Chapter 30: Spirit in the Sky

He was still watching, still keeping tabs on things. He was still trying to dig up some way that he could help from up on the Watchtower, but all of that was proving beyond fruitless. Still, Mr. Terrific couldn't exactly just sit back, watch and eat popcorn. He had to try and help out out all of his fellow Justice Leaguers, and at the very least keep a weather eye open for any signs of other dangers, just in case he had to warn his friends and colleagues.

And that was why, despite being so far away, he saw it all unfold. He had seen the cloud's final attacks on Metropolis, had seen as the military had fought back, and he had seen the Justice League's desperate attempt to get that cloud out of the city and away from the danger zone.

But most importantly now, he had sign all of the signs of the cloud's end, before the others had got it clear.

Except they weren't the signs that he was expecting. They weren't the signs of death.

Instead, they were signs of true hope for all of this.

Snapper Carr had hardly moved. He was still laid out in the remains of his news helicopter, exactly where it had been left in the city after being almost totally destroyed, forgotten. In truth he still didn't feel like he could move. He was still feeling the full brunt of the hurt the aliens had unleashed on him, wherever he had been before he woken up here again. It wasn't as bad as it had been before he had returned, but it was still bad. It was still practically crippling.

But at least from here he could still see what was going on up there, high in the sky. When this was all over, and just as soon as he was feeling up to it, he would still have a story to tell. And, no matter how it ended, what a story it would be. That said, though, Snapper was still dreaming of this tale having a happy ending. Even if bad news sold better, any news needed to have a surviving audience to hear it.

Right now, though, a true corner stone of the piece was unfolding. Even without being completely clued in, without having all the details and the full low down on the situation, he could still recognise the signs of such a significant event. It was pretty blatant that this was the end. The fact that the energy cloud that had once looked so menacingly unstoppable was now falling to pieces made it shockingly clear.

And yet that wasn't the only story up there. Nor was what that cloud falling apart could mean for the people like him still in the city.

No, this Snapper really hadn't expected to see.

Without taking his eyes off the sight unfolding up there before everyone, Snapper turned to his cameraman, still sat there at his side. This. This would sell the story for months to come. The fight with this cloud and all that he had been through was already a story which could make a career. This could mean his name would go down forever in the journalism hall of fame.

This could mean the world was saved.

And it could mean an awful lot for just two of the world's most prominent heroes.

"Tell me you've some way of getting this?!"

Stood atop the skyscraper, Green Arrow saw it all. In his current role directing the Justice League's evacuation efforts, it was his job to be watchful, to see everything. Even if it hadn't been, this was something that would prove to be well worth seeing.

It had only been a matter of minutes since that missile had made it into the centre of the cloud, letting loose its entire payload right in the heart of the neutralised threat. From how desperate GL and Shayera had been to stop it, Arrow didn't need to have the inside track on what was going on to know that it hadn't been something the League had wanted to let happen. There had been a plan, a plan that was working. Or had been working, before the military had decided to weigh in. Arrow had spent enough of this situation alongside Mulligan to know without doubt that it was he who had given the order. The man had never been happy with the Justice League's methods, had wanted the cloud destroyed right from the start, in spite of the consequences. He certainly wasn't happy about Batman's plan to end this, and so he had clearly unleashed one of his own. And now a lot of people could be about to suffer.

Bats. Diana. J'onn. They were all still up there, and from the sound of things so were a lot of other people who needed saving. People needed saving down here too, but the bad guys who had brought the cloud here weren't the threat any more. It was Mulligan and his damn missile.

Yet the damage was already done. That much was as plain as day. There would be no going back from it, no undoing it. They could only try and save the day in spite of it.

The cloud was fractured, rupturing, its energy no longer vibrant. The thing was dying, and dying right above the city. It was ripping apart, crumbling into pieces, pieces that would soon have to fall. Based on what they had seen so far, those would be pieces falling down right on top of the people still sheltering by the Metropolis waterfront.

And the heroes down there trying to save them.

"Green Arrow to Shayera!" he called hurriedly down his comm. It had only been a couple of minutes since he had sent her in there. It was only proper that he let her know exactly what he had sent her into. "In case you've been too busy to pay attention, you might want to hurry things along! I reckon we're well into our final countdown here!"

"I've seen it, Arrow, but I'm not abandoning these people!" Shayera's voice returned, sounding strained as if she was currently carrying plenty of weight. "We've got friends up there, we have to trust that they can do their job!"

"It's too late, there's nothing GL and the rest can do!" Green Arrow began to argue, remembering all the futile efforts before to stop all of this. "We...need... I mean... Its..."

Arrow's attempted sentences all droned off before they had properly begun. The developing sight had that effect on him. Time was already up. This was the clouds time of dying, the precise moment of it. Arrow watched to his horror as all the energy that was left rippling around the thing imploded deep towards the clouds innards, coupled with a thunderous roar. The next moment, the ruptures seemed to grow, the pieces of the cloud getting further apart. What was left joining it all together was getting stretched far too thin.

But there was enough time left for one final act by the cloud, a final act that Green Arrow had never seen coming. Despite it all, despite the cloud being only a second from becoming a thousand deadly pieces, it still found the time to change its shape one last time.

It was gone almost as soon as it had appeared, but it still lasted long enough for Green Arrow to draw in every line, every trace of it. Not only that, but Green Arrow knew that this would be something that the whole world would see, that it would become one of the world's truly enduring images. It went beyond the fact that it was almost symbolic of a final effort to save the world, an effort that looked like it might well work. It was an especially powerful sight as no one out there would likely have seen it coming, and yet at the same time it just looked so right.

Once before the cloud had changed into the combined symbols of Batman and Wonder Woman. Now it had changed into the shape of the two themselves, with them still inside the thing.

An image of the two of them, locked in the most passionate of embraces.

Green Lantern was still fighting, still trying to drive the cloud away from the city in tandem with what was clearly the efforts of Batman and Wonder Woman. The others up there around him were all doing so too. It was in the midst of those actions that they all saw it.

The implosion of the energy the cloud still had, the tearing of its remaining pieces into even smaller parts, the darkening of it all. The cloud was dying, finally and without reversal. This was it, all too soon. It was still over the city...

But as things evolved, moments before the actual end Green Lantern saw and understood that their helpers were not done yet. Batman and Wonder Woman still had one last bout of tricks up their sleeves.

Before all of that though, GL couldn't help but focus on simply what he saw. His talk with Diana in the Watchtower's commissary seemed like so very long ago, but in truth it had only been hours at most. How quickly things could change. How much people could go through in so short a time, especially when they were in love. Especially when they were those two in love. Seeing them both up there, visually formed in the cloud up in the skies for all to see, locked in each other's hold, it brought everything home.

Next to him in the sky, Green Lantern saw Captain Atom turn to look at him in shock at that moment. For someone whose entire head was made of energy within a suit, he was sure showing plenty of surprise. No doubt all the others were too, though none would be finding it an unpleasant one. Batman and Wonder Woman. They just had that effect on people. Right now, with the whole world surely watching what was happening here, a whole lot of people would be feeling that pleasant surprise.

But things weren't done here. Batman and Wonder Woman wouldn't have done this just to show off their feelings for each other. This was all part of the fight, part of the effort to ensure this cloud harmed as few people as possible. GL didn't know all the ins and outs of the cloud, but he was still sure that everything they were doing, including the cloud changing its shape to show them off, was connected. It was all a part of saving Metropolis, and the entire Martian race. GL was not about to let those efforts be lost in vain by losing his own focus. He had to keep his concentration. He had to keep fighting.

However, the moment when the cloud finally shattered showed just how much Batman and Wonder Woman had fought. What had just been an image of two of Earth's best was now just thousands of shards of death. This had been what GL had feared for a while now, pieces of the cloud falling from the body towards the city, ready to kill all they touched...

Only they weren't falling towards the city. Somehow, thankfully, the finally traces of energy in the cloud exploded stateside, blasting the shards outwards. Those shards, they were all falling towards the ocean, out of harms way. Somehow, Batman and Wonder Woman had saved the day.

Although, there was one piece that didn't go that way, one piece that did go towards the city. He had managed to keep himself prepared, but even with the power of his ring GL couldn't stop it, just as he couldn't stop the pieces that had fallen before. The efforts of the others couldn't do anything significant against it either. However, as the last bastion of what had once been a vast cloud smashed through the green light, GL noticed that it wasn't as energetic as before.

And that alone made him realise that maybe this was all a part of the plan too.

Flash finally stopped running, dropping off the final few Metropolis citizens he had been carrying clear of the last tower the cloud had hit. It had been pretty hairy at moments, but he had managed to get everyone out in one piece. Some might need looking after to stay in tip top shape, but they were all alive.

He hadn't taken them all the way. He hadn't carried all of those people all of the way out of the city, or all of the way to Mulligan's military checkpoint where the government's evacuation was centred. He had taken them far enough so that they wouldn't be threatened when their tower finally fell, or hopefully so that they were now beyond the cloud's immediate reach.

That was why Superman had finally been able to let the tower fall. He had directed it of course, minimising the collateral damage as much as Kryptonianly possible, but Flash had still seen the dust cloud forming as the tonnes of concrete and metal and glass hit the deck. Still, he hadn't stayed watching for long. The action was still ongoing, and the director had yet to call cut. He planned on waiting only long enough for Supes to display his own super speed and join him so that they could head off together to save the next bunch of civilians. However, when Big Boy Blue did arrive, that plan never came to be. The big bang was too distracting.

It boomed out just seconds after Superman had whizzed into view, meaning that both Flash and Supes were looking up into the skies before there was even a chance to say hello. In doing so, they both saw it all unfolding, as did all those rescued people just behind them. Flash tried not to listen to all the gasps, the screams, the shouts of surprise, in no small part because it probably wouldn't do to let them see he was feeling all the emotion right there with them. They still needed him and the others to be strong.

This was the clouds end. Flash saw the energy draw in, breaking the whole thing apart. It was done for, pieces being sent scattering. But they weren't sent scattering out over the city. They had all been directed, almost every part out towards the ocean. Only one major bit was sent the other way, but Flash quickly put it all together. This wasn't the end that they had all feared. This was what they had wanted, what they had planned. The sight that had gone out to the world the moment before the cloud had broken apart showed that.

Bats and Wondy. Kissing.

He had hardly been able to believe it the first time he had seen it, deep within the cloud. Even after J'onn had confirmed that there had long been something brewing between those two, Flash had been amazed by it. Seeing it all happening again now, he was still amazed. Bats and Wondy. Wow. Just... wow.

Apparently Flash wasn't the only one who had been late to learn about this. The two must have been playing their cards close to their chests, until they just stuck them out there for the entire world to see. Even their best buddy looked shocked. Especially their best buddy seemed shocked.

Superman's jaw was hung lower than his cape from the instant the cloud showed Bats and Wondy duelling tongues. It stayed there beyond the cloud's final end, beyond the end of all of the danger that had plagued this day. Flash was just about starting to feel the need to give him a prod, since they did need to move things along after all. However, all of a sudden Superman's jaw closed, his head tilting as if he was listening to something off in the distance. Then his face completely turned from one of shock and into one of concern all over again.

"Hey big guy, wazzup?" Wally was quick to press. There was no sense in hanging around. Things had just started to look good. They couldn't go wrong now. This story needed a happy ending. Metropolis had to be safe. The Martians had to be safe. Bats and Wondy had to be safe...

"Something's going on across the city," Superman quickly responded, breaking from his reverie of listening to address Flash. "There's no time to explain. We have to get to General Mulligan's command post. Come on!"

As soon as those last words ended, Flash was left looking at a red and blue blur. He didn't hesitate long before he was a scarlet one himself.

But despite that, despite the signs of hope he had just seen, Supes' reaction just now meant that all he could feel was worry.

Most of the others had gone off to help out in the city with the evacuation, particularly as they had pulled people out of the cloud to lord knows where. The cloud had managed to absorb so many people during that first attack. Perhaps they had returned right into the parts of Metropolis that were most at risk, perhaps into areas that everyone else had thought were already cleared of the living. Wherever they were though, they wouldn't be in perfectly tiptop shape. They would all need a hand to get themselves clear before that cloud died, and so the Justice League magicians had set out to lend them that hand.

But Zatanna had not been among that group. Unlike the majority, she still had a job to do here. When they had sent him back into the cloud, his body had stayed behind. It hadn't been sent back up to the Watchtower as Shayera's had been, it had stayed here, with them. It had made sense. They had learned from the people of Metropolis that the immediate medical attention and life support weren't necessary to sustain the bodies of the stolen minds, Batman himself showing that back then that the return of the mind was enough to reawaken the body. What was more, by keeping him close they had a way of keeping an eye on things. The body and mind were still linked somehow, that was how the magicians had been able to reacquaint them without an excessive struggle. If something terrible had happened to Bruce's mind in there, if something had gone wrong with the plan, then seeing the potential change in his body would act as their early warning device to maybe set things right.

And Bruce – or his physicality at least – was still here, laid out prone at the area the magicians had been using as their own. Zatanna was not about to abandon him when everything went down, nor was she about to send him away. She still had to keep a watch on him. There hadn't been any reaction from Bruce's physical form from the moment that he had gone back into that thing despite the magicians suspicions of what may happen, but Zatanna wasn't going to rule out the chance of anything happening yet. The anchor may no longer be in place, she may not be anywhere near as powerful as the combined force of the Justice League magicians, but she also couldn't leave. If he needed it, she had to be here to try and pull Bruce out of there, however she could.

That was why she was at the height of her watchfulness, hardly even blinking. She was just staring down at the prone and still Batman, trying to ignore the feelings seeing her oldest and perhaps closest friend in that state brought up. However, that didn't mean her eye corners were blind. It was out of one of them that she saw the beginning of the cloud's end.

She stumbled backwards in recoil at the sight of the energy imploding into it. She didn't know how many of the others were with him, but Bruce was definitely still in that thing. If it was gone...

But then Zatanna saw the change. Just like everyone else, she saw the moment when the cloud altered its form. She saw that moment when it became Bruce, and Diana, together.

It was then that Zatanna knew that Bruce was still fighting, and when he was fighting, there was always hope. No matter how grim things might appear, Batman could always find a way out. It didn't mean that he would be able to take it, but there was a chance, and that was all that mattered to mean that now was too early to grieve. Besides, before Bruce had gone back into that thing, she had told him that he and Diana were a great team, that they worked well together, that they would fight harder being together so that they would have even more chance of pulling this mission off. Well they were definitely together now.

And they would both be trying to get out of this. Zatanna was sure about that. They both had too much to live for.

The image of their kiss didn't last very long, though. The cloud just hold together for long enough for it to show, but that was about it. Soon it was detonating, pieces sent scattering. From down on the ground, even Zatanna could pick out the precise nature of the energy detonation. Most of those pieces were sent out over the ocean, away from the people of Metropolis. She also figured why. It made her look down at Bruce again, feeling great pride and joy. He had done it. Together with Diana, he had just saved many lives.

However, as she glanced back up again, that joy became short lived. There was one, solitary piece of the cloud that hadn't been blasted out over the waters. One solitary piece that was probably the biggest of the lot. One solitary piece that was headed right this way.

She wasn't naïve enough to think that she would simply stop it by herself where Green Lantern and the others in the sky had failed, but she had still had to try. Nevertheless, her spell too had failed to stop the thing. Before she knew it the ball of what energy was left in the chunk was on them. She had no time but to brace herself and hope, one hand clutching on to Bruce's motionless shoulder as if the action would help to protect both of them.

But the chunk of cloud missed. It didn't land where she and Bruce were. It overshot. Not by much. In fact, by just enough so as to land right in the middle of General Mulligan's base camp.

It was a remarkable shot. The thing had landed right in the middle of the plaza where the military had set up, right in the empty space in the centre of it where no one was stood who couldn't get out of the way. Almost as if it had been carefully aimed to do exactly that.

The entire plaza was momentarily illuminated by the light that blob of energy was throwing out, but through that Zatanna could still see the military reacting. They were looking scared, including the General himself. They were all looking ruffled having rushed and dove out of the way, but they were also looking ready to act. Guns and other weapons were being hurriedly drawn. For it was becoming obvious that it wasn't just energy that had landed in their midst. From the centre of all of that light, forms were becoming visible, very life like shapes in the middle of the final chunk of the cloud. It was those that the military were getting ready to fight. Zatanna, however, had other suspicions of what they might be. This part of the cloud had been sent here, into a very specific place amidst so many areas where so much damage could have been done. She knew what the plan had been, what had been inside that cloud. All the pieces just fit together too well for it to be any other answer.

If Bruce and Diana were behind this, then the military couldn't attack. Those forms, they weren't likely to be enemies. They were likely to be friends. The military had to be warned, before any rash actions were taken that would quickly be regretted...

But Zatanna couldn't go in. She couldn't go and give the General that message. With the cloud gone, she knew that it had to be now, or he would never be waking up.

And in that moment, she saw Bruce's hand twitch.