Peter and Karen
Chapter 7: Erased
Peter had to admit that this day was a bunch of ups and downs. Sure, seeing an alternate reality was cool and everything but he was also super worried about Karen's mental state. He could see that all this was really breaking her down. He couldn't even guess what it felt like to lose your home not once, or twice but possibly three times?
How much loss can someone take before it just breaks them?
This Diana woman (also known as Wonder Woman) was taking them to the Justice League base and actual space station. Granted his earth had them too, he knew S.W.O.R.D. and S.H.I.E.L.D. had their own as well as possibly other groups. But this was one only for heroes, he just knew that as soon as they got back and Tony heard about this he would build his own. He wouldn't let anyone out do him even if they were from another reality and didn't know him. To Tony, it would be the principle of the thing.
They had to leave the Fantastic Car behind, Reed had security precautions to make sure that no one messed with it anyway. Still, they left it on top of the tallest building they could safely put it just in case. At first Peter thought they were going to get a lift up there with a space ship or something. Turns out they had a type of teleportation technology they got from something called a Boom Tube.
They were currently waiting for the entire League to get to the Watchtower first before arriving.
Peter saw Karen hugging herself looking off into the distance. He walked up to her and placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. "How are you holding up?"
"Honestly? Not well," Karen's voice was low and nearly cracking. "I thought I could go home again, what a stupid thing to think, should have known I was going to get screwed over again."
"Hey we're here for you," He told her.
"For how long?" She asked her eyes looking slightly red now. "For how long? I keep losing everything and everyone, what's to say that it won't happen again? Can you honestly promise me that this will never happen again?"
Peter wanted to tell her anything to make her feel better but he could tell that a lie here wouldn't be for the best. She wanted something, no, needed something solid to hang on to. He just wished he knew of a way to give it to her. "I'm sorry, I have no idea, all I can say is that as long as we are here you're not alone."
She hung her head but nodded knowing it was the best he could give her. He pulled her into a hug as she sent stiff for a moment before easing into it and just held onto him. She needed something, anything to just keep from falling into this abyss she found herself in.
Their moment did not go unnoticed as Wonder Woman's heart went out to the poor woman. All women were sister in arms to her and seeing her like this was heart breaking. At least she had good friends to lean on. The spider themed hero was giving her much needed comfort and she was glad to see such a kind hearted man giving her such support.
"So…what's your story?" Johnny asked her to kill time and also to talk up one of the hottest women he ever met and he met a few.
"Pardon?" She asked curiously.
"You know your story," Johhny pointed to himself and Reed. "The two of us plus my sister and our good friend went up into space, got hit by cosmic rays and came back to Earth with powers and we became the Fantastic Four. So what's your deal?"
"I grew up on Theamescara."
"Never heard of it, Reed?" He looked at his brother in law.
Reed shook his head. "That name doesn't ring any bells at least for our world."
Diana frowned at that but she guessed maybe the Amazons didn't exist there, or maybe they had and were extinct or still in hiding the world forgot.
"It's a hidden island where the Amazons went to, I grew up there. Although recently I found out that I am a daughter of Zeus."
"So you're a Greek, Amazon, Demi-god?" Johhny tried to piece it together and looked her up and down. She was tall, athletic but in a very sexy way, her costume did look like it had some armor theme to it. "Yeah explains a few thing."
Diana raised an eyebrow, usually the whole demi-god thing tends to get a bigger reaction. "Do you have a Zeus in your world?"
"While we have never met him," Reed spoke. "Beings such as that are known, in fact one of them has been a prominent hero for years now."
"Who might that be?" Now she was curious.
"Thor, god of thunder," Johnny shrugged his shoulders. "In fact, Spidey over there is on the same hero team The Avengers with him. We've met him a few times but he's got more time with him."
Diana while never meeting the Thor of her world had heard of him, although from the stories she heard her Thor was a bit of a troublemaker. It would seem the Thor on their world was more of a hero.
"Oh and of course there's Hercules," Johnny snapped his fingers. "Haven't seen him around lately but he's around."
"WHAT!?" Diana's face curled into rage at the name shocking everyone. "That vile pig dares to call himself a hero?"
"Whoa-whoa-whoa!" Johnny took a step back. "I feel like I'm missing something here."
"Hercules came to our island under a flag of truce and then during the night he and his men enslaved my mother and all the Amazons. To be kept as their 'spoils' from that point on." The anger Diana felt at the great betrayal of her half-brother was something she had since learning of it. She grew up with the stories of what happened that night and what had followed.
Diana held up one of her silver bracelets. "We wear these to always remember our bondage and what happened so it would never happen again."
"Wow, okay, first…that's horrible, I mean, jeez where do you even start with that." Johnny could tell what was implied by the tone of her voice.
"I implore you that our Hercules is in no way related to that," Reed told her. "He is an honorable man and while I do know of the story of him going to the Amazon's to gain the Belt of Hippolyte but in our world, he never subjugated the Amazons."
Diana was caught between her age-old hatred for the man and wanting to believe them. It was hard to think of that man as anything other than the vile man he was, but they did seem genuine. Also, the slight alteration to her mother's name maybe meant that it wasn't her actual mother.
"What of the Amazons in your world?"
Everyone shared a look as Johhny shrugged, "Sorry but no one seen them outside of stories."
Diana wasn't sure if that meant the island was still hidden or if it didn't exist in their world. Before anymore thought could be given her communicator activated.
"Diana, we're ready."
"Very well, we're going to the Watchtower now to get to the bottom of her problem." Wonder Woman stated.
Peter gave Karen's hand a comforting grasp as she gripped it back. They were all teleported in and instant to some kind of large open area. There were windows showing space and the planet Earth below them. Peter had to admit the sci-fi geek in him wanted to look around but suddenly feeling Karen's hand squeeze even more he looked to see the others here.
He saw a man in mainly green floating with a green energy around him, a very well build dark haired man in mainly blue and a red cape with what looked like a S symbol on his chest. Some dark gothic looking guy in a bat outfit, a dark-skinned man who looked to be mostly cybernetic. Then there as the guy in red with some yellow with a lightning bolt on his chest.
To Peter it looked like an interesting group, but he could see the expression on Power Girl's face. She seemed to recognize them but also some things were wrong.
"So, these are the guys from the alternate universe?" Mr Green and glowing stated.
"Yes, I am Reed Richards, or Mr. Fantastic of the Fantastic Four." Reed stepped up calmly. "This is Johnny Storm the Human Torch."
"Yo," Johnny waved.
"Our good friend Spider-Man," Reed pointed to Peter.
"Hello from the Looking Glass side of things," Peter waved to them.
Karen walked tentatively up to Superman as she looked him over. The suit was similar, but it was different, no red trunks for instance and he looked younger than the last time she saw him. She looked into his eyes, but she saw only curiosity there, no recognition. Her heart dropped, she had hoped really hoped that he at least might have some memory. But he didn't, it was gone, it was all gone now…again.
"I…" She had to take a moment to breath feeling herself about to break down, but she pushed it down. "I am Power Girl, I came from Krypton as my Kryptonian name is Kara Zor-El of the House of El."
"Zor-El?" Superman asked.
She nodded her head. "My father and your father were brothers."
"We should do a DNA scan to make sure," Batman stated looking at the others. He wasn't sure what was going on here, but all this seemed suspicious. Then again, he suspected everything, it was harder to be surprised that way.
"I feel like we all need to catch up on what's going on," The Flash stated.
It was a long talk as Kara explained everything while Batman ran the test with the equipment they had up on the station. She explained her original life how she crash laned on Earth after her cousin landed first. How she became Supergirl with him and the Crisis with the Anti-Monitor, how the world was remake after with her not remembering the previous world for most of her life.
She explained she got her memories back and then suddenly she was in another world entirely with so many things she remembered just not there, of meeting Spider-Man, of the help he and the Fantastic Four had been and how Reen had gotten her to what was supposed to be her home.
During this Cyborg and Reed were having their own conversations on what could have happened. Everything by going over Reed's data to make sure a mistake wasn't made to some kind of reality warping effect. Batman came back with results of Power Girl being Kryptonian and sharing DNA with Superman.
"The only problem is, isn't there a Power Girl in California?" Hal Jordon the Green Lantern spoke up.
"That's the only problem?" Barry the Flash asked. "Seems to be like there are like a dozen problems."
"Maybe we can get someone to ask her to join us?" Diana questioned. "Maybe she could give more insight?"
"I'll go," Superman stated. "If this Power Girl is the same as the other one, she might be another Kryptonian and might react better to the invite if it came from me."
With no real objections Superman was off but now it was basically a waiting game. Flash and Johnny were quickly getting along with swapping stories and exploring the differences in their worlds. Redd was still off with Cyborg doing their science stuff and Peter really wanted to join them but seeing Karen look so isolated he wanted to stick close by.
"He seems very protective of her," Diana whispered to Hal.
"Yeah, he's been keeping close, and she hasn't gotten too far from him. Think she's using him as a security blanket?" Hal asked.
While she wasn't totally sure what that meant she had an idea. "I can see she's in great pain and he's wanting to help but this kind of pain I'm not sure what can be done."
"Yeah, you think it's possible?" Hal asked her as she gave him a questioning look. "Like our whole lives have been messed with and we didn't even know it?"
Diana hadn't been trying to think about it because it led to a whole mess of problems. If their lives had been altered, then by who and for what reason? What was she missing? She was afraid to find out. Power Girl hadn't gone into the changes in depth, only that things were different.
"I shudder to think if it was," Diana told him.
"Yeah, no kidding," Hal nodded and then noticed Spider-Man just sitting on the wall next to Power Girl. "Okay seriously spider powers? And how can that be comfortable?"
Diana smirked, "It doesn't seem to bother him. I think she could use someone to talk to."
"Yeah, might as well open this Pandora's Box," Hal sighed.
They both walked over as apparently Aquaman was talking to Spider-Man.
"So there is an Atlantis on your world with it's own hero?" Aquaman stated hearing the story from Spider-Man.
"Oh yeah although Namor is kind of has a…rough personality to get around," Peter was putting it gently. The guy was arrogant to say the least.
"Interesting," he mulled it over. "It's nice to know that across realities there is another city under the seas."
Diana looked to Power Girl as he and Hal arrived. "How are you doing?"
"Staring to wish people would stop asking that because honestly I feel like I'm hanging on a thread," Power Girl stated as the stress of everything was starting to get to her. She rubbed her forehead. "Sorry, sorry, it's just…"
"Everything." Diana stated.
"Yeah everything," Power Girl nodded. "I was so hoping to get back to my life and now…" She looked out the window at the Earth below, but she knew it wasn't her Earth.
"We will figure something out," Green Lantern told her confidently.
"Thanks," Kara looked them both over. "I will say the costume changes at least look more updated then when I left."
"Oh?" Hal looked down at his it was the same as always, or was it? Great now he was starting to get paranoid that his life might have been messed with.
"Well, yours is still the same but Diana's was an upgrade to that leather jacket she was wearing. Then he looked to Arthur. "You didn't lose your hand at one point, did you?"
"Lost my what?" Arthur asked shocked.
"Leather jacket?" Diana questioned at the same time.
"Well, you got better," Kara told him and then looked to Diana. "Yeah, I remember Donna saying how it looked like you were going for a 90s look."
"Donna who?" Wonder Woman asked but then saw the look of dread on the other woman's face. "What is it?"
"You know Donna…Donna Troy, your sister." Power Girl stated while she wasn't close to the Amazon sisters, she was on the same message group that a lot of heroes used. It was a way for them all to keep in touch and talk about (or vent) to others in their line of work that could understand their problems.
Diana felt like something slammed into her stomach. "Sister?"
"Yes, you have a younger sister named Donna, she used to go by Wonder Girl, founding member of the Teen Titans? She took over as Wonder Woman for like a year." Power Girl was suddenly terrified. She hadn't looked into all the heroes she knew but was Donna erased? If she was, then who else was gone?
"Diana?" Hal asked seeing the Amazon actually unsteady on her feet for the first time he met her.
"I…I believe I need to sit down," She walked to the nearest chair in the meeting room as the words kept echoing in her mind. Sister? She had a sister? She felt a hole opening up inside of her, if this was true then she had lost something she could never gain back. Questions flooded her mind, what was her sister like? Did they grow up together? What did she look like? They must have been close for Diana to trust her with the mantle of Wonder Woman.
"Oh gods," Diana whispered out knowing she once had family.
"What else is missing?" Hal asked worried as Aquaman also was wondering what else might be changed.
"I-I don't know, I'd have to check. I know the JSA don't seem to exist, so I don't know if any of those heroes are here or not." Power Girl stated.
Peter seeing the distraught Amazon spoke up. "Maybe we shouldn't go too far, we might not like what we find out." He nodded to Diana still processing everything.
Hal could only look at his teammate and silently nodded his head. He thought of his dad dying in that test flight, what if he had survived in that other universe? What if his dad went on to have a couple more kids? What if he had worked things out with Carol and they got married?
The door opened as everyone looked to see Superman had returned with a shorter blonde woman in a mostly white outfit. She had on a red cape and what could only be described as a stylized P symbol over one side of her chest.
"So, I hear there's another 'me' here?" This world's Power Girl stated.
Karen walked up to her double, she was younger than herself that was for sure. Not by much, maybe by a couple of years. She still had a sense of innocence about her that Karen felt she had lost in recently years. Her double was looking her over as well.
"Bold choice of costume," the younger her smiled.
Karen rolled her eyes, she was even getting flack from her costume by another her of all things. Well, this had to complete her bingo card for the types of people asking about her costume.
"So, from what I was told," PG stated. "You're the me of this universe?"
"It's…more complicated but yes," Power Girl told her. "I originally was from another universe but that got merged into this one."
"Oh, I see," PG nodded her head. "Well, you should know I'm not from this world either. See my friend and I are from what we call Earth-2 and we ended up here not too long ago."
"Wait wouldn't you call your world Earth-1?" Spider-Man couldn't hold back the question.
"I was thinking that too," Johnny nodded.
"Same," Flash said.
PG sighed, "Look it was a whole thing with Helena and me talking about it but we ended up calling this Earth-1 because we had to number them and she won out that it should start on the world we are on." She waved her hand. "Anyway, we've been trying to get back to our world and when Superman here told us everything, we were hoping this Reed person can help us get back."
"Should be too much of a problem," Spider-Man said. "I guess he can leave the tech to how to do with you guys unless we can make another trip here."
"Or you can make the trip with us back to our place and Reed can send home from there," Johnny offered hoping she could take up the offer. If he couldn't get anywhere with this Power Girl, maybe the other one was more open?
PG smiled in relief, "You have no idea what this will mean for us. We've been worried about our home since we left."
"I see we have another guest," Reed walked in with Cyborg.
"Basically found out I wasn't exactly replaced," Power Girl told him. "She's from another-other Earth."
"Fascinating," Reed's mind thought of that. "I wonder if your disappearance triggered her arrival here."
"Doubt it," PG stated. "I came here with someone else."
"Well as good a theory that is," Cyborg stepped up. "I went over Reed's work and I can't find any fault in it."
Truth was even for him he had struggled in a few places. Vic always knew his new cybernetics helped to make him one of the most intelligent minds on the planet. He could think and process information like a supercomputer. But Reed, the man's mind was on a whole other level. It was like a scientist meeting Steven Hawking for the first time. Vic honestly never met a man with a mind like Reed Richards.
It was nice to work with someone that he could hold scientific talks with and not hold back or dumb things down.
"What did you find?" Batman asked.
Vic and Reed shared a look that did not go well with everyone else. Reed stepped forward, "The conclusions that both myself and Mr. Stone have come to is that this is the world that Power Girl, the Power Girl we know that is, came from."
"So, what happened?!" Karen demanded. "Why is everything different?"
"We were working on that," Vic took over now. "From what you describe we had to rig up some equipment to check for certain changes. We found alterations in time."
That got everyone's attention especially Batman and Flash's attention.
"Because of certain villains in our universe having used time travel, I've come up with ways to detect changes in the timeline." Reed told them.
"Oh, let me guess…Kang?" Peter asked as Reed nodded his head. "Makes sense, that guy is always messing with time."
"At any rate," Reed continued. "This world timeline has been altered."
Everyone was quiet as Flash got pale as he cast a look at Batman who was mulling things over. Flash kept thinking back to 'Flashpoint' he created when he tried to save his mom. But he went and stopped himself, nothing should be different now. He remembered how things were and he also remembered that alternate timeline. Had he screwed up? Did he miss something? There had been that moment, that one moment with the mysterious woman in a hood.
No.
No-no-no-no-no-no!
"Oh god," Flash fell back against the cold metal wall of the satellite.
"Flash," Batman warned as they only had a theory now, granted it was a good theory, but he was not one to make rash leaps in logic. He needed more evidence, more data to come to a conclusive outcome.
"What's going on?" Superman demanded seeing the two of them, they knew something. Batman was keeping his heart rate low but the Flash, even with his enhanced heartbeat, Superman could tell something was wrong.
"It was me," Flash had felt like this since he first learned because of his actions he created the Flashpoint timeline. All that death and destruction had been on him and him alone. The Reverse-Flash had been right about that much.
"Barry," Diana rose up slowly and dangerously. "What did you do?"
"I…I tried to go back and save my mom from dying and I did," Barry let it all come out. He thought he had fixed things, he thought that things were the way they were supposed to be. "But it changed things, changed so much. Atlantis and the Amazons were at war, Britian was a bloodbath of a battle ground. People were being killed by both sides even those that had nothing to do with it."
"But I fix it!" he pleaded with them. "I went back and stopped myself, so everything went back to-ack!"
He was cut off as suddenly before anyone could react Power Girl was on him. Her forearm was pressing against his throat as he tried in vain to pull her off feeling the steel like arm choking him.
"YOU!? IT WAS ALL YOU!?" Karen felt so many emotions. Betrayal, pain, loss but most of all, rage.
"Power Girl get off him," Superman quickly pulled her away with Earth-2 Power Girl helping him.
"This bastard took my life!" Power Girl screamed as tears starting to flood her eyes. "Everything is gone now, people I know are no longer here!"
Flash held his throat coughing. "I-m *cough* sorry *cough*. I…"
"I had a sister Barry," Diana told him coldly. "She told me I had a sister that no longer exist."
"I know this is bad but I'm sure Barry didn't mean to do all this," Superman was trying to calm things down. Power Girl was nearly as strong as him normally, but she was filled with such emotions he had to really hold her back.
"You had a wife and kid." Power Girl looked to Superman. "You married Lois Lane and have a kid, is that still there!"
Superman's face was shocked. He and Lois? He had been trying to date her, but it just seemed like things weren't working out. He looked to Diana as the two of them had recently started a relationship. To learn that he was already married with a family?
Power Girl looked to Barry with teared filled hatred in her eyes. "This is all your fault!"
The Flash just slunk down to the ground. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I…oh god what did I do? Why don't I remember any of the changes? I should remember them, shouldn't I?"
"Not entirely," Reed stated. "I don't know the nature of how you changed the past, but we'll need the full story."
Superman nodded and looked to Power Girl, "I'm going to release you, but you need to calm down. I know, I know it's hard, but we need to know what Flash did."
"Come on, we'll get through this," PG told her softly.
Karen didn't want to listen, she just wanted to hurt Flash like he hurt her. She felt so much rage she could feel the power rising behind her eyes. She could just use her heat vision on him, it would be so easy to do. She stood there just staring at the man but in the end, she knew she needed to know. Maybe they could fix it but she needed to know.
"Fine!" She told him angrily as he let go. Power Girl turned away because she couldn't even face him anymore. She let out a primal scream letting all the pain and rage out she had been holding back. She went of one of the chairs in the meeting room and just fell into it. Wiping the tears of her face she just stared down at the clear metal table, because she couldn't stand to look at the man on the other side of the room.
She sensed Spider-Man, Johnny and Reed coming up to her. Spider-Man sitting on her right, Johnny on her left. She felt Reed's hand on her shoulder, and she sniffed and nearly sobbed at the kindness. She was a total mess both mentally and emotionally, but she knew that it wasn't done yet.
The other heroes slowly took seats, all of them were looking at the Flash and also Batman as he didn't reaction at all to any of this.
"Did you know of this?" Arthur challenged him.
Batman remained quiet for a moment. "Yes. Flash came to be shortly after the event."
"And you didn't tell us?!" Hal shouted out.
"I hadn't noticed anything that had changed and neither did Barry." Batman simply explained although he kept the note out of it. That was personal and had no relevance to any of this. "He said he only remembered two timelines and not three."
"I think we need to start from the start," Superman took a chair. "Flash, tell us everything and don't skip the details.
Flash took a chair as he started to tell his story. How he went back in time to make sure his mom survive. To when he got back to a present that was totally different and he had no powers. He explained how it was Thomas Wayne that was Batman because his son had been killed in that alley. He went on to explain the war between the Amazons and Atlantis.
Diana and Arthur shared a few uncomfortable looks between them as they learned it all started with them. They had had an affair and Arthur's wife found out, she went to confront Wonder Woman and Diana had ended up killing her. That was the opening blow that started the war that killed millions. Diana felt her stomach turn hearing how in that world she had led the war, killing so many civilians and even some heroes. The thought of running her sword through a child that the Flash had explained with Captain Marvel made her sick to her stomach.
She had no idea she was capable of such a vile act.
Flash described his fight with Reverse-Flash and how Thawn had explained what had happened when he had changed time. Barry went on to explain how he had to say goodbye to his mom and merge with his younger self to prevent him from travelling back in the first place.
"Something doesn't add up," Vic stated by this point.
"Correct," Reed nodded. "By your description nothing should have changed, did nothing else happen?"
Flash did remember something. "There was one odd thing, after I merged it was for a moment, but I saw time itself. It's hard to describe but think of strands, now thing of seeing one pain strand and suddenly two others being wound together with it."
"Other timelines?" Vic asked.
"That would be my guess," Reed thought on this on why this was happening.
"There was a woman there, I heard a voice in my head," Flash commented. "She said something about our world having been split into three long ago to weaken it and that I think she was using Flashpoint to bring them together."
"You didn't think to bring this up?" Hal angrily asked him. He couldn't believe that Barry had been keeping this secret.
"I wasn't sure," Flash told him. "If I thought for a moment something like this had happened, I would have told you all. I didn't remember any changes, so I thought whatever happened hadn't changed anything noticeable or at all. It was only for a moment I saw it."
"Okay so why not go back in time to that point and stop her then?" Hal looked around the room. "We undo what she did and that's that."
"Unfortunately, we can't," Reed spoke up as everyone turned to him. He extended his fingers to make a visual representation. The original timeline was moving forward until Flash did what he did, now normally any changes could be changed but that original timeline no longer exists."
"Wait Reed, haven't people messed with time like this before?" Johnny asked. "Hell, the Flash literally said he changed the entire timeline, so why is this different?"
"It's the other timelines, isn't it?" Spider-Man picked up on what was different.
"It creates a new factor." Victor nodded his head as his mind was processing what they were getting at.
"Correct," Reed continued to explain. "You see at the point the two other timelines merged with the main timeline, the main timeline had to compensate. For instance, the Flash said he did this recently and yet all your history has been changed, including the past beyond what the Flash changed. That's because when this happens, time has to compensate."
"It re-writes all of the past to match up with the changes," Victor noted. They had no idea how far back time had to correct itself. It could even go right back to the beginning of the universe for all they knew. Even if it did have a limit of how far back the changes went, what if it went back to when Flash was born or even further? Then what? If you could do to a point before the changes, you wouldn't know what changes were being made and you couldn't travel forward in time.
You would have to stay in that time period and make the changes as they happened to unthread time. The process could take years and that's if you knew what you were doing.
"Are you saying that history literally retcons itself?" Peter asked next.
"In a way yes," Reed agreed. "If you were the travel back in time in this new merged timeline you would end up in the new retconned timeline's past. The two other timelines have been merged and the original has been lost to time. If we could untangle the timelines, then it could be possible, but I have no idea where to even begin with that."
"Not to mention the power to do that would be insane," Cyborg was still making the calculations and they were massive. "You would have to know what belonged in what timeline or you would still have a merged world, and if you weren't careful, you could literally rip the three timelines apart."
"It's like taking a cup half filed with water and then pouring more water into it." Reed continued. "Where is the water that was originally in the glass and the new water? Where do they begin and end and how would you separate them again?"
"You can't," Peter said in a defeated tone. "Not unless you knew which right down to the exact atoms that belonged to both if not further than that.
"So, what you're saying is," Power Girl took a breath. "It's all gone…"
There was heavy silence in the room as they all came to realize what had happened. Flash bent forward on the table, resting his head in his hands. He had done this, he had messed everything up and he hadn't even realized because from what they said, he had re-written himself as well.
Arthur was thinking of Mera and how his actions in another world not only betrayed and hurt her but ended up killing her and starting a war. He couldn't think of being able to betray her like that. She was his wife then as well. It gave him so much to think about.
Batman silently was trying to think of what else they could be missing, what other changes had been made and for why? Who was the woman Flash saw and what was her game?
Superman could only think of Lois and a child he had with her apparently. A part of him still loved her but he had moved on, hadn't he? All the things they could have had were now gone and might not happen now.
Diana was still lost in the thought of an actual sister and family she now no longer had. It was strange to feel like you were missing something you technically never remembering having.
For Power Girl she felt like the world had just become dark, she felt her heart breaking. Everything she had built, everything she had done was just gone. Atlee didn't know her and that's assuming she even exists in this world. All her friends were gone, her home gone, her business gone.
Her life…gone.
When someone asks you what the worst day of your life was, she had a few. The destruction of Krypton and her family, the loss of her Earth and now today.
-Elsewhere-
On the surface of Mars, a blue being was looking over the remains he had uncovered of one of the Martian cities. He had grown an interest in studying the dead cities of Mars. He could see how the cities became, how they grew, and how they died. Through them he studied the green Martians. They were an interesting people.
On his world Mars while still dead, never had life.
Dr. Manhattan looked in the direction of the Watchtower, his perception of the universe was vase and he could sense a change. He saw what was going on there as the Flash told his story. What the Flash didn't know was that the woman (the actual Pandora from legend apparently) had been manipulated by him to merge the three timelines.
He knew her fate, she would one day learn the truth and he was/is/had killed her. As he stands here he sees her future, he is there now watching her trying to tell the others who is to blame for the changes, he is there now watching the spot she had once stood, now gone forever.
What he hadn't known was that one of the beings of the universe before his changes was still around. He tilted his head, apparently, she had been sent to another universe, a universe blind to him. He saw the portal used by Reed Richards and how it worked on a quantum level. He could see it rippled through space/time and beyond.
"Impressive," Dr. Manhattan wasn't easily impressed but the fact a mere human created something that could pierce the barriers from one world to another was intriguing.
He saw what would happen, she could leave, go back to that other universe as nothing was left for her here. If he at all cared he supposed he would feel sorry for her, it was after all, all his fault she had lost everything. But he was beyond such human things now, he had been for some time now.
Apparently, there was more to the multiverse than he thought there was. This excited him for the first time since he first came to this world. Finally, something new, something he didn't instantly understand. When he was done here, perhaps he would try to find that universe.
That is if he survived.
He could see all his timeline except for one moment, one moment when everything goes dark. When he's facing Superman something happens, his conclusion is one of them must die but which one? That is a question for another day as he goes back to studying the Martian ruins.
TBC…