Back to Battle
I am not a speed reader. I am a speed understander.
-Isaac Asimov
Flash and Batman were looking at the girl with two big hopes in their eyes; the first hope being that the girl they saved from a lab rat life was safe or at least just alive, the second being that their powerhouse could still be there and kick the alien invaders to the universal dust they came from.
The speedster and the dark vigilante are unsure on how to know if there is a possibility of her resurrection from almost dead.
They look at each others, they both saw her injury healing and her skin turning vivid, what's there to be afraid of?
That's all some sort of biological defense mechanism of her species so predators don't bother to eat the corpse up as she seems still alive and so ready to pull up a fight?
In these seconds of unknown quiet they make up all the possible scenarios, even those that don't make sense.
And for the same seconds it seems that Kara Zor El will not wake up.
But for the extraordinary beings a second is a fraction of time too little to consider.
Her eyes open so fast that Barry has less than 1 seconds for his face to morph and showing surprise, his hands open up for the joy.
But Kara's power didn't get the message that there was a pause for digesting the news of her return.
Unconsciously Kara unleashes an inhuman scream.
"AHHHKK!" her lungs erupts.
Her energy bulks up before Barry can realize he should run and take Batman with him.
Bruce was more reactive since the scream put him on alert, with a cape swing he is already missing on the scene.
An invisible force comes from Kara's body and explodes, sends her surrounding meters away from her and so Barry is sent flying away.
The impetus creates an altar where she is laying down and a gigantic hole is decorating the scene.
Like a girl, that wakes up not because an alarm or a wakeup call, but her own brain telling her body she slept enough and is time to end the rem phase, she slowly starts to stand up.
She has a difficult time to stand still, gravity is teaching her that her gifts aren't granted and needs to train better to master it well.
Barry instead watches the scene by laying down and notices that it's true, Supergirl is back!
He quickly runs to her.
Kara sees him approaching, she isn't used to super speed yet but knows he isn't an enemy or that he wouldn't be too stupid to try and punch her when she is still the most powerful (good hearted) being on the planet.
Barry pulls Kara into an hug, a soft hug in which their heads start touching and their hairs met the hairs of the other.
"You're alive" says Barry with joy.
"..yeah…looks like…it" Kara replies with calm and an unreadable expression on her face that symbolizes how she didn't expect to return from her coma that almost meant death.
But those little fragments of unknown starts to change, a radiant smile swaps the previous emotion.
"YES! Yes I'm still alive!" she says with all the joy she didn't had the possibility to show off in any other time before.
She pulls Barry in another hug even stronger.
But not enough strong to crash up his insides, she knows she is like a bull holding a cup of tea.
"UCCKK" Barry manages to squeeze from his throat.
"Nice hold!" he then says in all the oxygen left in his body.
Supergirl realizes it soon and stops the constricting embrace, leaving Barry dazzled but euphoric.
"We can still do it!" Kara says with calm and security.
And in that moment another voice comes, the voice of the oldest by human years member of this improvised crew of desperate wannabe saviors.
"Sorry to interrupt this, I'm glad you're back, but we don't have luxury of relaxing yet, the invasion is still a reality, we're about to die again in this, let's make every second of this count."
Bruce says, calm and concise but with a tone that means there is more to come, and he doesn't expect everyone to return alive.
With a heavy breathe Barry gives his answer: "I know, we're just at bottom of the mountain, we have the instruments to climb it though."
"Am I the instrument right?" Kara says with half smile on her face, her brows in a calm before storm expression still.
"We all are" Barry replies without any other regret.
Bruce gives a nod of approval to his answer.
Kara then says "Well, I almost died and it was for nothing, if I have to return in a sleep without dreams it will at least be for a reason, I will try and make it right."
Her words full of regret in this, regret to have done nothing to stop the demon of the past of her homeworld.
But she continues her talk with a stare that would melt a brave heart.
"I know my cousin Kal-El and his parents would have wanted this, to see that the best of Krypton can still live in a single being, without war and without the insanity that doomed us, and for this the demons that still believe that madness have to die, and I will be ready to try and die for this cause."
With eyes full of hope and understanding Barry knows earth's new guardian is to be trusted till death, his smile says that he is happy to fight and possibly to die by her side.
The vigilante's once happy face than turns into a grim and severe utterance and said:
"It's not enough."
Barry and Kara eyes lit up on that.
"The good intentions, trying to, doing your best is all nice when you have to fight some clowns or a freak show or a bipolar maniac, but in this case the stakes are too high. We MUST win, for all the people of earth. If we fail it will not be just a city falling in anarchy or blow up, everyone dies and everything happened before will have been useless."
All the bitterness Batman hid until that point came:
"I have already felt powerless once, a little child unable to do anything as death was coming and took the two people he loved the most, only because someone wanted to know how it feels to kill a mother and a father. We have to stop it or no one will ever live to avenge them."
In that moment Barry finally gets why his doppelganger had so heartly the destiny of his parents and of another earth, because he had the possibility to save everyone and wanted to, but miscalculated and caused more to perish for his failures which broke him inside and decided to sacrifice his own good for others to live.
Kara understood well the words of the old chum, as the last biological daughter of a planet fallen in the technological horror of a lifeless dictatorship it was in her own birthright to save another planet by the hands of the insane monsters that caused her world to die, if no one couldn't save Krypton at least someone may save Earth, as redemption for all the sins the kryptonians committed in their whole existence of pillage and destruction.
Both new age heroes looked at the other, just a word that both passed in their mind came up and they said it at the same time.
"WE WILL DO IT!"
And with that the path between saving earth and this trio of justice doing everything in their power to was sealed.
And in the silence that followed the speech that could have lasted 10 seconds but felt an hour for what the three hours could feel inside Bruce decided to break the tension.
"So, if you supers can help an old man out we will go in the Batcave, we're going to fight and win a war."
Kara didn't got immediately what the helping out part meant considering she was already more than open to give help to fight the war, but Barry realized and with a calm face and closed eyes said with an half smile.
"Ok ok, jump in old man, we're going saving earth".
Doing poses that both knew weren't exactly pleasing to see but necessary for this Bruce managed to mount on Barry's back.
Remembering what he did before, in the fight with Nam-Ek where he could create a bubble that defended the target from the friction of the speed force, the speedster managed to concentrate the part that he was supposed to move and what was supposed to remain in stasis or in a state where the effects of the dimensional energy would protect him by the whiplash and the recoil.
And in a way that could be abridged in "he really wanted Batman to not get hurted" he was able to sprint up and run, with the old man on his back clinging but not really realizing what was happening.
While the Girl of Steel was near him, she too was heading for the Batcave and in what could be a minute they were there.
The mansion of Bruce Wayne, now dusty and webcowed but still imposing and beautiful as an archaic building that time destroyed and forgot.
Flash released Batman carefully, not knowing how much the anti-speed bubble would concuss him.
And got his answer right there when Bruce puked right in one of his unkempt bushes.
"Remind me again to do that only if we have too" Bruce said bitterly trying to remain dignified.
Barry could just nod.
The trio of justice went in the Batcave.
In the 10 minutes of preparation Kara was doing nothing but meditating at the sun near the riverfall outside the Batcave, knowing fully well her powers could increase, and knowing she was the only that didn't need train or her costume suit needing fixes.
She was thinking and trying to make up her mind on what was happening, Kal-El was dead.
Zod said so, her cousin was gone, the best of her race with him, only the worst of it survived and planned to do to earth what Krypton did to itself.
Earth, a little jewel of life and nature was about to get destroyed and being replaced by cold and lifeless metal and biomechanical lifeforms where soul and flesh don't mean the same.
But by looking at how the humans on this planet treated her she was still thinking about them being close to how kryptonians acted time ago, ready to take something natural and corrupt it to see if could be useful.
Those humans of the snow lands did this to her, like kryptonians did to others and to themselves.
Maybe the look isn't the only thing that makes both races similar.
But her mind also said "No, don't try to go into that hole. There are people in this planet that are still innocent, you met them, they want to save people, not corrupt the beauty and destroy life, the kryptonians you know are all adults with already blood on their hands, not all humans deserve this."
She was thinking at reasons to keep hating the kryptonians and the bad humans, the humans that caged her were dead, she killed them. The kryponians out here are still alive and will do what the bad humans did to her multiplied for billions.
Yes, this was the right thing to do, saving earth and humans and then teach them to not become kryptonians.
She was sure of herself.
"Hey Kara" interrupted her thinking.
Barry was there with his costume carved by a batsuit patched with piece of leather and Kevlar.
He really didn't need anything else, he managed to make the suit anti-friction by his own energetic field, he simply colored it more like red and scarlet to honor the Barry from another time.
And with a proud smile and eyes that spoke a single sentence, let's do it.
Batman instead was statuary and looked even taller than before, he was wearing an armor mixed with his old batsuit, and the result was like looking at a cyber robocop.
He was wearing a pitch black armored bodysuit, Kevlar reinforced with titanium, segmented by lames that functioned as joints to move, from his toes to his fingers to his neck he was virtually bulletproof.
And then his real armor:
shoulders, neck and chest were united by an exoskeleton whose colors kept switching between blue and silver as it was reflective to the light like a magnet. And in the middle a full yellow bat shaped logo that meant "I'm Batman".
The cowl was now jointed so he could move the neck, his mask was an armored helmet, the chin guard become part of it, the bat ears were longer and sturdier, a giant gray-blue shielded visor covered the face.
His forearms and hands were armored and plated by blue gauntlets which were weaponized with three upward claws each and positioned at the sides, and with two belts connected to these gauntlets that went directly to his back.
A big yellow belt on his waist, with pouches and God knows what else of various oval shapes.
From his thighs, to his knees, to his calves and his leg to end on his foot a plated exoskeleton completed the look, articulated braces at the joints to give mobility and protection, and three upward blades at the lateral sides of each leg.
And his majestic cape, connected to the shoulder pads, turned in two spliced wings and at the end of these edged curves decorated the two cloaks.
Each member of the improvised group gave one final look of challenge and pride to have a chance to fight for the planet.
The trio finally said at the same time "It's time."
All was ready for this sacrifice mission.
All was ready.