---

Johnny tugged at the form-fitting material, which rode up uncomfortably in several sensitive areas. The blue and white full-body suit clung to him in ways that would make runway models envious, but he wasn’t feeling particularly glamorous.

“Okay, I get that you spent a lot of time and put that big brain of yours to work inventing some new impossible particles—”

“Unstable molecules,” the lanky man corrected for the dozenth time. “And I didn’t invent them; I discovered the molecules several years back. Recent events, however, inspired me to revisit the configuration and synthesize…”

Reed Richards was considered by many to be a once-in-a-generation intellect. To Jonathan, however, he was just the guy his sister chose to date. Not that he disliked Reed. In fact, despite the man’s constant need to ramble on, Johnny had grown fond of him in the years since they first met. He wasn’t as stuffy as some of the other labcoats the Future Foundation had to offer, and he treated Sue with the respect she deserved. Reed was just a bit of a dork and got overly excited about far too many things. But, Johnny supposed, when your mind perpetually raced a million miles a minute, that was to be expected.

“Right,” Johnny agreed after waiting a minute for Reed’s explanation to end. “I get all that. Mostly. The weird molecules make it so the fabric doesn’t burn up when I get all toasty. That’s honestly really cool.”

He emphasized this next part by pulling awkwardly at the crotch of the suit. “But what I don’t get is why you made this thing so damn constricting. Can’t we get it, like, tailored or something?”

Reed frowned from behind his tablet and glanced at Susan Storm, who was readying for the next set of stress tests. The tilt of her head and cocked eyebrow conveyed her thoughts.

“Well, I hadn’t considered that,” he admitted sheepishly. “It’s a wonder I got a prototype up as quickly as I did, given all the other projects I’m balancing. My investigation into what failed with our transdimensional slide has been taking most of my focus, and…”

Johnny sighed and turned his focus toward his sister. Sue leaned over a control panel on the opposite side of a transparent wall, mirroring Jonathan on all sides. She confirmed several readings and then flashed her brother a thumbs-up.

“Johnny, we’re good to go. And don’t worry, I’ll make sure we get a new version of the test suit worked up. I’m certainly not stuffing myself into one of those things for my next tests. You look ridiculous.”

After Reed’s project had blown up in their faces the previous month, he, both of the Storms, and the final member of their project team had been faced with more tests than they cared to relive. Doctors had drawn their blood, scanned them with every piece of known medical equipment, consulted with experts in every conceivable bioscience field, and monitored them for weeks on end during isolation. Nothing had indicated the foursome was at risk of harm to themselves or others. However, what had not been tested was the extent of the incredible abilities each had.

The younger Storm had found himself capable of spontaneously combusting while the elder Storm discovered she could render her physical being completely invisible. Reed could stretch his limbs and flatten his body in a manner that practically taunted the laws of physics, while Benjamin Grimm was now strong enough to bench press a semi-truck. The latter also suffered from a considerable side effect brought on by the metaphysical changes each experienced, though he alone faced this unfortunate fate. As a result, Ben had holed up in his quarters for the last several days to avoid attention.

Susan, biochemical genius of the Foundation, determined they should all go through a further gauntlet of trials she devised to understand the true scope of changes each had undergone. First, she tested Benjamin after coaxing him from his room long enough, followed by Reed, who tried to modify several of the tests using new gadgets he had designed. Sue had made it clear she would go last only after witnessing the capabilities of the others. However, Johnny would have bet heavily on the fact his sister had likely been experimenting with her abilities privately.

This left Johnny as the current lab rat. He had been given the unstable molecules uniform to wear to avoid exposing himself again and placed inside a five hundred square foot glass box. Reed had tried explaining to Johnny that it wasn’t truly glass but a transparent composite material nearly as durable as steel but a thousand times more malleable. To Johnny, it just felt like a cage.

“Sensors are transmitting, Sue.” Reed’s right arm extended and twisted through the air to flick a switch. “Datafeed is live.”

Susan smiled at her longtime boyfriend, the two sharing a moment of scientific thrill. Every test thus far had brought forth incredible material to sort through, the kind of data that a researcher could only dream of encountering in their lifetime. They had run the figures based on Johnny’s previous fiery displays observed during quarantine, and Reed had created a model predicting the young man’s potential energy output. If the facts matched the projections, then things were about to get very exciting.

She turned her attention back toward her brother. “Okay, Johnny. Let’s start slow. Just light up and let us get a base-level reading.”

Johnny tensed his muscles and felt the now-familiar surge of power run through him. His skin appeared to erupt in red-hot flames, but in actuality, his entire physical form instantly converted to a state of plasma. Remarkably, the test suit remained intact.

“Great, hold right there for a moment.” Sue looked toward a monitor she and Reed shared, which displayed various input data, including ambient heat in Fahrenheit. After making several notations, she signaled for her brother to continue.

“Fascinating,” Reed muttered as the data poured in. “Your brother is visibly composed of orange and red flames, which by all scientific measures means a temperature of 1,100 to 1,800 degrees. Yet the sensors first had him at a mere 400 degrees, and now he’s pushing 2,500.”

“I know,” Sue concurred. “If he existed of actual fire, then common sense tells us he should have a white flame right now. I’m not sure what to make of that yet.”

Johnny rapped his glowing fist on the not-glass substance. The material briefly turned yellow in reaction to the burning touch. “Hey, as much as I love being the center of attention, I don’t want to be stuck in here all day. I’ll crank things up and get you what you want faster.”

“Johnny, wait, you’re already on par with the projections and we—”

Sue was cut off when a sudden burst of energy from within the test chamber caused the data feed to erupt with overwhelming amounts of information.

“3,000, 3,700, 4,500.” Reed rattled off the figures as they flashed across the screen.

“Johnny, slow down.” Sue tried to reign in her brother, but it was too late. The transparent walls of the chamber holding him had already begun to glow a deep red, and by this point, some of the heat started seeping through to the observation room.

“Susan,” Reed warned. “He’s gone past 5,600 degrees. The composite is only rated for 6,200. It was meant to have a comparable melting point to tungsten; I didn’t expect for…”

Sue ignored him for the moment. She was well aware that things were reaching a critical point. She was also aware that the communications system wired into the test chamber would have melted by now, rendering any chance of calling Johnny off null.

“Holy #$%&!, man!” Johnny shouted from within, his words unable to reach the pair outside. His flaming aura had grown, and the radiating heat now encompassed the entire space. “This is totally awesome! I think I can push it even further!”

The composite material gave way at that moment, simply vaporizing the chamber entirely. The intense, feverish wave of energy burst from Jonathan, whose eyes widened in realization and horror. He frantically willed his fire to extinguish, but by that point, it was too late, and the overwhelmingly high temperature and flames poured outward, threatening to incinerate the entire observation room, his sister and Reed included.

At the last moment, just as the inferno looked to consume the two scientists, the cascading fire smashed into an ethereal obstacle. The edges of the flames curled up and washed over themselves as if trapped in a fishbowl.

Johnny’s corporeal form rematerialized, and the stream of fire subsided. He looked on in shock at his sister, arms outstretched, face intensely strained, as she appeared to be holding the blaze at bay until it, too, died out. A thousand thoughts raced through his turbulent mind as relief, confusion, and astonishment overcame him. However, another beat him to it before he could express any of those thoughts.

“Susan, honey, what did you just do?” For once, Reed shared Johnny’s dumbfounded expression as he posed the question.

Wiping a trickle of blood that trailed along her upper lip, Susan looked between the two of them. “So,” she answered in between exhausted pants. “I may have discovered something the other day that is pretty fantastic.”

The Red Lantern ring sat in a reinforced jar on the table in between Hal, Sinestro and May. It seemed to constantly tap against the glass, as if an angry hornet, a low rumbling from within. "Yup, that thing looks pissed." Hal stated the obvious.

"It is the Ring of Rage, i am no sure how you were expecting it to react to encarceration." Sinestro responded.

"Honestly, i was expecting it to... Well, lay on the table like a regular ring." Hal replied.

"These are sacred artifacts that channel the rawest emotions from all of the creatures across the galaxy. You should consider yourself lucky that my ring of Fear isn't on the loose or it would be forcing you to feel your deepest and most disturbing fears." He replied. Hal sat and thought for a second.

"We talkin' standing in front of the whole school wearing just my underwear or we talking existential horror like my old man stood over me telling me i'll never amount to nothing and that we live in a cold unfeeling universe where the most we can hope for is to make people remember us for a few generations before we rot in the ground and are inevitably forgotten and may as well have never existed to begin with?" Sinestro's eyebrow slowly raised. "Look, i sit in a cockpit of a 15 ton death machine for several hours at a time with nothing but my own thoughts, i think about this crap." Sinestro gave that look of questioning how someone with so few braincells figured out how to breathe let alone use a power ring.

"In any case, we need to consider putting out feelers to figure out who the Champion of Rage is." He said "Agent May, do you have any idea's?" May looked at the Ring. "No." Sinestro stated, very matter-of-factly, before May's eyes darted to Sinestro.

"What?" Hal asked, looking confused.

"Agent May is under some misguided belief that she can simply choose to become our Champion of Rage." He replied.

"The Director has made his position on these rings very clear. At least one of our agents is to be given one of them." She replied.

"And as i told your mysterious Director when he made that demand, that is quite impossible to guarentee." He replied. "Why are you humans incapable of understanding such a simple rule. THE RING CHOOSES THE BARER! IF I LET YOU PUT THAT RING ON, YOU WILL BE SUBSUMED LIKE THE MAN WE TOOK IT OFF OF!" Sinestro raised his voice a little, not into a shout, just reiterating his point louder and slower. May simply smiled at Sinestro

"Perhaps i have a lot more rage than you give me credit for." She said rather coldly, she put her hand on the glass and the Ring reacted, glowing brighter and brighter. Hal simply stared.

"Be it on your own head if you release that ring and uses your body to kill everyone in this building." Sinestro and May sat staring daggers at each other again. As they did, the Red Ring began to glow brighter and brighter. It suddenly shot out of the other side of the glass from May, rocketting out of the window and immediately zooming off East at what seemed like Lightspeed. Hal and Sinestro looked at each other, then seconds later, a flash of Green and Gold set off following the Ring at the same breakneck speed.

---

Jessica Cruz had just gotten home from a fairly exhausting day. A protest against expansion of oil drilling, volunteering at the pet rescue center, a second protest against the expansion of non-replant logging, then finally tending to the community garden in her neighbourhood. Getting home to her small appartment, she slumped down on her sofa and let out a long, unadulterated exhale. "Christ i need to curb it with the protests." She said, grabbing her face and trying to massage some of the aches away. She had college in the morning. Luckily, all her work was up to date, so that wasn't really much of a problem, but it was going in and sitting and listening for so long... Effort is hard... She then looked over to the framed newspaper clipping she had of Jadav Payeng, the man in India who had single handedly grown an entire forest... Effort was hard, but with enough effort, anyone could change the world. He did it, she'd do it. As she felt her strength returning to her, a second wind flowing through her branches, she heard it...

"Mrrrrow..." Turning to the kitchen area, she saw her angry little bundle of extra fluffy joy. Dexter, a long-haired Russian Blue sat there on the counter. She looked down to her hands all covered in his extra sharp and pointy "Shows of affection" let out a deep sigh before jumping back up.

"Dexxy! My super-duper-fluffy bundle of joy!" She exclaimed. "And what are we so loud and proud about today?" She asked, daring to risk a hand stroking him down the back. One stroke from the top of his head to the small of his back. Any further and it was back to the rubbing alcohol. His fur was coarse and unkempt. Attempts at grooming were dangerous and any attempt to actually bath him was bordering on suicidal. But he needed someone to look after him. She had watched as he was brought into the rescue center, practically feral. Watched over him, tried her best to show him love and attempting to domesticate him, while hoping against hope that one day he may be adopted. Then the day came. After 1 year, if an animal hadn't been adopted, it was common practice to have them put down. It was a policy from the top, she had protested against it multiple times, but she had to be honest, she had never actually seen an animal stay at the rescue for more than a year, meaning she had never actually witnessed this. She knew a number of other shelters had this cutoff point as low as 6 weeks. She remembered the day, getting him into the carrier, tears pouring down her face as she prepared to take him to the vet clinic onsite... Walking through the doors... To the administration office and signing the paperwork to take him home with her. He was a living, breathing creature and one day, she would figure out how to turn him into one of those cats on the internet that wanted the cheeseburger and rolled over and did everything a cat should do.

"Mrrrrow..." The growl came again. She looked down to him sat on the counter next to his bowl. She then looked at the time, 8:03.

"DEXXY I'M SO SORRY!!!" She fake cried. "3 MINUTES LATE FOR YOUR DINNER, YOU HAVE PRACTICALLY WASTED AWAY TO THE BONE." She twirled and slumped her back against the counter as she slapped her head as if fake-dying in a play. "That's her, officer, that's the one, take her away for animal cruelty and attempted genocide of the feline race!" She looked at Dexter who was still very much waiting for his food. "Alright killer, i'll get you your food now."

"Mrrrrow..." The exact same growl every time. She knew once he reached 5 was when he stopped taking her shit and would just clawing the furniture in protest. She had had to put all of her porceline collection into storage the day he came home s she was somewhat incentivised to keep him happy. Walking over to the cupboard, she pulled out a small tin of tuna and the box of kibble. Jessica was Vegan and although she had tried to get Dexxy to go Vegan as well with some good vegan suppliment cat-food, she had quickly figured out that he was very much not reciprocative to her new idea's. Pouring the brine into the sink before putting tuna into his bowl along with the kibble at a 2/3 ratio, she finished it off with hiding his medication in a particularly fat piece of tuna. She put the tuna on the floor next to the counter and Dexter was immediately in there, his jaw working like a steam shovel, just scooping as much as could fit into this mouth, 3 chews and swallow, then onto the next bite. Jessica managed to get another stroke down his back, another angry growl escaping the cat as she turned and walked over to the sofa. As she sat down there was a knock a the door.

"Uuuuuuugh, dios mio..." She groaned as she got up and walked over to the door. She looked through the peep-hole. 3 Police Officers. "Uuuuuugh!!! Look, for the last time-" She began, starting to unlock the door to give them a piece of her mind. "My right to peaceful protest is protected my the Constitution and you facist bullyboys are not getting me to admit that i-" As the lock went click and she turned the handle, the door suddenly and very violently smashed into her face, sending her sprawling across the floor. Everything suddenly went very surreal for her. She heard the 3 men barge in and start rumagging through her stuff.

"30 seconds, in and out, grab whatever you can." One of them said. Jessica slowly started to try and crawl back to her feet, but there was a sharp pain in the back of her head as she realized she was swiftly stomped up as her face smashed into the wooden floorboards. "No, dumbass, the small stuff. People see cops carrying a TV, they're gonna remember it!" Jessica tried to get up again, but this time there was a debilitating pain in her side as her ears started ringing. "WHAT THE FUCK ASSHOLE!?!?!?" One of them yelled. Jessica felt her stomach suddenly feeling rather warm as she manged to look down and see a bullet hole having ripped straight through her gut from back to front. "GRAB AND RUN!" It was at this point that the shock set in and Jess could only lay there staring at the blood seeping through the cracks in her floorboards. This was sort of broken when she heard screams of agony, managing to look up, she saw Dexter was now latched onto one of the cops arms, clawing and biting. "GET IT OFF!!! GET IT OFF!!!"

"What is going on in here?" A voice asked, Jessica looked up to see her neighbour, Mr Jenson stood there. An old retired maths teacher who lost his wife to Cancer 2 years ago. Jessica tried to reach up to warn him, but all she succeeded in doing was seeing Mr Jensons reunion with his wife as a bullet ripped straight through his forehead.

"H... Hel...p..." She tried to wheeze out, but her breaths were to shallow to really make any considerable noise. There was a third, fourth and fifth gunshot as she saw Dexter fall to the floor as well, covered in his own blood. "D-EEXX!" She tried to wheeze out, before the guy with the gun took aim at Jessica's head and one final shot ended her involvement in the situation. As everything went black, she could see something glowing red...

Dexter floated through the void of space. He had no idea of concepts of heaven or hell or pergatory. He only understood violence and food and the tall cultist that provided him with comfort, but didn't understand her place as she kept touching him without his permission. As Dexter seemed to float towards a gaping maw of utter blackness, suddenly the void was engulfed in a red light. "DEX-TER!!!" Dexter looked around, before finding himself sat on a rock, surrounded by a red, flowing river, intense heat as if lava, but viscous as blood. "DEX-TER!!!" The voice came again. As Dexter looked up, he saw a pair of volcanoes erupting side by side and in the center, an immense red, demonic being wearing a strange symbol on his chest. "DEX-TER, I SENSE IN YOU THE MOST UNHOLY AND POWERFUL OF RAGES!!! SPEAK THE OATH!!! YELL IT!!! DEMAND THE GODS KNOW YOUR RAGE AS YOU JOIN OUR RANKS!!!!" It roared as the volcano's unleashed their pyroclastic fury around him. The cat opened his mouth as a red ring slipped onto the end of his tail.

"With blood and rage of crimson red,
From the corpse of the innocent, so freshly dead,
Together with our Righteous hate,
We'll burn all evil--that is your fate!"

The blood pooling around Dexter slowly started to rush back into his body, pulling it into the bullet-holes as they closed up, the bullets slowly pushing out and clattering to the floor. The robbers were currently running down the hallway to the lift to make their escape. As one of them pressed the call button furiously, the others looked at him. "What the fuck, man! That was supposed to be a smash and grab. Get in, get the goods, get gone, we could have tipped at least 3 more of these guys, but you just had to be the big man, just HAD to turn a simple burglary into a double homocide!!! Uuuuugh, we're getting the chair for this!!!"

"SHUT IT! We are not getting anything, because there were no witnesses and we are all wearing gloves and once this gun is in the sea, that's the end of any evidence." As the door opened, the 3 rushed in, before pressing the ground floor button. As they turned back, they saw it. A tidal wave of red energy rushing towards them. The 3 men screamed as they saw the cat they had just killed in the center of that red lava. The door closed... But not fast enough as Dexter slipped straight through the gap. The last thing that was heard from the 3 men was the utmost terror as the lift slowly descended, as if taking them to hell personally.

---

As Hal and Sinestro arrived, they followed the energy trail of the red ring in through the window to see the scene. Hal rushed over the girls body, putting fingers to her throat. "I got a pulse. Gold, can we-" Sinestro grabbed Hals arm and pushed the Ring towards her body.

"Then there is time, will her to live, Green Lantern." The green energy from the ring surrounded Jessica's body. "It will not guarentee her survival, but it will stabilize her long enough to get her to a medical center." He got up and jogged out the door, straight over the corpse of the math teacher. "Too late for this one" He heard the screams from the elevator and looked at Hal. "Green Lantern, the Red Ring has found a new host. and is heading down." He jogged back over to the window they had entered through.

"But what about her?" Hal asked. He then heard a scream from outside the door, one of the other neighbours checking on the commotion no-doubt. Hal ran out into the hallway and saw an old lady screaming. "Ma'am. I need your help." He ran over to her, the old lady seemed shocked but looked at Hal as he asked for her help. "Ma'am, i need you to call 911 RIGHT NOW. There is a girl in that appartment there fighting for her life and she needs an Ambulance ASAP." He said to her, the old lady nodded and Hal then ran back into the appartment and leapt out of the window, following Sinestro down to the lobby, rushing into the appartment block, they stood outside of the lift in a covered position, both holding their rings towards the door. As the door opened, they would see something out of a horror film. The lift entirely painted in the gore of 3 fairly large men, fragments of bone everywhere, bits of organ sticking to the ceiling of it, a rancid smell to be sure... But most prominently was a single cat, sitting in the middle of the utter carnage. adorned in a spandex outfit of red and black. "Ummm... Sin-Gold..." Hal corrected himself in confusion. "That's a cat..." Dexter started to lick himself. "The Red ring has chosen a cat... Is it the champion or-" As Hal asked, the cat looked up, first at Hal, then at Sinestro.

"I kill..." The cat growled out. "Monsters kill food-barer!" It said.

"And now it talks..." Hal, stood here in spandex pyjama's, next to an alien from space, in front of a talking cat in an elevator straight out of a horror film, every one of them weilding magical rings... He started to once again question reality or if he had finally had that psychotic break. Altitude madness they called it. Too much time up there causing bubbles in the blood stream damages the brain when they pass through. The technical, medical term for it was "Tutti-Fruity-coocoo-cachoo-pants-on-head-banana's" But Hal wasn't a doctor, so that was just a guess.

"She isn't dead." Sinestro spoke to Dexter. As he said that, Dexter Shot straight up through the ceiling of the lift. breaking the cables, the lift dropped and smashed on the floor as there wasn't enough time for the emergency brakes to kick in. Sinestro flew through the gap created by the lifts drop and followed Dexter. Hal finally snapped back to reality and followed the 2. As he landed outside of the appartment again, he saw several other tennants had come to look, Dexter was stood atop Jessica's body, his corse tongue licking her face.

"Awaken food-barer... Monsters dead..." He demanded. Sinestro stood looking at the scene as Hal joined him.

"So, verdict?" Hal asked.

"The Champion of Rage has been chosen..." Sinestro replied. He reached out with his ring and a yellow pet carrier formed around Dexter. Dex immediately lashed out, and a red claw smashed straight through the consruct, before the yellow repaired itself. At that point, the red costume around Dexter disappeared, that claw being the last reserves of his rings energy after he used all of the rest of it to butcher the monsters. He continued to scratch, lash out, scream and do all of that to the cage, but without his ring, there was no chance of him breaking it. Hal pulled out his phone and called May.

"Send a containment crew to my location and make sure they know not to go in the elevator... It's not a pretty sight." Hal said. The sounds of sirens could finally be heard as the first responders arrived. Hal and Sinestro floated up to the top of the building with Dexter to wait for the containment crew to arrive.

'DOWNTOWN' // CENTRAL CITY

Iris ran the length of the city on foot and was still there before the bomb squad had arrived. She squeezed herself through the first cordon, past the on-lookers stood with their phones out. There would always be fools who tried to get a chance of glory, at risk to themselves. Running up to the police cordon she came to a stop near a group of officers who stood with a bunch of laptops and cellphones. The wind rushed as she stopped scattering their papers everywhere, they turned to her with a mix of annoyance and surprise. She put her hands on her waist, twisting herself slightly in an attempt to look heroic. Instantly regretting the decision she rubbed her hands together awkwardly.

"What's the situation-?"

"Who the-"

"Hey you're that one that fought that Condiment King!"

Iris blush matched that of the red in her costume. "Yup, that's me. Your friendly local superhero." She coughed clearing her throat. This wasn't going very well. It wasn't going badly, but it wasn't going well.

"Well, there's a bomb down the street there Miss uh-?"

"Flash, call me the Flash."

"Really?"

Iris waved off the remark. "Just go with it, so the bomb?"

"Yes, uh. It was called in anonymously about ten minutes ago. The timer still has thirty minutes on it, we're just waiting for the bomb squad to arrive."

Iris looked around the area. While there were some civilians nearby, most of them had likely been drawn in by the police activity in the area. This part of the city didn't typically see much action, especially at this time of the day. The bomb was in the middle of an intersection, easily seen. Easily detected. Not only that it had been called in, anonymously. Everything she had picked up from her father's years of experience taught her one thing. This was a trap.

But is the trap for me or someone else? She had been using her speed to help for a few weeks, but only recently donning the costume and helping in a very public 'superhero' kind of way. That can't have gained that much attention yet?

Iris nodded to the officers. "Okay I'm going to take a look-"

"Not without me you're not." Iris and the officers turned around as a small blonde woman wearing civvies approached, the only thing identifying her as a member of the police was a badge at her waist. She pulled out her ID and opened it up to show Iris, and the other officers present. "Patty Spivot, CCPD Crime lab.

Iris raised an eyebrow, her father and Barry had told her there was someone new in the crime lab, but nothing more than that.

"And why would I take you for a look?"

"Do you know how to disable a bomb?" Iris didn't respond, merely shifting her weight nervously. "That is what I thought." Rolling her eyes, Iris grabbed Patty and within half the blink of an eye, they were at the bomb behind the cordon. Several cylinders were tied together with wires, nuts and bolts. In the centre of the configuration was a Lex 5 Series, the latest smartphone on the market. The timer counting working its way down slowly.

"Got anything Miss Spivo-" The phone's screen turned to a camera, flashing saving their likeness.

They both flinched as the phone buzzed and a notification came through on the screen of the phone.



The timer re-appeared on the screen. Five Seconds. Their eyes went wide. "Badllaaannnnddddddssssss." Iris hadn't even noticed before that there were two attachments on the bomb near the phone. Grimacing she picked up the bomb, and headed south towards the badlands. A barren stretch of land between the city and the mountains.

Digging deep she ran. 4. Over cars, around people. Pushing herself as hard as possible, digging deeper. 3. The wind rushing passed her. 2. As she left the city, and got onto the dirt. A cloud of dust shot up behind her, she came to a stop and dropped the bomb. 1. Turning around and running in the opposite direction she was glad for the goggles that were built into the outfit, she couldn't see anything. She just focused on trying to go in a straight line, there was no telling how big a yield the bomb was going to have. She stopped, skidding slightly on the loose surface as she turned and looked back at the very unexploded bomb.

Approaching it cautiously, the timer on the screen had been replaced by another message.

"Thankyou for your participation."

---

Vic didn’t know why it was so cold. Not freezing, no, freezing didn’t seem to exist here. He’d caught a glimpse of the surface once when he was brought here. Vast stretches of ecumenopolis in between towering pillars spewing endless flame. It shouldn’t have been a place that could support life. Certainly not human life, and yet, here he was staring up at a dark stone ceiling. His breath came in and out but he didn’t feel any air moving. He moved his right eye. His left didn’t want to work, nor did the rest of his body. Vic had sleep paralysis once before. It had been peak football season and his knee had been acting up. He hadn't told anyone, just in case he was benched in his last school year. His grades were slipping and his parents were getting on his case (like he wasn’t still valedictorian material with a 3.9 as opposed to a 4.1). He’d known they were just worried about him, and it’s not like they were wrong, what with how stressed he’d been. Stressed enough to have a bout of sleep paralysis, he’d assumed. They were parents and he was just a kid, it’s what they were supposed do. He didn't remember what their faces looked like anymore. He just imagined them with purple eyes and the overbite of the only humanoid face he’d seen, one that plagued him like a ghost since he’d gotten here. He still had the feeling of them and the love or annoyance they’d given, holding on to everything through his waking moments to keep it from slipping away, but he felt like it was slipping away always. Was the grass of the football field always gray? All his memories had been tinted to red and orange for that was all he’d seen. That and black, like the shadows that filled every corner and the whips that tore his flesh when he had misstep on his menial labor of moving stones back and forth across a field for no reason other than to do it with no end in sight. Come to think of it, it’d been football sized. Moving stones back and forth for no reason: it was all the same.

He heard laughter and chills went down his spine. It was low, droning, and forced, made because there was no other choice rather than out of true mirth. Laughter itself was a crime here, mirth more of a privilege than anything. He wondered who was laughing, but it was him. He wasn’t in sleep paralysis, he was awake indeed. Why couldn’t he feel anything but the stone he lay his head on? A sharp grip found his scalp, pulling the skin under his curly hair. A face curled over him: the dull purple stare and bald head of Dr. Bedlam causing him to go still. He held a lone finger up to his lips. “Shhhhhh, the delicate part is almost done. I will forgive you just this once, but should anyone else hear then there will be not a thing I can do for you. Not a thing! And I’m already taking care of everything for you.”

Vic could speak but he didn’t want to. Instead he tried to move his body, but it wouldn’t listen. His eyes flickered but he couldn’t even see past his nose. He felt fear but his heartbeat seemed distant and stable. Dr. Bedlam casually wondered, “Do you want to see?” Victor didn’t say yes or no. Bedlam took it as a yes. Flashing his teeth, his grip was a bit more gentle this time. He pulled Victor up and he saw a segmented length glistening red expect where metal plates were installed, small metal arms working on coating the structure with machinery. Wires and cables were attached to what remained of his spinal column, going off to other machines. He couldn’t feel his feet because he had no feet. He couⱢdn’t feel arms because he had no arm𝕤. He cou𝚲dn’t bod𝚢 had n𝘖 body. C𝇈uldn’𝛕 fe𝀣l no l𝛦gs no leg𝛓s ꧶ould︖’t feel bac𛱘 no ︸꤂uldn’t feel fi𝈆gers cou꠵d꣣꣤꣤nꢓt ꠷o lungꚘ elbowꜦs heꞵrt nail꣔ stꕕmach coꔅuldn’t ䷽eel no꒤ thin︙

He screamed he screamed he screamed he screamed he screamed he screamed he screamed he screamed he screamed he screamed even though he didn’t have a throat or lungs or vocal chords so he couldn’t stop

---

---

Victor jumped with a start. His right eye was greeted with darkness, slowly adjusting to the low light of night. His red eye flashed with warnings, highlighting danger as a gold and green bug eyed monster with small metal wings and a black firearm stood over him. Victor threw aside his blanket, gray with a coarse texture, but the gun already fired, a red beam of energy sending him back to the floor before he could do more than sit up. The concrete was scoured by the metal of his silver limbs as Victor rolled to his feet. There was a crack, and he saw stars, head colliding with the small bridge under the walking path he’d found to sleep under. His skull might have been metal, but the skin still bled, the brain within knocking lightly. Generally, Victor treasured the piece of humanity he had left, but now it wasn’t doing him any favors. He felt a rough shove from behind, a second parademon giving him a brutal shove. He splattered into the dirt, the two of them letting out shrieks that might have been laughter. No, not laughter, not from Apokolips. They were war cries of victory sung too soon. Fingers melting away, a cannon took the place of his arm, a sonic blast fired off. The wooden bridge was reduced to splinters, and the parademons were blasted back. Getting back to his feet, Victor leapt at the nearest one. With a feral roar, he plunged his remaining fist into his face again and again. Though they were monsters there was flesh underneath, and Victor brought out of hiding. Another blast hit him on the back but after being buffeted he turned his sonic cannon on them and tore them to shreds before going back to his main prey, launching another fist into the puddle of flesh.

It only found dirt. Frantically patting the ground, Victor didn’t find even a stain. Jumping to his feet his head swiveled around, there was no sign of parademon or weapon anywhere, only the destruction left behind from his cannon, its technology beyond this world. Running fingers across his forehead he rolled the blood and sweat he found between his finger and thumb. The messages from his red eye still flashed.


Dismissing it, Victor closed his eye, letting his thoughts quell, letting sleep the nightmare that had awoken him every night since he returned to Earth. He fought to escape for what? A family he couldn’t bring himself to see? A prison he was still trapped in? Mirthless, he laughed. It was the one freedom he’d earned. Stooping down, he grabbed his blanket, pulling it from the rubble and shaking it free of as many splinters as he could. Draping it over his shoulders he walked off, going parallel to the city lights of LA, for he didn’t know where to go but in whatever arbitrary direction he’d decided was forward.

Having been unwilling to take the furious cat further than necessary, currently, S.H.I.E.L.D. had coopted one of the buildings of Blyniville Airforce Base to use as temporary HQ while they figured out what to do with the cat. Dexter was currently being examined by the boys in the lab. May finally made her appearance."Gentlemen, we have a special guest with us today." May said, pressing a button on a remote and the TV turned on. Sat in the shadows was a figure with a cat on his lap. The cat in question specifically being Dexter. Hal looked visibly concerned as the man on the TV stroked the cat with seemingly no concern towards the fluffy ball of genocidal rage sat there.

"Pleasure to meet you." The voice was distorted, clearly this man was trying to keep his identity a secret. "Call me Director Fury. I think it's time that we had this talk face to face."

"Or face to lack of face." Hal replied. Fury didn't respond.

"So far, we have had multiple reports of ring activities from across the globe." A picture of the world came up.



The crew looked at the map. Obviously, the attacks on Coast City and Yonkers from the Red Ring were marked. "Looks like the Orange Ring has been busy on the border. Probably latching onto the drug cartels. Then it's made it's way over to the middle-east, probably latching onto the Oil Barons, then over to China doing... Who knows what? But the Blue Ring is also active in those areas."

"The Blue ring seems to have found a host, but they are being ellusive." Fury replied.

"The Blue ring is the absolute least of our worries." Sinestro replied. "Blue is the colour of Hope, the most incorruptible force in this universe. Even if the Blue Ring's current host is not the true champion, it will mostly act in the best interests of hopes and dreams of the world around it. I suggest we leave the Blue ring for the moment and redouble our efforts on the more dangerous rings."

"Orange seems to be the one i'd label most dangerous. Love is pretty incorruptible as is Compassion." Sinestro looked over at Hal with a more serious look than usual.

"NEVER... Underestimate the powers of Love and Compassion." Sinestro growled. "They have lead some of the most upstanding and noble of heroes down the darkest paths. You have no idea what people will do in the name of feeling the love of another or easing others perceived suffering." Sinestro gave that thousand yard stare that Hal had seen on the faces of other pilots after sorties. The same look he had seen on another pilot who had accidentally initiated an airstrike on friendlies due to them giving him bad coordinates. That stuff messed up a man and it looked like Sinestro had gotten a first-hand look at what those rings had done before.

"Sinestro..." Hal said, legitimate concern on his face. "If you need to talk-"

"What i need, Hal Jordan, is to save your planet." Sinestro replied coldly.

"There will be plenty of time for shrinks later." May replied. "The Indigo ring seems most active in Africa. Primarily along the Gold Coast, our best estimates put the slave trade along there at 1/200 people are in some form of indentured servitude. Mostly in the sex and fishing industries."

"Yeah, they could use some compassion over there." Hal sighed.

"That combined with the current famines in central Africa, no wonder it's chosen there as its stomping ground." May continued "Looks like its attempts to push east are being quashed by the Blue ring and its user."

"Meanwhile the Pink ring-" Hal began.

"Star Sapphire." Sinestro corrected.

"Seems to be hitting all the romantic destinations. London, Paris, Madrid, Honolulu... No surprise being that it's the Love ring." He continued looking at the map. "Alright, which was the latest hit?" The photo zoomed in on a Japan.

"Sapporo, the Star Sapphire ring took over a pair of kids who had run away from home due to their parents forbidding their love." May replied

"A pair of kids?" Hal asked. "How did 1 ring take control of 2 people?" Sinestro and May both looked at Hal. "What?"

"Did you not read the dossier i wrote on the rings and their powers?" Sinestro asked. May looked angrilly at Hal as Hal slowly rubbed the back of is head in nervousness.

"I... I don't think it was delivered to me. You know, maybe someone from accounting screwed up?" Mays look of disapproval and Sinestro's continued questioning of Hal's intelligence was NOT abated by this excuse. Sinestro sighed.

"Although each ring has the power to create energy constructs, grant flight, rapid rejuvination and environmental control, each of the rings has unique powers, specifically not shared by the others. Star Sapphire has the power to split itself into 2, sharing itself with the hosts true love." Sinestro stated.

"And the Green rings unique ability is...?" Hal asked. Sinestro smiled that cruel smile that made the hairs on the back of Hals neck stand up.

"In the dossier." He replied.

"Ok, i deserved that. So, Sapporo is our next destination. Wheels up in 30?" Hal asked, getting up from the table.

"Before that, i am handing down some executive decisions for you." Fury replied. "Number 1. You are now going to be based out of Blyniville Air Base." Hal looked confused.

"I mean, i'm glad for the opportunity to be based out of my hometown, but why specifically?" Hal asked.

"Your comfort is only a by-product of the decision. In order to secure the assistance of our Champion of Rage, i have made some concessions to him." Fury replied.

"Mrrow..." Dexter's meow was also distorted by the voice filter as well.

"Most notably, he is to remain close to his owner, who is in critical care at St Martin's." Fury continued. "The bullets used by those bastards were only .22, which is why she wasn't killed by that bullet through her eye, but is currently in a medically induced coma."

"My name is Dex-Starr now..." Dex said, his voice continuing to be distorted by the filter.

"And Dex-Starr... You are joining us in Sapporo?" Hal asked the cat.

"Dex-Starr will kill for Fury." He stated.

"And if we need people not dead?" Hal asked. Dex simply began licking himself, not answering the question. "Beautiful." Hal said with a smile at Sinestro that begged the alien to save him.

"Wheels up in 30." May said.

"That's my line, i called dibs on that!" Hal yelled as he got to his feet.

FORMER SOVIET PRISON // UNKNOWN LOCATION

1100HRS. Jogging up to the door, he pushed his head against the glass, trying to look outside the room. Two guards. He ducked down low to the offside of the door and banged on it once. "Help!"

Without hesitation, the door was thrown open. The two guards ran in, guns coming up. Twisting out from his hiding spot, he threw the shield as the door closed. Holding the door open, continuing with his momentum he grabbed the first guard's taser as it came up, twisting his arm until the guard's hand opened and fell to the ground. Still holding the mans wrist he placed his other hand on the mans shoulder and pushed the guard in between Steve and the second guard.

As Steve heard the taser fire, he pushed. Sending the guard flying back, the teeth of the taser digging into his vest the two landed in a heap. Steve didn't have time to check on his handiwork however, within moments the sirens would be blaring. Picking up the shield he raced down the hall, shield on his arm. Getting down the hallway, the door at the end of the hall burst open. He pulled his arm back, twisted his entire torso, and threw his arm forward. The shield came loose and bounced down the hall. "Rogers, ha-"

The guard in the lead was cut off as the Vibranium shield caught him square in the jaw. The shield bounced back and caught another one in the helmet before it was back secured on Steves arm, as he grabbed it he allowed the momentum to take him in a twisting somersault. His feet collided with the chest of a guard. Through the door, he didn't bother to check what guards may have been on their feet, or conscious. Racing down the hall the lightning dimmed and turned too red and an alarm blared.

He could already hear people in the halls around rushing to their stations, men shouting and barking orders. Left at the end of the hall. Steve had walked through this facility many times over the years, at the end of the hall he tucked down behind the door. It burst open as a group of guards ran through, streaming straight passed him. One, two, three, four, five... He went to stand but he stopped himself. Wait for the sixth. The slower straggler came running through the door trying to catch up with his compatriots. Smiling to himself he shot up to his feet and around. End of the hallway, take a right. Window at the end of the hall.

Steve rounded the corner, kicking it up to another gear. "Damn."

A group of soldiers stood at the end of the hallway, guns up. He swung his shield up tucking his body behind it as best he could. "Steve Rogers, Stop or we will shoot!"

Ignoring the orders he pushed himself harder directly for them. The corridor erupted in sounds of weapon fire, the bullets hitting the walls, doors, and ricocheting off the shield. There was a dull thud as he ran straight over one of the guards. Kicking himself up, he collided with the window shield first. There was a mighty crash before he was in the open air. Plummeting to the ground below.

---

They’d agreed to wait. It only made the most sense. Things were hectic all over and for Jean to drop everything into one endeavor perhaps wasn’t the smartest. She wondered if Scott thought that maybe her feelings would cool, but for days on end they consumed her.

It’s true that it wasn’t her priority. When she had a bit of time she took a bit of an evening flight, dressing in dark clothing and using her telekenesis to roam about while Nathan slept and Scott worked. She was plagued with constant pangs in her heart and visions of one thing or another going wrong at the apartment, but she was only planning on being gone for an hour. She promised herself that much. It was an interesting experience: she had never used her powers for such a long period of time on such a relatively large object, and once she got the hang of it she was zooming about. It had taken her 5 minutes to return from the neighborhood that it took her 15 to reach at first. The biggest difficulty was navigation: she hadn’t been outside much at all at night, let alone at this elevation. She kept her phone on her and powered off, just in case, and put LED lights they had for power outages by her window, set to green and gold, so she’d know exactly where to fly in when she came back.

She hadn’t been flying errantly. While getting a lay of the land was part of the purpose, she also kept her mind out for the green skinned boy. She’d probed rather deeply last time, getting full scenes of his memories that had given him the burning feelings that would cause one to take a gun to an elementary school. While it wasn’t something she liked to do, as usual fearing potential negative effects, it gave her more than enough of a flavor of how he thought, which she hoped would allow her to detect him. Baltimore wasn’t exactly the most idyllic city, and the only place she could think to find who she was looking for was in the worst areas. And with her mind opened, she more keenly felt their bitterness, anger, their fractured minds, the cries of bliss from transient pleasures like alcohol or drugs. She’d intended to stay out searching for half an hour, but had to leave after half that. It was too much for her. It always had been. Those pushed to the dregs of society, those on the bus commute, to walking the streets: everyone was struggling in their own ways constantly. Suicidal thoughts, fantasies of violence and destruction, deep cries of agony behind smiling faces, a weight of heavy anxiety. She managed through her day to day because she’d gotten rather good at shutting it off, turning it into background noise. She hadn’t opened it in a long time, for good reason.

Was it selfish of her to only be trying to help one person? She knew that if she did everything she could for everyone in front of her, she’d break down. She’d done it before, at school she’d tried to push together two people who had silent crushes on one another, but it fell apart. Perhaps it would have gone that way eventually had it happened at all, but Jean still felt guilty and responsible for a role she took that none could ever have guessed at. Wasn’t being a superhero just tackling the loudest, largest problems? Mercifully, she hadn’t crossed paths with anything particularly troubling tonight. She wouldn’t be sure what she’d do if she did, not until she got to that point. She hadn’t really been in a fight before. But she’d have to take it all in stride. Seeing those two lights as she returned home, she wanted to believe in the power of symbols. Finding Nathan to be perfectly alright, she tried to get some rest, but any sleep she found was rather light.

Hopping up the stairs, Jean returned from another day at work, eager to see Scott again. Their disparate schedules was a rough concession, but it made those daily moments all the more of a treasure. A bag bounced at her side, excitement uncontainable as she entered.

Scott popped his head out of the kitchen. “Hey! Hey, what’ve you got there?”

Putting down her things, a bit of apprehension came to her. “Don’t be mad.”

Scaott gave a light smile and a shake of his head as he returned to the kitchen, the smell of his pot of chili emanating through the house. “I can’t get mad at you, not for anything superhero related at least.”

Jean had just turned the corner, mouth agape. “How did you-”

She was interrupted by a soft kiss on the lips, Scott slipping the paper bag out of her hands. “I just knew!” Taking a peek inside, he observed, “Green and gold, huh?”

“I thought that X-genes are just a part of the evolutionary process, so green is a tie to nature. I thought about red because, well, Firebird, but I don’t want to be thought of as aggressive. Gold can be seen as representing compassion and optimism, and that’s really want I want to inspir-oh!” Jean shuffled through the bag of fabric, pulling out a piece of construction paper. “I was thinking about how to hide my identity and came up with this with the kids in class, what do you think?” Putting the piece of paper over her face, she looked through the two big eye holes. The page sat on her nose with two large triangle flaps pointing upward.

“Made with?” Scott raised an eyebrow.

She dropped the page. “Some of them have been excited about superheroes being real, and a lot of them have been anxious. So I thought it would be fun to try and have them think about being heroes themselves. We just used construction paper to make masks.”

“...You exploited child labor?”

“No!” Jean and Scott broke into laughter for a good few seconds. Wiping at her eyes, Jean looked over to see Nathan looking up at them from the other side of his barrier, a clear longing to be with them on his face.

A little while later, they sat at the table, Jean with her laptop, the TV in the other room on and playing Channel 5, all of them with food. They mask was set nearby, Jean stealing glances at it and starting to admit to herself that her design sense wasn’t the strongest.

“I think a mask is a good idea, I just don’t know if you should reveal so much of your face. And how were you going to conceal your voice? If one of your students or their parents or anyone recognizes you then it’ll be a sh...poopstorm.” Scott stole a glance at Nathan, using his finger to wipe some of the food that spilled onto his chin.

“You also don’t really like it,” Jean said knowingly.

Scott admitted, “It might look better when you actually get around to making it properly. Where are you going to get a sewing machine?”

Jean hadn’t made a costume in a while, but it wasn’t as though she lacked experience. “I bet one of the other teachers has one, if I say it’s for Halloween they might lend it out.” Scott dwelled on that, Jean catching a few of his reasonable misgivings. Would they want to see the finished product? Even if they just saw green and gold fabric, if a red haired hero wearing it popped up out of the blue, mask or not… “I’ll figure it out. For the voice though...I haven’t thought about it yet, augh.” She bowed her head, taking a bite of chili and listening to the TV a bit in the lull of conversation.

“- that could have been avoided if law enforcement were properly equipped to fight back against these powered individuals. If we could rely on our civil servants instead of vigilantes and the odd mutant with a conscience.”

Freezing mid bite, Jean blinked, stunned like she’d just received a slap. She turned to Scott, who’d similarly stopped with a spoonful in front of his mouth before dropping it back into his bowl. They didn’t need to exchange a word, both of them standing and moving to the living room to get a better look at the TV. They watched the young CEO of Stark Industries parading about the stage decorated with metal men in various colors with weapons out and visible on many of them. The name said it all: War Machine. Jean leaned back in her seat, a trembling hand over her face. Scott gripped the arm of the couch, veins bulging from his hand.

“He- he did not just-”

“Can’t take the mask off if there wasn’t one in the first place!” Scott leaned forward, heel bouncing on the ground. A few feet away Nathan let out a low whine.

“People are saying the police need to be de-funded and he calls it War Machine! He said law enforcement, didn’t he?” She paused as he did. And the crowd continued to clap and cheer. That was the worst part. She felt her insides crashing down, each clap like a sledgehammer to an old mansion. It made her sick. Disgusted even.

It took a minute or so for them to gather themselves. “Jean, I’m sorry for ever doubting you.” He put a hand on her back, stroking it softly. “If you weren’t going out there, after seeing that I’d be the one figuring something out.”

Jean’s breath was starting to steady, but each deep breath still shook her. Looking back at the screen as Tony introduced his War Machine pilots, she caught the suit or armor sitting as a centerpiece. “I’m so glad I didn’t go red and gold, ugh.” Scott managed a smile, pressing his forehead against Jean’s shoulder. “The ‘odd mutant with a conscience’, oh what I wouldn’t do to give him a piece of my mind.” She clutched at the air before storming from the couch, giving Nathan a reassuring kiss on the forehead and snatching another bite of food. Taking him in her arms, she floated his high chair and their bowls of food back to the living room, Scott watching with awe and trepidation.

“So what, they’re going to put a War Machine in every major city in the US? I have to buy half my school supplies for my one class but the BPD are going to get a shiny new toy to crash through the Basilica.”

“Or we’ll just get fresh take on the Gun Trace Task Force. Dear god if someone takes a joy ride in that thing...who thought this was a good idea? A whole room of the smartest minds in the countr-”

Scott stopped dead as the next exposition began, a mammoth in red and purple emerging: a bona fide mech straight out of the pages of science fiction. Its face and shape were roughly human, yet it displayed no humanity whatsoever. Bolivar’s Tasks words didn’t carry any either. ‘Human problem’, ‘DNA scan’, ‘mutant gene’, ‘registration’. Each of these words and phrases sucked all the air out of the room. She and Scott went deathly quiet. Hand trembling, Scott turned off the TV. Their bowls were placed down, the contents destined to grow cold. They didn’t have much appetite any more. Jean stood for a moment, picking Nathan up. With a flash of her mind, the paper mask on the table fluttered into the trash can and she sat back down. Scott wrapped his arm around the two of them. She looked into his sunglasses before leaning in, pressing her head against his chest, feeling his warmth, so needed right now to stave away the cold fears gripping their hearts. She gently stroked Nathan’s back, holding him close. She knew she and Scott were thinking the same thing. If Trask’s Sentinels rolled out, there would be no hiding. So Jean wasn’t going to hide, come hell or high water.

Hal, Sinestro, May and Dex sat on the plane as it flew over the Pacific towards Sapporo. Hal stared at Dex as he sat licking himself. "Ok. I'm gonna be the one to say this." Hal said, guesticulating wildly at Dex. "IT'S A CAT!!!" Dex stopped licking himself and looked at Hal.

"It is human who smells of Steak Sauce." He replied. "Dex-Starr can state obvious too." Hal felt like he was living in a coo-coo-clock.

"Sinestro, i'm being damn serious right now, how the HELL is a cat the Champion of Rage? This raises so many questions. Are there SERIOUSLY not angrier people out there? I mean, i caught a documentary the other day of the CEO of Wayne Enterprises. That guy saw both his parents gunned down in front of him. You are telling me this cat was able to comprehend more rage than him?" Hal asked. Dex's eyes narrowed.

"Dex-Starr's rage is currently aimed at Green Steak-Sauce-Human." He growled as his ring glowed a darker red.

"AND WHY DOES IT TALK?!?!?" Hal yelled at Sinestro. "I can get around the secret agent who knows how to kill me in 200,000,000 different ways with just her big toe, I can just wrap my head around an alien man from space that came baring magic rings that turned us into the god-damned Power Rangers, but a talking cat joining the team? That's it, i'm drawing the line and demanding answers!" He looked at May for validation. May was just as curious, but she was trained to be restrained and not act out irrationally, unlike Jordan, who, despite his Air Force training, the stress was clearly getting to him. Sinestro looked at May.

"Are all of your military personelle as irrational as this one?" Sinestro asked. He then looked at Hal. "To answer your quesion, Green Lantern, the rings are not simply drawn to those who have felt the most of their emotion in their lives. When they are on the hunt, they are looking for the correct kinds of it. Dex-Starr is the one full of the most righteous anger at this very moment and it was enough to convince the ring to choose him. His speech is due to the rings translation matrix allowing you to understand what he's saying.

"Wait. The ring has a translation matrix?" He asked. He looked at May. "Say something in... German, i dunno." May rolled her eyes.

"You're an idiot." She said.

"No i'm not, this is a valid experiment." Hal reasoned.

"Well, then it works." May replied.

"No, you need to say something in German for me to tell." Hal said. May looked at Sinestro.

"So it turns everything i say into something he understands." She replied. "Not surprising, considering we don't speak Korugarian."

"What's..." Hal stopped himself, realizing that question was most definitely in the briefing that Sinestro had written. "So, what happens if you say something in Spanish?" Hal asked. "I'm a Cali boy, i speak Spanish." He replied.

"Creo que sonaría exactamente lo mismo." May replied.

"Ah, that came through as Spanish because i understand it." Hal pointed at her.

"Alright, so that was a fair experiment." She replied.

"But, back to the cat?" Hal asked.

"He is not the first non-sapient animal that has been made into the Champion." Sinestro put his ring out and began creating constructs of several other creatures. A squirrel, a dog, a space-whale looking thing, an entire planet.

"A planet became a Lantern?" Hal asked.

"Mogo, one of the strongest of our order. He was Green just as you are." He said.

"Well, Mogo never got to meet Hal Jordan. And that's a shame for him, because i'm gonna be better than him. Hal replied with an arm-pump. Sinestro looked at Hal.

"For all our sakes, i hope you are right." Sinestro replied.

"...most recent trial for Weapon X was largely a success, though subject is growing rapidly unstable..."





"...displaying worrying signs of resistance to our behavioral conditioning. Suggesting full memory wipe unless..."





"...a perfect weapon...."





"You're not like any other subject we've ever had...."





"Logan...."





"....wake up!"

I open my eyes, looking up at a cloudy late-afternoon sky. I'm lying in the back of my old pick-up, and Kitty is standing next to it nudging me in the side with a stick. "I got us to the closest town. You wanted to pick up some supplies, right?"

Rubbing my eyes, I sit up and see that we're in the parking lot of a Loblaws supermarket. The truck's suspension groans as I climb out of the truck, stretching. "We'll have to be quick," I say, "Lots of cameras in big stores. Anyone comes looking for us, we don't want to be on film too long. You haven't gone in and bought anything yet, have you?"

Kitty shakes her head. "I don't have any cash on me. And after you skewered my phone, I didn't want to know what you'd end up doing to my debit card."

"Good," I nod, before opening the passenger's door and reaching behind the seat. "You don't want to leave anything that can be tracked. Cash only."

"I just told you," Kitty rolls her eyes, "I don't have any--"

Pulling out an old duffel bag, I open it up and root around until I find what I'm looking for: a stack of about 10,000 dollars. Kitty's eyes grow wide when she sees the money, and even wider when I hand it to her.

"I go into town on the occasional beer run," I shrug. "I'm coming up on the last of my rainy-day money, but this should be enough to get us to New York."

"Where'd you get that?" Kitty asks, uncomfortably. "Are you, like, a drug dealer or something?"

"Nah," I say, pulling out a stack of cash for myself. "It's my retirement fund. Chances are I got it from the same people who are after you now."

"Oh, that's much better," she says, her voice thick with sarcasm. "Do I even want to know what you do for them?"

"Did. Past tense," I correct her. "These days I don't do anything for anyone. I just mind my own business, at least when I'm not smuggling teenagers across the country."

"And that reminds me," she says, "I've been so focused on figuring out whether or not you're a serial killer that it didn't even strike me to ask where you're trying to smuggle me to. What's in New York that you're so dead-set on?"

"Fair question," I say. "Ever hear of Charles Xavier?"

For just a second, I see her eyebrow raise, her lips purse, a flash of recognition in her eyes, which she immediately tries to bury. "Not really," she lies, "he's some old mutant activist guy, right?"

I think about calling her out on the lie, but I can't exactly blame her for not being straightforward, not when I haven't given her any real reason to trust me either. I'll let it slide for now, but I keep in mind.

"He's the Mutant rights activist," I tell her, "and he's set up a place for people like us. Well, like you. Kids with a future, but who need guidance, protection. It's a haven for mutants, yeah, but it's also a school. Full Ivy League level education, and they teach you how to get a handle on your abilities."

Kitty thinks about it. "So...it's like Hogwarts? Just, y'know, without the problematic author?"

"The hell's a hog-wart?"

"God, how long have you been living out in those woods?"

I shrug. "What year is it?"

Kitty laughs, I grunt, and we head into the store to load up.

---

Belle Reve Super-Max Facility
Terrebonne Parish, Louisiana

"Floyd Lawton."

On the other side of the massive slab of steel that served as the door to his cell, a man with shaggy black hair lay on his cot, staring at the ceiling. As a fly buzzed around the fluorescent bulb that washed the cell in a harsh white light, he made a pistol shape with his finger, drew a bead on the insect, and quietly made pow-pow noises.

"Floyd Lawton," the voice on the outside of the cell repeated itself.

"I know what my name is, thank you," the shaggy prisoner rasped, still keeping his aim on the fly as it flittered about the cell. "Did you have anything else to go with it?"

"I'm going to ask you to come with me," the voice said. "On a matter of international security."

"I don't do security," Lawton dismissed the stranger, "In fact, it's kind of the opposite of what I do."

"Trust me," the voice answered, "we know exactly what sort of thing you do. High-level contract killing, under the alias 'Deadshot.' Eighty-two confirmed kills, estimated another hundred-fifty unconfirmed. Forensic evidence at the scene of your crimes suggest a level of accuracy with pistols, rifles, submachine guns, and automatic weapons that would break every world record if they were ever written down. Number one on the FBI's most wanted list for six years until they finally caught you."

"I did get quite the reputation, didn't I?" Floyd chuckled.

"And we'd like you to live up to that reputation," the voice said.

"Who's 'we?'" Floyd asked, his curiosity piqued.

"Who 'we' are," came the answer, "isn't as important as we can do for you. Ten years off each of your sentences..."

"Bringing my total down to a mere two hundred and sixty years," Lawton scoffed. "You'll have to do better than that."

"...and visitation rights for your daughter."

Lawton sat up. "Who's the target?"

"I know reputation means a lot in your line of work," said the stranger. "Your type likes to compete, make names for yourselves, give yourselves code-names and callsigns and keep up with each other, so you know where you stand."

"What's that got to do with who the target is?"

"I've got a codename for you, 'Deadshot,'" the voice said. "A real blast from the past. Does the name 'Wolverine' mean anything to you?"

The air went out of Floyd Lawton's lungs for a moment.

"...holy shit..." he said.

"We're putting together a crew," said the voice, "of people like you. People with nothing to lose, but everything to gain. We're going to equip you with everything you need to get the job done. We're going to provide you with a network of full support in the field, giving you information in real-time on your target. And when the job is done, we're going to give you better accommodations to spend the rest of your sentence in comfort."

"Or you'll give us a pine box and a hole in the ground when the Wolverine cuts us to fucking pieces," Floyd scoffed.

"Sure, maybe you'll get the chance to die a hero," came the answer, "or the opportunity to become a legend. They say the Wolverine was the best your line of work has ever seen. You take him down, what does that make you?"

Floyd thought about it for a long moment, before the voice said, "or I walk away from this door, never come back, and you rot in this hole forever and never see your daughter again. Your choice."

This time, the pause was just long enough for Deadshot to clear his throat. "I'm in."

"Good to hear," the voice said.

The door swung open, and standing in the door, not even bothering with a security escort, was a stocky black woman in a charcoal-gray suit. Just her very presence made Lawton stand up, halfway standing at attention before he realized what he was doing.

"My name is Amanda Waller," the woman introduced herself, "Assistant Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. Welcome to Task Force X."

"An on-site accident? Really?"

Lois' eyes radiated skepticism as the MPD officer on the scene sighed heavily. The rather unfortunate man had been fielding questions from residents, firefighters, city officials, and reporters for the last hour due to his standing position outside of the gate adjacent to the now-smoking hole in the east wall of the Manufacturing Plant. Thrust into the role of temporary liaison between the department and the public while his peers worked the scene inside, the officer had been doing a serviceable job at deflecting questions that neither he nor the MPD had any real answers to - after all, this was a Luthorcorp scene. The minute that squad cars and ambulances had arrived, there had been at least three lawyers already present and outfitted with PPE gear to guide the rescue workers onsite, maintaining absolute discretion when needed. Whatever had happened was being kept a closely guarded secret until Luthorcorp decided that it was nessescary to inform any official channels. That was just how it had worked for the last twenty years. The way they conducted themselves, the company may aswell have been operating as its own sovereign nation within Metropolis.

But then there was Lois Lane. Already infamous for her journalistic exploits before being promoted to leading anchor of The Daily Planet, there were few in the city or even on the force who weren't aware of her dogged tactics. How she'd project an interviewee's carefully redacted misdeeds back at them to get a confession while live on the air had brought the career of many campaigning politicians to a screeching halt, and that was just when she was feeling generous. Several had outright declined being seated with her for any press at all, a fact of which she had often touted with pride - truthfully, she had never wanted to waste more airtime on the sleazy underbelly of city politics than nessescary. Her focus had always been on the middle to lower class, the average man and woman that had been too often overlooked in the rush to kiss the feet of capitalists like Lex Luthor and Bruno Manheim.

So when it came to a story involving salaried workers - who were already paid less than a living wage - being put into direct peril due to possible negligence of one of the world's leading megacorporations, Lois wasn't about to pull any punches. Nor had she ever been afraid of trying to punch well above her weight class. Even as the officer tried in vain to come up with an official line that might have gotten the other inquiries off of his back, Lois could tell that he knew exactly who she was. And that apparent intimidation on his sweat-frocked brow was all that she needed to crowbar her way past the corporate slogans to some tangible answers.

"Look, I don't know what else to tell you. My bosses are in my ear telling me that it was an electrical malfunction, Luthorcorp's people are telling them that the CCTV footage was wiped out by the blast. Nobody has any concrete answers at the moment. We're just focusing on making sure everybody got out okay."

Lois retracted the ready microphone in her hand, bringing it toward herself. "And while I'm sure that the brave people down at Metropolis Central are doing what they can, you have to admit, officer..."

The officer indicated the nametag above his badge. "Harper. Forty-second precinct."

"Officer Harper. You have to admit that things are looking a little sketchy from the outside, right? I mean, take what you just said about Luthorcorp. If this was truly an accident where no video surveillance can be pulled, why would their lawyers already have that information cleared for public airing? That can't be standard procedure, can it?"

The officer glanced over at Lois' accomplice, the ginger-haired young man with the camera resting over his shoulder. Before she had formally started asking questions, the reporter had assured Harper that this wouldn't be a live broadcast. But the way that he kept getting shots of the blast site, making sure to follow the movements of the rescue crews? Part of him knew that whatever he said would find its way to the nine o'clock news. In truth, he had no reason to lie - Metropolis PD truly knew about as much as anyone here. But he also knew Lois Lane's reputation. The best path forward was to stonewall his answers before he accidentally found himself facing a suspension.

"Wouldn't know. Not my department."

Lois' brow furrowed. "But surely..."

"Sorry, ma'am. Even if I knew what to tell you, they'd be on me with so many NDAs that I'd be begging for the standard paperwork."

Her mouth opened to form a rebuttal, but Lois was silent. As frustrating as it was to admit, the officer had a point - Luthorcorp was nothing if not incredibly litigious. Though she could tell that there was something more going on even as she approached the scene, whether it was a potential cover-up or otherwise, Lois still possessed the fundamental instincts of a good reporter. And one of the more important tenants of the business was knowing when a source was going to wind up as a dead-end. Perry White had taught her that on the first week of the job, and she had been mentally cursing his name for it ever since. Partly because so much of his advice always wound up following her out into the field.

"If you need anything else, call up the precinct tomorrow morning. They'll have a statement prepped for you and all of the other outlets. Until then..."

With a nod, Officer Harper turned to address another group of civilians slowly approaching from the sidewalk, leaving Lois and Jimmy with little to show for their efforts beyond some B-Roll and a couple of vague quotes. Jimmy shrugged to himself as they turned in the opposite direction in an attempt to move out of the way, considerably less bothered by the snubbing than his visibly frustrated colleague.

"All in all, at least he was nicer than most of the cops you've tried to wring a quote out of."

"Nice doesn't get us any closer to an exclusive. Or answer why Luthorcorp's already clamping down on leaks. Even when they're trying not to be suspicious, it's like they're..."

Jimmy gave her a look. Lois sighed, waving it off.

"Ah, nevermind. You wouldn't get it."

"Probably not. Maybe we should just stick with pedestrian talking heads? Get an angle on the blast from the outside?"

Lois looked back, visually scanning the area of the blast and squinting to see if she had missed something. There wasn't any way to explain it, but her instincts told her there had to be much more to this than some faulty equipment gone haywire. Luthorcorp was still an incredibly shady organization, but their boss had spared little to no expense whenever it came to anything. Security, lawyers, public relations, and even the basic consumer software that lined department store shelves. It was all top-of-the-line, largely paid for by Lex Luthor's legendary eye for business. Ever since he took control of the board of directors, the company had enjoyed watching its stock climb to new heights every quarter.

So in the face of overwhelming success, with a CEO who had become infamous for triple-checking the data and running a tight ship with policies that lent itself to meticulous testing, when did that leave room for subpar factory equipment? And with such an overwhelmingly public result? It didn't add up. And while Lois knew she was onto something, there was virtually no way for her to turn a hunch into a top story worthy of The Planet's broadcast.

"I doubt that'd get us anywhere. And if I did, I would've put a recorder in the intern's hand. Make him gather snippets from the crowd for us."

Olsen smirked. "He has a name, you know."

"And I'm sure it's very memorable, but c'mon. We've seen more than our fair share of guys like him. Guys who think they can cut it in television now, only to get in way over their heads and jump ship. In a week, I guarantee this one'll have left for some corner-office website or a video vlog. Or God forbid, newsprint."

"Wow. If they could bottle your cynicism, someone would make a fortune."

Lois let out a small chuckle as they crossed over to the next block, where a larger crowd of onlookers had gathered.

"Is it cynicism if it's true? Mark my words, Olsen. One week and you'll have forgotten his name, t---"

Lois and Jimmy both paused.

They had both felt some vibration rumbling from the ground a minute prior, but that was always to be expected at the site of a destructive event. In Lane's time as a broadcaster, she had even been to a couple of particularly nasty scenes with some measure of aftershock. Entire apartment buildings that had caved in after a fire. Rows of houses destroyed by violent forces of nature. But whatever they had experienced in the past, the two slowly looked at eachother in acknowledgment of the fact that this felt different. In fact, the ground was practically quaking.

"Lois? What's..."

"I... don't know. Something's off. It feels like..."

A silence had befallen the crowd ahead, each of them sharing a similar expression. A few even asked what was happening amongst themselves. But as their eyes collectively began to dart upward, the tone of their reaction changing one by one, Lois elbowed Jimmy hard in the shoulder and immediately started sprinting toward the crowd. Something was definitely happening, and the only difference between the crowd's peripheral vision and theirs was a massive cloud of smoke billowing upwards. Silently directing Olsen to start filming towards the sky as they got closer, Lois maneuvered beneath some yellow-and-black tape, popping back up to join the crowd's gaze while trying to see what the hell was going on for herself.

And what Lois saw was something no one on the scene could believe at first: with little immediate indication of what it was, an enormous object had suddenly breached through the large factory roof and was in the process of rising, splintering the already structurally damaged factory wide open. Screams could immediately be heard crying out from the inside, and a small batch of rescue workers were spotted fleeing from the object's path. Police officers around the perimeter began to panic, shouting barely intelligible orders into their walkie-talkies. Lois and Jimmy could do nothing but watch the scene unfold, mouth agape, as the moving object began to reveal itself: its hull made of an unpainted-but-strikingly toned metal, with pistons roaring to life and visible armed weapons jutting out from two sides, it was some sort of advanced military-looking craft. And as it rose fully, it turned violently towards the crowd.

"Uh... what is that?"

Lois' eyes widened. The hardened reporter thrust in a state of disbelief.

"Holy shit."

The voice was heavily distorted, but broadcasting off of a speaker loud enough for the next block to hear and then some. It was the same voice that many in the crowd had recognized from a collection of fringe rants against Luthorcorp and its owner that had been garnering millions of views over the past few months. Lois herself had broadcast samplings of a few of them on The Daily Planet, and Jimmy had even mocked them amongst his co-workers in the breakroom over the last month. Now, it seemed, the anonymous hacker's threats had become very real.

The large craft took an imposing step forward, bringing down an entire wall as it approached. The crowd dispersed, screaming, while the Metropolis PD brought out their guns and began to fire on the seemingly mindless drone. The bullets simply ricocheted off of the hull, bouncing into the debris that surrounded it. An ear-piercing whine emanated from whatever engine was powering it, which sounded angrier than a machine like this seemed capable of.

Jimmy's camera was affixed to its approach, with the cameraman holding no regard for his safety. Lois was still in too much shock to say anything, but she did move forward, her gaze still on the drone, and grab him hard by the back of his shirt's collar. Olsen nearly dropped the camera as she violently pulled him out of the way, but he quickly realized that she was right. This wasn't the time or place to try and get the perfect shot.

To the onlookers' horror, the weapons trained at either side of the drone began to move upward from a stationary position.

Lights flickered to life. Even to the uninitiated, that clearly meant one thing:

It was aiming.

---

Move it, Clark...

Kent had heard the disturbance from over half a mile away.

Not merely content to stay seated in the back of Lane's car, the wannabe journalist had managed to track down a couple of passing bystanders and ask for their thoughts on what had caused the initial factory explosion, recording the brief conversations with a hastily installed app on his phone. While no one he'd talked to could necessarily agree on the details, it had all pointed towards a very sudden and hastily covered disaster that had rocked the immediate area of Hob's Bay: all the local businesses had closed shop early, patrons were preparing to be gridlocked in traffic leading out of the city, and the residents living in the surrounding apartment buildings had all filed out to the streets to try and understand what was happening. Clark didn't have any answers for them himself, but he'd tried to assure them that it looked like the emergency services were handling it the best that they could. Most of them merely balked at that assertion, claiming that they'd barely cared to make the effort before.

But this was Luthorcorp. If Clark knew one thing about living in Metropolis for most of his life, it was that if the tech-giant were at risk, the police, firefighters, ambulances, and even the National Guard might arrive to help as quickly as they could. None of the local government could risk losing out on a potentially game-changing grant drawn from Lex Luthor's personal account, and they knew it. People's livelihoods depended on the reclusive billionaire's every whim, and that had proven to be as predictable as the changing tides. It was a sentiment that had never sat right with Clark, for obvious reasons, but such a city-wide mantra had always made for a good way to tell when something was going to be done to solve serious problems. If you needed anything to change, get Luthorcorp involved.

Clark had tried to ring Jimmy's phone, but he realized that despite their friendly conversation in the days before, he'd never gotten a number to call. Lane had even instructed him to contact one of them if something went awry, but again, there was no way to get ahold of either of his co-workers. And whenever he finally sought to contact The Daily Planet offices themselves, his signal seemed to be interrupted by... something. So after stuffing his phone back into his pocket, Kent had seen no choice but to start running towards the scene himself. He was still several blocks away whenever his acute hearing had picked up the loud noises of metal crushing against concrete, but he knew something was severely wrong. The ground had been vibrating for several minutes and people had been leaving the area as quickly as possible.

"C'mon. C'mon."

What bothered him most was the sound of the screams. Even miles away, people were reacting to whatever was happening in absolute terror. He'd never heard anything like it within the city, but he'd heard it elsewhere. Massive fires half a world away. Natural disasters that had swept up countless innocent lives in the span of seconds. Emergencies that someone, anyone would be powerless to try and stop...

Except for him. Even in the most extreme of circumstances, someone of his abilities was more than capable of trying to prevent as many human casualties as possible. And before today, he had dabbled in trying to lend a hand to whoever needed it. Going back to when he was thirteen and beginning to feel his powers manifest, Clark had actually secretly been visiting areas of impending disaster for some time. Always in the background, just out of sight of watchful eyes and camera feeds. Trying to be as careful as possible as he moved certain obstacles out of the way, or grabbed a person in danger and placed them just shy from being killed. Part of him had wondered if he had any right to interfere, whether it was his place to do what was needed.

But the simple fact of the matter was that it was needed. Even his parents understood, whenever he'd been forced to admit to them what he'd been doing after coming home with his clothes singed from a fire or his school belongings missing, having left them behind to perform a so-called miracle save. No one had ever really spotted him, and he kept to himself so carefully that few had any reason to believe they had been helped by anything more than luck or divine intervention. Still, Clark had never felt like he had done enough. His need for anonymity had constantly put him at odds with his own beliefs in what was right. If he weren't so afraid of revealing his powers to the world and how the world would collectively look at him, this mild-mannered stranger that had somehow been given gifts that science had yet to be able to explain, Clark had long-since fantasized about the idea of being able to save as many people as he could every day.

But he knew that the world was more complicated than that. He knew that if he openly tried to do something to stop disasters and prevent even petty crime, the world would fear him, and that fear would eventually turn to hatred. And the truth was that ever since he had gotten these powers, all Clark had ever wanted was to be seen as normal. To have friends and to make a life for himself where he was never perceived as anything more than anybody else.

So he'd taken to wearing the glasses. To dressing himself down, to making his hair a little unkempt all the time. It was what little he could do to ensure that he'd never stood out. The tint of his glasses' lenses helped to hide the radiant blue that his irises had developed into. The hair had always maintained a slightly unnatural sheen to it, like it wasn't the result of human genetics. And as far as his physique went, well, Clark had to admit: he'd never needed to hit the gym in his life. These were all qualities that he couldn't help, but with time and practice, he could hide them effectively enough.

Now, though? None of that felt important. Even his running speed seemed to pick up from a practiced normality to something slightly above the norm as he bolted across the next block, his anxiety picking up over the thoughts of what was happening closer to where Lois and Jimmy were still standing. It hadn't even occurred to him that something was necessarily attacking until he'd made it about a block and a half away. His eyes fixated on the buildings ahead, Clark immediately lowered his glasses and squinted - well, focused - on what he could see once his vision cycled past the solid matter. Another one of his gifts at work.

But he was a few precious seconds too late.

"Oh my God, it's heading the overpass! Run! Run!"

Clark's eyes widened as he finally saw what was happening. Just above where Lois' car had been parked, there was an overpass full of emptied cars. The reason being that their former occupants had gotten out to see what was happening with the plant explosion. Now they were all trying to climb over themselves in a panic because an object had been seen rocketing through the air and coming straight towards them... in the unmistakable shape of a small missile.

No...

Before he could even flinch, the missile hit with a deafening boom. The overpass immediately splintered with heavy cracks, and bodies went flying through the air. Without a second's hesitation, Clark moved toward the overpass as soon as he saw that there were still people in the cars under it. He had been too late to save the ones above, as some were already visibly dead, but if he moved quickly enough - he hoped, with every possible prayer that he had - he might be able to prevent others from befalling a similar fate. Clark didn't know where the missile had come from yet, and he didn't care. Removing his glasses and tossing them aside, all he knew was that it was time to stop hiding. The world could hate and fear him later.

"STAND CLEAR!"

Leaping into the air and crossing over several coming vehicles in a single bound, Clark reached the middle of the overpass' undertow and lodged himself under the rapidly collapsing concrete, pressing himself as hard as possible against it. The collapse briefly slowed down, but even with his admittedly untested reservoir of strength, it wasn't enough. The enormous structure was bearing down against him, and he felt his legs buckle into the street below - and as crucial seconds went by, slowly through it.

Please, just...



...hold...

---

A green eyelid cracked open at the sound of the door shutting. Within a few moments Garfield could plainly hear the rustling of fabric, the shifting of a curtain, and running water. Stretching out his paws and upper body, he took a few strides out of the corner and left his cat form. He was clean for the first time in weeks, having swapped to a cheap Fortnite shirt and cargo pants Rachel got from a Walmart. A few wrappers of their late night mockery of a meal still hung around so Garfield rounded them up and threw them away before taking a seat against the wall as he waited. He’d managed a shower last night, his old clothes left in a pile on the floor, but when he’d come out, Rachel had already passed out on the lone bed. She hadn’t been willing to pay for two rooms or two beds so Garfield had joked about just sleeping in the corner, expecting to be finding a place outside, but she had been too tired to argue.

Eventually, the water went off and the door cracked open. Garfield awaited her in the form of a Labrador, dutifully sitting at attention, tail wagging lightly. “You’re still here?”

Dressed down to a fresh black T-shirt and shorts with a towel over her shoulders, she took a seat on the bed while Garfield turned human and crossed his legs. “Uh, yeah? You were going to do the familiar ritual thing.”

“...You can’t be serious. Did you not hear me? I want to-”

“Yeah, destroy the world for your dad, I remember.” Gar saw her eye twitch as she stared. He thought she was trying to probe him for a reaction so he kept as neutral an expression as possible, but as she leaned over slightly, her still wet hair falling from her shoulder, his eyes scanned her up and down as he felt his heart start to race. He’d thought he kept it pretty cool, but her face broke into a smirk. A chill ran down his spine.

“Pathetic. I suppose I should have expected as much from a literal animal who can’t keep his paws off of me.”

Images flashed through Gar’s head of last night of himself lifting her up off the ground and keeping her from falling when the inter-dimensional corpse came through. “Wait, nononono, that’s not why I want to help you!”

Rachel stood. “Then why? What possible thought in your tiny little brain could justify the destruction of everything you’ve ever known? Don’t you have a single worthwhile attachment?”

“Don’t you?”

“Don’t change the subject.”

Garfield stewed to himself for a few moments. “Of course I do.”

“So you are lying to me to get into my pants.”

“When did I lie?” Rachel glared. “I said I want to help you and that’s that. Does the reason really matter?”

Rachel was still for a moment. She ran her towel across her head and tossed it aside before sitting down. “No, no it doesn’t. Once you’re my familiar you’ll have to heed my commands anyway. If I want you to fetch an artifact, steal something, or turn into a wolf and rip out a 5 year old’s throat: you won’t have the agency to deny me.”

Garfield leaned back, hands propped on the carpet. “Oh, okay then. How does the ritual work?”

Rachel’s eye flashed and she gritted her teeth. “You’re taking me lightly, aren’t you?”

Garfield shrugged. “What? I don’t think you’re as bad a person as you think you are. You helped those mages yesterday didn’t you?”

Rachel’s mouth shot open only to flop awkwardly. She struggled through her thoughts before finally belting out, “You made me do that!”

“Oh, does that make you my familiar then?” Rachel raised her hands, clutching at the air. Garfield felt a pressure around his neck, like he was in a headlock. He gagged, and after a moment it dissipated. He noticed a bit of Rachel’s dark magic fading away. Letting out a cough, he gasped, “Did you just Force Choke me?!”

“...I’m normally much better at controlling my emotions.” Garfield didn’t believe that for a second. “Besides, it doesn’t matter anyway. All the good I do, all the evil I do: Trigon will find his way into this dimension one way or another, and it will all be gone. That goes for you, me, everyone: everything. All those little chemicals in your brain are telling you, all the science and math you’ve learned, all the philosophy you’ve been force fed, the religion, even our souls and the metaphysical cycle: it’s just one universe. I don’t care if some God did make it all, Trigon’s conquered countless dimensions and he’ll conquer countless more. Everything turns to dust: what good is deciding what kind of dust you want to be when it’s all over?”

Garfield felt his spirit being weighed down. “What, so nothing matters?”

“No, not nothing, just everything humans have ever come up with or accomplished. It’s all the same for the entirety of this vast cosmos. All that matters is Trigon. The soul is far from immortal, but he is. When I herald in his reign, I’ll be the one thing in this universe he’ll find worthy of remembering. The only lament is that I won’t get to see it.”

Rubbing a palm in circles on his forehead, Garfield was exasperated. “And where did you hear all this?”

Rachel crossed her arms over her chest. “Trigon. My father. Keep up, I hate explaining the same thing twice.”

“...So your father told you he’s the most badass powerful God-killing inter-dimensional conqueror that ever existed?”

“...It...it felt...never mind.” She stood, grabbing her blue cloak off the end of the bed. Sniffing it, she cringed at the trace scents of garbage and sulfur still lingering. “I don’t have to justify myself to you. Once you’re my familiar I won’t have to hear a word out of your mouth ever again. I’m going to get the ritual book from my mother’s library. This is your last chance to run away.”

Garfield stood to his feet. As he took a step, he could feel Rachel tensing up. Raising his arm, he reached past her, swiping the remote from the nightstand. Plopping down, leaning against the bed, he flipped on the TV. “Sounds like a plan.” Rachel shot him one last nasty look before throwing her cloak on. The window shot open and she floated out into the LA morning. Garfield sat there for a few moments, pretending to watch TV, before he flopped his head back. He let out a long groan, “Oh maaaaaAAAAAAN!”

It was a dark night at Gotham, and on a rooftop near Port Adams, a solitary figure was wearing black and orange armor. Silently watching the port with binoculars. It seemed to be a quiet and slow-going night at the port. "Are you sure about this Wintergreen?" Slade asked his friend over the radio.

"Positive, my intel suggests that Walsh has a contact in Port Adams, and he should be there tonight," spoke the Englishman. "Did you get the intel I sent you?"

"Yes," Slade not stopping his watch over the port. "I am looking for a man named Charles Graves, Port Adams supervisor, 5'11, brown hair, clean-shaven, blue eyes, forty years old. The depiction of that picture you sent me."

"Good, good, just find him and find out what he knows. How does the port look?"

"Quiet, besides a ship about to leave and lazy security. It should be an easy job getting in and out and finding the guy." Slade let out a small chuckle, "unless the bat shows up."

"Bat? What is that about?"

"It seems like there is a bat monster in Gotham right now, and unless it gets in my way, then I do not care." Besides, I should be able to take on a monster."

"Well, either way, be careful, and good luck, Slade."

"Thanks, and I will let you know what I find from Charles, over and out."

Turning off the comms piece in his helmet and with his talk with Wintergreen over, Slade put away his binoculars and slowly moved out of sight. Now it is showtime.

It did not take long for Slade to infiltrate the port, sticking to the shadows and using his physical talents to evade the lax security. It was child's play, really, he did not work up a sweat. It was a waste to be carrying his full gear but one thing that Slade does not like is not being prepared or caught off guard. One slip up, and he might be dead in his line of work and during his quest to find Walsh. Still, it seems too much for this night.

After dodging the guards and security cameras. He made his way to the central port building and found the door unlocked. Slade, before entering, could hear a conversation going on in the room and silently listened.

"Are you sure you do not want anything? I mean, it is late, and you are overworking yourself by being here this late." A younger voice spoke.

"No, I do not want anything, and I just want to make sure that sure that things go smoothly this night. Remember what happened last month?" An older voice spoke.

"I know, I know, Mr.Graves, I know," the younger voice spoke. "I should not be long and just try not to fall asleep, okay?"

The other voice did not say anything.

"Okay," that was all the younger voice said before leaving, and Slade could hear a door open and close.

Mr.Graves, it must be him, and at a good time, too. Slade thought and time to see what he knows.

So Slade quietly opened the door and closed it behind him. Then, he quickly ran over to Charles before he could react and placed him in a chokehold. Slade does not fool around, "Hello, Charles Graves, I have a question for you."

Charles tried to get out of the chokehold, but it was a futile effort as Slade had a tight hold over him. "Who... who are you? What do you mean you have questions about?" Sounding confused and startled.

"I am going to ask a simple question, where is William Walsh?"

"I do not know who you are talking about," sounding innocent.

"That we both know is a lie, so I will ask again, where is William Walsh?" Slade's hold getting tighter but Charles can still talk.

"Again, I do not know who you are talking about. I do not know a William Walsh."

"Wrong answer," and Slade would push Charles to the wall and hold him against the wall. Slade, using this position, was prepared to start breaking bones. "If you do not tell me what I want to know then bones will starting breaking, your choice. Tell me or suffer," Slade sounded menacing.

But, before Charles could reply, his phone started to ring, and Slade, while maintaining his hold on Charles, went into his pocket and answered the phone. For a minute, Slade listened before declining the call and tossing the phone away.

"Charles, what is heading to New York City?" Slade asked in a cold tone.

Charles's demeanor changed from a confused worker to something else. "I will never tell you. I do not know who you are, but you are making a mistake by coming for Walsh. He... we are apart of something bigger and you will not get in the way."

"Yet since Walsh is involved, I think I will, and you will tell me more. Everyone has a breaking point."

Charles simply chuckled, "good luck then, you will need it for coming after us." He chuckled some more before biting down on a tooth and quickly poisoning himself with cyanide.

Slade, noticing the foam coming out of Charles's mouth and slowly let go, and Charles's body fell to the ground dead. "Cyanide?" Slade wondered as he watched Charles's corpse. "This... this changes nothing, I will find Walsh, even if it means fighting whoever he works for.

So, with his target dead, Slade quickly left the port, making sure that no one knew he was there by the time Charles's body was found. Slade was long gone, and while he had questions. He was sure that he could find them in New York City and maybe Walsh himself, but no matter what. He will get his revenge on that man, no matter how long or hard it will be. No one crosses Deathstroke.

It's buckling. Can't... I can't...

Every muscle in Clark's body tensed up as he tried in vain to lift the crumbling slab of concrete and metal off his back. He had never properly tested the upper limits of his strength, but he knew he could lift cars, trucks, and even a few man-made structures. But an entire section of a destroyed overpass was something he'd never been ready to try his hand at, and this moment had been the worst possible time to learn that there was a ceiling to his abilities. Even as he strained under the building pressure, the insurmountable weight pushing him further down into the dirt beneath the broken street, Clark shifted his focus toward his hearing. Specifically listening for any signs of life around him. Even if he didn't manage to lift the overpass itself, his one hope was that he could still buy enough time for others to escape before its final collapse. But Clark's teeth grit and his knees wobbled as a grim realization hit him: he couldn't hear anyone breathing. There had been several bystanders standing helplessly beneath the overpass at the time of the missile strike. Clark had rushed in to try and save them whenever he'd realized that he couldn't save anyone above it. But according to his hearing, vision, and every other advantage at his disposal, he had no choice but to admit that they were all gone, having succumbed to the falling debris. Whatever his intentions going in, he'd failed.

I can't.

A reservoir of immense heat burned behind his eyes. His anger rising to try and meet his overwhelming despair, Clark's head nevertheless craned downwards. The commotion of the overpass' destruction had sent off a shockwave of echoes in every direction. Steel hitting against steel. And even in his state, Clark could discern that there was something very hollow several feet beneath him. His mind racing, fighting through the rage of experiencing so much immediate loss, he realized that at one point, there had been a different subway system beneath Metropolis - one that remained largely abandoned after Luthorcorp sought to replace it with an improved transportation system of their design. He wasn't sure if that was exactly what he was over, but Clark could at least tell that nothing living existed there. And given that he couldn't make his way out quickly enough through sheer force alone, Clark told himself that he had no other choice. Even with lifeless bodies and vehicles that were still being flattened beneath it, he'd have to let the overpass fall.

Got to let it out.

With a deep breath, Clark felt the heat that had been building and relaxed himself. Normally, he had to focus everything he had to keep his powers at bay. Sometimes, he even had to do all that it took to keep himself from floating off of the ground. But his supposed "heat vision", as his father had called it? It was the one ability of his that scared him. The sheer magnitude of cataclysmic potential that he felt inside of him whenever that anger boiled over into a literal red hot output, it'd been something that he'd practiced for years to keep within. But at this moment, all of his failsafes subsided. Everything slowed to a crawl and Clark finally managed to bring himself to a point where it wasn't a burden - it was a grand release. Opening his eyes, Clark violently thrust his field of vision toward the ground and blasted his way through the dirt below. The immense crimson light from his eyes practically blinded him, he smelt the burning asphalt and felt his body sinking at a much faster rate than before. The weight of the overpass above him slowly disappeared, turning into a mass of destroyed rubble as it went tumbling with him deeper into the Earth.

After a few minutes, Clark finally heard the soles of his shoes hit solid metal. His heat vision still firing with terrifying brilliance, he kept the pressure on and rendered the solid object into a melting molten liquid. The circle of a glowing lava-like solution grew wider and wider as Clark's anger fueled the beam exploding out of him to focus, until with a final push of two forces colliding against eachother, everything finally gave way. Clark finally collapsed through and haplessly fell several stories down, hitting the bottom of a massive tunnel just before what was left of the overpass powerfully crashed around him. For a moment, Clark felt like giving into the tension of what had just happened and passing out. But he had never even been sure if it were possible for him to do so in the first place. So he simply laid there, gathering himself before he could finally make himself stand back up.

What could've...

The heat behind the eyes returned, as Clark replayed the moments leading up to the strike in his mind. He wasn't sure of what everyone had been running from near the Luthorcorp plant, but he knew that someone had fired that missile. The question wasn't a what, or even a how. And that realization made Clark angrier than he'd ever been in his life.

Who did this?

It was a question that Clark knew he'd never be able to live with if he didn't answer. So many people had just been mindlessly killed in an attack that, for all that he knew, was still ongoing several miles above him. He didn't know the details of why it had been carried out and right now, he didn't care. Someone would have to answer for the murders that they'd just committed. The police weren't going to do anything about it quick enough, the army wasn't there to fight back, and S.H.I.E.L.D. certainly wasn't on standby. But Clark felt the power surging through him. One way or another, he was more than capable of bringing whoever did this to justice. The only question on his mind was whether it was worth potentially exposing himself - his powers, his identity, the entirety of his life of secrets - to the world. Placing his hands against the ground, Clark paused a moment. Then he pushed, bringing himself to a steady rise.

It wasn't a question to him. People had died because he hadn't acted quickly enough. If he hesitated any further, others still could. He had no choice but to leave it all behind, to act now and save as many as he could no matter the personal consequence. Breaking past a barrier of broken concrete, Clark stood amongst a thick cloud of soot and breathed out. He felt different - changed, somehow. This new resolve to use his abilities openly bringing with it a renewed sense of self. Looking down, he noticed that his red hoodie had been tattered by his ordeal. It hung over his shoulders, draping over his back and above his blue shirt. He considered tearing it off when his hearing suddenly kicked back in. People were still screaming. Taking a step forward, Clark allowed himself to slowly rise off of the ground. Gravity be damned, he began to fly forward.

This was a call to action. And he was ready to answer it.



Time to go to work.

---

"Movemovemovemovemove!"

Lois frantically guided Jimmy by the arm through the streets as the colossal drone continued carrying out its attack. Crowds of people straddling them in a run on either side, the two found it difficult to maneuver, but Lane was determined not to let her and her cameraman drift apart. This proved to be easier said than done, as even when he was running to keep up the pace, Olsen would occasionally slow down to try and get an extra shot. The seasoned reporter almost wanted to knock the damned thing out of his hands, but she had to admit a hard truth: if it were up to her, Lois would be doing the same thing. So despite the severity of the situation, all that she could do to keep her and Olsen from getting crushed was keep barreling forward. Eventually managing to spot an open alley out of the corner of her eye, Lois spun around and grabbed Olsen with both hands before utilizing what little speed she still had to pull him and herself into it. Stumbling forward, Olsen tripped and fell into an aluminum bin while she caught herself just in time, doubled over and gasping for breath. Her heart was doing laps and ready to burst out of her chest, but she and the ginger-haired cameraman were still alive. Chalk one up to small victories.

Assessing to make sure Lois was okay, Jimmy turned his attention toward the camera. His look of terror faded quickly into annoyance.

"Oh, come on! This footage is barely useable!"

Lois angrily punched him in the shoulder, causing him to yelp. "Seriously?! You could've been killed!"

"Yeah, and for what? Blurry crowd footage?"

"Jesus..."

Turning toward the alleyway's entrance as people continued to zoom past, hoping to escape with their lives as the drone rampaged just a few feet away, firing off blasts of heavy gunfire towards the opposing Metropolis PD cars as they appeared, Lois scanned the area for an immediate shortcut toward her car. But it didn't take long for her to spot where she had been parked - the area was now buried underneath a massive pile of rubble. The gears turning in her head, she began to realize the true immediacy of the situation: as long as that thing continued to attack, they were all trapped here. Lois' eyes widened as she began to realize another horrible facet of what had just happened.

"Jimmy. The intern."

Jimmy looked up. "Huh? What about him?"

"Remember how I told him to stay in the car?"

Getting to his feet, Olsen quizically looked at her. "I don't follow. What are you..."

Tears welling up in her eyes, Lois took a step back, horrified.

"I think I just killed him."

Olsen glanced back over at the area and spotted the debris of the overpass. His face turned white as a sheet. He hadn't known Clark Kent for more than a week, while Lois had met him less than an hour ago. But he seemed like a decent enough guy to both of them and certainly didn't deserve the fate that had seemingly befallen him and the other people that had been parked beneath it. Jimmy looked back, seeing the rising guilt on Lois' face. She blamed herself when it was nobody's fault.

"Hey, don't do that to yourself. You didn't know what would happen. Neither did he."

Watching the hardened news anchor nearly collapse into herself, Jimmy placed a hand on Lois' shoulder as she quietly berated herself for not even being decent enough to memorize the guy's name. It seemed so ridiculous, but she couldn't help it - everything had just escalated so quickly. As Olsen tried to muster up something else of small comfort, both were rocked completely out of their state of momentary bereavement by an all-too-familiar sound: the distorted voice of their tormentor, echoing out from the drone's hull.

The two reporters watched as the drone paused, raising its hull and standing at attention as if it were waiting for something.

As Olsen visibly tried to discern whatever the disembodied voice meant by that, Lois glanced over at the site of the factory explosion. Something was moving out from the large hole that the drone had made. Lois squinted to see if she could tell what it was, but by the time anything was visible, it became apparent that it wasn't one specific thing - it was several. Smaller helicopter drones flew out of the hole, boasting similar armament to their larger brethren. They were encircling the area in a tight formation, beginning a wide scan for any lingering onlookers. Lois nudged Jimmy in the stomach, directing him to see it aswell.

"That... can't be what I think it is, right?"

"Our situation going from bad to worse? Yeah."

Between the larger drone and its small battalion, neither Lois nor Jimmy saw an immediate way out. Both realized that this could easily be their end. Defiantly, Olsen brought up his camera and began to film every bit of it that he could. If he was going to die today, the world would at least know what killed him. Lois, on the other hand, began to look around. Maybe there was some small part of her that thought there was still a way out, but there weren't any options making themselves apparent. As she did, however, Lois did notice something else: a crashed car, freshly careened around a telephone pole with its engine smoking. The driver was hunched over his wheel, weakly moving and with blood trailing off of his forehead - but still clearly alive. And directly in the way of the larger drone as it resumed its destructive path.

She didn't hesitate.

"Stay here. And keep shooting."

"What? What are you..."

Jimmy's jaw dropped as Lois sprinted towards the crashed car.

"LOIS, DON'T! GET OUT OF THE WAY!"

She wasn't listening. Making her way to the driver's side window, Lois fumbled with the door's handle and placed her foot against the side of the front, pulling as hard as she possibly could. The door was damaged from the crash, making it harder to pry open without any tools. But with a little grit and determination, Lois pushed herself as hard as possible until it finally gave in. Swinging it open as a loud thud signaled the drone's oncoming approach, Lois knelt inside and grabbed the man's arm, throwing it over her shoulder. He still wasn't fully conscious, but Lois wouldn't let it stop her.

Beginning to drag him out of the seat, Lois managed to get him out of the vehicle. But as she tried to pull them both back to the alley, she caught a glimpse of the drone as it rose above her. Barreling down without a second's thought. "Oh, God."

This was it. Within seconds, it would crush her. Olsen's screams for her to come back were drowned out. Letting the fear wash over her, Lois closed her eyes and braced for the end.

And then ... nothing happened.

"...Holy mother of..."

Olsen's declaration caused Lois to open her eyes again.

And what she saw nearly caused her to collapse on the spot.

"Wh... Who..."

It was a man in blue and red. And despite the seeming impossibility of it, he was pushing against the drone's leg and preventing it from stepping down on Lois and the barely conscious driver. Straining against the machine's power, the stranger nevertheless managed to get his bearings and throw the drone off of himself, freeing the two to finally cross without danger.

Turning towards Lois, the man revealed that his eyes were glowing crimson. She didn't know what to make of him at first sight. But his stern expression indicated that whatever he was doing here, he had only just begun.



"Get to safety."

WADE WILSON/DEADPOOL

Issue 3:White Wedding

Location: A Ballroom In New Jersey

Kingpin had given Wade another job. This one would be much more exciting than riding some crime boss’ son around. Wade would need to kill some high-ranking members of the Gualtieri crime family. The reward would help with Wade’s retirement funds. The real reason he was doing this was that the Gualtieri crime family were scum and needed to be eradicated. So, this job was mostly for fun. Wade was told that most made men attended a birthday party for the don of the Gualtieri family. Wade will hide in the birthday cake, waiting for the right moment before commencing the onslaught. One of Kingpin’s men will be masquerading as the chief and will be the one who will get Wade into the cake.

“Should I wear anything sexy?” Wade asked. The contact and Kingpin rolled their eyes at this comment.

“No, Mr.Wilson. You will have enough firearms to eliminate the targets.” Fisk smiled. Wade nodded, hoping to get a China Lake grenade launcher like his son had given him before. He was disappointed that was not the case.

Wade soon found himself inside the cake, waiting for his cue to attack. Beforehand, he was given a variety of weapons that he would need. Most of them were various pistols, submachine guns, grenades, and about two assault rifles. He was making sure that the guns were loaded and that he would be ready. He listened to some music to help pass the time before he was given the cue. He was listening to the Joy Divison album called Unknown Pleasures. It was a good thing he went to the washroom beforehand. This was to pass the time and try to drown out Frank Sinatra's crooning voice. As the party was going on, it was soon time for the party members to cut the cake. “Lock and load.” Wade thought while holding an assault rifle. Most of his weapons were strapped onto his body, including a bandolier of ammunition, as one of the mafia members came over to cut the cake. Wade removed the hollow top and popped out, surprising everyone around him.

“Party’s over.” "He said with a smirk behind his mask. Kicking the cake towards a group of mafia members while starting to fire his gun. The whole commotion caused some of the mafia members to run. The bullets hit some goons who were pulling out their weapons and jumping out of the way of the gunfire and hiding behind a nearby pillar. Firing his AK-47 into the jabronis that were firing back at him. “The fatman sends his regards.” Yelling out as he threw a grenade into a crowd of goons. The explosion caused the whole room to shake and tremble. Wade moved a little closer, using nearby tables as cover. When he noticed his AK was out of ammo, he quickly loaded ammo into the magazine—putting the magazine back into the empty slot with the precision of a trained soldier. This came soon to him, thanks to his time as a soldier and mercenary. Throwing a mafia member into the DJ booth causes the current song to skip to Dean Martin's Ain't That A Kick In The Head.

Noticing some more goons left, Wade moved away towards the exit with whom Wade assumed was the consiglieri. “Where are you going, Van Zandt?” Wade said, moving or running toward the small group instead. Most of the bullets were either missing or hitting him. However, by this point in his life, he was used to the pain. As he moved closer, his nose was filled with a mixture of blood and gunpowder.

Wade got close enough to the group to smell the cheap cologne they were wearing. He threw his empty AK at one of the group before switching to the M16 strapped to his back. The group moved from the main ballroom towards the kitchen. There was screaming from some of the wounded mafia members. Most of them hold their bloodied stubs or their bullet wounds. “Come back. I just want some spaghetti and meatballs.” He shouted over the gunfire and screamed.

Following the group into the kitchen, I want them to stay in the building. Quickly noticing that he was out of ammo for his M16. He switched towards his pistols, firing at the various kitchen appliances. Some of the bullets ricocheted off of pans and caused various appliances to become damaged by the bullets. Thankfully, a few bullets wounded some of the goons. Moving closer to the ground, he switched to his katanas. One of the goons picked up a nearby frying pan to attack Wade. He counterattacked by cutting off the hand that held the frying pan. This goon fell onto the floor, screaming in pain. Wade moving towards the next goon in his way. Grabbing his head and pushing his head into a fryer.

“Does anyone want some fresh arancini? It just came out of the fryer.” Wade threw the screaming man onto the ground. Most of the made men and goons were now quite scared of Deadpool. But this fear would not last long as Wade sliced and diced most of them. “When you see Death, tell her I’ll see her next Friday.” He said before finishing off the group.

As he walked out of the kitchen, drenched in his and the goon’s blood. He could see there were still injured mafiosos on the floor. “Time for a little celebration.” Walking over towards the DJ booth and playing Madonna's Like A Prayer.

While the sound was playing, Wade danced and murdered the injured goons. He didn’t want any witnesses to identify him and make his life difficult. Take a break from cleaning up by drinking red wine and eating half-eaten gabagool. Once he was finished, he left the bloodied hall with a bottle of wine. In the distance, the police sirens could be heard. “Better go before the po-po comes.” He thought before escaping into the night.

—-----------------------------------------

Later

Wade was sitting on the rooftop of an apartment building, drinking his wine and enjoying his little celebration. A few hours ago, he told Fisk the excellent news that the mission was complete. The fat man seemed pleased with Wade. While drinking his wine, he heard some commotion in the alleyway. Looking down, he noticed a woman bothered by a couple of thugs. “Looks like a job for Deadpool.” He said be"ore going down the fire escape. His cool entrance of jumping from the fire escape onto the ground was botched by slipping and landing face-first on the ground. This caused the thug and the woman to look over in his direction. Wade quickly got back onto his feet. He strolled towards them, “Are these guys bothering you?” He asked to which she nodded.

“Wrong choice bub.” And in response, he smashed his wine bottle over the head of one of the thugs. Another came over armed with a knife and stabbed Wade in the hand, who was trying to defend himself. Removing the knife from his hand, the group, including the woman, could see his wound closing. “Now you pissed me off; that was a perfect bottle of wine.” Wade grabbed the knife-wielding goon and threw him into a nearby garbage bin. He picked up a nearby discarded mop and smacked the other goons like he was in a Bruce Lee movie. He was finishing up by breaking and causing ruptured organs and limbs of the thugs. Breathing heavily while looking over at the woman.

“Are you okay, Miss?" He asked; as she walked closer, he noticed something strange about her. Her face seemed to change from the woman standing there a moment ago. Now, her skin was blue, and her hair was pure white.

“Thanks you for your help; they were after me because I’m a mutant. Are you a mutant, too?” She asked, standing close to him.

He didn’t understand what she meant. “"What the hell is a mutant? Is that the kind of slang the kids are saying, like sigma rizz, no cap?” This response made the woman chuckle.

“No, a mutant is someone with extraordinary powers; I assume yours is an accelerated healing factor?” She was now looking over at him and the costume he was wearing. “Are you some kind of superhero?” And to this, Wade shook his head.

“No, I’m no hero; I’m just your friendly neighbourhood mercenary.” He smiled underneath his mask, handing her a business card. Something he had made in his free time. Assuming his healing factor and heightened reflexes happened because of the Weapon X program.

“Your name is Deadpool? My name is Vanessa, but you can call me Copycat.” She said, holding out her hand for him to shake.

“My name is Wade. Give me a call if you need any merc work done.” He said, finding her quite attractive. Walking away before looking back, He noticed she was in the shadows. Her appearance changed as she came out of the shadows.

“I’ll be sure to give you a call.” She said with a wink before walking in the other direction. Wade walked down the street, heading over towards Blind Al’s place.