as she grinded down the historic landmark, before finally landing on the ground with a running start.

Back up on the deck, Sayaka watched Lightning's stunt with awe. "Hey Madoka! Betcha fifty yen that I can do that too!"

Madoka looked somewhat concerned. "Well, I don't think that-"

"Now hold on a second!" said Shirley. "Light said we needed to stay put-"

"Then catch me if you can!" The magical girl took a running leap out the window in full view of the amazed crowd, with Shirley leaping after her, trying to grab Sayaka before she got herself killed.

She succeeded to a certain extent, managing to clutch Sayaka's body in her arms, but Shirley failed at stopping herself from falling out the observation deck and landing on the same edge of the tower that Lightning had grinded down. Not wanting to experience first-hand the agony of a 500 pound-plus metal body carrying a child crashing into pavement at terminal velocity, Shirley made every effort to stay balanced, ultimately giving the impression that she was running down the side of the tower. A soon as they had reached the ground, Shirley came to a screeching halt in front a Hawaiian-shirted tourist who had decided to videotape the whole thing.

"That. Was. AWESOME!" Sayaka threw her hands into the air, accidently sending Shirley tumbling over. Sayaka, however, just got up and started running after Lightning shouting "Thanks, Girlborg! I owe you one!" in her wake.

"Wait..." Shirley panted, "wait up..." she then began to jog after Sayaka.

Meanwhile, back at the tower, Madoka and Shinji looked at each other in confusion.

"...how about we take the elevator?" suggested Madoka.

Shinji nodded in agreement.

---

"...with all due respect, sir, this is a missing persons case." Detective Keiichi Ikari looked incredulously at Chief Sonoda as they walked down the hallway. "Isn't this a few orders of magnitude below what the Cataclysm Department would handle?" Ikari's partner looked at him with envy; Keiichi had long ago mastered the delicate art of questioning superior officers without getting fired.

"Budget cuts." said the Chief. "Some politician figured the Metahuman Crimes Division was sitting around twiddling their thumbs while vigilantes did all their work for them. So of course all work they did have gets pushed over to the most overworked department in Tokyo."

"Tragic."

"You don't know the half of it..." Sonoda placed his palm on his forehead. "And it's not just 'some missing person case', because I wouldn't be here if it was." he leafed through a manilla envelope full of redacted data. "Apparently this "Hope" girl's the adoptive daughter of some big-shot CIA spook. Apparently she broke into some retired mad scientist's house to "borrow" a teleporter he'd been working on."

"Did his name happen to be something like 'Dr. Insano'?" Ikari's eyes glazed over.

"Good guess." Sonoda's made a joyless lifeless smirk. "That name turned out to be the only thing that wasn't a complete fabrication. In reality, neither Batman nor Insano ever came within a hundred feet of each other, though we only have the latter's word to go on."

"Given that he's still alive, I'd say that's a safe bet." Ikari looked at his notes. "Had she been bugging this "Insano" guy before?"

"Actually, no. They were apparently on good terms, and she had acted as a lab assistant for the past couple months. Probably learned how to use the teleporter there, though that doesn't explain her choice of destination..."

"Well, she did say she wanted to go to Sternbild." quipped Maniwa. "Maybe she put in the wrong coordinates?"

"That's the working theory." Sonoda's eyelids drooped as they entered the room full of jail cells. "In any case, I need you and Ikari to help with the drop-off. It should be simple; we just need to take her to the airport, where an escort will be waiting to-"

But when they finally opened the door to the cell, Hope was nowhere to be found. Instead, there was a big gaping hole in the cell wall, surrounded by dozens of scratch marks.

"...DAMN IT." The chief pulled his radio from his holster, and set it to the local frequency. "This is Chief Sonoda of the Cataclysm Division. We have a 39-44, escaped metahuman child of variable appearance. I repeat, we have a 39-44, escaped metahuman child of variable appearance. Medium priority. Subject is dangerous, but not inherently violent." The chief then sighed.

Detective Maniwa began to say "Sorry about this, sir, I take complete responci-" before his partner shushed him.

"No, it's not your fault..." the chief grimaced. "It's those goddamn budget cuts again." he grumbled began to put on his jacket. "I say It would be a good idea to spring for titanium plating, but nooooo, 'nobody evertries to break out' they tell me. And then when somebody actually does they just slash the budget againbecause we're apparently not doing our jobs right-"

Maniwa coughed. "You wouldn't mind if we looked into this case, would you?" Ikari gave him a slight glare.

"By all means." Sonoda began to march out of the room. "We're allgoing to be in hot water if we don't find her."

---

From the safety of the public restroom, Hope tried desperately to come up with the perfect disguise.

On one hand, Hope couldn't make herself any taller, shorter, thinner or fatter, and had no control over her clothing. On the other hand, she had free reign over her skin, hair, and even facial features aside from the bright red tattoo on her forehead (which thankfully she could cover up with thick bangs or a hat). She shifted through few different forms to try and find one that would help her blend in, but every time it ended up looking less like an actual Japanese person and more like a caricature of one. So she tried some more exotic shapes. Catgirl, tengu, gorgon, martian, and countless others, Hope on tried every shape she could remember from her time on the TV Tropes Wiki. And she rejected every last one of these for reasons ranging from being really silly-looking to fear of pissing off the Martian Manhunter.

Eventually, Hope settled on something that looked vaguely like a Drow, with jet black skin, purple eyes, silky white hair going down to her knees, and a pair of milky white fangs because they looked cool. She was satisfied by her new form, finding it to be both attention grabbing and completely unlike her true self. And since Elves weren't actually real (Well okay aside from Santa's elves BUT THEY DON'T COUNT), no one could call her bluff for not being a cold-blooded sociopath like Drow are supposed to be. But the best part was that if anyone asked about how she got her powers, she could just say "A wizard did it!" and leave it at that.

Her clothing was still a dead giveaway, but her outfit was generic enough that simply wearing her "Wild Tiger" T-Shirt inside-out would be more than enough to fool a casual observer. True, it was still nothing like one would expect an Elf to wear, but she assumed a proper costume would come later; something purple and green, with spikey bits that- oh wait no spikey bits that would be hard to move in.

Well it didn't matter. The point was that Hope was ready to show the world what she could do.

She exited the bathroom with some modicum of grace, and stepped into what she assumed was the line to the interview table. She didn't know for certain, however, because the rivals standing in line all towered over her diminutive frame.

Wanting to get a better view, she extended her claws and used them to climb up a huge man wearing a bronze-plated football uniform, taking care not to dig in deep enough to actually hurt him.

"[Hey!]" a gruff voice shouted as the football player swiveled his head to face Hope. "[Whaddya think yer doin, pipsqueak?]"

Hope had no idea what he actually said, but she got the general idea. Frightened, she leapt from his shoulder onto guy who was dressed like a giant tree, and then rolled onto the ground when a stray branch came flying at her. From there, she crawled on her elbows and knees, secret agent style. At least up until the point that a nerdy guy wearing a viking helmet took just the wrong moment to drop his warhammer head-first right on top of Hope. She squirmed in discomfort as her spine snapped and reassembled itself over and over again. Luckily the faux-viking was a good sport, being kind enough to let Hope cut in line as an apology for almost-but-not-really killing her.

This brought Hope close enough to the front that the wait was almost bearable, though of course it still took a good thirty minutes or so. She instantly regretted leaving her game-filled cellphone back at home, but then reminded herself that dad could probably track her through the phone lines or something. And she couldn't afford to take any chances, not when she was this close to joining a real-life superhero team.

Sure, maybe it wouldn't have been as cool as teaming up with Wild Tiger, but even Hope admitted this was a bit of a stretch. Despite her confidence back at the police station, she had no idea if Tiger would even take a sidekick in the first place what with that new partner of his. She grinded her teeth just thinking about Barnaby Brooks Jr., that smug bastard...

"Next...?"

Suddenly, as a man wearing nothing but swim trunks and a jellyfish on his head walked away sobbing, Hope realized that there was no one else in front of her.

Better yet, the tired old geezer conducting the interviews was being tagged out for a blue-haired man with a blue jacket and a drill-shaped Necklace. Simon, she thought his name was.

The judge sitting next to him didn't look half-bad either; given how bubbly the blue-haired woman with the weird eyes looked, she was probably easy to impress.

It was the last guy that concerned her. A teenage boy with purple eyes and a face obscured by a domino mask, wearing an Allan Scott costume. It looked like she would have to go all out if she wanted to get a positive review from him.

Simon is the first to speak up. "So, whaddya call yourself?" he said.

Hope facepalmed. "[AAAGH THE LANGUAGE BARRIER I COMPLETELY FORGOT MY GOD THIS WAS DUUUUUMB.]"

"[...do you speak English?]" the teenage boy said.

Her hands still on her face, Hope spread out two of her fingers so she should get a good look at him. "[Uh... yes. Yes I do.]" she said. "[I... don't speak Japanese.]"

"[That's okay, most people in Japan at least know a bit of English.]" the woman smiled. "[So, what's your name?]"

Somewhat more confident, Hope opened her mouth to speak, but was then cut off as a hail of shuriken flew over her head and embedded themselves in the table in front of her.

Thinking quickly, Hope turned around and saw a tall man in blue tights, wearing a scaled blue chestpiece, with bright yellow shoulderpads and matching yellow gauntlets. But it was the unusual mask he wore that Hope's eyes were drawn to; split down the middle it was black on the left side, Yellow on the right, and lacking entirely in features save for a rough contour of his face, and a singular eye on the right.

Back at the booth, a purple haired teen in a cheap batman costume (complete with fake muscles) rushed over to the table. "Oh my god!" he said. "That's Deathstroke the Terminator! He's like, one of the world's biggest badasses!" he then began to make a series of awkward poses out of a combination of both fear of astonishment. "He can think, like, nine times faster than normal, run at least thirty miles an hour, and knows every form of combat known to man."

"Including a few I've made up myself." Deathstroke bragged. He then cracked his knuckles. "Now look, I'll make this easy on you. Hand over the boy and I'll let you walk away from all this. Otherwise..."

Suddenly, the fake viking burst out the crowd to charge at Deathstroke, hammer held high. "Never fear, citizens!" he cried, "Super Cosmic Viking Man is here to save the-"

He didn't even get the chance to finish, as Deathstroke pulled unheated a worn longsword and stabbed Super Cosmic Viking Man through his unprotected stomach. The would-be hero froze in place for a moment, before limply sliding off the blade and falling to the floor.

Deathstroke glared at the crowd behind him. "Any of you jokers try to pull something like that, and next time I'll TRY to aim for a vital organ."

Simon, pounded the table with fist. "Yeah, well, if you want to get to Shinji, you need to get through us!"

Deathstroke raised an eyebrow. "Shinji? Who the hell is that?" he said. He then drew a second blade and pointed it at the teenage judge, much to his surprise. "That's who I'm looking for. Him and his kid sister."

"Lelouch?" said Rivalz, looking at his friend with a worried expression. "What do you want him for?"

"Lets just say his father has a few choice words for them, and leave it at that."

Lelouch glared at Rivalz. "We'll talk about this later. Rolo, NOW!"

...and in the blink of an eye, Lelouch vanished.

Deathstroke looked around fruitlessly.

"Very clever..." he said. He then raised upholstered a submachine gun, and fired it into the air. "ALLRIGHT, LISTEN UP!" He shouted. "I GAVE YOU A CHANCE TO COME PEACEFULLY, BUT I'M THROUGH PLAYING NICE."

Hope ducked as Deathstroke fired off a clip into the crowd of heroes, striking down dozens of heroes where they stood.

"YOU HAVE FIVE MINUTES TO SHOW YOURSELF, LAMPEROGUE, OR ELSE EVERYONE FUCKING DIES." A mechanical sound was heard as he reloaded his machine gun, and then immediately fired it at a green-arrow imitator who had yet to master the art of the quick-draw. "AND ANY WISE GUY WHO THINKS THEY CAN TAKE A CHEAP SHOT WHEN MY BACK IS TURNED GETS TO GO FIRST. YOU UNDERSTAND?"

The crowd remained silent. Not one dared make a move, in fear of pissing off merc with an itchy trigger finger.

Suddenly, Hope found herself snatched up by something very cold and metallic as the Lagann grabbed her with one hand, and charged at Deathstroke with the other. The appendage then transformed into a giant drill, leaving Deathstroke only a split-second to roll out of the way.

But Simon kept going until he was right in front of the crowd, whereupon he retraced the drill, and carefully placed Hope onto the grass.

"[You okay?]" A voice came from the robot, which Hope immediately realized belong to Simon.

"[Well, yeah but-]"

"[Good!]" Simon's robot gave Hope a thumbs-up. "[We're going to need all the help we can get!]"

Realizing that Simon had just asked for her help, Hope returned with her own thumbs-up, followed by a toothy, fang-exposing grin.

The cockpit of the Laggan then opened itself up, revealing Simon to the world. "Listen up, Deathstroke!" He stood on his chair, and put his foot on the rim of his mech. "You might think you can bully us around, just because you've got a lot of guns..."

"And swords." said the guy dressed like a tree.

"And training." said the football player.

Back at the booth, Rivalz continued to count up Deathstroke's advantages in front of Nia. "And super reflexes, enhanced senses, regeneration..."

"...So you've got a lot of stuff! Big deal!" said Simon, "But we have something that you don't!"

"Stupidity?" said Deathstroke.

"Noble hearts dedicated to justice!" Simon pumped his fist, and then pointed it at the mercenary. "And with our noble hearts, we're going to make a drill... of justice!" He then extended his index finger to point straight forward, and then he raised his hand to point up in the air. "And this drill will pierce through the vault of heaven, and lead us to a better tomorrow! A tomorrow free of fear, where we can live out our dreams in mutual harmony! A harmony that will last till the end of-"

"I don't have time for this." Without even bothering to aim, Deathstroke pointed his gun at Simon, and fired off an entire clip of bullets before Simon even had a chance to blink.

But rather than the sensation of led perforating his skull, Simon instead found a shell of glowing red hexagons suddenly blink into being, accompanied by the sound not unlike a nuclear reactor running at full blast.

"Simon! We've got your back!" Simon turned to the side, and saw Shulk and Shirou standing among the crowd, decked out in medieval plate armor, Shulk raising the The Monado above his head, and Shirou readying a wooden crossbow.

"Good save!" Said Simon. "I didn't even know you could do that!"

"Neither did I until three seconds ago." said Shulk. "You see I had this vision where Deathstroke killed you in the middle of a rousing speech by shooting you through the heart. I didn't want to alarm you, so I got Emyia to trace up something that could protect you. But we couldn't give it to you in time so I-"

...and just as suddenly as it appeared, the shield blinked out of existence.

"...Maybe we should talk about this later." said Shirou.

"Agreed." said Shulk.

A smirk spread over Simon's face. "Well, that's what we get for monologuing."

He then jumped back into the Lagann, and closed the cockpit, and once again the Lagann began speaking for him. "Allright, in that case I'll keep it quick. You want to know who the hell we are?! WE'RE THE JUSTICE SOCIETY OF JAPAN, AND THAT'S ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW!"

All the while, Hope watched the whole thing unfold with childlike glee. Even if she didn't understand a word of what was being said, she could practically taste emotion floating through the air. It was like watching a superhero cartoon come to life, but with better costumes and worse acting! And she was right there in the thick of it!

Even if her father were to show up right then and there to drag her back to Florida, Hope knew that this was a trip well spent.

---

A girl ran through the streets of Tokyo. She didn't know why, exactly, but her instincts told her that when a girl wearing golden armor jumps from the top of a metal spire, lands hard enough to make a crater, and then immediately starts chasing after you, the safest thing to do was run away as quickly as possible.

There were actually quite a lot of things the girl didn't know, actually. Her own name, for one thing. Followed by who she was, where she was, and how she got here. She did know what she looked like, at least. She remembered seeing a... shiny glass thing that you can see yourself in. She could clearly remember seeing one of those before. What are they called again?

Well, whatever it was there certainly wasn't time to think. The gold-plated-girl was hot on her heels, showing a surprising amount of grace for wearing something that looks so heavy.

The girl then looked down at her own clothing. It was black. Very black. And quite shiny, like it was made from very fine stuff she couldn't quite remember the name of that is made of from the skin of those big animals she couldn't quite remember the name of that live on that place she couldn't quite remember the name of that also make that white beverage she couldn't quite remember the name of.

The girl makes a mental note to get this missing-memory thing sorted out as soon as humanly possible.

As for the rest of her outfit, it seems to be dominated by an enormous zipper that seems to run the length of it. The girl notes the irony of knowing what a "zipper" is despite being unable to put a name to more commonplace things. She also notes the presence of a pair of high-heeled boots on her feet, thinks to herself "no wonder I've been having so much trouble running" and kicks them off the very next moment. This turns out to be a mistake, however, as she suddenly remembers why people wear shoes in the first place. Specifically, she learns why they wear shoes while running on the pavement in ninety degree weather.

"GAH!" she yelps. But with the gold-plated-girl chasing after her, she has no choice but to press onward, so she splits off of the road and runs towards some kind of... green place that was walled off from the outside world by a chain-link fence. A freestanding net sat on top of a rectangular pattern painted out of white lines, both of which the girl puzzled over the purpose of.

Still, the girl knew an opportunity when she saw it, so she ducked through a gate and shut it behind her with some kind of lock. She then walked away from the gate, taking a moment to catch her breath. She was confident that the gold-plated-girl wouldn't be able to follower her through...

...only to turn around in shock as the sound of a long, golden blade cut through the gate like melted butter. "Trapped like a rat in a cage, aren't we?" The gold-plated-girl wore a smug smile as she approached. "It's almost pathetic enough to make me laugh... but a heroine needs to be humble, after all." She twirled her blade between in her hands.

Just then, a new voice rang out. "Electra!" it said, and soon a pink-haired woman wearing a white jacket and a red scarf lept between the girl and her gold-plated stalker. "What's going on here?"

"Ah, Lightning! Good of you to come." the gold-plated-girl (apparently known as "Electra") pointed at the girl. "I had just finished tracking down this undesirable, and was about to put an end to her life."

The girl gasped, and took a step back; her worst fears had been confirmed.

"...that's nothow we do things." the woman known as "Lightning" glared at her companion. "We don't murder criminals. Especially when they haven't done anything."

"Murder is such a strong word." her expression unchanging, Electra flipped her hair back. "Royalty doesn't commit murder. We perform executions."

"It doesn't matter what you call it. Maybe they don't have this where you come from, but in our time we have something called 'due process'..."

"Oh? Are you willing to die for your so-called 'due process'?" Electra reached behind her cape, and pulled out a gold-plated sextant (the girl, of course, didn't know what a sextant actually did, but somehow she still knew what it was called). "The Apoco-Scope identifies her as one of the seven people who will bring about the end of the world! She must be destroyed before that happens!"

"Why? What exactly did this girl do to deserve to be hunted down like a wild animal?"

"Well I... don't quite know that. The end of the world wasn't so much a singular event as much as it was a series of seemingly unrelated disasters." Electa pointed to the Apoco-Scope again. "But the Apoco-Scope says it, so it must be true!"

"...You're expecting me to believe that you're passing snap judgements based on a fortune telling tool that might not even work?" Lightning pulled her weapon off her belt. "Are you crazy?"

"A better question is, are you blind?!" Electra screamed. "Just look at her jacket; it's the same kind that the members Organization XIII wore!"

"You've either been living under a rock, or you really are from the future. Those jackets were extremely popular a few years ago. My sister has one. Her fiance has one. Even I have one. Does that mean we're members, too?"

"...you COULD be..." she looked away from Lightning, and towards her own weapon. "I can't quite discount that possibility just yet..."

Thinking the pair were too busy bickering to give chase, the girl made a break for it. But just as it looked like she was out of range, she felt a sharp, stabbing pain in her thigh, which seized up and caused her to fall over. Looking at the source of the pain, she saw a Gold-plated knife sticking out of the back of her leg. She tried to pull it out, but when she reached for it the knife immediately lost it's luster, turning into what appeared to be an ordinary knife-for-place-where-you-make-food. The knife then made a noise that the girl would probably compare to crumpling tinfoil if she knew what that tinfoil was, and a series of cracks began to form. Before she knew it the knife had fallen apart into a pile of iron scraps. While it did get the knife out, it also caused her wound to bleed profusely, which somehow hurt even more than simply having a piece of metal stuck in it.

The girl then looked back up at the others. As she sat on the floor nursing her own wound, Lightning and Electra had launched into combat. Electra fought with all manner of weapons, from glowing swords and magical maces to some kind of metal tube that made a loud noise when she squeezed it. And all of her weapons were extremely ornate, as they were exclusively fashioned out precious metals and gems, to the point where it eventually got to be a bit silly. After all, how practical is a flail with a giant ruby on the end, exactly?

She swung hard and swung wide, but despite her boasting Electra's blows were clumsy enough that she would occasionally drop her weapon. And whenever she did, the weapon would instantly take on a less opulent form and then fall to pieces just like the knife had.

Apparently the girl wasn't the only one who noticed this, as the first time it happened it gave Lightning pause. "What are you, Bizzaro-King Midas or something?"

"Don't associate me with that pretender!" the girl screamed. "An ounce of my blood is worth more than a gallon of his!"

In contrast to Electra, Lightning's combat style had a graceful rhythm to it. True, she also swung wide, but she was fast enough that whenever an opponent tried to exploit what appeared to be an opening, Lightning dodged it and immediately made a counter-attack. And while Electra herself left openings whenever she tried to change weapons, Lightning was able to switch from gun to sword to magic without skipping a beat.

It was funny. It probably took years to learn how to fight that well, but seeing it in motion it all looked so easy...

Just then, more newcomers entered the battle! One was a blue-haired girl with a blue chestplate, and the other was a somewhat older, orange-haired girl with two pink, transparent antenna sticking out the side of her head, who was also wearing a silly costume.

"Hey Light! What's going on! Why 'ya fighting golden girl?"

"Sayaka, I thought I told you to-" Lightning leaned to the side to dodge an incoming sword thrust. "Nevermind. That girl over there is injured." she ducked to avoid a swipe at her head. "Heal her up, and get her to safety. Girlborg, you go too. We don't know who she's working for."

Sayaka (the blue-haired girl) returned a salute as she rushed towards the nameless girl's aid. "You got it, boss!" she charged straight through the fight, sliding as she passed Electra to avoid being struck, and then rolled up to her destination.

She rubbed her hands together. "Allright, let's see what we can do here..." She pushed the girl's jacket aside in order to get a good look at the wound. She then held out her hands, and a faint blue light began to emanate from them.

But rather than closing up, the area around the gash began to glow with a sickly, black light, accompanied by a faint ringing.

Sayaka poked at the wound, bloodying her finger when she found it to still be there. "Well that's weird." she looked at the girl. "I don't suppose you know anything about this?"

"Um... not really." she replied. "Sorry."

"Right then." Sayaka then picked her up, and held the girl over her shoulder. "Hey Lightning! It's not working!"

"What'snot working?" at this point Lightning had disarmed Electra completely, leaving her to flail her fists helplessly in Lightning's direction as Light held Electra's face back at arm's length.

"My healing magic! It's not doin' a darn thing!"

"...Great." Lightning clobbered Electra with a punch to the face, and tossed one of her own healing spells in the nameless girl's direction. Unfortunately, this had much the same result; same ringing, same blacklight, same lack of progress.

"She's probably immune to magic." Lightning said. She then bent down to pick up the girl, first grabbing her by the hand. "I'll get her to a hospital. You two finish up the fight with miss high-and-"

But the moment she touched the Girl, the air filled with an intense ringing. Starting from the point of contact, the girl's arm lit up with the same black light energy that appeared when they tried to heal her. The girl panicked, and tried to break free of Lightning's grasp, but even if she wanted to Light found herself stiffening, and unable to let go. Then, just as suddenly, she went limp, and collapsed right next to the girl she was trying to rescue.

The remaining heroines looked at their fallen ally's body.

"So. now what?" Sayaka looked at Girlborg expectantly.

"I..." Girlborg glanced at Electra, who was now recovering from her blow. "...I think we should run."

---

There was a rumor that Deathstroke once beat the Justice League single-handedly, back during a time where they had over a dozen members.

But whether this was true or not, it was clear that he was having trouble with the hundred-plus E-List heroes that were now swarming him en masse.

"Eat treebark, ruffian!"

"Hut hut, HIKE!"

"Go for the eyes, Hamtaro! GO FOR THE EYES!"

True, they all had dumb costumes, dumb powers, and most fainted at the sight of their own blood, but he had to give the japs some credit; they can be a real a vicious pack of bastards when they want to. Fighting a group of heroes he didn't know a damn thing about. It was arguably more difficult than having to fight a trained men, or even a group of A-listers, because at least with someone like Green Lantern you have a reasonable idea of what to expect. This was anarchy at it's finest.

"Prepare to face the wrath of THE SALARYMAN!"

"This one's for Super Cosmic Viking Man!"

"Don't give up now! We've got him on the ropes."

Deathstroke turned his attention to that last voice. He knew that somewhere, Simon was hiding safely in his mech, commanding his own private army through motivational speeches. "Cut off the head, and the rest of the body shrivels up..." Deathstroke mused as pushed through the crowd of attackers until he finally came across Shulk. "...and what better way to expose the neck than with a poke in the eye?"

Though he rarely took stock in magic, Deathstroke knew that The Monado was useless against humans. With this in mind, he pounced into Shulk, grabbed him by the throat, and shoved him into the grass face-first.

"I bet you feel real smart right about now, kid." Deathstroke said. "You probably wish your so-called 'leader' wasn't so much of a coward..."

"You got it all wrong, Deathstroke!"

Deathstroke paused. He could clearly hear Simon's voice, but he had no idea where it was actually coming from.

"I wasn't hiding from you; you were the one hiding from ME!"

A giant drill then sprouted out of the ground, right where Deathstroke was standing. He let go of Shulk and tried to leap away, but his footing was already compromised so it was less than effective than anticipated.

Worse yet, Simon seemed to have anticipated this, as the drill then changed directions to point away from Shulk and towards Deathstroke, and lept out of the ground like a trained dolphin. The drill then transformed back into the Lagann, which wound up its fist for what looked like a mighty blow.

But even the mighty Lagann was too steps behind Deathstroke. Calculating the angle of the robot's descent and the most likely arc of its blow, he took one step back, pulled out his sword, and held it straight out.

Gravity did the rest of the work for him. Being unable to change it's course, the Lagann impaled itself on Deathstroke's weapon, its arm freezing mid-swing, just inches away from its target.

"Pathetic." Deathstroke let go of his longsword, plopping the mech on the ground with an unceremonious *thump*. He looked around to admire his handiwork. Where there was once a zealous mob of vigilantes, there was now only a roughed-up gang of rookies shitting their pants.

"Well, I can't say it wasn't interesting while it lasted..." Deathstroke pulled his sword out of the broken mech. "Now if you excuse me, I have a pair of kids to-"

Deathstroke froze. There was no blood on this sword.

His mind ran through all the possibilities. Perhaps he had missed. Perhaps the robot was on remote control. Perhaps he teleported out of the way just in time. Perhaps it was a hologram. Perhaps Simon didn't bleed at all...

...but the one thing Deathstroke DIDN'T expect was for Simon, a man with no powers and no fancy gadgets aside from his mech, to use his robot's mass to launch himself high into the air, and then punch Deathstroke on the way down.

The last thing Deathstroke heard before he blacked out (aside from the sound of breaking bones) was the following conversation:

"...you cut it a bit close there." said Shulk. "My visions can't predict everything you know."

"Well you saw enough, at least." replied Simon, "I mean if you hadn't told me the exact spot he'd attack you we would have- ERK!"

"Um... how hard did you hit him, exactly?"

"Oh, don't worry (ow), it's just a (erk) broken bone or two... or three." There was another thump as Simon collapsed onto the grass. "Don't... worry... so... much..."

"Oh bugger. Shirou, get Lightning; she can repair the damage far better than I can. I'll get Nia to set the bones so he doesn't get any worse."

And then, with his brain hemorrhaging faster than his healing factor could fix it, Deathstroke passed out.

---

The girl watched helplessly as the two heroines dashed down the hallway of the building they had broken into, each struggling to carry someone larger than themselves. The girl herself was being carried by the one called Sayaka, while Lightning was being carried by the one known as Girlborg.

Behind them, Electra continued to give chase. The twisting brickwork hallways did little to deter her pursuit. Rather, it only seemed to aggravate her further, as she began firing at them with a silver revolver. Her aim was poor, but given how the gun was apparently firing rounds that left SUV-sized craters in the walls, it was immediately clear that actually aiming was never a top priority.

"WHAT DO WE DO NOW!?" said Sayaka.

"I DON'T KNOW!" said Girlborg.

"AREN'T YOU IN CHARGE?! YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO KNOW!"

"I ONLY TOOK THIS JOB BECAUSE I WANTED TO IMPRESS A BOY I LIKE!"

"THAT'S A TERRIBLE REASON BUT I UNDERSTAND COMPLETELY!"

"THANKS!"

Sayaka then turned her head as if she were listening to an invisible presence sitting on her shoulder. "YEAH, GOOD IDEA, LETS DO THAT."

When they rounded the next corner, the pair ducked into a supply closet full of sporting equipment. Shirley tripped over a sack of sporting equipment as she entered, dropping Lightning like a limp rag-doll.

She then got on her knees and pointed at a blank wall. "W- What is that thing?" she said.

"It's a Barrier. It a portal to where a Witch and her familiars live." said Sayaka.

The still-nameless girl expected that there was a more explanation forthcoming, but if there was, then it seemed to come from a seemingly-ordinary spot on the floor.

Finally, Sayaka spoke out. "Wait, so your plan is that we just run from one fight into another? That girl could be killing people while we're gone!" Another pause. The presence seemed to be in another spot entirely. "Yeah, well, that's still not fair!" she added. "Just because the Witch kills more doesn't mean we can let them both off the hook."

The girl raised her hand. "...what's goin on here? Who are you guys talking to?"

Sayaka looked at the girl, and then looked back at the floor. "Hey Kyubey, you think you could let her see what's going on just for a sec?"

A psychic voice rang out in the girl's head. "Oh! Sorry about that."

Suddenly, a large, glowing glyph appeared on the wall. It appeared to be shaped like a neon-green baseball diamond (another pointless thing the girl was surprised that she recognized), with the lines between bases replaced by a string of incomprehensible symbols moving in a counter-clockwise direction. A faint cheering sound emanated from it, accompanied by high-pitched, mechanical organ music.

"There. Better now?"

"Uh..." the girl looked down at the formerly empty spot on the ground. It was now occupied by what looked like a cross between a cat, a weasel, and a bunny rabbit. "...I don't know."

"Ah, good! you can hear me!"it said. Or at least, gave the impression that it said something, since it's mouth didn't move at all. "I was worried for a moment there that you'd also be anti-psionic, but it seems my powers work just fine!"

"...What?"

"Okay, I'll make this quick:" Sayaka pointed at the rabbity thing. "This is Kyubey." she pointed at herself. "I'm a magical girl." finally she pointed at the glyph. "And that's a Barrier, and there's a thing called a Witch inside that eats people." She then pointed back at Kyubey, back at herself, then back at the Barrier. "Kuybey gave me powers to fight Witches. Understand?"

"...sort of?"

Shirley looked at the Barrier thoughtfully.

"Great!" said Sayaka. "Now I don't suppose you have a plan, do you?"

"...not really." said the girl. "I don't even know my own name, to be honest."

"Classic amnesia."said Kyubey. "I'd offer you a Contract so you could wish to fix it, but honestly I'm not sure it would work. And even if it did, it would probably be more prudent to wish for something to help you out of this situation, like a healing factor, or immortality, or-"

It was then that girlborg spoke up. "Guys... I think I have a plan." she looked at the Barrier. "How hard is it to get out of one of those things?"

"Almost impossible for anyone other than a magical girl. Only a magical girl can enter and leave whenever she wants, but anyone else needs to defeat the Witch and wait for the Labyrinth to collapse."

"Well... in that case..." Girlborg bent down to talk to Kyubey. "Do you think you could let her see the Barrier, too? If we could trick her into entering, then leave before she-"

Just then, a golden blade pierced through the front of the door. "OPEN UP!" Electra shouted from the other side. "OPEN UP THIS INSTANT OR I'LL SKEWER THE LOT OF YOU!"

"I think I know where you're going with this." said Kyubey. "Consider it done!"

---

With a mighty heave Electra Pendragon kicked down the door that she swore those mongrels had entered moments before, only to find herself staring at a messy closet full of sporting equipment. Nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary, save for a large, glowing glyph shaped like a neon-green baseball diamond. Which admittedly was pretty damn weird. But given that the most famous heroes of the era were a man dressed like a bat and an alien who flew around in his long johns, it wasn't terribly surprising, either.

"One of those plebeians must have some kind of... dimensional portal power."she mused.
After poking around to see if they weren't trying something stupid like hiding behind the door or on the ceiling, she went up to the glyph to examine the writing on the diamond. She didn't understand the language, but even so she understood that it read "TAKE ME OUT TO THE BALL-GAME, TAKE ME OUT TO THE CROWD, BUY ME SOME PEANUTS AND CRACKER JACK, I DON'T CARE IF I EVER GET BACK" over and over again in an endless loop.

"Of course." Electra said to noone in particular. "It's obvious that portal must lead straight to the baseball dimension." she sighed. "The Baseball Dimension. Really now? The oddities of this era never cease to amaze..."

Electra looked around for a baseball bat, just in case it turned out that it would be a good idea to have one. She ended up taking three; one genuine Louisville Slugger that was probably used for "official" games, and two aluminum bats used during P.E. She took a few experimental swings, before finally deciding to use her power. The aluminum bats took on the appearance of fine damascus steel, featuring organic ripples that appeared to ooze raw power. The wooden bat, meanwhile just changed color from the stark white of maplewood to a fine mahogany brown.

"Hmph. Commoners' tools for a commoners' sport." she glowered at the Louisville bat. "Don't look so smug. I'll be rid of you for good once this particular trial comes to an end."

Without any further hesitation, Electra stepped through the portal, and predictably, found herself in a baseball stadium. An empty frame of a baseball stadium that was ten times larger than usual, constructed out of neon green girders held together by duct tape, and had an empty void in place of a field, but it was a baseball stadium nonetheless. Cheering and organ music could be heard from the stands, but the crowd was either invisible or not present to begin with.

In the direction of first base, Electra could see her target; a young, black-haired girl of vaguely asiatic descent, who may or may not have been an Organization XIII member but was clearly up to no good. After all, look how they're waiting hand and feet on her, taking care of her even though she clearly hurt their comrade. Electra figured that the girl had some kind of mind control in place.

"In fact, I bet they'll thank me once I kill her and free them from her grasp." Electra thought. "And if they don't... well, I could always stand to perform a few more executions."

She approached the group, weapons drawn. As she got nearer, she was able to pick up snippets of conversation.

"...so wait, someone's been stealing Witches?" said the orange-haired girl with the stupid costume.

"Yeah, Mami was telling me about it just the other day. It's pretty weird running into all these empty Labyrinths.." said the blue-haired girl with the somewhat less stupid costume. "She thinks someone might be trying to breed them or something."

"Why?"

"I dunno. Infinite grief seeds? World domination? Science? Take your pick."

"But how?"

"Who knows? But apparently everyone's trying to find out, expecting to end up with a huge cache of grief seeds."

"What's a grief seed?" said the nameless girl.

"Oy, do I need to explain this all again? A Grief Seed is-"

"-AHEM." Electra stomped her foot on the metal she was crossing to get everyone's attention. Something that they quickly obliged to.

"Oh. right." Sayaka grimaced. "I almost forgot." She formed a cone with her hands, put them up to her mouth, and shouted "HEY MORON. GOOD JOB FALLING INTO OUR TRAP!"

"Moron?!" Electra's face turned red. "You DARE call ME a moron?!" she pulled out her revolver once again, and aimed down the barrel at Sayaka. "You should know better than to antagonized a member of royalty when she possesses deadly firearms!"

"I wouldn't do that if I were you."said a voice from seemingly nowhere. "With no Witch to kill, the only way you're going to get out of here is with a Puella Magi's help."

Electra looked around for the voice's source. "Where are you? Show yourself!"

"No."replied the voice. "If I did that you would just shoot me. Which, by the way, would accomplish nothing. Though I doubt you'd listen to reason on this matter."

"Kyubey's right." said Girlborg. "Violence isn't going to help here. Why don't you put down the gun, and we'll make some sort of deal?"

"You dimwitted ignoramuses!" Electra practically began to foam at the mouth. "Don't you see that we're on the same side here!? That girl is all that stands between us and planetary annihilation!"

"Well the thing is..." Shirley held her fingers together. "...even if that was true, you're not doing a very good job of convincing us."

"I don't need to convince you! I'm royalty! Why shouldn't you be listening to me?!"

Sayaka responded by counting on her fingers. "Well one, we live in a democracy. Two, if you are from the future you probably haven't been born yet so you have no right to rule. And three, you're just kind of an asshole. How do we know your 'end of the world' isn't just something stupid like 'my dad gets thrown out by an angry mob so I went back in time to change that'?"

"How DARE you say such slanderous things about my father! He would NEVER allow that to happen!" she huffed. "And besides, the Apoco-Scope is infallible on such matters!"

"Oh yeah?" Sayaka jeered. "Well what does it say about us?"

Electra pulled the sextant from her belt. "Well I'll tell you what it says! It says..." she left that last word hanging as she looked through the scope. And then she remained silent as she looked through the scope again, this time to confirm that she wasn't seeing things. Though the scope, the three conscious girls had thick, yellow outlines, and a HUD element said "Keystones Acquired: Eliminate to Negate Timeline" above their heads.

"You bastards..." she snarled as she put down the device. "...no wonder you defend this girl you've never seen before! The three of you are in this together!"

"No, that's not it!" said Girlborg, "We just want to save her from-"

"THE APOCO-SCOPE SEES THROUGH YOUR LIES!" With two baseball bats drawn like swords, Electra charged with extreme ferocity.

"Um... TACTICAL RETREAT!" Shirley grabbed Lightning and started rounding the bases in an attempt to get back to home plate.

Sayaka tried to do likewise with the unnamed girl, but Electra threw her enchanted baseball bats with enough power to rupture the ground beneath her, leaving a huge gap in the path between first and second base. The unfortunate Puella Magi flying across the newly-created gap, and also trapped the girl she was trying to rescue on the other side. The side that Electra Pendragon was still standing on.

"Sayaka!" screamed Girlborg.

"I'm okay!" said Sayaka. "I'll be fine. But we need to save no-name!"

"Kyubey! You don't happen to have telekinesis, do you?"

"Nope. And before you ask, I don't think I'm allowed to make contracts with robots..."

"Ah, Okay then. Um..." Girlborg looked around. There wasn't anything in hand but the road they were on, which was constructed entirely out of...

"GIRDERS!" Girlborg said. "We'll make a see-saw out of Girders!" She began pulling one out of the ground with all of her cybernetic might. "If I hold one down, you think you can leap across?"

"I'll certainly try!" Sayaka pumped her fist in excitement. "Anything for Miss Nobody! Even if she is a literal Nobody! Which I'm still not sure of."

Meanwhile, on the other side, Electra was slowly walking towards the no-name girl.

"You won't believe the kind of day I've had this morning..." she growled. "First I end up in this backwater time period, THEN I get stuck in line for hours waiting for you morons to hear me out, THEN it turns out that everyone's moral compass prevents me from doing my JOB..." she took out the Louisville Slugger, and clasped it with both hands. "I think a commoner's tool would be suitable for a commoner'sdeath, don't you think?"

Her fight or flight response no doubt dulling the pain in her leg, the nameless girl searched desperately for a weapon to defend herself with. The closest thing she could find was a chunk of metal just below the edge of that looked just like it was about to fall off.

"Come on..." she thought as she reached out for it. Her hand didn't seem to be quite long enough. It looked like she could reach it if she leaned over, but she was too afraid of the void below to go too far.

"Well? What are you waiting for?" tease Electra. "Are you going to die pathetically, or will you at least put of a modicum of resistance?"

The girl looked back for a moment, and then closed her eyes. She took a deep breath, and she reached out to grab the shard. She heard something snap, and found herself holding something heavy or at least heavier than expected.

"No answer? Very well, then: BATTER UP!" Electra swung the bat in a downward motion towards the girl's head.

Instantly, she rolled onto her back to defend herself, trying to use the shard to parry the blow. But when she opened her eyes, she found she wasn't holding a shard at all. Rather, she appeared to be holding a giant... Key?

"Fascinating!"said Kyubey. "Is that an actual Keyblade? It must be. Otherwise I would have detected it by now."

"What's a Keyblade?" said Girlborg, who had just gotten the Girder in position.

"A mystic weapon from long ago that had recently resurfaced in the hands of a young boy named Sora. Though I'm wondering how this girl acquired such a thing? Could more have been left over from the Keyblade war, that are only now just awakening? Or perhaps-"

"SHUT UP I'M TRYING TO FOCUS HERE." Electra hammered away at the girl with her baseball bat, but each and every one of her attacks were parried by the girl, who suddenly seemed to be moving much more deftly than a few minutes ago.

"And what's more, you seem to be copying Farron's exact fighting style after having seen it for a few seconds. Most peculiar. Perhaps you have a meta-gene that records the exact sequence of neurons needed to-"

"SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP!" Electra screamed, her attacks growing more erratic with each passing second.

"No, keep going!" said Sayaka, who was now getting into position herself. "Keep talking about her brain! Keep her angry!"

"...very well then. In addition to a possible metagene, the girl must have extreme neuroplasticity in order to react unconsciously to-"

"I DON'T GET THIS AT ALL!" screamed the girl.

"Yes, well, science can be like that."said Kyubey. "Now, another possible theory is that-"

From her starting point, Sayaka took a running leap and landed on the other side just in time to block an incoming attack with her own blade. She then grabbed the unnamed girl, and started to run for home plate.

"COWARD!" Electra screamed, "COME BACK HERE AND FIGHT ME!". But enchanting all those weapons wore her out more than she realized, so she could only follow at a plodding pace.

Eventually, Girlborg (still carrying an unconscious Lightning) met up with her Sayaka, and together they passed back through the Barrier.

"PLEBEIANS! IMBECILES! PSYCHOPATHS!" Electra tried to escape through the barrier herself, but only ended up smacking herself in the face for her efforts. "You... YOU MONGRELS! How dare you leave me trapped in here! How dare you..." she then got down to her knees, and began to cry. "How... dare you..."

---

Back on the other side of the Barrier, Shirley and Sayaka congratulated each other on a job well done.

"Well, the villain's trapped, and our Jane Doe is safe." Sayaka slowly put the girl down. "I'd say this was a job well done!"

"Yeah..." Shirley looked at the Barrier. "...you're sure the other girl will be okay?"

"With the Witch gone, the place is cleared out of Familiars. I checked. And unless her swords can cut through dimensions, I'd say she's pretty safe where she is right now." Kyubey then looked at the newcomer. "So. You said you lost your memories, right?"

"...y-yes." said the girl. "At least, I think I did..."

"Well, I can't restore them without a Contract, but if you want I can do a deep scan of your brain and see what I can dredge up. Would that be good?"

"Yeah. I suppose so..." the girl began to rub her forehead. "This... won't hurt, will it?"

"Of course not! Now, let's see what we can find..."

Kyubey scampered into the girl's arms. She lifted him into the air, and she touched his head to hers, and closed his beady little eyes.

There was silence for a full minute, and everyone waited in eager anticipation for the result.

"...Interesting."

"Did you find anything?" the girl asked.

"Nothing of immediate concern."Kyubey responded. "But I got your name at least. It's very unusual, though."

"...well, what is it?" said Sayaka. "Don't keep us in the dark!"

"As best I can tell, her name is... 'Ino Atom Nix'."

The previously unnamed girl mouthed the words silently. "...are you sure that's right?"

"Positive!"said Kyubey. "It's my policy not to lie about anything."

"Well its just... kind of a weird name..." Ino scratched the back of her head.

"Hey, don't talk to me about dumb names." said Sayaka. "There's an teacher at my school who's called 'Pink Supervisor'. Compared to that, your name is practically normal."

"I guess." Ino looked around. "So, uh, what happens now?"

Shirley shrugged. "I guess whatever usually happens to mysterious girls with mysterious powers who also have amnesia."

"I mean with her." Ino pointed at Lightning, still out cold. "Is she going to be all right?"

Shirley bent down, and tried to take a pulse. "...yeah, I think so. Her heart's still beating, at least."

"Until then, I'd try to stay away from her until we figure out why that happened." Kyubey added.

"Either way, we need to get you guys to a hospital."

"Way ahead of you." Sayaka started dialing an emergency number on her cell phone. "Man, I bet the others wish they weren't stuck in that boring old park."

---

Despite budget cuts, the Tokyo Police Cataclysm Division's response to Deathstroke's attack was swift and decisive. Only minutes after the smoke cleared, a fleet of ambulances arrived to take away the dead, and give the injured proper medical treatment. Immediately following was a squad of police cars, accompanied by an armored car, and an armored SWAT team that would be on hand just in case Deathstroke woke up and tried to escape.

"...and you say you beat him by... punching him in the face?" Chief Sonoda looked at Simon with his trademark "been there, done that" expression.

"Well, actually it was the head and not the face. But yeah, that's more or less how it happened," despite being strapped down in his stretcher and in constant agony, Simon managed a weak chuckle. "I think I overestimated my ability to take a hit, but I did end the fight quickly..."

Sonoda retained his blank expression. "I see." he said, which, Simon recognized as a very polite way of saying "whatever". "Well if that's all you have to say, I suppose I'll be going now. Paperwork, you know."

"Okay. See ya." Simon said as the chief turned to leave, but Sonoda neither seemed to neither noticed nor care.

Suddenly, Simon heard a voice behind him. "Si-mon!" He turned and saw Nia, Lelouch, and Shulk waiting for him. "I heard about what happened! Are you alright?"

"What, this?" Simon motioned to his broken arm. "You know it'll take more than that to keep me down!"

"That, and we've got two healers." said Lelouch. "Speaking of which, I just got word from the others. Electra went bonkers and tried to murder everyone, Lightning's in the hospital, but the rest are fine."

"...that's good to hear." Simon nodded. "Nia, can you punch Lelouch for me?"

"...I've also heard that- wait, what?"

A split-second later, Nia's ladylike fist crashed into Lelouch's glass jaw, leaving him sprawled out on the grass.

"WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED BACK THERE?!" said Simon. "WHO THE HELL HIRED DEATHSTROKE!? WHY THE HELL DOES HE CARE ABOUT YOU AND YOUR SISTER SO MUCH!? HOW THE HELL DID YOU DISAPPEAR LIKE THAT?!"

"...I deserved that." said Lelouch.

"YOU DESERVE A LOT MORE! PEOPLE DIED TODAY BECAUSE OF YOUR LITTLE DISAPPEARING ACT! WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO SAY FOR YOURSELF?!"

"First of all, stop shouting." Lelouch wiped some of the blood off his lips. "Second, my family life is immensely complicated. I have dozens of half-siblings, step-siblings and cousins, all of which are constantly plotting against each other for the family fortune. It could have been any of them. My sister and I have been hiding out here in order to stay away from all that..."

"I thought you had two siblings." said Nia.

"Rolo isn't my real sibling. He is, or at least was, an assassin hired by my father that I was at one point brainwashed into think was my brother." Lelouch's eye twitched. "Our relationship is... complicated."

"So why are you telling us this now?" asked Shulk.

"Because it's become clear that this country is no longer safe." Lelouch stared at the city skyline. "I'm going to need protection one way or the other. And I figure the best way to do that is to be as high-profile as possible."

"Well if you just wanted help you should have asked us!" said Simon. "Kidnapping is still a crime, last time I checked. Of course we're going to help! Just give us some warning, next time!"

"Without even asking for anything in return?" Lelouch smirked. "You guys really are heroes."

"You bet we are." Simon looked around. "Say, what happened to Milly?"

"...she took the whole thing pretty hard." said Shulk. "Erm... it's probably the whole lot about people getting killed by Deathstroke and the girl she vouched for turning out to be a murderous psychopath."

"...well, can you let her know I don't blame her for that?" said Simon. "Getting killed in the line of duty is just something that happens. Nobody expected Deathstroke to show up..."

"I can't." Shulk looked uncomfortable. "She's... erm, in the ladies' room."

"Ah, got it. Nia, could you-"

"Sure thing! I'll be back in a sec!" Nia said before walking off.

"Still, I wouldn't worry too much about Milly." said Lelouch. "She can bounce back from anything. My guess is that she's probably just worried about her image."

---

Milly stared at her reflection in wide-eyed terror.

On some fundamental level it was... wrong.

Oh it was the right shape, certainly, and it mimicked all her movements, but beyond that it was almost completely alien, with snow-white hair, porcelain-colored skin, long pointed ears, and blank, soulless eyes that lacked pupils.

She looked at her hands... her REAL hands, and found that they, too looked just like the ones in the reflection.

"[Oh god, oh god, oh god...]"she clutched her hands to her head as she moaned. "[Okay, let's think clearly. I haven't touched any magic stuff, it can't be the machine plague since that's not what it does anyway...]"

She looked at her face again, pulling at her skin as if she was trying to remove a mask "[...but LOOK at me! How am I supposed to go out like this? Well, maybe I'd be welcome at a renaissance fair, but-]"

The door to the bathroom creaked open. "...Milly?" a familiar voice said.

"DON'T LOOK AT ME!" Milly leapt back onto the sink as if she were trying to crawl away.

"Milly? It's me, Nia." She opened the door, and stepped into the dimly-lit bathroom. "What's wrong?"

"ISN'T IT OBVIOUS?!" Milly screamed.

"Ah, yes. I guess it is. Sorry." Nia looked at milly with an apologetic face. "...but... Simon says he doesn't blame you."

"DOESN'T BLAME ME?!" Milly fell to her knees, and covered her face. "HOW?! I'M A FREAK!"

"Milly, you made an honest mistake. You cared enough about the team to set up a recruitment drive. Even though you didn't get permission, it was still thoughtful of you." Nia got down on her knees as well, and put her hand on Milly's shoulder. "And nobody could have expected Deathstroke to show up. You mustn't blame yourself for things you can't control."

Milly uncovered her face. Could Nia even see what had happened to her? "Um...Thanks, Nia. That really means alot to me."

"No problem!" Nia replied. "Now let's go. Shirley's going to be back any moment now, and I bet you want to get going."

"Yeah..." Milly glanced back at the mirror. Her reflection was just as freaky as ever. "Nia... do I look strange to you?"

"Not really." said Nia.

"Describe me."

"Well... you're of above-average height, and you've got blond hair, blue eyes, white skin, ..."

"When you say 'white', what do you mean?"

"Well... you know. Caucasian." Nia tilted her head to the side. "Are you... feeling alright?"

Milly put her hand to the side of her head. "Yeah, just dandy... I'm just a bit overtired, is all."

"Well, make sure you get plenty of rest tonight." Nia said. "If you're having trouble sleeping, you could always make an appointment and I could prescribe you some-"

"NO! NO EXAMINATIONS!" Milly blurted. "Uh, that is. I'm afraid of doctors offices, so I don't want to go unless I really have to..."

"Well, to each their own." Nia helped Milly back onto her feet. "Well if you don't want to bother with prescription, you could always pick up some melatonin. I've always found that hel-"

Just then, a crazed-looking girl with orange hair and distinctly-shaped epaulets kicked down the door and pointed a gun at the pair. "A-ha! "Operation Woman In Refrigerator" is off to a smashing success!" But rather than actually making any kind of demands or something, she just continued to talk. "And to think that all I need to do is kidnapp the chairman's girlfriend and stick her in a refrigerator to make the chairman angry enough to go after Lord IlPalazzo and fall into his fiendish trap! It's a good thing that I was able to find a large enough refrigerator or else I'd have to cut her up, and she would die if I did that. And that would be terrible! Much more so than stealing forty cakes, though that's a pretty terrible crime too. Think of all the birthday parties that would be ruined! And I better make sure it's warm in there so she doesn't freeze to death. Actually now that I think about it maybe I'm going about this all wrong; my plan doesn't sound all that tatestful now that I'm describing it. It would be especially disrespectful to that Green Lantern guy. Is he still a Green Lantern? I forget."

"...can we help-" Nia began to say, before the girl started shooting up the floor with her machine gun.

"No talking! "Operation That Almost Certainly Has a Woman in it But May or May not Involve Refrigerators" is a black ops mission and those require stealth! If I hear anyone talking loud enough to give away our position I'll make them do a hundred thousand pushups! And then I'll shoot them! Or maybe I should shoot them and then make them do pushups! But if they're dead I'm probably going to be waiting a long time, and that's no good..."

There was a rustling in the bushes. The crazed girl spun around and said. "Who goes there? Stop or I'll fire! Unless you're an enemy of ACROSS in which case I'll have to fire anyway, so sorry in advance!"

From the bushes, a strange-looking kid kept out, and did an awkward somersault that ended with the girl landing on her back, but quickly scampering back up. Milly instantly recognized her as the drowish-looking kid they were about to interview before Deathstroke showed up. "[Hey you!]" she said, pointing at the crazy girl. ["What do you think you're doing, kidnapping the guys I have an interview with!"] She made a cheesy karate pose, and extended her fingers, the tips of which then transformed into sharp points. "[You'd better give them up right now, else I won't go easy on-]"

Frightened, the orange-haired nut accidently let loose a whole round of machine gun fire in the kid's direction. "Oh no! What have I done!?" dropped to her knees. "I just killed a child! A poor, sweet, innocent child that was threatening to claw my eyes out! Now I'll have to go to jail run by this bible-thumping warden who lets his guards murder the inmates and I'll become his right hand man while simultaneously forming a friendship with this worn out old inmate played by Morgan Freeman-"

Nia smacked the girl over the head with a sap, knocking her out instantly.

"...Um..." Milly began to say.

Nia held up the sap. "Never leave home without one!" she said with a stern face. "Now come on, there's a chance that child might still be alive!"

Exactly one second later, the kid raised her hand. "[I'm okay! I'm okay! I've got healing.]" She sat up. "[I just didn't expect the bullets to hurt so much...]"

Milly looked at the girl for a bit. She looked just like a drow from one of Rivalz's Dungeons and Dragons books. Pointy ears, ebony skin, white hair, purple eyes... yet her clothes were pretty contemporary.

"Where exactly are you from?" Milly asked.

"[Um... I'm from a...]" the kid's eyes darted all over the place. "[...a... tangent dimension! ON MARS!]" she pointed up at the sky. "[No, wait! It's not on Mars, it is Mars! But not our Mars! another Mars that's on a parallel wavelength... thing.]" She then started using her hands like puppets for illustration. "[And, like, there's this dragon! Named Trogdor! And he, like, has no stomach, because whatever he eats gets sent to this universe! And my dad was this knight who fought him, but he was all burninated. And mom was a witch, so she gave me gave me a magic seed that I got superpowers from. But she got burninated too. So I fought the dragon but it ate me. So that's why I'm here!]"

Milly did everything she could not to laugh. That was by far the worst story she had ever been told. It's a wonder who she thought would believe such a rediculous-

"Ooooh! Poor dear!" said Nia, who got down on the grass to give the girl a hug. "[Don't worry, we'll find a way to get you back. Until then, you can stay with us as long as you want...]"

Milly stared at the scene with disbelief. How could anyone be so gullible?

And yet...

Milly noticed that her own features had suddenly taken on a very "elven" appearance. She was willing to bet anything that the sudden arrival of this new girl probably wasn't a coincidence. After all, how many elves wore wear t-shirts and jeans?

No, whatever was going on, this girl was her first hint.

"[So, tell me...]" Milly said. "[What was your name again? I don't think we ever got that.]"

"My name?" the girl looked startled. "[My name is Ho-]" the girl paused, as if her train of thought had suddenly changed direction. "[...oooo-n'kale. Hon'kale. It's, um, an elf word that means 'very lucky'.]"

"I see." Milly smiled. This girl looked like an easy egg to crack. "Well, Hon'kale, how would you like to join the Justice Society?"

---

"Well that does it." Merasmus slammed his book shut. "I've run through every test I can imagine, pondered the wisdom of every ancient, scoured every tome of unknowable knowledge that I of." He pointed his index finger at Kallen. "It is because of these very facts, that I have no choice but to conclude that you, Kallen Stadtfeld-"

"Kozuki." said Kallen.

"Kallen Kozuki, are unmistakably, indisputably, and without any doubt whatsoever... A HORRIBLE, flesh-eating ZOMBIE!"

This announcement was made somewhat less impressive by the nearby medic's snoring.

"Dude." Tamaki said. "That was one of the first things you ruled out."

"FOOL!" said Merasmus. "You DARE question a MAGICIAN? I can tell just by LOOKING at her that she is clearly an EMACIATED, ROTTING corpse animated by the FOULEST of oh wait no she doesn't look anything like that does she?" the alleged 'magician' tossed the book over his shoulder, smacking Tamaki in the head. "Well, I'm out of ideas. She's probably just a freak, then." he then turned 180 degrees to face Tamaki. "Now, about my fee..."

"Fee? What fee?" Tamaki sputtered. "You didn't do anything!"

"YOU INSIGNIFICANT MICROBE." Merasmus was suddenly wrapped in a wreath of flames. "You DARE to deny a MAGICIAN his hard-earned PROFITS? For such insolence, I ougt to STRING YOU UP in the deepest, darkest part of THE NETHERREALM, where your body will turn itself INSIDE-OUT in UTTER TERROR, but you'll still be ALIVE to hear the haunting music of THE DEVIL'S ORCHESTRA OF THE DAMNED! And you know the thing about the damned? They only know one song, AND THEY'RE REALLY BAD AT IT!"

"OKAY I'M SORRY I WON'T DO THAT AGAIN." Tamaki curled up into a fetal position on his seat.

"...need a... dispenser over here..." the medic snored.

"That's better." Merasmus returned to his normal, less on-fire self. "Now, since you clearly don't have the authority to make such a transaction, I shall await the return of your master. Toodles." And then he walked out of the room.

"…I'd better get going, too." muttered Kallen as she got out of her bed.

"Woah, hey! You can't just do that!" Tamaki got up from his own seat. "Zero's gonna throw a fit if he finds out you left before-"

"...what do you think he's going to do, fire me?" Kallen gave Tamaki an annoyed stare. "Look, I still don't know what's going on but I feel fine. Okay?"

Tamaki iched the back of his neck as he looked up at the ceiling with a mild grimace. "Allright, suit yourself. But if anyone asks, I was never here."

Kallen lurched out of the room, her joints still stiff from all the bed-rest.

"Okay. I've got annoying superpowers and an easily avoidable weakness:" she thought."I'll be fine if I just stay out of jewelry stores and churches."

The door-handle snapped off as Kallen tried to leave the medical wing. She glared at the broken handle as she continued to ponder her situation. "Either whatever happened to me isn't supposed to be a curse, or the bad stuff hasn't quite kicked in yet."

She looked at her watch. If she left now, Kallen could probably make it back to the academy in time for lunch. Not that it was an option at this point, seeing how she still couldn't walk through a door without tearing it off its hinges.

"Best thing to do at this point is go home, see if Dad's old library has anything on this, and then get help from an actualwizard." For probably the first time in her life, Kallen was grateful that her father had an unhealthy obsession with the occult. Unless it turned out that these powers were his fault in the first place. Though it's not like her opinion of him could really be any lower at this point.

Now out of the medical bay, Kallen tried to fetch a 10-yen piece out of her pocket to buy a soda from a vending machine, only to accidentally bend it into kind of a taco shape. "Of course that's assuming I don't get arrested for destroying something by accident."

"Well whatever's going on here, I'm not going to get anything done just by sitting around." she mused. She looked up into the cloudless afternoon sky, and watched as an albatross passed overhead.

"I wonder..." Kallen looked around to see if anyone was watching her.

The coast clear, Kallen broke into a brisk run. She accelerated faster and faster as her feet hit the ground with superhuman force. Kallen quickly realized that she had to be careful if she wanted to avoid hurting anyone, so she stuck to the road when she could, steered clear of the island's more crowded areas, and tried to avoid uneven terrain.

But most importantly of all, Kallen did not stick her arms out in front and pretend to be Superman. Because of course that was the sort of thing that little children wearing bathtowels around their necks, not teenagers who moonlighted as hardened mercenaries. "I mean what am I, nine?"she thought.

She then came across a very long stretch of road with nothing of note ahead except for a T-shaped intersection overlooking a long, rocky slope that fed into the ocean.

"...well, might as well give it a shot."

From her jog, Kallen made a mighty leap. She soared, up over the roadway, up over the intersection, up over the-

And then Kallen began to fall as discovered that flight was not, in fact, one of her powers.

As he tumbled down the rocky slope and into the water, Kallen made another discovery: While her body was still invincible, her clothes were not. Nor were they waterproof. She considered herself lucky just to get away with some scuffed shoes and a few tears in her jeans.

"Well, there goes another nostalgic childhood fantasy."Kallen thought as she climbed out of the ocean and onto the rocky beach. "I wonder how much a pair of lead weights cost these days..."

---

BETHANY SNOW: Good evening folks. And welcome back to Channel 52. It is a very solemn night at the station, as we mourn the passing of Earth's greatest protector.

AMBUSH BUG: It is with a heavy heart that I announce the death of one and only Superman. We will never forget his noble sacrifice, as he was horribly murdered fighting a kryptonite elemental created by- hold it, I'm getting an update... this just in! He's already back! False alarm, everyone!

CALENDER MAN: In other news, the Green Lantern Corps. have reported that the notorious space pirate known as "Captain Harlock" has been spotted in the vicinity of our solar system. His current bounty is at seven hundred and seventy seven billion space dollars, and is likely to rise in the coming weeks. Harlock is the third such notorious, intergalactic criminal to be spotted in the past week, after the mysterious "Mister" and the even more enigmatic "Monkey D. Luffy", who is so mysterious that we don't even have a photograph of him. He must really be that scary. And now here's our foreign correspondent, Dr. W, with an update on the new Justice Society.

THE 11TH DOCTOR: Thank you, Calendar Man. I'm here at the Hamarikyu Gardens in Tokyo, following up on your report of the new superteam known as "The Justice Society of Japan". Just one day since the roster was announced, and already the team's recruitment drive is off to a smashing success. I mean just LOOK at all those brave young men, women, genderless aliens, cyborgs, and combinations of the above. I don't think I've seen this many crime-fighters in one place since Super Young Team's own recruitment drive. Anyway, today I'm speaking with the group's publicist, who despite not being a crime-fighter herself has nevertheless decided to hide her true identity for safety reasons. Now tell me, how many new members are you recruiting?

TOTALLY NOT MILLY ASHFORD: It's hard to say, really. But we're estimating somewhere around two, maybe three.

THE 11TH DOCTOR: So you're saying most of these folks will be going home disappointed?

TOTALLY NOT MILLY ASHFORD: Sadly. But it's not often that the Japanese hero community gets together like this, so I'd like to feel like they'll be going home with something, at least.

THE 11TH DOCTOR: Well then, would you like to share with the audience what you expect out of a new recruit?

TOTALLY NOT MILLY ASHFORD: By all means! We're looking for someone driven. Someone anxious to go out and save the day each morning. Someone enthusiastic, animated, a real force of personality. And of course, bringing something new to the table wouldn't hurt.

THE 11TH DOCTOR: Well that's about all the time we have, miss! Back to you, Snow.

BETHANY SNOW: Thank you, Doctor. Coming up, the world's leading Paleontologists discuss the so-called "Hollow Earth" theory. But first, here's Joseph Coyne with the latest on Wall Street...

---

Omake #1: Wherein I Attempt to Write a Humorously Over The Top Drizzt Do'Urden Parody Without Actually Having Read Any Books About Him

Deathstroke was about to pull the trigger, when suddenly an AWESOME drow ranger just came right the fuck out of nowhere and defeated Deathstroke with a single flying karate kick to the face.

"Drizzt Do'Urden?!" Simon exclaimed, "Whaaaaaat are you doing here?!"

"Well, I was just on my way back from fighting Lobo, Larfleeze, Sephiroth, Bizzaro, Solomon Grundy, Gorilla Grodd, Darkseid, Lord English, the Anti-Monitor, the Anti-Sun, the Anti-Christ, the Anti-God, the Anti-Anti Devil, the regular Devil, Vandal Savage, Lolth, Sauron, Morgoth, and my evil twin from the antimatter universe all at the same time (I won of course) when I decided to drop by to see how my daughter was doing!"

"Yay, daddy!" said Hope.

"Hey there, champ!" Drizzt said. He then looked at his watch, which was beeping rapidly. "Uh oh, looks like Mandrakk is trying to eat the multiverse. Again." He winked and gave everyone the thumbs up. "Don't worry. This will only take a minute."

He then got on his Mobius Cycle (which used to be Metron's Mobius Chair before he lost it in a card game because DRIZZT WAS THAT AWESOME) and then zoomed away in a flash of non-euclidian light.

And then everyone swooned and said "He's so dreamy!".

Yes including Deathstroke.

Author's Notes

My god, this chapter turned violent in a hurry. o_0

But that's what you get when you add Deathstroke!

One of the goals for this story was to take fanfiction cliches and kind of reconstruct them. If you've read Hope's entry in the character guide, you know what I'm doing with her, and her behavior in coming up with her own "OC" just reinforces this. Those familiar with my MST series are already familiar with Electra's brand of "KID FROM THE FUTURE WHO MUST SAVE TEH WORLD"ness, with the added problem that she's pretty much the opposite of a hero.

But Ino is a combination of three well-worn cliches; two of which are kind of general, and the other is fandom-specific.

First of all, she's amnesiac. That should already be sending out some "alarm bells" for those well versed in fanfiction cliches. But unlike most examples of laser-guided amnesia, she's clearly forgotten more than the name of her childhood friend who killed her parents and then raped her or whatever. In reality, she probably wouldn't be able to function without constant coaching and supervision.

As for the 'mysterious power', I'd say I'm ahead of most because the power is well-defined, limited in use, and even somewhat inconvenient. You'll see what I mean in later chapters.

Finally, she's an OC Keybearer. The Kingdom Hearts fandom is plagued with the damn things, and the revelation that there used to be a fuckton of Keyblades lying around certainly hasn't helped matters. In fact there was even a game that deconstructed this by having a 14th member of Organization XIII appear who had a Keyblade, but she turned out to be a replica of Sora's memories or something.

But I think the thing that saves these characters from being Mary Sues is that they're part of an ensemble cast. You see, it's my personal belief that a true "Mary Sue" is a character that the world revolves around for no clear reason. These OCs are important, to be sure, but so is everyone else in the cast. At least I hope so.

Also:

I've decided that while Batman is probably Lelouch's favorite superhero, he likes Alan Scott's/Golden Age Green Lantern's/Sentinel's costume better since he digs the opera cape. As Linkara puts it, it's a costume that really shouldn't work and ought to look really silly on an old guy, but somehow looks awesome instead.

And in case anyone asks, I don't mind the fact that Alan Scott of Earth-2 is now gay. What I do mind is that the Allan Scott of Earth-1 no longer exists, at least in canon. *sigh*

For geography nuts, there actually is a tennis court near the Tokyo Tower. I think it belongs to a school or something.

Canonically, Sayaka's magic can only heal herself, buuuuut given the nature of her wish I'm going to say that she can heal others as well. ;)

Excel is still the most fun character to write.

Fun fact: I had a cape when I was a kid, but I didn't pretend to be Superman; I pretended to be Mario.

HAIL ILPALAZZO!