Dark Dreams
December 16, 1938
Less than a year has passed since Superman broke through the chains of mundane reality and exposed the sprawling underside of the world, full of the strange, the astonishing, the macabre. Like moths drawn to an erupting flame others have joined him. The dark culmination of a grieving child's whispered prayer haunts the nights of Gotham City. In the Midwest, a gale force with a human heart runs its endless race. And in New York, the gleam of an emerald champion becomes a familiar sight in the twilight. They are the greatest exemplars of this new phenomena, the superhero, but they are far from alone.
The plate glass window of the Undertow bar meets its match in Gotham, as a criminal is kicked through it. Standing in the middle of the establishment, all fishnets and leather, is the Black Canary. She'll put eight more of the clientele on the ground before someone gives up her target, Hal Fink. He's made the mistake of kidnapping a child in her city, a mistake that Black Canary is all too eager to correct.
When Dinah Lance gets home in the early hours of the morning and puts away the blond wig, her knuckles still sore from wailing on Fink and his hired help, she smiles. They're all afraid of the Bat, but the Canary's reputation is growing. He can't be everywhere at once. It's not an easy life, but she made the difference for someone tonight and that's all that matters.
On a rooftop in Brooklyn, a man in a yellow and black costume holds pure power in between his thumb and index finger. Miraculo, he calls it.
He's here because a Dominican woman named Lucia answered his ad in the newspaper, telling him all about how her dress shop has been squeezed by a group of xenophobic thugs. "Residency tax," they call it, "pay up or go home," they say. She offers money, but Rex Tyler doesn't need the cash. He wants the thrill. Beating up awful people is an added bonus.
Rex swallows the pill and for the next sixty minutes, Hourman lives again.
The mugger laughs at the small man in the blue mask. At first, he thought it was a child interrupting him. Al Pratt shouldn't care. At 5'1" he's been laughed at all his life. Even more when he was only 98 pounds. Al's put on some muscle since then. Twenty seconds later and laughter's turned to tears as Al's got the mugger in an arm bar. They may never give Al the respect he desires, but, by God, they'll give it to the Atom.
The past opens up for an archeologist in Midway city, as his hands grace an ancient Egyptian dagger, forged from metal made of no earthly origin. An entire history of death and rebirth seeps into Carter Hall's heart, as well as an explanation of the loneliness he's felt all his life. In a dig site in Algeria, a woman understands something irrevocable has occurred, that a signal fire is lit. They'll be soaring together within a year, hand in hand.
Kent Nelson leaves the desert that has been his home for nearly all his life. It is also his father's tomb. The mysteries of the universe have fallen away during his studies. Order and Chaos will be at war once more and it is time for Doctor Fate to return to the world at large.
Beneath a washed out Los Angeles sky, Jill Corrigan dies. The events that preceded her death had all the undertones of a trap, but for a woman that took pride in her cynicism, she had failed to afford herself the brutal honesty of just how much her fellow officers hated her. All the tabs she paid, all the shifts covered, all the casual abuse endured. To them she was simply an unhinged broad, and worse, a rat.
In that marginal space between life and death, Jill Corrigan meets something beyond the bounds of her mortal comprehension. An angel arrives, not of life, but death. An angel buoyed on wings stained with the blood of the guilty, their screams a heavenly choir all their own.
The cops that killed Jill Corrigan die over the next few days in all sorts of inventive and atrocious manners. She reports for duty, her own demise greatly exaggerated. At least, for the benefit of her peers. Jill Corrigan really is dead. She serves a higher purpose, for now. The Spectre walks the earth once more.
Ted Knight basks in the swirl of stars above his observatory. He is never more alive than when he works under these celestial conditions, the universe at his fingertips. The instrument on his desk is nearly complete, a rod to channel the cosmos. He thinks of the man with the green flame and how he sailed through the air. It's not ready yet. Soon, Ted thinks, soon.
Phantom Lady, Red Tornado, The Ray, Commander Steel, Amazing Man, Mr. Terrific, the Human Bomb, Guardian, Red Bee, Blue Beetle, TNT, Firebrand, Vigilante, Johnny Thunder, the Tarantula Crimson Avenger, the Star Spangled Kid, Shining Knight, Johnny Quick, Airwave, Fury, Manhunter, Captain Triumph, Miss America, Doll Girl, Wildcat, Plastic Man and more still.
The pace quickens. The world turns once more with feeling. The stakes have never been so high.
Perhaps most importantly, on an island forgotten by mankind, a woman watches the waves break on the shore. There is more to this life, she thinks, a well worn mantra. Though her mother may protest, though her sisters will bar the way, Diana will see the world. And it will be wonderful.
The sun blotted out by ash. A world blackened by fire and decay. A golden helmet shattered to pieces. The dove struck down the falling star. The brightest day turned to blackest night. The lightning lost to the depths, the sand scattered from the hourglass.
Wesley Dodds stood by his fire place. His body was covered in sweat, but he felt cold. Back in his bed, Dian Belmont slept peacefully. He had taken care not to wake her.
The nightmares started two years ago. After his father's death. After he moved back to the city. Wesley had always felt like he was close to the seeing the big picture. Like he was just one dial turn away from being tuned into the truth.
Wesley saw the truth all too often these days. In the halls of slumber, he bore witness to the miasma that roiled beneath the glossy sheen of American life. The tide of cruelty and apathy was too potent, too damning to the soul for him to ignore. So, the Sandman was born. He could fight the storm, even if he could never fully overcome it.
These new nightmares were different. He had grown accustomed to a certain scale, an intimacy with the visions. They were seldom literal, but they applied to dangers that the Sandman could handle. Puzzle boxes to be unraveled. The Tarantula. Mr. Scorpion. The Phantom of the Harbor. Evil, but evil that Wesley could contain, could snuff out.
This was apocalyptic. The visions never played out exactly the same, but there were recurring elements. The dove and the star. The broken helm. The ash fall. This was beyond him.
Wesley would need to gather the others. A group of heroes with a common cause.
A society.