It seemed the fighting had already started.
Part way flying to D.C. from the Tri-state area, Superman had joined up with Diana. Both were two of the fastest people in the world, so it was no trouble keeping up with the other, though if push came to shove, the Kryptonian thought he was the faster one. He wouldn't say that to an ultra-competitive Amazon, though.
From where they flew, the two could make out the front and back lawns of the White House. The front had several men sprawled unconscious over it, with what looked like large riot shields next to, or on top of, them. The back lawn also had unconscious men, but there was considerably more damage done to the lawn. Trenches and burnt grass were scattered randomly over the area. That wasn't Flash, or Hawkgirl, or even J'onn's handiwork, so that left John as the most likely one to cause that damage.
However, since neither of the four were visible, that meant they were already inside the White House. "I'll go in through the front," Superman said as the two heroes began to descend on the building. "You take the back."
"On it," Diana agreed before she drifted towards the back lawn. Superman, in the meantime, landed on the front porch, quickly noticing the open front door. Cautiously, he stepped through the threshold and caught sight of the lobby.
There were quite a few unconscious men here, many of whom were either lying on the rightmost staircase, or at its foot. Others were scattered on the floor, or on the leftmost stairs. Machine guns and plasma rifles were also lying on the floor.
Immediately, Superman used his super speed and sped throughout the room, picking up each and every weapon he could find. He even found one in a small antechamber with another unconscious man there. Finishing with all of the weapons in a pile on the floor, the dark-haired man's eyes glowed red before he fired his heat vision. Mere seconds passed as the guns began to melt, leaving them inoperable. When he stopped, he looked at a pile of melted metal.
Next, Superman turned his head to the rest of the room, focusing on his X-ray vision. Unfortunately, he quickly realized just how antiquated the building was with its former use of lead paints, lead piping, and just lead in general. It wasn't like looking at a Lexcorp building, but he was getting partial views throughout the building.
Not good.
Yet, despite this unexpected handicap, he was able to pick out movement on the second floor. Floating off the floor, he flew up until he landed right at the top of the rightmost stairs. Seeing a hallway, he started walking down it.
Still using his X-ray vision, he was thankful the doors were relatively new as he could see right through them, allowing him to skip checking each and every room physically.
This allowed him to focus right on a room at the end of the hallway. There were two men with weapons in their hands, their advanced mechanics indicating they were plasma rifles. There were three other people, all of whom were kneeling on the floor—hostages.
Reaching the door, Superman opened it, causing both of the gunmen to jerk around to look at him. Not giving them a chance to react further, the Kryptonian shot towards them with super speed, slamming his fist into the first man, then the second half a heartbeat later. Each blow sent each man flying through the air and into the wall, the unconscious men dropping to the floor a moment later.
Turning his attention to the hostages, he saw two women openly weeping from relief, a man murmuring under his breath, "Thank God, thank God."
Moving to the man, Superman knelt down in front of him. "Can you tell me where the others are?" he asked seriously.
The gentleman shook his head. "They caught everyone off guard. Everyone scattered at the first sight of the guns. Sharon, Melony, and me got stopped in here and this is where we've been ever since."
"Are there any other places people would've run to?"
He paused for a moment. "All of the exits are on the first floor, but there are a couple staircases people would've headed for. You'll want to check the East Wing. That's where most would've headed to since the Secret Service would've locked down the West Wing."
Superman nodded. "I'll see you three to the front door. Once you get out, go to the police."
"Haaaaaaaa!"
Shayera was in her element. It had been a long time since she had been in close quarters combat, but her very blood was boiling as she clashed with gunman after gunman.
She and J'onn were in a wide open corridor, which led right into a much larger chamber and then another wide hallway on the other side. The two were working their way to the chamber with its paintings and the table and plants that were situated right in the middle of the room.
The Thanagarian was in the lead, her mace having just recently nailed one of her foes in the head. The punk now had his head in the wall, the rest of his body hanging limply from the hole. To her left, J'onn shot by her, delivering a powerful blow to another armed man a short distance away from her. The guy's head snapped to a side even as the Martian grabbed him with his other hand and then hefted him up off the floor. In one fluid motion, J'onn slammed the guy against the wall, causing the wall to shatter and leave a crumbling hole in its wake.
As it so happened, there were a couple more men in the room on the other side of the hole and J'onn immediately charged at them. Trusting her friend to take care of matters there, Shayera pressed on, reaching the entrance to the room before her.
If she was expecting a big fight here, she was sadly disappointed. Before her were three men, each with large, bulky guns. Their barrels were rectangular and shape, each one pointed right at her. Whatever these things did, they wouldn't stop her. She wouldn't give them an inch.
"Take her down!" the lead guy shouted and all three fired their weapons. Bolts of what looked like lightning flew at her, causing the Thanagarian to widen her eyes just before she raised her mace up. Each bolt struck the head of her mace, thankfully touching the Nth metal only. However, the force of the collective blasts were starting to push her backwards.
Gritting her teeth, bolts of electricity began to dance over the head of the mace. Pushing her weapon out and up in front of her, she let out a war cry as she then swung her mace to one side, redirecting the electrical blasts from her and towards a wall. An explosion erupted, the force of the blast knocking all four of them off of their feet. Shayera let out a cry as her left shoulder collided with the wall next to her, but that thankfully helped her keep upright, unlike her opponents.
Eyeing where the detonation occurred, the smoke slowly revealed a rather large hole where the wall had been. As it so happened, she could see right out of the White House and out into the D.C. skyline. Shayera hated to think of what would've happened had she not tossed aside those blasts.
Which is why she took off flying the moment she could. The leader was just now pushing himself off the floor, leaving him vulnerable to the redhead as she drew a leg back and the swung it forward, slamming her foot into his face and knocking him out cold.
The next closest man was back and to the right, so she went after him next. The guy had managed to get onto his knees and was in the process of raising up his electricity gun. He never got a chance to fire it as Shayera rammed her knee into his face, stopping him cold.
Unfortunately, that was as far as she got as electricity struck her in the back. The winged woman screamed as her back was seared, her muscles spasming and going into tetanus. The moment it stopped, she collapsed to the floor, smoke wafting up from her body. Teeth clenched tightly, her head trembled as she turned it to look behind her.
As she expected, the last man was rising to his feet, his weapon clutched tightly in his hands as he had the barrel aimed right at her. "This is as far as you go, alien," he growled, a menacing glow beginning to build in the barrel.
And then a pair of white beams struck the man's hand, causing him to yelp as he dropped the energy gun. Seeing her opening as the guy clutched his hand, Shayera reared up on her knees and twisted her upper body around. Swinging her arm out, she let go of her grip on her mace's handle and set it flying at her foe, where it slammed right into his face and sent him crashing to the floor.
"Are you alright?" J'onn asked her as he seemed to drift into the room. Shayera was positive the Martian was walking, but thanks to his cape, she couldn't see his feet moving.
Getting up to her own feet, Shayera rolled her shoulders, ignoring some of the tightness—and no doubt burns—in her back. "I'll live. Just wasn't as fast as I thought I was."
J'onn nodded his acceptance before he moved to inspect the electrical gun. "This isn't Kalanorian," he commented after a moment. "It looks like it originated on Earth."
"So that makes it some sort of pulse gun? A giant taser?" the redhead remarked, raising an eyebrow up.
"Possibly. Regardless, they're quite effective on you. I think it's possible these invaders may have weapons tailor-made to our weaknesses."
That raised alarms in Shayera's head. "How do you think they could come up with those?" she demanded.
"We've been around for several years, Hawkgirl. It's not too surprising for even the casual onlooker to pick up on what's effective against us. It's widely-known that Superman is susceptible to Kryptonite. With the number of villains we've come across, someone would've come up with a way to strike at us."
"And considering the number of villains we've fought, none of them have," she pointed out. "I mean, there's only been one guy that targeted us that way specifically and he's dead. It would have to take someone of his intelligence to do the same."
"Which is how we'll have to progress if we are to stop this Vandal Savage," J'onn replied.
That was a fair point. Considering this Savage guy had been able to stay underground right up until this moment, he wasn't someone to trifle with. Though he had threatened to kill hostages if the military showed up, he hadn't said the same about the Justice League.
Now that was strange. Why wouldn't he make that threat? Was he that unconcerned with them? They were taking out his goon squad left and right with some—but not much—difficulty. It was as if he were expecting them.
She didn't like that thought.
"We better tell the others," Shayera said as she raised a hand up to her comm link. However, when she hit the button, a sharp, squealing, static sound blared into her ear, causing her to hiss as she immediately stopped the transmission.
"What's wrong?" J'onn asked instantly.
"There's a radio jammer on the grounds," Shayera growled. "We're basically cut off from the others."
J'onn normally stoic face grew serious. "Then we need to regroup with Flash and Green Lantern quickly."
It wasn't all that hard to find John. The trail of unconscious men he left in his wake made for excellent bread crumbs.
It also didn't hurt that he gave off a green light every time he attacked.
Diana managed to track the Green Lantern down, finding him engaged with plasma rifle fire. John stood in a room, by a doorway, a green shield construct in front of him, yet there was something wrong. It only took a second for the Amazon to realize what it was.
There were cracks throughout the shield and they were growing larger. There was visible strain on the Lantern's face and if she wasn't mistaken, she could see a couple beads of sweat dripping down the side of his face. It was hard to fathom considering Diana knew it took considerable power for the Green Lantern ring to be overpowered. Yet, from what she could see, it was only a few energy beams. There was nothing special about them, just ordinary, yellow beams.
It would do no good for her to go charging through the open doorway. There had to be another way. Moving further down the hall, Diana came across another door, one that was opened ajar. Carefully she approached it, peeking through the crack between the door and the frame.
The dark-haired woman couldn't help the small smile that appeared on her face. Through the crack she could see three men, each holding a plasma rifle, completely focused on John. Eyeing a bust of some important figure on the opposite side of the room, a plan began to form inside her mind.
Hand falling to her hip, she took a hold of her lasso, letting it uncoil as she held onto one end, the rest falling to lay on the floor. Grabbing the door by its side, she then yanked it open and moved into the doorway. This move drew a couple of the gunmen's attention, but it wasn't enough for them to react as she whipped the free end of the lasso at them.
Or rather, right between them. The golden coils wrapped around the marble bust tightly and with a flick of her wrist, Diana pulled it right off of its stand and sent it crashing against the back of one of the men, making him cry out as he stumbled to the floor before her, falling to his knees.
This immediately cut off all of the plasma beams as all three men released the trigger voluntarily or involuntarily. Taking a step forward, Diana delivered a kick to the kneeling man's face. He jerked backwards and fell to his back, his legs staying at an odd angles.
Letting go of her lasso, Diana followed through with her kick with a spin, bringing her extended leg down to ground so she could stand on it while simultaneously whipping out her other leg. The heel of her red boot slammed into the second gunman's arm, a satisfying crack! being made as the bone snapped. The armed man screamed wildly as the force of the blow caused him to stumble to a side, bumping into the wall as he dropped his weapon, gripping his injured arm before he dropped to his knees.
As Diana brought her leg back down, she then lunged at the man, drawing up her knee to ram it against the back of his head, causing his face to collide with the wall. He slumped to the floor in a heap after that.
By then, the Amazon was turning around to face the last gunman. Unfortunately, he had his plasma rifle aimed at her and was taking the shot. That only left her time to get her bracer up just in time for the beam to collide with it. The metal of her bracelet heated up immediately, but it wasn't unbearable; she had felt hotter before.
However, it wasn't ricocheting off, instead forcing the Amazon to hold her ground. Surprisingly there wasn't much force behind the blast, which went completely against what she saw with John. Pushing that thought aside for the moment, she began to force her way forward, closing the distance between her and the gunman with every surefooted step she took.
She never got the chance to finish the man off, however. There was a flash of green and the armed man let out a pained cry. The yellow beam promptly ended as the thug body stiffened, his eyes rolling into the back of his head. There was smoke coming off his back as he fell forward, dropping his gun as he landed on his stomach.
"I had him," Diana said as she lowered her arm.
"I'm sure you did," John replied as he walked up to her. "Just consider it thanks for bailing me out there."
A small smile appeared on her face. "I can accept that." She then turned her attention to the plasma rifles, causing a frown to form. "You were struggling too much with these plasma rifles. Was something wrong?"
"You have to be joking," John retorted. "It felt like...well, that you were wailing on me."
That couldn't be right. "Did you not see me?" she questioned then. "I was pushing up against it quite easily. In fact, had you not defeated him, I would have."
John frowned at that. He then looked down at the plasma rifles sternly. "The ring doesn't have many weaknesses. Fear is the main one, but that's a state of mind, nothing physical unless you count the yellow rings."
That made Diana look up at her comrade. "Yellow rings?"
"Yeah, a former member of the Green Lantern Corp went rogue once. Created his own Corps using a fear-based weapon: the Yellow Lantern rings. They've proven to be a difficult match."
Though surprising, that did explain why John had struggled with the energy beams—yellow ones, she mentally reminded herself. And if someone had made a power ring for it...
"Would it be possible to make a fear-based weapon technologically?"
John was about to answer, yet he paused. "I would say it was impossible, but that isn't necessarily so," he ultimately said. "I highly doubt it on Earth, but we've seen weirder things before."
"So if one were to make a fear-based weapon, what would it look like?"
A scowl appeared on the Green Lantern's face. "A yellow blast."
There was a silence between the two of them until John continued, "This can't be coincidence." Looking to the Amazonian Princess, he said, "We have to find the others—now."
Diana couldn't help but agree.
This was the last hallway on the first floor. Any and all hostages that had been found had been quickly evacuated; the bad guys were left to lie in their own drool.
That just left the bad guys in this hall.
Deciding on doing reconnaissance over just speeding around the corner and giving each and every one of these guys a dirt nap, Flash peeked around the corner, counting five of them armed to the teeth. The men alternated which side of the corridor they were in, three on the left and two on the right. There were a couple of doors, all of which were damaged. Flash highly doubted someone was hiding in them, or being held wherever the doors led. The only one that wasn't damaged was the door at the end of the hallway.
Well, time to get to work.
Pulling back away from the corner, Flash backed away a few steps before he sunk down to the ground. Hands pressed on the carpeted floor, his legs set on the floor, and his self-proclaimed tight butt up in the air, the red-clad man looked at the sharp right turn and then took off, time seeming to slow down as it was left behind.
Shooting around the corner, Flash was at the first man in less than a blink of an eye. Grabbing the gun, forced it up and shoved it into the gunman's face, then took off to the second man, opting to ram his elbow into the right side of the guy's face. Darting to the third, Flash buried his fist in the man's gut, causing him to start doubling over. With his other hand, he delivered a chop to the back of the neck.
Onto the fourth, where Flash grabbed the man by his combat fatigues and pulled on him as hard as he could. Spinning his body, he lifted the guy right off the floor and sent him flying towards the fifth and last gunman.
And then time sped up. The first man hit himself in the face with his gun and promptly dropped to the floor. The second jerked to his left, the side of his head bashing against the wall and knocking him out. The third just dove face first into the carpet and didn't so much as twitch. That left the fourth and fifth guys to crash into each other and fall to the floor in a heap.
Seeing as none of the bad guys were moving, Flash raised an arm up and rubbed his forearm back and forth across his forehead. Well, that was a job well done.
Which just left the last, unharmed door. Turning to it, the red-clad man grabbed the doorknob and gave it a twist. The door opened and he was through the doorway in an instant. It was here Flash found himself in what must have been the ballroom, though it was too small for that, in his humble opinion. It was definitely a dining room and a large one at that. He imagined this was where the President wined and dined his important guests.
However, the room was clearly not ready for guests. What must have been a very long dining table had been tipped onto its side and shoved up against the wall, specifically the one with all of the windows. The chandelier was at least intact, but the ceiling had a lot of bullet holes in it. There was another doorway on the other side of the room, which must have lead to the kitchen, or so the speedster thought.
Seeing nothing worth hanging around for, he raced to the other side of the room, coming to a stop at the other door. However, before he could attempt to open it, the door was flung open and a yellow energy blast hit him right in the chest.
"Ahhhhh!" Flash screamed as he was flung backwards, landing hard on his back several feet into the room. That hurt! It really, really hurt! Tilting his head up, he noticed some smoke wafting from the lightning bolt symbol on his chest, though the symbol itself was darkened by soot.
Oh, this had just gotten personal.
In an instant, Flash was kneeling on one foot and knee, ready to show everyone who exactly the boss was. He first noticed four more of the combat fatigue-dress men, each holding plasma rifles. There was no telling which one had been the one to tag him, so he was just going to have to hit them all a little harder than usual.
Flash took off to his left then, just as the four men fired their Kalanorian weapons. The beams hit the floor where he had been kneeling, leaving a nice scorch mark on the floor. Before any one of them knew what hit them, the speedster dashed right in front of the group, his fist colliding with the leftmost man's face and knocking him clear off his feet. Flash kept on going until he reached the wall before he dashed back, hitting the rightmost man this time as he passed by. He repeated the same action again, taking out the guy in the back and then made one more pass to take down the last standing gunman. He then circled around to come standing right in front of the group of newly-unconscious men, arms crossed over his chest as he looked down on his handiwork with pride.
Now that was how you showed someone you were pissed.
Of course, things couldn't have ended just like that. The door he had used to enter the dining room was suddenly flung open, more of the gunmen pouring into the room. Turning to look at them, Flash didn't once lose his cocky smirk, watching as...whoa, that was a good eight guys there. It seemed they were ready to take him serious now.
"So, you guys want a beatdown too?" the red-clad man called out, shifting his hands to rest on his hips. "I know, I'm a popular guy and I'll try to share every bit of me."
"How generous."
The voice had come from behind Flash, causing him to frown. Whipping his head around, he caught sight of a dark blue ray coming right for him. The ray itself seemed to project an endless line of circles, ones that hit him and suddenly Flash couldn't stand. It was as if the weight of the world was on his shoulders, crushing him down. His knees buckled and he dropped to the floor, shooting his hands out to catch himself from falling flat on his face.
What the hell is going on?! his mind shouted. Seriously, why did it feel as if the world was so heavy? He could barely keep himself up like this!
And then it stopped, though the feeling of being a hundred tons did not go away. Arms screaming in protest, Flash found himself dropping until his forearms were resting on the floor, his upper arms keeping him up. The sound of approaching footsteps caught his attention and he struggled to raise his head up.
It was him, the guy on the television that announced his take over the White House—Vandal Savage. His black suit covered him from neck to foot, save for the bulky-looking gauntlet on his right hand, one that was pointed right at the red-clad man. "I must say, this is how I always wanted to meet you, Flash," Savage told him.
The speedster was pretty sure this guy was being condescending to him and he wasn't going to take it. At least, that was his plan as he began to force himself up; the moment he did, Savage fired that strange blue beam at him, the beam itself coming from the tips of his fingers to the bottom of his palm. Again, he felt like he was being crushed to the floor, the floor itself groaning from the strain of holding up his weight. He couldn't see it because of the carpet, but he could certainly imagine the cracks that were forming beneath him.
And then the beam stopped. "Marvelous, isn't it?" Savage remarked casually. "You're probably wondering what I just did to you."
"Yeah, you could say that," Flash grunted out through clenched teeth.
"What this gauntlet of mine does is dramatically increase the gravitational pull of its target—in this case, you. You may be the Fastest Man Alive, but you can't run if you weight a few tons."
Well, that certainly explained that. However, the effects had to be temporary; why else would Savage hit him with another blast? No doubt he would do it again the moment the speedster so much as twitched. He needed to stall for time, so that he could recover and get back to normal. Then he could use his speed to take this guy out.
"That's a pretty fancy toy," he remarked, keeping his eyes on the dark-haired man. "I'd love to know where you got it from."
A smirk appeared on Savage's face. "I invented it myself. In fact, I'm sure your friends are encountering many of my other inventions. Admittedly, they're modified versions of the Kalanorian weapons, but it would've been a waste to not upgrade them."
"So what? This was all a trap for us?"
"Partially. As of right now, I am the Commander and Chief of this country. I just knew the Justice League would come to stop me once I usurped the President, so why not take precautions? I can eliminate the Justice League at the same time I take on the mantel as the Leader of the Free World."
"Then what was the need for the Canidite?" Flash pressed. He could feel his body beginning to lighten, so this was working. He just needed to keep it going a little longer.
"Beneath the White House is a maze of tunnels, a relic from the Cold War. In order to breach them, a powerful explosive was needed—the Canidite in this case. I did have other uses for it, but your friends found my supply, so I was limited with what I could use."
C'mon, almost there. "Well, that is sort of what we do," he verbally jabbed.
"Yes, it is." Savage then reached inside of his suit jacket and pulled out a rather bizarre-looking gun. It was shaped like a handgun, except its barrel was much longer, its circumference larger than normal, and it had metal rings encircling it at even intervals from one end to the other. "Now let me introduce you to another of my inventions. This is what I call a handheld rail gun. The shell that's in the chamber is quite heavy, but the magnetic rings help fire it at the same speed as a cannonball. Allow me to show you."
Flash tried to move, really, he did. But his body was still sluggish from the gravity beams he had been subjected to. He couldn't even vibrate his body with any success. All of this combined to leave him helpless as he watched Vandal Savage calmly aim his fancy rail gun right at his face.
BANG!
To Guest: Vandal Savage doesn't have the notoriety as some villains do. Some of Batman's lesser known villains are more known than him, even though Savage is a deadlier foe, just as Flash has discovered.