Chapter 6: Out of Body Experience
Slowly her eyes began to flutter their way open. Slowly she began to wake up. Her head was still killing her, but it was nowhere near as bad as it had been in that brief second before she had passed out.
Wonder Woman pushed herself up gingerly. She still had no idea what had happened to her, but she was as determined as ever that she would not be beat. That was why she leapt up into the air as soon as she could, fists held at the ready for whatever may be thrown at her. In that same instant, facing the unknown, she took in all of her surroundings.
This certainly wasn't the Watchtower any more. She had no idea where exactly it was, but the Watchtower it was not. It didn't look like any place that she had ever seen on the Earth before, either. For one thing, she had never seen rocks floating several feet in the air down there. The glistening sunlight wasn't so starkly red anywhere there either, even during the most photogenic of sunsets. Even the sands beneath them looked grayer and felt courser and than the norm. However, particularly with no signs of any aggressors around her, it was what was laid in those sands that truly caught her eye.
It was the others. J'onn. Flash. Bruce. They were all there, and they were all laid out prone. Whatever had hither, whatever had brought them all here, it had got all of them good. However, none of them were waking up as she had done. Wonder Woman had not forgotten that her Gods-given endurance could easily have lead to her recovering from whatever happened quicker than the rest. She just chose to ignore that fact. She had to make sure for herself that all of the others were all right the old fashioned way.
That was why she flew straight back down into the sands and to Batman's side. It had to be him that she went to first. She cared about the other two deeply, but she loved Batman, regardless of his flaws. Perhaps even because of them.
"Bruce!" she called out his name as she landed in the sands beside him, feeling the grains warmth against her knees as she rapidly knelt by his head. She gently took his cowled face between her two hands, softly turning his head so that she was looking him right in the lenses that sheathed his eyes. "Come on Bruce, wake up!"
She scrambled to try and find a pulse, thoughts of the worst scrambling through her brain. Things weren't helped by the fact his strong armour stopped her from finding any veins, not without tearing his suit to shreds. What she did notice, though, was that he was still warm. That was a good sign.
Just seconds later, and just before his neck guard was about to be torn loose, Wonder Woman was feeling great relief as she heard the sounds of him stirring.
"I'm here, Princess," he said with a growl, obviously instantly recognising that it was her leant over him. He spoke softly, but there was enough to it to make it clear that he was relatively unharmed. His gauntlets moved up, gently removing her hands from his face as he pushed himself up to a kneeling position of his own. Wonder Woman kept a steadying arm around him regardless. "Are you all right?"
"I'm fine, Bruce," she quickly assured him, though she couldn't miss the irony. She was the one with the healing of the gods, and he, the mere mortal, was worried about her. It was typically Batman. Granted, he had enough compassion in him to care about anyone who could have been in danger, no matter how much he hid it, but Wonder Woman still felt almost like there had been more to his words with it being her they were said to. That made her smile. It helped her to momentarily forget that the two of them still hadn't had the reunion she had been waiting for, that he still didn't know if he was ready to move forward, or not. Then she remembered that this was not all about the two of them right now. No matter how much she cared for Bruce, she wasn't about to abandon the mission, or her friends. This was about more than just the two of them. She was an Amazon warrior, for Hera's sake. "Come on, we have to check on the others."
But, barely had she said the words than it turned out that they didn't have to act on them. They didn't even have to stand, let alone move over to where the other two lay. Barely had Wonder Woman said the words than Flash was speaking up behind them.
"Man, what hit me? I feel like I just took a double decker bus to the face... Woah, big guy, you've stopped screaming!"
Wonder Woman quickly looked across the sands. Just as what she was hearing implied, both of her two friends had woken up too. Whatever had happened to them, they had all made it here intact, wherever here was. And, as Flash had pointed out, J'onn had stopped screaming. He was still pretty much laid out flat, his face still looked twisted in pain, but he was conscious and his screams had gone. Now, not even a whimper was escaping him.
"The attack on my mind has...lessened," J'onn answered, not turning to look at the others. His voice sounded strained. While Wonder Woman's headache had now passed, clearly the influence of the energy cloud on J'onn's telepathic brain had not gone completely. Wonder Woman could therefore only assume that it was still relatively close by. That put her right back on guard again.
"Glad to hear it. Now where the heck are we?" Flash, typically, was able to fling himself up to his feet fast. With his speed, he even had time to run around the area, having a scout about to see what he could find before anyone else could respond. By the time he halted back in front of them, though, all that he had achieved was to kick up a miniature dust devil of sand. "This place looks totally wacky to me. I certainly haven't been here before, except maybe once on a trip I took in college..."
That last comment was left forgotten. Even Wonder Woman had learned enough of Man's World now to know what he meant, and to know that he wasn't being serious. J'onn still wasn't moving, but both Wonder Woman and Batman had returned to their feet. Diana moved over to stand by Wally's side as he continued looking around, though Batman stayed where he was, studying the surroundings his own way. Wonder Woman left him to it. Flash's direct action approach was more her style anyway.
"I don't know it either," she answered him. "All I can say is a lot of places where we're not."
"How did we get here anyway?" Flash carried on with the questions. "Last thing I remember we were safe and sound in our space orbitter. How the heck did a flying light bulb get us out of there?"
"It didn't," Batman spoke up, so unexpectedly and forcefully that Flash almost leapt out of his skin. Wonder Woman quickly turned to face Bruce again. His back was to them at first as he stared out at the expanses around them, but that didn't last as he carried on. "I think we're still aboard the Watchtower. Or at least, I think our bodies are."
"You're not... Are you saying that we... Are we dead?" Flash stumbled around the words. He clearly didn't want to think about that. Wonder Woman didn't particularly want to either, not that she thought that it was true. It didn't take long for Batman to assuage any of Flash's fears.
"No, we're alive. Or at least we should be, so long as there wasn't too much damage to the Watchtower. We know that the cloud was made of practically pure energy, we know that it possesses strong telepathic abilities. I think that it somehow stripped our thought processes, our consciousnesses away from our physical forms. I think that when the energy of its light surrounded us, it somehow absorbed our minds. Right now, what we're seeing... I believe that its a projection, an image. So are our own forms here, all the gear that's come here with us, that's just our way of comprehending all this in a way we'd understand. I believe we're inside that cloud. Or at least, our thoughts are."
"Okay... You lost me at stripping," Flash muttered. He did indeed look confused. Wonder Woman wasn't overly clear on things herself, not that Batman hadn't done a decent job of explaining his point. It was just that what he was saying sounded so unbelievable. She couldn't see how it was possible. She didn't particularly want to. The idea of having her mind ripped out of her body was not one that she wanted to contemplate, especially as Batman was yet to make any comment about how to get them back. She certainly didn't know a way to do it.
"Batman is correct," J'onn softly groaned from the sands at their feet, drawing all attention back to him. After all, it was the first thing he had said since his incident had begun. He took a steadying breath before continuing, though. Wonder Woman knelt down by his side as he did so, as if telling him not to use excessive effort to make himself heard. Flash quickly followed her lead. Batman stayed exactly where he was, but he was always listening closely.
"Right, I know he's frustratingly right almost all of the time, but how is that possible this time? What he's saying's crazy!" Flash argued in J'onn's break between words.
"It was believed to just be a myth," J'onn began again, ignoring Flash's comment. Wonder Woman took his hand to further help him through this, as the big Martian was clearly still in a lot of pain. "My people have spoken of such a thing since ages long past. The Transcendence, they called it. It was said that if Martians died whilst in telepathic communication with one another, then there was a link keeping their thoughts in existence. Provided the mind wasn't instantly destroyed during death, it would remain connected with the others in the telepathic link. They would literally become beings of the mind alone. They would become thoughts consisting solely of the energy such thoughts create."
Once again, J'onn paused to recapture some much needed breath. Flash looked ready to jump in with another witty comment when presented the opportunity, but Wonder Woman took the chance from him with a shake of her head directed his way. She loved Wally's humour; it helped stop the darkness of what they all did from becoming overwhelming. However, she knew that now wasn't the time for it. They had to at least hear J'onn out first. With Flash taking her hint, J'onn was then able to continue on as soon as he felt able.
"It was long believed possible, but it was also never tested. The process of Transcendence was always said to work best with multiple minds contributing to the telepathic connection. But such numbers would never volunteer to sacrifice their physical existence on merely the chance that the Transcendence was real. However, there is no longer any doubts. It is not just a rumour. It cannot be. This energy 'cloud' is the proof. It is the amalgamation of many deceased beings. It is the amalgamation of scores of bodiless minds. As Batman suggested, this place where we have found ourselves is an illusion they have created to give their realm a sense of normality, to make it so they can cope, comprehend and live as close to how they all did before they died. We are not alone in here."
"Wait, there's other Martians in here?" Flash blurted out in surprise. Wonder Woman never had the chance to keep him quiet this time. He jumped in before J'onn had even begun his latest pause.
"That is correct," J'onn answered, looking as if he had tried to begin a nod before deciding better of it. "I can sense them on my mind. And there's more than I can single out to count at this time."
"But I thought you guys are... were... are... Whatever they are, your lot loved peace didn't they? What're they doing attacking us all, even if they are just creepy brains these days? What are they doing attacking you like this?" Flash jumped in again. Wonder Woman wouldn't have stopped him this time. It was a question that had occurred to her as well, a very important one. The only answer that came to mind was not one that she particularly enjoyed.
"It was them that caused my pain to be debilitating aboard the Watchtower, yes," J'onn gave the actual answer. "But it was all in an attempt to warn me. I told you that my people believed Transcendence to be a myth. This is the first time such an event is ever known to have happened. They are still learning about the powers they have in their new form and way of life, especially regarding connecting to an outsider. They are still learning just how strong so many minds combined can be, particularly against someone else so attuned to telepathy. They harmed me by accident, overwhelming my mind. They are still doing so, albeit not quite to the same extent, though that could just be because we're now a lot closer. I haven't the strength compared to them to break through and tell them to stop."
"But why did they bring us in here? What are they trying to warn you about?" Wonder Woman couldn't help herself this time. She got in before Flash could. She had to hear the words. She had to know if they had another major fight on their hands. She had to know if she had guessed right.
However, it wasn't J'onn who answered this time. Batman did it for him.
"The Imperium."
Wonder Woman hadn't noticed, but during the talk Batman had walked over to stand right by their side. Right now he was looking down at them, and Wonder Woman could not stop herself from looking right back up at him. She definitely did not like where this was going.
"Hordes of the minions must have been there when the Martians Transcended. They would have been swept up in the creation of the cloud, just as we have been now. That's why the Martians in here had to warn J'onn. The Imperium will believe they are still at war with all Martians. The last fully living one would be a target they couldn't ignore. With their own kind long gone from the Solar System, J'onn gives them their best chance for answers and to get home, or to find a new one to make their home."
Wonder Woman heard Flash audibly gulp at that point. She knew why. She could remember the Justice League's last – and only other – encounter with the Imperium. Of course they had been regular, albeit alien, physical beings then. It had actually been the mission where the Justice League had been formed. They were the threat that had made Diana feel she had no choice but to leave Themyscira to help safeguard Man's World. They had caused her first meeting with Batman...
And they had tried to make the Earth theirs. They had tried to completely block out the sun that was so hazardous to them by ionising the entire sky. They had revealed nothing about their long term plans for humanity, but based on the weaponry they unleashed and their track record on Mars, it was pretty clear that it would not be good. If the human race wasn't enslaved they would have been wiped out. Thankfully the Justice League had found a way to stop them. The Imperium – named after their leader as they didn't seem to have a name of their own – had either been destroyed or had fled into the farthest reaches of space, their leader among the lost. They had not been heard from since, not even a peep. Their threat had been defeated.
Until now.
"And I have lead them straight to the Earth," J'onn added to what Batman had said, now sounding guilty as well as hurt. "I am sorry."
"J'onn! Don't even say that!" Wonder Woman reacted fiercely to that statement. She was not happy about what she was hearing, but they had beaten the Imperium once and she was sure, no matter the circumstances that they found themselves in, they could do so again. Regardless of all that, she would never blame J'onn for this anyway. "This is not your fault! You couldn't have seen this coming!"
"Besides," Flash backed her up. "It's not like you asked them here. Now come on, big guy, less mopey, more talky. How we gonna beat them this time? There a way for us to leave this cloud doohickey?"
"We..." J'onn began to answer him, but he got cut off. Batman interrupted him, his tone full of urgency. Looking up again, Wonder Woman immediately saw why.
"That can wait. We've got incoming!"
Batman had the explosive batarang removed from his utility belt, hurling it away before he had finished talking. It was almost like he had seen them coming before they had even arrived, but then he had been the one who wasn't focused purely on J'onn. It was a good job too. It meant the start of the first wave were taken care of before they could unleash any kind of surprise attack.
They came out of nowhere. They didn't walk in, they didn't fly, they didn't even crawl up through the sands. They just literally appeared from thin air. They looked almost exactly like Wonder Woman remembered, although perhaps they were even less solid. They were gelatinous in nature, albeit in a humanoid form, coloured a murky, patchy white. They were hardly imposing or intimidating to look at, but that was irrelevant next to what they were capable of. They were definitely not to be taken lightly. That was why Wonder Woman was glad to see the first batch all completely taken out by Batman's batarang, caught up in its explosive blast. The problem was that they were not alone. More were following in the wake of the first group, appearing just like their predecessors.
And Wonder Woman knew that Batman didn't have enough batarangs for all of them. They might not be physical beings any more, but the heroes were still in a fight.
Wonder Woman quickly leapt to her feet, fists raised, ready to charge at the aggressors. The Imperium had arrived a short distance away. Obviously they wanted to be seen first, they wanted the four to know what was coming for them, likely to try and weaken their resolve. That meant that Batman had the time to halt Wonder Woman's charge before it had really began, an arm thrust out across her path to block her off. Wonder Woman flashed him an angry glare because of it. Eight months ago he had forcefully kept her from a fight where the fate of the entire world was at stake, albeit to protect her. He was not doing that to her again. Wonder Woman was a warrior. She was going to fight. Thankfully, it turned out that Batman had not forgotten that aspect of her in his time away.
"Princess, guard J'onn," he commanded, drawing more weapons to fight the Imperium as he did so. "He's their target. Keep him safe. Flash, with me!"
He didn't wait to hear her reply. He was already leaping into action, already tossing another batarang into the throngs of villains surging towards them. Wonder Woman deeply wanted to chase after him, but she knew that he was right. Damn it, he was right. Tactically it made sense. Someone had to protect J'onn. In his current state he could hardly protect himself, and there was no guarantees that the Imperium wouldn't be able to find a way to him if there wasn't someone on guard. And Wonder Woman was the obvious choice. Of the three of them, she was the most powerful, the least reliant on being able to move. She was the one who could most be counted on to hold the ground around J'onn, the one who could be most relied upon to take everything the enemy could throw at her without having to get out of the way. Besides which, she couldn't abandon J'onn to these guys anyway.
But none of that changed the fact that she wanted to be in the heart of the action. She wanted to be right at the front-line. She wanted to be right at Batman's side, and to keep him by hers. There was no way of knowing for sure what their fate would be if they lost this fight, if the Imperium managed to "kill" them in here. It was entirely possible that the death of their illusionary bodies in this illusionary world could destroy the traces of their minds that now existed in the cloud. Wonder Woman did not want to be finding out if that was indeed the case. She wouldn't do at any time, but especially not when her eight month vigil was finally over.
Flash only paused to offer her a shrug before dashing after Batman and into the fight that was only seconds away.
"He's definitely back," he commented, before he became a blur. Wonder Woman couldn't resist a slight nod of her head before dropping back and taking a guarding stance above the still prone J'onn.
But she kept her eye firmly on the battle as much as she possibly could. She kept her eyes on Batman.
This was definitely not how she had hoped their long-awaited reunion to go. She could only pray that the fates – or Bruce himself – were not about to take those hopes away from her.
Flash was on top of the attackers in no time at all. He hit his targeted Imperium soldier the same second that the batarang struck the next one along, both enemies falling but not staying down for long. Flash, however, kept on running, sending punches into all the soldiers that he could as he went, not staying still for long enough to give them an easy chance of striking back. These guys didn't have the guns that they had back during that first encounter, but Flash remembered that they could still pack one hell of a punch without them. At least they could when they weren't just imaginary... or whatever, mental beings. There was no way that a mere bunch of brainwaves could punch him, was there? Surely.
Still, this was a fight, and to win it Flash could only think to fight it like any other, so he kept on hitting the Imperium while avoiding getting hit himself. Unless Bats or J'onn came up with another gem about this place that was all he could do.
Another batarang sizzled past Flash's ear. It was an explosive one again, catching the Imperium who had been lined up as the next victim of a Wally West sucker punch. Flash only just had time to react and change course so the short-lived fires didn't lick at him too.
"Flash, watch out! You're getting too close!" Batman's voice sprang out from somewhere behind him, punctuated with grunts of effort. He was clearly engaging the Imperium himself, locked in a fist fight, featuring gadgets, that Flash couldn't see. Flash, however, felt more annoyed than concerned. That guy had been his. Instead, he very nearly got flames to the face.
"Relax!" he called back without looking, just carrying on with his rampage. More and more of the bad guys were being turned to goo by his flying fists, the equivalent of knocking them out. Of course, they could well be doing their Terminator 2 act in no time once they had 'woken up', but every long moment that they were just a mess in the sands was a long moment that they weren't attacking. Do it enough times and these guys would be beat. "I mean, come on! You said yourself that all this is in our heads. They can't really hu–!"
Flash really hated irony. It always had a way of biting him right on the ass. He hadn't even got the word out when one of those amoeba-like villains finally managed to hit him, clotheslining him across the chin. He had gotten too cocky. He hadn't seen it until it was too late. He was sent sprawling, flying off of his feet and skidding across the sands.
But that wasn't the bad part. He could quickly get back up again, he could quickly start running again. The bad part was that getting hit like that hurt. It really hurt.
He had been wrong. It didn't matter that they were just an image created by their minds. It seemed that here, inside the cloud, the projections had essentially created a physical form, or at least gave them all the sensations of one. Pain was definitely a part of that. Right now, Flash's chin was throbbing.
Worse, falling like he had had allowed the Imperium to gather around him, encircling him. It may have been easy for Flash to haul himself back to his feet before another blow could come in, and it may have been easy for him to start running. But all that was useless if there wasn't somewhere where he could run. These guys had him trapped, they had him completely cornered. Any direction that he ran, he would just run straight into one of them, and now Flash didn't want to be doing that again. They could pack a real wallop for a bunch of ghosts... With the circle around him getting rows deep, Flash's eyes widened in fear, desperately looking for a way out of this. He had learned the hard way that even in the cloud he could be wounded. He didn't want to also find out if he could be killed in here.
Thankfully he didn't have to find out. The head of the grapple burst through a line of the Imperium like an alien through John Hurt, latching on hard to the last in the line in place of displaced gooey innards. One hard tug was all it took for the entire line of Imperium to fall like a bunch of pins during a strike. Like with Flash, unless more damage was done to them they wouldn't be staying down for long, but that clearly wasn't necessary. They hadn't been toppled to be beaten. They had been toppled to provide Flash with a way out. The line of fallen soldiers gave him a perfect escape route from his predicament, a perfect path out of the entrapment.
And it was an escape Flash quickly took, running right over the top of all those fallen Imperiums. His feet almost crushed them all as he ran, particularly due to his speeds. An added bonus. Perhaps those ones would be staying down after all. Flash actually smirked a little before skidding to a halt beside Batman, although not before punching away an Imperium that had been allowed to get a bit too close to the broody guy, no doubts as a consequence of him giving Flash his way out.
"I told you to be careful!" Batman chastised Flash with a furious growl as the two wound up back-to-back, looking at the hordes of Imperium still around them. "Its entirely possible that you could get killed in here. If you do then your mind will be lost forever! You'll be dead in every sense of the word!"
"I got it!" Flash firmly stated back, rubbing his throbbing chin for emphasis. His own voice wasn't exactly sounding light-hearted in that moment. He didn't like being treated like a misbehaving child, even if he did know it was Batman's way of showing he cared, that he wanted to protect Flash. That he counted Flash as a friend. "We can't do this the simple way. So what's your better plan then?"
Batman threw a punch as another Imperium got too close. With the two back-to-back, that meant that Flash was able to look beyond as Batman occupied the nearest attacker. He could see that some of the Imperium had gotten through their two man line of defence. Not surprising really, especially given that hiccup he had just had. Wonder Woman was fighting them, doing a remarkable job of keeping any and all of them away from J'onn in the fleeting look Flash took.
His attention was quickly brought back to his own fight as another Imperium came charging at them, this one more his side than Batman's. Whirling his hands in rapid circles, he created a gust that blew the alien away. It landed a fair distance away, right against one its fellows, causing one heck of a splat. However, they were also reforming near instantly, sped along by the narrow spread of their materials.
"To stay alive," Batman finally growled a very simplistic answer to Flash's question, causing Flash to look at him with a 'that's it?' kind of expression on his face. He wanted to actually say those words, but he didn't get them out before Batman was diving against some more charging Imperium, tackling them to the ground before they could run past and on towards J'onn and Wonder Woman. Just seconds before he did so, Flash noticed that Batman was very intently checking up on those two with a glance of his own.
However, Flash was then left to just get on with it. There were plenty of Imperium left to get rid of. There was plenty of fighting left to do. So back into the throngs of the horde he ran, only this time, he would be more careful.
Wonder Woman sent her fist crashing into yet another Imperium soldier, before performing a flying back flip through the air to stop another one before he could attack J'onn. The big Martian was trying to get up to help her, but all he had done so far was to cause his pain to momentarily heighten and make him let out another quick scream. It was all up to Wonder Woman to keep all the Imperium from him that had made it past Batman and the Flash.
And she was doing a damn good job of it too. She wasn't up against the same kind of numbers that Batman and Flash were, but then she also wasn't covering anywhere near so much ground. Her fighting was more compact, and so it felt all the more intense. Hera, these Imperium seemed to really want to get their hands on J'onn. Almost inevitably, it indeed seemed like they wanted to kill him. Wonder Woman would not let that happen. She would guard him to the end, just as she would anyone worthy of such protection. She would give it every ounce of strength she had, every last breath if that was what it took.
But that didn't mean that she also wasn't keeping one eye on Bruce. Whenever she could she cast a glance his way, to the only man who could, and would, ever truly capture her heart.
The one man who had yet to confirm to her that she could also still have his...
"Diana..." J'onn groaned up, catching her attention instantly.
Wonder Woman finished sticking her fist through the 'head' of the last Imperium soldier close enough to J'onn to be an immediate threat before turning to him. For one brief moment she was scared that she had missed something, that perhaps she had been so distracted with her current targets that a soldier or two had snuck past her to J'onn. Thankfully that turned out to be paranoia. However, when she did turn back to the pained Martian, she certainly didn't get an overly pleasant surprise.
"The cloud, I can feel it..." J'onn resumed, croaking out the words. "It's moving. It's heading for the Earth. Diana, it's attacking... We have to stop it, now. We have to get out of here..."
She didn't have time to react straight away. More Imperium were drawing near, ready to attack like the others. Wonder Woman whipped her lasso from her hip, swinging it around them with great precision just before they could arrive. Pulling it tight, she was able to make them fall, cutting deep into their not entirely solid bodies. That made it easy for her to sweep forward and pound them all out of the fight.
The instant she was done, though, she was back to J'onn's side. Now she could react. Now she could show her worry at such a thought. The Imperium attacking them were still too numerous. There was no way to get away from them, never mind stop and figure out a way to affect the very cloud that now contained them.
"Then we're in trouble," she muttered, looking out at the hordes again. As she did so, for the briefest of moments she caught Batman looking back to her in between Imperium aggressors. For that moment, their eyes locked. She knew that in hers Batman would be able to read that worry, along with the determination not to give up, to keep fighting. She also knew that he would see how glad she was to at least be facing this with him back at her side.
But she could see nothing in his. With his lenses covering his eyes he was giving nothing away. Eight months was really a very long time when she thought about it. It was time for plenty of things to change, for opinions to change, for promises to be broken...
She quickly cast such thoughts from her head. Now was the time for worry of a different sort. There wasn't time to be selfish right now, even if such worries were true and not just paranoid delusions. Right now, the world needed them. The rest of the Justice League might be able to stop the cloud from the outside where they had failed, but she very much had the sense that they were in the best position to act, to somehow take this thing down from within. Right now she had to give all her efforts to the fight, to finding some way past these Imperium soldiers so that they could get to work saving the world again. And that wasn't even mentioning finding some way to get their minds back into their bodies.
But that was all easier said than done.
"Indeed. We all are," J'onn agreed with her comment. More Imperium were almost upon them. Wonder Woman braced herself to engage them again, but not before J'onn had added three simple words. "Very big trouble."
A/N:
So there you go. They ain't dead yet – and neither are plenty of certain aliens who were long thought gone. Be honest now, how many of you predicted it?
Review/follow/favourite away, but particularly the first one. Last few chapters too if you haven't already. 'tis all greatly desired and appreciated.
In return, you'll soon get to see what happens next (though still likely in about a week, despite the use of puppy eyes by some - apologies), as that cloud starts to show the Earth how bad storms can really be. These four ain't the only ones with a battle on their hands.
And this thing is only just getting started...