F A W C E T T C I T Y

---

There was a broken wrench on the floor.

It was weathered. Rusted with age so that it was only vaguely reminiscent of the tool it had once functioned as. The child’s foot kicked it, startling the boy who hadn’t been paying attention at where he’d been walking.

He had been paying more attention to the pair of adults sweeping the alley below with flashlights.

The piece of rusted metal echoed loudly as it bounced around the wrought iron bars of the fire escape, signaling the child’s flight up the rickety metal stairs that was bolted to the side of the condemned flat.

He should have known better than to have gone back to the shelter a second night in a row, but it was starting to turn cold out and Billy was running out of options.

Now he was just running.

And, yeah, it sucked. But so did six months and seven foster homes. But Billy had discovered that losing everything you care about wasn’t the worst thing in the world.

The worst thing in the world was being entrusted to people who didn’t even pretend to give a damn about you. So, yeah, he ran. And he got better at it each time, too.

He didn’t blame the child protective services workers that were after him. They thought they were doing right. And so was Billy. They were all trying to do right.

The first time you huddled in a cardboard box, desperate for warmth in a dank alley, eating out of the McDonald’s sack that you just stole from out of the hands of some random guy... you learned just how complicated things like right and wrong can become.

Billy wasn’t even sure he could recognize right if it was standing in front of him. So he settled for doing what he felt he had to do. And, right now, that meant ducking through the wood slats that had been tacked up in an effort to board up the windows. He felt something snag and realized he’d just cut himself on a bit of broken glass that had still been in the rotted out frame of the window.

He tried to make a somewhat graceful landing. In his head, he might have imagined the ubiquitous hero rolling smoothly along the floor boards and then rising to his feet like no harm, no foul. Instead, Billy totally wiped out. An assortment of dust clouds and rat feces going everywhere as the boy tumbled ass-over-head as he came crashing through the window.

---

Breathless, haggard, underpaid, and too old for this shit, Ethel Harris hunched over and tried to catch her breath. She shone her flashlight between the slats boarded up over the window, straining to peer through the cracks in search of the boy...

But he was no where to be seen.

William Joseph Batson.

It was sad but true that he was now Fawcett City’s Most Wanted. His picture plastered up in police stations from Hillsborough to Upton Heights. And for no other crime than being an orphan.

Swearing under her breath, the social worker sank back against the fire escape. Part of her wondering just how the hell she’d managed, at her age, to get up here... and how in God’s great holy Jesus name she was going to get down...

What Ethel didn’t see, either because she wasn’t paying attention or else he didn’t wish to be seen, was the horse on the corner of 17^th and Johnson.

Which was rather remarkable in itself, as most horses didn’t stand like a man.

His silvery-white mane fell about his shoulders, which had become bowed with age. Leaning against a rather eccentric-looking staff, the Wizard regarded the forgotten slums of yesteryear’s housing developments projects with a sadness that was palpable.

Once upon a time, he had sought the knowledge of the universe. Only much later would he realize, the knowledge of what would be came at great cost.

Good heroes tried to save everyone.

But a great one had to know who to let die.

It was a choice that he faced now. To interfere or not. To save two lives or not. To stop a friend from making a terrible mistake or not.

There were many possible futures. Propelled into being by many different acts of many different beings across many different planes of reality. But, among those, were moments in time that stood out as influencing the course of events to come.

The Wizard stood now before one such moment.

In the decades to come, Billy Batson would save countless lives. But, more important, emerge victorious where Mar-Vell would fail.

It was on that victory that the Wizard now gambled, in order to fight the future.

And all it would cost him was the death of one little boy.

Above, a point of light shone like a star in the daylight. It grew bright and brighter still. The atmospheric pressure elevated by the approaching fall of some celestial object.

As the star fell, the equine being tightened his grip on the staff he carried. A single tear slipped down his long face.

---

Nice of the humans to leave these abandoned buildings around.

Mar-Vell broke through the ceiling, crashing through floor and floor, pile-driving the creature beneath him as the pair split the structure straight down the middle. Until they’d broken through the foundation and cracked the basement slab laid over the actual ground beneath the structure.

Fists bared at the creature’s throat, the demon N’Astirh seemed to have finally had the fight knocked out of him.

"SHAZAM!"

Lightning came down from the sky. Electrical energy poured over the now broken husk of the building, creeping up along the walls as it seemed to swirl with an otherworldly energy. And then it was gone, along with the demon.

Rearing back, the veteran of Kree’s many wars let out a self-content sigh. Stretching his right arm, he tried to work out the slight pain in his shoulder. Cracking through a foundation wasn’t as easy as it used to be.

But, all things considered, not a bad bit of business.

Something wet hit him, dripping down the back of his neck. Reaching back a hand, the man wiped at the nape of his neck without even really being conscious of what he was doing.

Something about it felt wrong. It was sticky. It was warm. A sense of dread was forming in the pit of his stomach, as the man pulled his hand away and saw the fingers smeared red.

Then the smell of blood hit him.

_{“Oh, no...”}

Overhead, he could see a hand overhanging the hole above. The red-and-blue costumed figure shot out from out of the basement. The feeling in the pit of his stomach rose into his throat, the acid bite of bile nipping at his senses as he cleared a pile of debris with a broad sweep of his hand.

There was a boy there. The body badly injured. Mar-Vell’s mind was already calculating the boy’s probability of survival. Internal injuries. Hemorrhaging.

The child was dying.

What had he done?

Gently, the Kree soldier cradled the broken body of the child. The pain slipped as Mar-Vell let loose a cry. A hollow, haunting lament the captured pain and grief, giving both form in the raw emotion uttered in that echoing sound. Craning his head back, the man held the child in his arms as he shouted, “WIZARD!”

The sound of the walking stick striking the ground could be heard, faintly at first, growing lounder until the Kymellian’s three-fingered hand touched Mar-Vell’s shoulder.

But he had only cold comfort to offer. “I cannot stop death, any more than I can create life.”

Mar-Vell looked up at the equine form of the man he’d come to revere, and found that idol worship repaid with only a harsh reality. Shouldered bowed, the Kree slumped forward, his head downcast.

“But where life still exists, I can breathe on the embers... for a time,” Aelfyre offered, as the old Wizard knelt down beside his most erstwhile pupil. Tightening his hold on the man’s shoulder, the Kymellian added, “As I did for you.”

Tears streamed openly down the face of the great hero that the universe knew as Captain Marvel. The suggested implicit to the Wizard’s words causing the man to stare down at the bronze bands that encircled his forearms.

And he remembered being in the boy’s place, once upon a time.

Except, he was only a boy.

The man turned his head up. His mind was full of questions, but he found his mouth unable to form them.

“I cannot make this choice for you.” The words sank in, as though the Kymellian already knew what Mar-Vell wanted to say. Letting go his apprentice, the Wizard rose back to his feet. Leaning on his walking stick, the horse-like mage looked down and said only, “Where you journey now, you must do so alone. I cannot go with you.”

Mar-Vell looked down. At himself. At the boy. At the bands on his forearms that had for so long been his only lifeline. His last connection to a life he’d refused to give up on when a horse-faced magician had come to him, dying, and asked him if you had only a single hour left in which in life, what would you do with it?

He’d told him then that he’d do everything different. He’d do everything right. And he wouldn’t stop until he’d made a difference.

Maybe instead of making a difference, he needed to make amends.

_{“SHAZAM...”}

Lightning crashed, bathing the two in light until it had become blinding.

When it had cleared, the red-and-blue costumed hero was gone. In his place, the bronze bands appeared around the wrists of the young boy.

30 Years Later

---

Of course, it just had to be dire wraiths.

The bronze bands around the boy’s reedy forearms crackled with otherworldly energy, as the child ground the advance of the hulking behemoth to a halt. Planting one foot behind him, the young demigod gave a grunt as he lifted upward. The silvery, misshapen being came off the ground, raised overhead until the child was holding a massive creature no less than five-times his size over his head.

He tossed the vampiric bug like an oversized beach ball, the dire wraith slamming into two more that were coming over the ridgeline.

He almost took a knee after that. His face flush and his hair slicked back against his scalp, the boy was winded from the effort that was going into pushing back the encroaching parasites from the Kymellian colony on the edge of their space.

Except Arcon was pretty far from Wraithworld, so what were dire wraiths doing here?

A flash of static energy opened a brief portal, which soon after took on the form and likeness of a Kymellian boy who was close to Billy own age. “The technocrat has ordered the evacuation of the colony.”

Billy gave a grunt at that. Levitating himself a few feet off the ground, the boy caught a glimpse of just what they were up against. And it was a silvery tide of thousands of all very bad things headed right for the colony. Landing back beside Kofi, it was easy for the boy to say, “He made the right call.”

“Our defense of this world has failed.”

The dejected tone with which Kofi had said it sparked both sympathy and no small amount of desire to try and plow through that horde. Neither was going to make much of a difference however. Nevertheless, the boy adopted a thin smile as he looked over at his companion. “Don’t think of it as retreating,” Billy offered brightly, giving a shrug as he explained, “Think of it as... advancing in the opposite direction.”

With those long faces, Kymellians gave a wicked sidelong glare by the way.

So, Billy just offered a cheesy grin in return. But, the fact that they were rapidly becoming surrounded by large, armored, vampiric cockroaches was closing in on them fast. “If they’ve left, so should we,” Billy offered.

A three-fingered hand touched him on the shoulder. A moment later, the pair were vanished in another spark of static energy, right as the dire wraiths came crashing down on them.

Federal Plaza
Manhattan

"Are we doing this or what?"

"Let me start recording."

I heard the digital tone of the recorder on the table. It echoed off the bare brick walls of the room. Besides myself and my interviewer, the only other things in this room I could sense were two chairs and a table, all of them bolted down to the floor.

"For the record," he said into the recorder. "It is May 22nd, 2018. This interview is being conducted by me, Assistant US Attorney Franklin Nelson. FBI Special Agent in Charge Patrick Van Ness is in observation in the adjacent room. He will be in during the course of the interview, and will always announce his presence." There was a pause. "State you name, please."

"Matthew Michael Murdock," I said.

"And you have declined to have an attorney present with you, Mr. Murdock?"

"What good what it do, Foggy?" I asked with a laugh. "I don't need a second opinion to tell me I'm screwed."

"These are very serious charges, Matt." Foggy dropped the formality of the Mr. Murdock shtick. It was either to make me feel more at ease or himself, I couldn't tell. "Racketeering, money laundering, arms trafficking, drug trafficking, human trafficking. Jesus, Matt."

"Keep going, Foggy. I'm catholic. Shame feels good."

"Tell the truth and shame the devil," said Foggy. "And speaking of the devil. What do you know about him?"

I smirked. Subtle, Foggy. Very subtle. "More than most people. I'm the Devil, and he's me."

Foggy's heart started to race. I could smell sweat starting to form on his forehead.

"What?" he asked.

"It's a long story..."

---

Six Months Earlier
Brooklyn
3:19 PM

"You son of a bitch!"

Arthur Blackwood, president of the Crusaders Mortorcycle Club, hit me with a right cross to the jaw. It hit flush and spun me around. I hit the floor of the courtroom hard, spitting blood. Judge Newton slammed the gavel down and a phalanx of deputies rushed into the courtroom to get Blackwood out of there. I felt hands on my back, people helping me up. Across the room, the jury was stunned into silence by what they had just seen.

"Clear the courtroom," Newton shouted. "Clear the gallery, get the jury out of here!"

Five minutes later, I sat at the defense table with a paper towel on my mouth. Eric Sanchez, Deputy DA representing the state, sat at the prosecution's table while the judge dictated his decision.

"After the jury witnessed the defendant attack his attorney, I have no choice but to declare a mistrial."

Sanchez rose to argue, but stopped short thanks to a withering look from the judge.

"Mr. Sanchez, I understand what a gigantic pain in the ass that is, but there is no way in hell the jury can remain impartial after seeing that. They're tainted. We go back to voir dire and pick a new jury. A new trial would also mean a delay because Mr. Blackwood would need a new attorney, because he seems to have severed ties with Mr. Murdock in a dramatic fashion."

"I'll still rep him, your honor," I said standing. "He'll cool down."

"Be that as it may, I recommend you two work out a compromise or a plea deal. Mr. Murdock gets paid by the hour, but Mr. Sanchez and I are politicians. I don't want to cost the good people of New York anymore money on another trial. The court expects a decision on it shortly."

Newton left the bench and disappeared into his chambers behind the courtroom. I could feel Sanchez's eyes on me even before he spoke.

"Blackwood pleads to all counts. He gets a maximum of ten years, with time served and good behavior he'd be out in five."

"Bull," I said, standing. "The state throws out the gun charge and reckless mayhem charge, Blackwood pleads to simple agg. assault and gets two years."

"No way, Murdock," Sanchez started to pack his briefcase. "With time served, that means he could be out in six months. That man is a menace, my boss will rip my head off if I bring her this deal."

"Imagine what she'd do if you lost a trial," I replied. "Let's not forget, Eric, I already heard all the evidence the state plans to use against my client in the next go-round. It's gonna at least six months before we're back in here, that's six months I got to shoot holes into your case and present my own theories. It was already a shaky bet, I know there were at least two tough not-guilty votes in that jury we just lost. You want to role the dice again?"

"You're working awfully hard for a man who just decked you."

"Just doing my job," I said sheepishly. "What if I offer this: Agg assault, two years and Blackwood doesn't get credit for time served. He'll have to do at least a year. That's a year he's off the street and the Crusaders are without their president, a year that the feds and your boys in the intelligence unit have to find more dirt and keep him in there."

"And a chance for you to get paid to defend him again," Sanchez said. It wasn't a question.

"Do we have a deal, counselor?"

We shook hands. Sanchez hurried off to let both his supervisors and the judge know there would be no second trial for Arthur Blackwood. I lagged behind. Blackwood wouldn't be thrilled about a year in jail, but it was better than the seven years that he would have gotten if he were convicted. Right before I left the courtroom, I pulled out of my mouth the broken capsule that had been filled with fake blood and dropped it into the garbage can beside the door. Arthur Blackwood may pull his punches, but I never do.

----

St. Patrick's Cathedral
Manhattan
6:21 PM

"I'll be right back.'

Dakota North, my driver/investigator/bodyguard, said that would be fine as I stepped out of the idling car and into the church I had twenty grand in my coat pocket. The cash was from the Crusaders for the Blackwood trial, as well as my regular retainer for doing the club's work. It was drafty in St. Patrick's, like it always is this time of year. T

Going into churches always made me think about my mother. Maggie Murdock was like a ghost. I had no idea where she was, and I often wondered what she was doing if she were still alive. I thought many times over the years about getting Dakota to track her down, but I always came up short at the last minute.

The twenty grand in my jacket didn't feel that big. It was just two hundred one hundred dollar bills bundled into twenty neat thousand dollar packets. The cash felt light enough when I took it out of my jacket and stuck it in the poor box. They say all the good Catholics tithe ten percent. By that logic, I had to be a great one. Before I left I asked a priest to light a candle for my mother.

Maybe it was good to never meet her. That way she could be that devout catholic woman I knew all those years ago. She could never be corrupted like my dad was. She was frozen in time as a good woman. A good woman who would never have to witness what her son had become. I made a final prayer and prepared myself to go to work.

----

Red Hook, Brooklyn
11:20 PM

"We don't fuck with drugs we don't make," Mike Klebitz, vice-president of the Crusaders Motorcycle Club, said with a scowl. "We're not errand boys. You want mules go to Washington Heights and get some project niggers. Why the hell should we stick out neck out for you? Because you say you'll pay?"

The two mobsters looked at each other. Paulie D'agistino, the underboss of the Campisi Crime Family, rubbed his chin while Joseph Baggato "Joey Bags" stuck his hands in his pants pockets and shrugged.

"Because we'll pay," Joey Bags started. "And, we both know your club is going under. The days of the outlaw biker gang ain't what they used to be. Your guy, Blackwood, is in the slammer. You're hurting for money, the ATF busts your balls day and night about that little weapons trafficking business you got. Fact of the matter is you need this. You're already making these fucking rides anyway, why not get paid while you're at it? Say yes."

Klebitz looked behind him, where three of his fellow bikers sat parked on their motorcycles in the back alley lot. He shuffled his feet and exhaled before finally nodding.

"Fine," he said.

Suddenly, a sharp whistling noise filled the air. A spinning object flew from the shadows and decked a biker in the forehead. Paulie and Joey pulled pistols from their waistbands at almost the same time the Crusaders did. The two sides looked across the lot for any indication of the voice's owner.

"The hell was that?" Paulie asked, looking at Klebitz. "You trying to pull something on me?"

"Me? What about you?! You're a goddamn informant or something?!"

Out of the shadows, a blur of motion slammed into Joey Bags and knocked him to the ground. Both sides opened fire, Klebitz fell to the ground as bullets fired above him. The figure jumped away before the bullets could reach it. It swung back into the shadows and up onto the roof of the warehouse.



"Red Hook is the Devil's territory!"

The Devil jumped into the darkness to fight the gangster as they all opened fire on him.

The Baxter Building
Manhattan

"JOHNNY!" Ben Grimm yelled as he stomped through the Baxter Building's upper levels. "Come out so I can murder ya!"

"Stop me when I lie!" Johnny said as he ran out of a side room and sprinted down the hallway away from Ben. Ben started to give chase, his rocky footsteps shaking the whole floor. Johnny came the end of the hallway and ducked out on to the terrace outside. Johnny leaped from the terrace, free falling for a few seconds before bursting into flames and taking to the skies.

"Come back here!" Ben shouted, shaking his rocky fist into the sky as Johnny streaked away.

"What's going on?" Sue asked as she stepped on to the terrace. "Oh," she said, her face scowling as she saw what was on Ben's back. Johnny had slapped a sticker read "WIDE LOAD!" in the middle of his back.

"Mind helping me?" Ben asked, pawing at the sticker that was just out of reach. Sue nodded and helped pry it off his rocky back.

"I'm sorry," she said, crumbling the sticker up into a ball.

"You ain't gotta apologize for him," Ben said with a shrug. "Kid's been a jerk since as long as I've known him."

"I know. He should know better since you're..."

"What?" Ben asked defensively. "What am I, Suze? Crazy? Depressing? What?"

"You know, Ben," she looked away and shrugged. "Sensitive."

Ben turned away and started to stomp away. "Well, I'm so happy that the ugly rock monster is worthy of your consideration and pity."

"Come on, Ben, you know I didn't mean it like that," Sue called after him. "I'm trying to talk to you, but I can tell you're in one of your moods.

Ben stopped short and looked back at her. "Mood? What mood?"

"You're having one of your pity parties. Anything anyone tries to say to you, you turn it around and use it against us. You want to feel sorry for yourself, go ahead. Just leave me out of it."

With that, Sue turned around and left the terrace. She headed up a few levels to the floor where Reed and Sue kept their labs. Her husband
was in the main work station, stretched out underneath a hybrid car.

"How's it coming?"

"Fantastic!" Reed said from underneath the car. "I took out the engine and replaced it with one of my own design. It can go over eight hundred miles an hour, and it's more than adequate to power hover engines and maintain flight."

"A flying car? Is there anything else it does?"

"It runs on water, but it's not as efficient as I had hoped. Only gets two hundred miles to the gallon."

Reed pulled himself out from under the car and stood up, stretching his arm halfway across the room to grab a rag from his work bench. He wiped his greasy hands off with the rag. "So how are Ben and Johnny enjoying their R&R?"

"Don't get me started," Sue said with a roll of her eyes. "They've been bickering pretty bad over the past few days. It's been nearly two weeks since Mole Man in the Ukraine. I think they need something to do."

"Idle hands and all that."

Reed's computer on the other side of the lab dinged, alerting him that he had a priority alert. "Excuse me," he said, stretching the upper half of his body across the room. Sue watched from the other side of the room as he scanned whatever was on the screen.

"We need to find Ben and Johnny," he said as he snapped back to face her. "Something's going on at the UN.

---

United Nations Headquarters



"This is like a flying tub," Ben grumbled.

"It's not," replied Reed.

"Totally is," Johnny said as he flew by the car aflame. "

They saw the destruction below and stopped their chatter. Gunfire was erupting from every where. Without another word, Ben jumped from the car and fell the fifty feet to the ground. His impact made a small crater on the road, a crater which he climbed out of and started to run towards the building. Johnny flew behind him and followed him into the building.

"I'm going in," Sue said to Reed.

She created a disc of invisible energy which she rode down through the sky and into the building behind her brother and friend. Reed placed the car on standby mode and stretched down to the ground, following in the wake of the rest of the Four into the building.

T H E P L A N E T A R C O N

---

The static energy dispersed.

As the light faded and Billy’s eyes adjusted, he found himself standing in the alien-yet-familiar surroundings of a Kymellian smartship, the nomenclature for intergalactic vehicles created by the technologically superior equine extraterrestrials that was operated, in part, by a self-aware artificial intelligence that gave the ships their own unique identity and personality.

This one was named Friday. It was actually an Earth cultural reference to a 1940 Howard Hanks film starring Rosalind Russell as a gender-bent character adapted from the play The Front Page. To hear the Wizard tell it, the name was just as good as another. Friday insisted that she’d picked out the name for herself, having acquainted herself with human television and theatrical work over the course of several visits to the planet.

Which made Billy wonder just how many times the Wizard had gone to Earth. All those tinfoil hat wearing conspiracies took on a whole new dimension when you realized that aliens were real, totally experimented on humans, and, yes, alien abduction was a thing.

If it wasn’t, then Billy would need someone to explain that human settlement on Ch’Reesharaa to him.

As the pair of children materialized, the young Captain Marvel found himself dwarfed by the white-maned old man who hunched over the controls of the ship. On the screen overhead, the dire wraith infestation of the planet was being tracked.

When they’d arrived, the problem had been in the single digits. Now, the dire wraiths occupied almost all of the available land mass.


Score one for the good guys.

You know, this hero thing was totally cool when you were winning. And it was a bitch to lose.

The tension inside the smartship seemed to echo exactly that sentiment. Turning his head, the young Batson looked over at the pair of brooding Kymellians beside him. “We’ve already identified a sustainable world for re-settlement...” he posed, trying to sound as hopeful as he could muster.

He was totally faking it right now. And he wasn’t really sure where he was going with this, so he just sort of trailed off.

Kofi gave an alien sort that might have been a strange marriage between a huff and a horse’s whinny. “Located in Shi’ar territory,” the young colt offered sourly, crossing his arms and shooting another sidelong glare over at the young Marvel.

“The Shi’ar have planned to colonize the planet for years, but have never been willing to divert funding for it from their war budget,” the Wizard uttered, seemingly only half conscious of the conversation between the two children on either side of him. “They’ve agreed to work with the Kymellians refugees from Arcon to cooperatively terraform the world.”

Billy tried to smile and shrug over at Kofi, as though to say See? Whaddiditellya?

The young Kymellian just gave a shake of his head, another huff-whinny indicating his utter rejection of the idea.

Billy guessed that generations of interspecies warfare wasn’t going to be un-done overnight. All right, if false hope wasn’t going to win the day, Billy could settle for some brutal pragmatism. “So, yeah, we just got our butts kicked. And it sucks, but there was no loss of life and maybe we get a chance at interstellar peace out of this,” the boy remarked flatly, planting his hands on his hips as he fired back a look of his own at the pouting horse-boy, before adding, “All things being equal, I’ll take that as a victory.”

The Kymellian boy turned to jab a thick digit out at the young Marvel. “I find your optimism disturbing, human.” With that, Kofi turned and walked off to the other side of the cockpit.

Billy just gave a sigh. Why was it whenever someone said the word human around here, they managed to make it sound like it was a four-letter-word? With a shake his head, the boy turned and made his way over to the food synthesizer that was tucked away in one corner of the ship. “Mountain Dew, two degrees centigrade.”

What appeared a moment later was decidedly not a tall, cool glass of neon green colored deliciousness.

Withdrawing the cup of what was so obviously orange juice, the boy looked up toward the ceiling as he asked a likely rhetorical, “What’s this?”


Self-aware starships. Sounded cool in principle. Really bad idea in execution.

Taking a sip of the orange juice, the boy wandered over toward the dark cloud that was the Kymellian in the corner. “Anyway, I get it! You don’t trust the Shi’ar,” Billy remarked. He’d freely admit he didn’t know the history between the races of the galaxy, only that the Kymellians, the Shi’ar, the Kree, and the Tamarians all had some bad blood between them. “If Cal an’ Vic an’ Bishop were here, I’m sure they’d agree. But we have a chance, and it could benefit a lot of people if it works.”

It never hurt to appeal to reason with Kymellians.

The way that Kofi bristled and looked at Billy, the boy realized too late that the young sorcerer’s apprentice had already arrived at the same conclusion. He just didn’t like it. And didn’t want to admit that Billy was right. “I hate you.”

“I get that a lot,” Billy answered, without even missing a beat. And he did, too. It was hard out here for a human. Most extraterrestials had no idea who or what you were, and those that did probably equated your existence to slaves.

Finishing his orange juice, the young Marvel made his way over beside where the large stallion sat brooding before a worsening situation for the doomed planet below. Staring at the monitors didn’t seem like it was going to help anything. And standing around here wasn’t really Billy’s idea of hero time. “So, what do we do now, Wizard?”

The old man gave a gruff, baritone huff-whinny of his own. “My people are dismantling the stargates to this system and placing interdimensional warnings to ward off any travelers who mistakenly find their way here.”

Something about that statement nagged at questions from earlier that were still gnawing at Billy’s subconscious. Arcon wasn’t the easiest spot in the galaxy to get to. Even the Shi’ar would need the use of a stargate and a couple of jumps to have gotten here. And the dire wraiths were far below the Shi’ar in terms of space travel. “But how did the dire wraiths find their way here?” the boy asked, looking up from his own brooding.

“An excellent question,” the Wizard replied simply, with no further elaboration. Billy got the impression that maybe the old man had the same thought that he had about it.

Not without help.

But chasing that line of thought in the blind was sure to be journey down a rabbit hole with no end.

As though to affirm that the Wizard and the young Marvel were of one mind, the old Kymellian suddenly said, “But not one I expect we will answer today.” With that, the Wizard rose from the monitors and moved back to take his seat at the dais that functioned as the central control for the vessel. As the old man appeared to be inputting a new course for the ship, he noted aloud, “You should return to Earth. There are elements there that may become emboldened by your absence.”

“Aw, shucks,” Billy uttered, kicking back into one of the side chairs. Were they going back to Kymellia? Chandilar? There were so many cool places in the galaxy that Billy hadn’t even been yet. “The League said they’d watch out for ol’ Fawcett City.”

Seriously, they were in space. This was basically Star Wars in real life.

Only there were things out here worse than Darth Vader. And no shortage of galactic empires.

Still, if they had horse aliens and vampire cockroaches and whatever the heck the Psions were supposed to be, couldn’t they at least have lightsabers? Because that’d be super cool!

“Perhaps, but your world still needs you.”

The boy’s face displayed a variety of very different emotions in a surprisingly short span of time, before he let out an exaggerated, “All riiiiight,” and hopped up from out of the chair.

The Wizard’s voice reached him about halfway to the airlock. “I will send Kofi to you shortly,” the Kymellian said, as the boy turned to look back at the pair. Extending an arm out toward the small human, the old Wizard asked, “Would you like me to teleport you back?”

This time, the smile actually reached up to his eyes. “Nah, I like flying through space,” the child answered, bringing a hand up to wave goodbye as he opened the inner door to the airlock. As he stepped inside, the boy brought his arms up, casually adjusting the distinctive bracers on his forearms.

_{“Speed of Mercury. Power of Zeus.”}

The words, whispered, echoed within the chamber. An aura of energy enveloped his small form, crackling with sparks that arced off of Friday’s metal hull. As he stepped up to the outer door, the exterior hatch was pulled away like a curtain to reveal the naked cosmos outside. Gently, the boy's foot drifted from off the deck as he floated freely into the vacuum awaiting him.

Space could be frightening the first time. There was no concept of up or down. No compass points with which to orient the mind. Some never overcame the vertigo. But Billy? Billy felt like this was true freedom. Putting his arms by his side, the child ducked and then pushed himself out through the void like a dolphin sliding through the sea. Gliding across the emptiness, the youth sailed upward to loop under and around Friday.

The Kymellian ship was making a turn of it’s own, lifting away from the planet below as it turned it’s course toward the center of the cosmos. And soon there vanished, leaving Billy drifting in space alone.

Veering to his right, the boy swam through an ocean of black. Closing his eyes, some internal compass oriented toward the Solar System. As he tilted his head back, the child opened his eyes and took a moment to marvel, open mouthed and in awe, at the wonder and majesty of the universe itself. He passed by planets. Massive, colossal gas giants. Worlds encircled by rings that separated into densely packed particles suspended in tight orbital paths.

He traveled alongside a comet for a time. Passing over and under the vapor trail it left in its wake. Except gravity turned it back along its own orbital path, as the boy soon found himself in the void between the orbital disk and the outer edge of the star system.

There was another debris field. It was something of the wall that marked the gravitational bubble of the central star around which everything orbited. Through that debris disk, the child arrived at the heliopause.

And then he was nowhere. Literally in the space between space. The interstellar medium beyond the stars.

There, in the distance, Billy knew Earth lay. Too far for the young sun of the Solar System to have yet reached this part of the universe. Hundreds of years from now, light from Earth’s star system would reach this part of the galaxy. And shine there for millions of years, even after the Solar System itself no longer existed.

Stretching himself out toward that imaginary spot on the cosmic horizon, the boy braced himself as though about to set out on a sprint.

“SHAZAM.”

A flash a light. A brilliant explosion in a soundless void of eternal night and he was gone.

W E S T C H E S T E R

---

Heat lightning scored the heavens over New York state.

Then a loud clap of thunder, as a brilliant spark of light suddenly leapt across the dusk-colored sky.

Static electricity, gathered from the atmospheric drag as he rapidly decelerated, crackled violently up and down his body. The white, gold trimmed cap billowed in the wind behind him. Rotating himself so that he was peering down at the Earth, the red-and-blue clad Captain Marvel was disoriented for a moment as his eyes and mind tried to find points of familiarity with which to determine his approximate place in the world.

He was overlooking the eastern seaboard. The town of Salem Center was several thousand feet below. From this altitude, Billy could see commercial airliners moving in and away from the traffic patterns that controlled the airspace around New York City’s bustling airports.

He dropped like a stone, holding his arms up by his head as he plunged toward the earth far, far below.

The red boots stopped in mid-air, just a foot off the ground. Slowly, gently, the boy controlled his descent until the crunch of grass was once more underfoot.

He was standing back on Earth.

There was a certain swell of emotion, as he looked up and found himself once more staring at a familiar sky. Familiar stars. Familiar constellations. He had been to many worlds, in many different galaxies. But none looked like this. None looked like home.

He wondered for how long that he’d been gone this time.

“Costume off.”

Another flash of light, this one washing across his body. The red and blue ensemble replaced by ordinary clothes, as his costume was swapped out for what he’d been wearing before he’d gone adventuring.

It was wholly inappropriate it seemed. It had been a different time of year when he’d departed Earth.Already, there was snow falling on the ground. And Billy was standing there in shorts and a tee shirt, both second hand from a Goodwill donation center in Fawcett City's lower East side. Instead of looking like Earth's mightiest mortal, now he just looked like the homeless kid from under the George Washington Bridge overpass.

The boy stood on the shore of a lake. Behind him was the back porch of a large European style mansion. The night sky made Billy realize that he was hungry. He wondered if there was anything to eat in the X-Mansion kitchen?

The weariness of the last several weeks was starting to catch up with him, exhaustion creeping up as the boy allowed the levels of aetherial energy running through him to drop back to ambient levels. The chill from the snow gathering around his naked ankles was nipping at his senses, as his feet began to go numb.

Even still, the boy couldn’t turn away from the view of the night’s sky overhead. He’d drag himself into the X-Mansion. But first, he just wanted to look a little while longer.

Midtown Manhattan
11:10 AM

"'Justice personified is blind, and so is Injustice. More specifically, that personification is a blind lawyer. This blind lwayer sits by the phone day and night, waiting for the call from some of the city's most dangerous and corrupt individuals. This blind lawyer talks about the lofty ideals of justice in the courtroom and in the media, but one look at the names on his client's list -- Campisi, Manfredi, De La Rosa, Blackwood -- and you discover that Matt Murdock's deeds do not match his words...' It goes on and on like that for a while. Bunch of talk about the mistrial with Blackwood, then the stuff about De La Rosa... and then a last bit saying you should be disbarred."

"So, usual Daily Bugle boilerplate," I said to Karen. "Remind me to sue them for libel when I get the chance."

"Yes, sir."

That paper has attacked me so much over the past year that I barely noticed Karen's pulse rise anymore when she reads their editorials. They're not the only place that likes to attack me. Papers, websites, TV stations, even other lawyers and politicians all have an anti-Murdock stance of some sort... at least, the politicians and media organizations not in the pockets of my clients.

"That's all, Karen, you can go."

Karen Page, a paralegal and my only staff member quickly and quietly left the room while I leaned back in my chair. Karen was the gatekeeper when it came to any time with me. I only worked by referral, my card nothing but a phone number. That phone number rang here to Karen's desk. From there she would do the Murdock Test. Either you had enough cash to cover my fees, or your case was unique enough to grant me exposure. If you didn't have one of those two things, then Karen would refer to her rolodex full of other lawyers happy to take the case. If you did pass that test, then she passed you along to me and we would have a meeting either at my office or at whatever lockup you happened to find yourself in. Hopefully said meeting would be in my office, if only for the scenery.

My office sits on the fortieth floor of an impressive Midtown skyscraper. They say it has one hell of a view of Lower Manhattan. Guess I'll take their word for it. Someone once asked why I paid so much for this corner office when I could have gotten another one on the same floor without a view for a hundred thousand dollars cheaper. I didn't dignify them with a response. In this business, what I do on the books and off of them, you show strength by your decisions. A blind man wasting a hundred grand on a view he'll never see is part of my strength. It's part of my power. I bought the office because I could.

"Phone call for you," Karen's voice chirped out of the speaker on my desk. "It's... Uncle Angelo..."

---

Syosset, New York
1 PM

"Matt, my boy," Don Campisi said cheerfully.

His old and withered hands felt like sandpaper scrapping against the skin of my hands. He patted the back of my hand and put the other hand on my elbow to guide me across the lawn. He thought of it as a favor, but I could get around the yard better than he could. I've never laid eyes on the man but I can describe the old mob boss perfectly. Short, squat, with wisps of white hair on his pale scalp. Large eyeglasses so thick his eyes look alien. To the world at large, Angelo Campisi looks like a doddering old grandfather. To think that's what he is would be to sorely underestimate the man.

"I'm so glad you made it out," he said once we were both sitting in lawn chairs. "I know it's a hell of a drive out of the city, especially for you."

"Well, I didn't hear any moaning under the car when I stopped, so I guess I did alright."

"If you hit 'em just right, you won't hear any moaning at all!"

Campisi laughed at his own joke before moving on to small talk. He had to tell me all about his kids that I didn't care about. I nodded at the right times and said the right things. One of Campisi's men came out and dropped off two impossibly strong coffees. Just the smell of it gave me the jitters. Campisi picked one up with shaking hands and took a long sip. After that he finally got down to it.

"I want you advice on something, Matty. You know Joey Bags? Works with that crew out in Red Hook? He and Paulie got into some trouble last night on a deal."

"What kind of deal?"

"They were working out a plan with those biker guys you rep."

"The Crusaders?"

"Those are the guys. They were gonna use these Cruasder fucks to mule coke and dope across the country. They're always going on these cross country rides to Piss-ant, Florida or somewheres out in California. They don't go on the interstate, and they can make drops and deliveries to our people in Miami, Kansas City, or wherever. Instead of a fucking pick-up truck carrying two hundred pounds, fifty bikers carrying six pounds a piece make drops over the course of a week. "

"Good idea," I said. I knew all about the scheme, and the meet, from the Crusaders. "I'm a bit upset you didn't use me as a go-between."

"Doesn't matter now," Campisi said with a shrug. "As I said before, there was trouble. That cocksucker in the mask showed up, the one that dresses like the devil, and he kicked the shit out of them all before stealing the coke my guys had sent. Joey Bags is in the hospital and two fucking pounds of blow are in the wind!"

I knew that all too well. Campisi was exaggerating. It was actually a pound and a half of cocaine I stole last night. And it wasn't in the wind, it was down a storm drain eight blocks away from the meeting. The part about Joey Bags is probably true. I remembered breaking a few of his ribs.

Campisi took another sip from his coffee. "What do you know about this guy, Matty?"

"Just what you know, Uncle Angelo. I heard that he took over the rackets of the Puerto Rican Army back during the summer. He runs Washington Heights."

That's the rumor on the street, anyway. In truth, since I took out Martinez brothers, Washington Heights has never been safer. The Devil acts like an up and coming racketeer, except he doesn't fill the void when he eliminates the competition.

"Look into it for me, will ya?" Campisi put his dried up hand on the back of my hand. I had to bite my tongue to keep from screaming. "You got friends on the police force and the DA's office. They have to have a file on this guy. If he's trying to muscle in on our action, then he is in for one rude awakening. We ain't fucking Puerto Ricans, we know how to fight back."

"I'll see what I can do, Uncle Angelo. As long as you answer this: Why didn't you let me know about the deal going down between your guys and the bikers?"

Campisi shrugged again. "It's Paulie's show, you know how he is with you. Thinks cause you're a mick you can't be trusted."

I didn't say it, but I thought that maybe Paulie was on to something. Maybe he was the only member of the Campisi Family with any bit of sense.

---

Williamsburg, Brooklyn
2:15 PM

Yussel Goren had never seen so much blood in his life. It seemed to coat the floor and walls of the small Brooklyn apartment. It covered his hands and arms. The thighs of his navy blue pants were a deep crimson now due to the blood. Neta was face down in the carpet, her blood pooled out from the spot where she had fallen and oozing out through the rest of the room.

Yussel stumbled forward. He took his yarmulke off with his blood-stained hands and stuttered out some words in Yiddish. He fell to his knees and began to weep. His free hand found a bloody knife buried in the carpet. He held it up and looked at it just as the door to the apartment burst open.

"NYPD," the heavyset uniformed officer said, his gun out and aimed at Yussel. "Drop the weapon!"

C H A P T E R 1: T H E B E G I N I N G O F T H E E N D

---

^{November 12th, 1957 - 22:26 | Underground Military Instilation - New Jersey}

6 0 Y E A R S L A T E R

---

^{November 12tH,2017 - 18:45 | Underneath the Brooklyn Bridge - New York City, New York}

He had heard legends of the Troll Market but never thought that it would be somewhere like the Brooklyn Bridge. The journal had made mention of a character by the name of Rasputin in a strange runic language and one other thing a mention of the Ogdru Hem

G o t h a m C i t y

---

_{November 7th, 2017 – 01:33pm | The Cauldron}

Gotham was getting colder.

It seemed winter was taking up residence in the city earlier and earlier each year. Batman had first noticed it years ago, roughly around the time when Dick had left the cave to forge his own path. He could feel that insidious chill even now, slowly settling deep into his bones. He stood atop a high-rise tenement block, the November wind blowing hard and sharp, but even still it shouldn’t be this cold. He made a note to revisit the suit designs when he was finished with nights work. Obviously, the insulating layers were working sub-optimally.

That, or you’re getting old, spoke the niggling voice at the back of his head. The one that had been getting more and more vocal recently. He ignored it, as he always did, and returned to his vigil.

An hour interminably dragged past. Thankfully Robin wasn’t with him tonight. The boy just didn’t have the temperament for this kind of operation. Stakeouts were an integral part of the job, but they didn’t deliver the level of excitement that Damian craved. He would learn though, eventually. Probably.

Time continued to creep past, until another hour had been lost, testing even Batman’s patience. He was on the verge of declaring the operation a bust when his target darted out of the tenement building into the alley below. The lips below the cowl hitched up, baring white teeth. Some might have called it a smile, but only if they were being generous.

The target paused just long enough to swing his large head back and forth, scanning the shadows, before unlocking his 4x4 and diving into the seat. It was too cold out to linger. The engine barked into life, the lights blinked on, and in moments the vehicle was rolling out of the alley and onto the street.

“Alright Moose, where are we going?” Batman grunted, turning from the roof ledge to track the 4x4 through the night.

---

_{November 7th, 2017 – 04:17am | The Cauldron}

“He’s late.” Said Ryan.

“He’s not late.” Replied Moose.

“Five-fifteen is what we agreed. It is now five-seventeen. That makes him late.”

“Your watch is running fast. He’ll be here any minute.”

“Watch? Who even wears -”

The two men, high ranking members of the Riley crime family, were cut off in their bickering by the sound of an approaching car engine. The taller of the two, Michael ‘Moose’ McCulloch, cast his eyes around the deserted construction site, checking that they were alone for what felt like the fiftieth time that night. You never could be too careful in this city anymore. They stood in a yellow circle of light cast by security floodlamps, and didn’t dare stray too far from it. It was flimsy protection, but it was all they had. You never knew what kind of spooks where hiding in the darker places.

The car pulled up alongside them, though it was several heartbeats before the driver got out. Several tense heartbeats. Moose sucked his teeth in annoyance. He had to get outta bed for this shit. The newcomer finally stepped out of his sedan, the door opening with a painful squeal that sounded like a thunderclap in the early morning silence.

Alfred Stryker was old-school. Everyone said it. Hell, the guy still wore nylon leisure suits and gold signet rings. He was a relic of a bygone era, a fossil from a time when the crooks ran Gotham. That all changed when the Batman showed up, and shook up the food-chain something fierce. Rumours had it that Stryker was the first guy that the Bat ever put away. The old criminal had been trying to claw his way back to the top ever since, though with mixed successes. Seemed like every time he tried to put a job together, the Bat was there to put a stop to it, haunting Stryker’s every step. Most crews had stopped dealing with him for that very reason. He was too much of a liability. This time though, well this time Stryker had hit gold, and the pay-off he promised was just too good to dismiss out of hand.

The old guy clutched a metal briefcase tight to his chest, like he was afraid that at any moment it might sprout wings and fly off towards the dawn. Considering the circumstances, he was right to. What was in that case was his last lifeline. If he lost it, he was out of the game. The Riley’s would see to it.

“You’re late Stryker.” Admonished Ryan. Moose’s buddy was short, both in stature and temperament, and all this cloak-and-dagger action was getting his hackles up. No surprise, really. You couldn’t trust the night anymore, not in this city.

“I was making sure I wasn’t followed.” Stryker said, stepping closer to the pair of Riley enforcers. A film of sweat beaded on the older man’s bald pate, and his suspicious eyes wouldn’t stop roving across the shadows. His whole frame shook so bad that it looked like he was vibrating. Moose sucked his teeth again, then clicked his fingers under Stryker’s nose. They gave a satisfying snap, which became even more satisfying when the old boy near leapt out of his skin. It was a second before he calmed down, calling Moose every bastard under the sun, still shaking but at least he didn’t look like he was on the verge of a panic attack anymore.

Moose raised his hands in a placating gesture. Years of being the Bat’s own punching bag had obviously done a number on Stryker’s noggin, but Moose didn’t have time to play nursemaid. His balls felt half froze already. “C’mon, sooner we get this over with, the sooner we can all get out of here. You got our goodies in that case?”

“You’re a dick. Know that?” Muttered Stryker, though he undid the clasps on the case and flipped up the lid to reveal the contents. Nestled inside moulded foam packing rested six vials of virulent green liquid, and alongside them a white plastic needle gun. Moose didn’t know how long those vials had been in that case, but the chemicals still seemed to be bubbling away. Ryan whistled in appreciation, and reached towards the case, pulling a vial loose and holding it up to his eye.

“Never seen Venom before.” Ryan’s voice was low, as if he was afraid that if he spoke to loudly he might cause it to blow. Which might have been wise. Moose had no idea if this stuff was explosive or not. He fought the urge to take a step back and returned his attention to Stryker. The old man wasn’t shaking half so bad anymore, and the beginnings of a smile were tugging at his thin lips.

“You got my money?” Asked Stryker.

“Yeah,” replied Moose. “It’s in the car. Where’d you get this stuff, anyway? Five-hundred a vial doesn’t sound like all that much. We’re not complaining, it’s just …” He trailed off, inviting Stryker to finish his thought. The old boy grinned even harder, showing a row of broken teeth. Moose would recognise those kinds of pearls anywhere. That was Batman’s signature. Moose himself had spent a small fortune in dental bills over the years. At this stage there was more porcelain than tooth in his mouth.

“Don’t you worry about where I got it from boys. Just remember that I can get you more of it. Get me?” Styker waggled his eyebrows up and down. He’s enjoying this, Moose realised, he really thinks this is his ticket back to the top. Stupid geriatric. Didn’t he realise that as soon as Moose verified that this venom was the real deal that he was going to put the screws to the old man, and find out where he was getting the stuff from. After that there would be no need for him. He supposed that was the trouble with being ‘old-school’. Inevitably you ended up believing that everyone else was going to play by your old rules, not realising that they were old for a reason. “So, why doesn’t shorty here try a taste, so you boys know this is the real deal, and you go get my money?”

“Sure, Stryker. I’ll got get the money.” Moose went to get his gun. No point prolonging this. If he they were quick, he might be able to get back to bed before the sun rose. “Ryan, grab that needle and –”

The lights died. The three men were swallowed by darkness. In Gotham, that meant one thing.

The Batman was here.

W E S T C H E S T E R

---

“Are you really... Captain Marvel?”

The new kid was named Sammy Pare. He seemed like he was about Billy’s age. Kinda. Maybe. His mutation was so aberrant in appearance that it would have been hard to really say for certain.

The X-Men had detected someone or something landing on the mansion grounds. An ad hoc team composed of Scott, Megan, and Ilyanna dispatched from the house to Breakstone Lake in order to investigate.

They were on guard. The tension around the three had been palpable, as they were rather startled at discovering a tee shirt and shorts clad Billy Batson sitting on the snowy banks of an icy lake, just staring up at the sky.

As Captain Marvel, he flew around the sunless reaches of the most desolate parts of the galaxy, where temperatures could be negative 455 degrees. Or negative 270 Celsius, if you were into that sort of thing. Here, in lower New York State, it was only about 34 degrees and the X-Men were acting like he was going to freeze to death any moment now.

They’d planted him in a chair at a table in the kitchen, around which Billy seemed to have found the Spanish Inquisition. In no particular order, Sammy was questioning Billy’s identity and/or the nature of reality. It was probably both, or the same thing, owing to the fact that the hero he’d heard about for probably his whole childhood was not only sitting right there, but looked to be his same age. Jean was making the boy a plate of leftovers. Ilyanna was helping catch him up on sports. Megan was looking to see if they had any clothes that might fit him. And Scott was giving him a strategic overview of what had happened since the whole Limbo thing.


“The guy from The Apprentice is President?”

The television running CNN in the background helped to fill in a couple of gaps in the deluge of information overload that he was receiving at present. Ronald Reagan had been an actor, so having someone from who wasn’t a career civil servant or politician in the White House was not unheard of in American politics. Nevertheless, as Billy sat there in front of a bowl of cereal, the fact that someone he associated as a television personality was now the leader of the free world was something of a culture shock.

The year was 2017. It was nearly two years since Billy had departed for the troubled Kymellian world of Arcon, time that Billy -- traveling at velocities greater than the speed of light -- recounted as the passage of weeks.

Donald J. Trump had run against Hillary Clinton for President of the United States. Both were subject to questions about Russian connections. He was mired in allegations of sexual harassment. She was plagued by questions about e-mail use.

“What’s e-mail again?”

The world had changed.

Billy had been born in the late 1970’s. Before the accident that had claimed the lives of his parents, he’d had a normal 1980s childhood. There really weren’t that many electronics. He played outside mostly. Video games were things you played at an arcade.

He didn’t think that he’d ever even heard of such a thing as a home computer. Electric typewriters. Word processors. But a computer? At home?

Cellular telephones had been these neigh mysterious inventions that belonged on television. No one Billy knew growing up had one.

Now people walked around with telephones in their pockets that could pull down information from the Internet and run apps that allowed you to read the news, get the stock quotes, shop for everything from clothes to groceries, and access the Library of Congress right at your fingertips.

Sometimes, when Billy got back to Earth, he felt as though he was the alien. Everything changed so fast, it was disorienting to try to keep up with what was new, what was different. He'd disappeared from Earth completely in 1987, when he'd been taken to the Rock of Ages and then journeyed around the galaxy adjusting to his newfound life and occupation. When he finally returned home, as Captain Marvel, it had been 10 years later. In the time since then, he'd left Earth several times to mediate disputes among the Kree, the Shi'ar, the Kymellians. The cost each time had been a voyage of days in which entire months and years passed on Earth.

But, even with that being true... not everything had changed. Wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria lingered on. At home, it was the debate about immigration and the so-called Dreamers.

In some ways, even though he’d only just gotten back, Billy was ready to go back to Arcon. At least a dire wraith infestation was a problem he knew how to solve. You just punched it. And you kept punching, until there weren’t any dire wraiths left to punch anymore.

Now, Earth’s problems?

Not even the wisdom of Solomon had the answers for all of Earth’s problems.

But, while Billy might not have the answers to health care reform, immigration reform, election finance reform, electoral college reform, or the Middle East... he did pick up on the fact that the X-Men weren’t telling him everything.

They seemed exhausted. They seemed on edge. Like they were waiting for someone to attack. And that was just the people who were here. Jono and the other New Mutants had apparently graduated and moved on with their lives. Well, except for Morph. But where was Victor? Where was Cal? Where was Professor Xavier?

Billy had every idea that something had happened, but Scott wasn’t offering anything up and Billy was a little too wiped out to have asked. Plus, it didn’t really seem like the polite thing to do, prying into that sort of thing.

Billy had a plate of food in front of him and a place to sleep tonight. He was happy to see the X-Men again, and they seemed somewhat relieved to have found him randomly sitting on the shores of Breakstone Lake.

It was enough to just enjoy the company for one evening.


He hadn’t had a bath in weeks.

...or, years, apparently.

Kymellian smartships had a finite amount of resources. Recycling stores of water for bathing wasn’t practical, so the Kymellians had developed a sort of sonic energy technology that was supposed to clean the body by using low energy pulses carried on sound waves to remove dead skin and dirt. It was supposed to be therapeutic, more like getting a massage than standing in a shower. But Billy thought that it just felt really, really alien.

With everything that had changed with computers and cellular telephones, at least the plumbing in the X-Mansion was something analog that he still knew how to operate.

Plus, the X-Mansion had hot water. When you relied on the showers in the local homeless shelter, hot water was a mythical phenomenon that only existed in fables and half-remembered dreams of what it was like before you lived on the streets.

“Megan said...”

Even before he could have stopped himself, Billy let out an involuntary sigh. Megan had scrounged up some clothes for him to wear. Mostly old stuff of Sammy’s that had been intended for donation. There was a spare bed in the dormitory room that Sammy occupied, so Billy was going to sleep there tonight.

Now the two roommates were getting acquainted. Or, at least, Sammy was trying to sort out just who the heck this strange kid was who was suddenly shacking up in the bed next to his, and Billy could already see where this was going.

“You...” the aquatic mutant began, stammering and hemming and hawing as the boy seemed completely uncertain of what he was asking. “That is, Megan, she... she said you. That you... you’re...”

“Yeah, Sam,” Billy began. Bringing his legs up so that he was seated cross-legged on the bed, the boy flexed his toes and stared down at his feet. Thirty years he’d been living like this. You’d think he could just own it now, but it wasn’t something he was proud of. Unable to raise his eyes, Billy just stared at a spot on the floor as he said, “I’m homeless.”

The statement hung in the air.

The silence was honestly starting to get uncomfortable.

“So... you... you really live on the street?”

Instinctively, Billy peeked up at the question. When people realized that you were a homeless person, they could get really funny acting around you. But Sammy? Sammy just seemed thoroughly confused.

Which was good. Most people had no idea what it was like to be turned out onto the street. And it wasn’t something Billy expected a lot of folks put much thought into. “I don’t live on the street,” the boy remarked, his head bobbing from side to side as he spoke. “Well, not all the time. Sometimes, yeah, if its warm then like... in a park, on a bench, or in a box or something. Or a junkyard. Junkyards can be cool.”

Shelters were bastions of good intentions. But, they weren’t always safe. And they were frequently over crowded and under resourced. Billy could survive in space. If he wanted, he could go be homeless in Atlantis or the Blue Area of the moon. Those were options that ordinary homeless folk didn’t have, so there were a lot of times that a shelter was available but Billy passed it by anyway.

No sense taking up a bed that someone else could use. And had more need of.

Sammy’s confusion didn’t seemed relieved by any of this. “But... you’re Captain Marvel.”

Billy’s eyes immediately ducked to the left. He fidgeted under Sammy’s innocent expression of shock. It was so genuine. But, there was something Billy found disquieting about hero worship.

“You’ve saved the world.”

Billy got the impression that his homelessness might be an inconvenient truth that was offending Sammy’s religion. The boy’s eyes found that spot on the floor again, lingering there a moment before he found the courage to look back up again. “Saving the world won’t even get you a Happy Meal, Sam.”

Judging by Sammy’s expression, Billy was the worst person in the world right now. He kicked puppies. Hated kittens. And was otherwise bringing the walls of Sammy’s own ignorance about his childhood hero crashing down around him.

Around both of them, as Billy saw in Sammy’s eyes an idealized version of Captain Marvel. Someone Billy didn’t know and was certain that he wasn’t capable of living up to. “But, even if it did... that’s not why I do it,” the young Marvel uttered.

He didn’t feel very much like Billy Batson now. Instead, the weight of decades spent adventuring in the shadow of Mar-Vell seemed like it was rapidly catching up with him. Unconsciously, the boy starting fidgeting with the bracelets on his forearms.

Once, he’d thought of Mar-Vell the way that Sammy thought of him. He thought that Mar-Vell had been a hero. Selfless.

Thirty years later, carrying the torch, and finding himself in the role of trying to clean up everything that Mar-Vell had left behind, Billy wondered if the bastard hadn’t simply taken the easy way out.

“Besides, there’s lots of people living on the streets. Some good. Some bad. But they’re still people.” Tired. Weary. And with far more battles before him than he could possibly take on by himself, the young Marvel raised his eyes back up as he said, “And as long as there’s some kid somewhere still living on the street... none of us have really saved anyone, have we?”

Hulk sat over looking a small town. The people here didn't really know Hulk, so Hulk chose to protect it. Puny Banner had told Hulk to be a hero when all Hulk wanted was to be left alone. So Hulk protected this small town, where Hulk could help just like Puny Banner asked, without having to deal with many people being scared of Hulk, or chasing Hulk. Looking up at the horizon Hulk growled as Hulk saw a storm approaching, forks of blue lightning arcing across the gloomy horizon. Hulk could see a giant sillohuette in the clouds, and could feel Banners conciousness recoil out of fear. Whatever Banner thought he saw, scared him. Hulk smirked, being the strongest there was there was little Hulk had to fear. Hulk doubted that even the so called Super-man could defeat Hulk.

The radio beside Hulk changed from it's music with 'breaking news'. Apparently there was some form of commotion in New York around a possible attack on the United Nations. Hulk didn't want to go. New York meant Superheroes, Police, Cameras and National Guard. Hulk moved to push over the radio, however Hulk could feel Banners conciousness pushing back. Hulk had no choice, growling as the heavens opened and the rain started to pour. Running, Hulk kicked up and bounded up in the sky leaping over a great distance. On nearing the ground changing stance so that the moment Hulks feet touched the ground, Hulk jumped up again. The rain and wind buffeting against his skin. Bounding there was a thundererous sound across the state as Hulk came closer and closer to the great city of New York...

---

Hulk landed a street away, Helicopters had already been following him through the city. Hulk chose to ignore them. As Hulk got closer Hulk could see the Fantastic Four, the Rock man jumped into the fray first, jumping from the floating bathtub that they seemed to be using as transport. Hulk jumped up as he saw another missile fire from one of the rooftops. Using his own body to block the blast Hulk was then sent towards the bottom of the UN building, crashing through the wall in a roll into a room full of surprised, and frightened politicians. Hulk stood up and roared towards the outside of the building, voice echoing through the streets. If someone hadn't noticed that Hulk was here by now, they surely would have.

Hulk saw someone in a red and black suit atop a building and almost went after him before Banner drew his attention elsewhere. Just across from where the Thing had landed there was a group of people cowering, above them a billboard began to fall. Hulk ran straight at the rock man, no doubt he would have thought that Hulk was about to get into a fight with him. People always thought Hulk wanted to fight. 'Well it's not as if you've given them any reason to think otherwise.'

Puny Banners voice was always in his head. As he approached the rockman he jumped over him. Landing on the otherside he ran straight up to the group cowered in fear, who didn't even move as Hulk approached. Raising his arms above his head the billboard landed straight into his hands, pushing Hulk down slightly. Grunting with the shock. "Puny Humans, Run!"

GOTHAM

---

"He's out tonight."

A low orange light hummed throughout the room: a vintage zoetrope fitted with a more modern bulb, spinning clowns and ringmasters round and round the walls. It tended to induce minor motion sickness if you lingered long, but if its owner felt nauseous, he didn't show it. If its owner could feel anything, he didn't show it.

A ragged and multi-stained figure had startled and snorted back to life as the low, menacing voice had broken a silence that had lasted several days. He rubbed his eyes free of grime and dirt and coughed heavily as old lungs brought foul air into a diseased chest; the zoetrope spun and spun and spun and the concrete pillars and tarmac floor seemed to twist and warp. Conciousness battled through alcohol and sleep deprivation and drug withdrawal and eventually drifted to the top of the fetid pile this old man's mind had become, and sat up, looking directly at the speaker. He had been sat, crossed-legged and perfectly still, for three days. His suit bore no dust, and his face seemed like gleaming porcelain. He faced a wall, smeared with all manner of violent graffiti and human discharge, but his eyes were staring, never blinking, as if he looked through a window into the city and filth beyond. Joker stood.

"I can smell him. Out there, in his city, protecting the innocent! Avenging those too weak or too young or too dead to do it themselves." There was venom on his voice, and the old man just looked on, silent. Joker had cut his tongue out last time he spoke, and the shriveled thing flopped from his breast pocket. "Even after all these years, he's so...reliable." Joker spat, the mucusy glob glistening in the low gleam. The spinning light of the zoetrope played across his face like hellfire licking at cave walls. He smiled. "Karl, darling...I miss the old game. He's grown old and withered and complacent. Boo-hoo-hoo! If he knew what I did, if he could sniff out all the little worms and bugs like I can...aaah. But that's why he needs me."

Karl the Hobo looked on in silence. Joker tutted, and bent down beside him, deftly taking the tongue from his breast pocket in one hand and sliding a short paring knife out of his sleeve and into the palm of his other. Karl didn't try to scurry away, or avoid what was coming. He knew. He had known for days. Joker gently slid the blade of the knife in between Karl's lips, letting it clack against his teeth as he nudged open the old man's jaw. "You know, Karl the Hobo...I feel like we've really connected on this little winter getaway of ours...and I feel like it might be valuable-" Joker roughly stuffed the tongue back into Karl's mouth, ignoring his gags and moaned protest as he held Karl's jaw fast in his hands - "if I got some feedback from my most trusted confidant." Joker hacked, making a sound that could be mistaken for a dry chuckle, and then, knife still grasped, began to move Karl's mouth for him, Joker's own voice distorted and semi-masked.

"Well gee boss, that sounds swell! I'm sure Bats is missing you too. Even I know Gotham hasn't been the same without you!"

Joker coughed again and then pushed Karl aside, the tongue tumbling out of his mouth and making a wet slap against the ground as Karl gagged and dry-heaved, quiet sobs beginning to emanate from the worn-down old man. Joker stood and hummed quietly, seeming to think something over in brain, tossing ideas around from one side to the other. "Aah, I must admit, I have lost my muse for grand schemes in my twilight years..." Joker rounded on Karl, the paring knife twirling in his left hand as his right reached inside his jacket and returned wielding a razor, "but that doesn't mean i'm completely out of good ideas."

There were no screams; but deep below Wayne Tower, in old abandoned storm drains, terrible laughter echoed.

---

GOTHAM

---

B R E A K I N G N E W S O N G C N -

A NIGHTMARE RETURNS?

CITY UNDER THREAT? LEADERS IN DANGER? CITIZENS IN PERIL? MANY FEARS FOUND AFTER CORPSE WITH CRYPTIC MESSAGE LEFT IN CHILDREN'S PLAYGROUND.

A CONCERNED PARENT'S REPORT TURNS TO WIDE-SCALE SPECULATION AS BODY OF UNIDENTIFIED VAGRANT FOUND IN A CHILDREN'S PLAYPARK IN RESIDENTIAL AREA NEAR GOTHAM CITY CENTER.

On what was expected by GCPD officers to be a routine call-out to rouse a drunk vagrant, was revealed to be a far more chilling and complex case, as the man was found dead with extensive scarring across his chest and back, seemingly inviting all manner of criminal elements to join a so-called 'Carnivale Macabre', in what many fear to be just the first of what could develop into a series of crimes designed to strike fear into the heart of Gotham's citizens. We go now to Jack Ryder, our man at the scene...

KITE MAN BEGINS

---

Gotham City - 11th November 2017

One of the many skyscrapers in the Gotham City Skyline was not like the others. This one's 27th floor stored the treasures collected by one Kenneth Nelson. A lifetime of adventuring and exploration, of action and drama, joy and despair. Gotham's Museum of Mysticism, a place in which the vibes could be felt through the walls. They were about to have a spectacular day today. The kind people write books and screenplays for TV-movies about. A day that would stick with them for the rest of their lives.

They were about to be robbed.

It wasn't Kingpin's men, nor was it the Penguin, not even Two-Face were going to kick down the door and tell everyone to get down on the ground or he'll blow half their face off - an ironic threat from that guy. No, it was a new player in town today. A scourge upon the populace of Gotham that they had never faced before. They were about to be greeted by Kite Man.

.. Whom was fumbling with his shotgun in the elevator with his mask still not pulled over his face. His heart was racing, feeling like it was about to burst through his chest. his green flight suit had his name tags ripped off and a kevlar vest over his chest. A Neon green Balaclava was on his forehead and a shotgun loaded with rubber bullets in his hands.

OK. Maybe they wouldn't write a Ocean's Eleven-esque masterpiece of a movie about today. It was his first gig, he had been prepping an entire week for this, he had done all of the required recon, he knew that right now was when the guards were just about to get off - but before the new guards came in to take over. Tired and bored guards made for easy opponents in a fire fight. "C'mon Chuck. Trust your training, just like in Iraq." He mumbled to himself as the elevator pinged that he was on the right floor. "Showtime." He pulled down the mask over his face and walked into the room where the classical music was playing - maybe 20 people in the room, all occupied with looking at the items of display. Brown only had one price in sight.

He let off a slug into the air, causing panic before he shouted. "This is a robbery! Now everyone calm down and face down on the ground and nobody will get hurt!"

C'mon, this is Gotham. These people are used to clown mooks holding them up. You have to give them a better show than that.

The guard came down the stairs from his office, Chuck took aim with the stock of the shotgun to his shoulder and fired, reloading as the shell hit the ground and the guard stumbled to the ground holding his chest in the spot the rubber bullet had hit him.

"Now, get your valuables ready and I'll walk around and collect them. Wallets, jewelry. Fancy handguns if you got them."

Chuck got out his burlap bag of his pocket and walked around, having people drop their valuables into it, one hand on the bag, another hand on his handgun he had removed from it's strap on his leg. "Hurry up." He told the young couple whom were scrambling to unload their phones, pocket knives, wallets and jewerly. Freaking hipsters. Why do you need eleven piercings. He thought solemnly. Once he had collected the room, he walked back to the display case.

"Time for the big price." He said, inside the display was his mark.

Spoons.

Antique spoons thought to be 4000 years old made out of solid gold. Worth a fortune, for sure. He smashed the glass and the alarms went off. The police would be here in not even five minutes, and there was no way to get out by going down. He put back his pistol in it's strap and readied his shotgun, aiming at the window. Two bullets and the glass crumbled raining down below. He turned around. "G'day and thank you for participating." Chuck said as he fell backwards out of the window. He anchored a strap from his Kevlar vest to his harness on the flight suit while falling and pulled a pin.

Like a parachute, the vest expanded off of his body, folding out into a triangular kite that he held onto by one handle on the left, strap securing him on the right. Flying around the corner of the building he could safely glide to the other side of the street behind the open window while he heard the police sirens pass him by below.

And thus the words escaped his lips for the first time, as he pumped the hand which held the valuables into the air in excitement.

"Kite Man, hell yeah!"

12^th November, 2017
_{Hell's Kitchen}
^{New York}

Why do they always run?

The man looked to be in his early twenties and drenched in about a lifetime's worth of sweat. He would have smelled a treat from a mile away, but Logan was in hot pursuit. He could smell every day since his last bath, etched into the pits of his t-shirt. Wolverine curled his nose, claws extended as he chased. Sometimes he wished he could turn his senses off.

"Outta the way, lady!" He yells, running into the road to avoid the pedestrians in his path. The same ones the mugger was happily pushing aside with his arm. In his right hand was a knife and clenched in his left was a heavy purse. It was clearly holding him back but he wasn't about to leave it for the previous owner. Logan sheathes his claws and runs on, trying to catch the idiot before he hurt somebody. He hears a crackle behind him, and before long Northstar is flying alongside him.

"What kept you?"

"Thought I'd have a look around. This used to be my old stomping ground after all," he smiles, his eyes following the mugger, currently slipping away. "You need some help or you happy to struggle on alone?"

"If you're not too busy." He huffs. Northstar speeds up, leaving Logan in his dust, as he reaches a hand out. He was gifted with the mutant ability to fly at great speed. His brain however, understandably lagged behind. The mugger in a fit of panic, thrashes the bag in all manner of direction, impacting with the young mutant's head, breaking his flight and leading him to an emergency landing.

"I've got him!" Jean-Paul grimaces from the floor as Logan overtakes him. His blood was pumping. The felon ducks into a blind alley and stops.

"I don't believe that is yours." In front of him, standing at a good twelve feet was the orange mass of fur known as Sasquatch, or Walt Langkowski to his friends. The gamma-powered beast tuts through an underbrush of fangs. The mugger drops the purse without a second thought, crippled with fear. As if compelled, he turns on his heel to run.

Snikt

He stops as he soon as he had started, the flash of adamantium stopping short of his neck. A panting, and thoroughly pissed off Logan stood before him.

"Please, jaysus. Take the stuff, man!" the robber pleads, dropping to his knees. Christ. Logan retracts his claws, his facing showing his disgust. He reaches down and hoists the man up by his arm.

"Now listen. You're going to take this purse and you're going to give it back to the lady you got it from, and then you're going to turn yourself over to the police." Logan picks the purse up and hands it to him with some force. "If you don't, it's going to be him that comes looking for you." He points to Langkowski with his forefinger. The beast smiles, giving a short wave. The man nods quickly. "And don't try to run. He reads minds too." He roars, happy to use his enemy's ignorance to his advantage. The man breaks off with a scream, pushing the reemerging Northstar to one side as he desperately tries to track his victim down. Wolverine rubs the corners of his eyes with his thumb and forefinger.

"You don't think you laid it on a bit thick?" Walt comments, his eyes turning to the roughed up mutant hovering in front. "What happened to you?"

"Shut up."

"Both of you--" Logan stops, his ears pricking up.

"What is i--"

"Shhhh!" Logan concentrates. From the sound of it, it was almost like an...

"Explosion!" A passer by yells, as it becomes clear that something is amiss. Wolverine thinks back to the news of that morning.

"You don't think--"

"We need to move." Logan makes off to run, following the noise as his comrades follow behind.

---

12^th November, 2017
_{The United Nations Headquarters}
^{New York}

As the red-clad assassin decended from the rooftop, the smoke from the bazooka-blast rocked higher and higher in the air. The explosion tore an amber hole in the otherwise bare New York city night sky. The man lands with a crash and a muffled whimper.

"Whimper," he says under his breath, wincing in pain. Sirens were blazing, the city's emergency services scrambling to get to the scene; in a heaped pile at the bottom of the building however, Wade Wilson was scrambling to rejoin his dislocated legs to his hipbone.

"Just gonna slide that in there. That's it. Flesh and bone scrape together as he manipulates himself. "Might be a few hours early for that." He pops his left leg into joint and starts to crawl forwards. He takes his time before ascending, pushing the other leg into place and shifting his weight onto it.

"Ahhhh, fuck-nuggets!" He screams, as he realises his ankle was shattered in the fall. He struggles with his footing for a moment, shaking in place. His healing factor is working its ass of just to keep him on two feet.

"Colourful. You kiss your mother's ass with that mouth?" He chirps, seemingly out of nowhere.

"I'm talking to you, jackoff."

Excuse me?

He picks up his pistol from the ground and holsters it.

"You heard me. I can see you." He snaps, "And change the clock behind you already. Daylight savings ended like a month ago already. Let it go...

I don't understand how this is--

"Don't you do any research for this? I'm the frickin' merc with the mouth, baby. I'm the only reason half the bedwetters reading this post know what 'fourth wall-breaking' means. Like, literally. Would you like me to refer you to the wiki?"

Can I get on with this? I'm just playing for time for when Alpha Flight turn up anyway.

"Salty. You were more fun on Old Guild." He shrugs. "...And also, I don't chirp."

Okay, okay. Jeez.

Deadpool looks to his left, to see three metahumans facing him down.

"Wilson. Thought we'd find you poking around here." Wolverine barks. He could smell the fire raging a little away from them, and the unmistakable stench of blood and quesadilla in front of him. "You wouldn't happen to have anything to do with this would you?" Deadpool looks surprised. Well, I mean, his eyes look surprised. He looks up at the sky.

"Yeah, real smooth." He replies. Wolverine looks bemused. He sighs.

"Who are you talking to?" He rolls his eyes. He could count on his claws how many times he remembered dealing with this loon and had very little patience for him. But now lives were in danger.

"You can't hear him?" Wolverine shakes his head. "Figures." Without a seconds notice, he pulls his uzi from its holster. "Listen, these ladies aren't going to be able to start without me, so if you excuse me..." He pops a few shots off at the hairy mutant before turning to run. Crunch.

"Motherfuuuc--" He starts, doubling over in pain as his ankle twists again. "Attention to detail my ass..." He snipes, getting back on his feet. He looks up just in time to see the orange-fur fist of the Sasquatch pummelling into him. His footing leaves him as he careens of into the air, and into the wall of the UN building with the force. Langkowski shakes his fist, negating the force, as he feels Wolverine's eyes bearing into the back of his head.

"What?" He asks. "He finally stopped talking." Wolverine smirks under his breath as the two start to walk towards the action, Northstar flying alongside them. This was going to be a long night.