[IC] The Legion of Superheroes RETURN

[Gisk]

Captain Marvel was dogpiled by clones of Multiplus, nearly dragging him to the ground. The clones grappled him, holding onto shoulders and arms, and he thought one might even be biting his ankle. The Captain strained to rise off of the ground, having some difficulty with the weight of so many extra bodies. He floated, his feet coming a few feet off the ground, and then called out to the sky. Despite the clear day, lightning struck from out of nowhere, coursing through the Captain, and into the clones who were latched onto him . Most let go, one was paralyzed by the strike and his muscles kept him rigidly holding onto Captain Marvel's shoulders. The Captain grabbed him and threw him unceremoniously back into the pile of Multiplusses.

"No one can say I didn't give you a chance," Captain Marvel said, both his voice and his eyes crackling with lightning. He lifted his hand, and brought it back down, calling more bolts of lightning, one then another, and still one more.

Captain Marvel: 9 [-6 from the dog pile]
Multiplus: 1 [-4 from lightning storm]

[Burning Kitty]

Maxima was approached about a month after emergence to join this thing called Legion of Superheroes. She had no idea what that was but it sounded like she got to punch things, so she was down with that but she didn't choose to join up right away she wanted to see the world, maybe beat up some thugs along the way, and maybe find a better offer.

During the month she learned more about this Legion thing. It did indeed offer her the oppurtunity to throw quite a few punches, but they were goody two shoes. She was creating a mental list of pros & cons. Eventually she forgot must of the list, and so to herself. "Fuck it, let's join."

She finally decided to join. She crash landed about a feet from the Legion's HQ. She stood up and dusted herself off. She walked up to their front door and knocked as loudly and as hard as possible. "Knock, knock."

[Omega Man]

Cosmic Boy, Ferro Lad, and the new Ultra Boy were all at HQ in one place or the other. Cosmic Boy was still going over automatic ring logs for the missing recruits, trying to triangulate where they might have went offline. There were three or four holo-screens in front of him, still confined to his chair. It looked as if he hadn't been getting enough sleep. There HAD to be a link in their disappearances if they were all already in Metropolis when their rings went dead. Somebody was targeting the team right down to the noobs. However no foreign tech was detected, so Brainiac 5 was mostly ruled out.

Glancing back over at footage of the battle in Old Bludhaven, it looked as if Momentum had got the injured heroes to safety and EMS crews. Hawk, Superforce, and Bolt were all hurt pretty badly and in the case of Bolt she was completely drained of power after the assault on the replicator and fell into a coma. With Momentum running to their aid, Bulk Lad and Capt. Marvel quickly dispatched a beating to the enemy and managed to keep the battle contained.

Sol was trying to take a rest. With what happened earlier downtown, and now half the team's in another town dealing with a guy who can create copies of himself, he was mentally exhausted. He closed his eyes for a few moments in his personal quarters, dozing off and remembering his last several days on Daxam. Then seeing members of the Legion die making sure Sol and other Daxamites made it offworld before the planet exploded. Then his dream shifted to a time when he was still in a Legion t shirt fighting superhuman criminals in Coast City. Mandroid got a strong punch on Ultra Boy's jaw. As Sol was hit again, this time it was Octo-Shark lashing out at him with the tendrils coming from the shark man's back. Within a few more moments, just when it seemed Sol would get his chance to deal some justice in the metaphorical game of cards, he was woke up by a loud knocking noise.

Alarms went off, Cosmic Boy looked at the security footage and noticed who was at the door.

"Somebody wanna let her in? Ferro, Sol, you guys busy? Don't make me hover all the way down to the first floor..." Rokk continued on the intercom.

Just outside of HQ...

A larger beast of a man with large teeth stayed his distance. He kept to the shadows but his eyes were locked on the purple clad new member of the Legion. He was too late this time though, this one got to the door. He snarled under his breath and backed into the woods surrounding him off the trail.

Old Bludhaven...

Multiplus was taking a beating but managed to get a few more shots in. He threw a duplicate like a missile striking into the Xudarian speedster, and a pair of duplicates tag teamed Bulk Lad despite being clearly outgunned.

Multiplus: 1
Captain Marvel: 9
Momentum: 8 [-2 from throw]
Bulk Lad: 7 [-2 from tag team]

A gang of clones also managed to sneak up on the green clad alien Capt. Marvel for an assault.

Multiplus: 1
Captain Marvel: 5 [-4 from Sig Attack]
Momentum: 8
Bulk Lad: 7

~KL~

[Burning Kitty]

Maxima was getting annoyed, now she was pissed. She was invited here and they leave her outside. Her constant knocking stopped. She flew up as high as she could and then far enough away to build up enough speed. She decided if they were going to fuck with her she was going to fuck up their front door. She flew at the door at full speed putting her arms in front of her face. At the last second she turned her head away. The crash could be heard miles around. Maxima stood up, she was unsteady on her feet. When the dust finally settled she looked at the door. "Damn good door. Put a major dent in it but didn't give. Another strike or three might give in." Just then her unsteady feet gave out on her. "Maybe that wasn't such a good id...." She passed out.

[Omega Man]

Sol was out cold in his personal quarters inside of HQ. He couldn't even hear the attempts of Maxima trying to get inside. After Cosmic Boy couldn't get anybody on the intercom he hovered down to the front entrance, where the young woman was still trying to bust in. When she struck the door the base went into lockdown mode so Cos had to open the door at it's main control panel rather than by remote from the central hub. As he hovered to the control panel he opened up the intercom link outside to try and save his door from getting wrecked.

Maxima having passed out from her hitting her head on the door or something woke up shortly before someone arrived. She stood up shakily. "That was amazing."

"I had to hover down from the 3rd floor, didn't you see the door buzzer? Calm down out there..." he said as the door finally opened and the HQ came out of lockdown.

"Maxima, it's good to see you! I was afraid you were among the recruits who went missing the last few weeks..." he began explaining as she followed him inside.

"What's a door buzzer?" Maxima asked confused. "Why do your lips not match your voice. It is very.....weird."

"That's the universal translators in the rings, it doesn't take long to get used to..." Cos explained.

With Ultra Boy passed out in his quarters, Ferro Lad possibly having done the same, Cosmic Boy showed the newest recruit around. The Central Hub and Monitor Room, the kitchen, the gym, etc. was among the things he showed her before leading her to the team's personal quarters. Sixteen rooms between two floors towards the top of the base, the Legion's personal quarters were much like studio apartments with a large room, and a bathroom, as well as closet space and a large window. The toilet in Bulk Lad's quarters was presumably built like a tank.

Maxima looked at her room. She found it oddly uncomfortable, she preferred the outside, having spent her entire life outdoors to this point outside or trapped in cryostasis. She thought she give it a try one night.

"We're waiting for some of the others to get back from a mission in Old Bludhaven. When they arrive I'll find the rest of the group and we can make proper introductions..." Cosmic Boy explained.

"Is there a gym where I can beat the crap out of robots?" She asked hoping to exercise some aggression.

"Yeah we passed it awhile ago, all the lights weren't on so you probably didn't notice half the equipment." he replied leading her back to the second floor where the gym was located.

She walked in. She bumped into some piece of equipment and cursed very loudly. "Why didn't the lights come on automa...automagically? That mansion I destroyed all the lights came on as soon as you walked into a room. So did the last building I was in."

"That kinda thing costs a bit much, and the United Planets already spent a fortune on the equipment, holodroids, and War Room..." Cosmic Boy continued.

Old Bludhaven...

The new Captain Marvel tried taking out as many clones as he could with his lightning attack, but the original Multiplus used a couple of his own duplicates as shields to avoid taking damage himself.

Bulk Lad: 9 hp
Momentum: 10 hp
Captain Marvel: 9 hp
Multiplus: 3 hp [+ 2 for two defense moves of four allowed]

"I don't know who you punks are, but you're NOT the Legion!" the enemy screamed with an evil laugh following a gang assault on the much slower Bulk Lad.

Bulk Lad: 5 hp [-4 hp from signature attack]
Momentum: 10 hp
Captain Marvel: 9 hp
Multiplus: 3 hp

~KL~ / @Burning Kitty

[Gisk]

Multiplus's shields doomed him. When Captain Marvel saw that some of the sea of endless duplicates were willingly jumping into the path of his lightning, he realized which one was the original, and made his move.

Faster than the cloner could follow, he swooped down and grabbed him under his arms, flying up and away before Multiplus could even react. He got high enough that struggling would be a bad idea, and then shifted him around so that he was holding the original by the fabric of the front of his outfit.

"If we're not the real Legion, just some punks," he said, winding up his free hand like a cartoon character, "Then this will be really embarrassing for you." He swung, socking Multiplus right in the jaw. It was a surprisingly mundane ended to a fight among supers.

With the original's loss of consciousness, the clones followed suit and started to disappear, freeing up the Legion members that they were fighting.

Marvel floated down, holding Multiplus in a surprisingly gentle manner, and addressed his comrades. "I'm not really sure what to do with him now, they don't show this part in the comics."

[rocketrobie2]

After colliding with the clone that was tossed at him Pano got to his feet ready to fight only to see the universe's Mightiest Mortal chase after the prime Multiplus. Pano did some quick evasion of the clone that was thrown at him and got to the perfect spot to watch the clash between the Captain and the multiplying man.

Pano cheered on Captain Marvel as he saw the hero dive for Multiplus and bring him high above the Earth. It truly was a sight to marvel at but the cost of the fight was way to high given all of the loss of man power that the Legion suffered. Things had gone terribly but they had done their job and saved most of Old Blüdhaven. Pano-Zu wasn't one for looking at the glass half empty and forced himself to look on the brightside of the situation.

As CM came back down with Multiplus, Momentum had begun to try and help his comrades to their feet, stupidly starting with Bulk Lad whom was still enlarged and probably beyond help from Momentum.

"Good... job... Capítan" Pano-Zu said in between grunts as he tried to lift any part of Bulk Lad to no success. Eventually Pano gave up and hunched over to catch his breathe. His tanks were running on low at the moment so he could really go for some food at that moment but he knew there was a little more to be done here.

"We gotta wait for-" Pano let out a loud sigh as he caught his breathe "...the police to come pick ol' Multiplication guy up" Pano panted, once again messing up a perfectly good opportunity to come up with something cool to say.

[Burning Kitty]

Maxima looked at the stuff in the gym she didn't recognize most of it. She messed around some of what she recognized for a while. "You say War Room? I like the sound of that." She felt an inch deep inside that needed to scratched, the only way she knew how was with violence. "Holodroids for combat? Activate how?" She waited for Cosmic Boy to tell or activate them. She watched them activate. She saw a screen full of potential opponents. She saw Superman, she could feel it in her bones a need, it was a biological imperative held over from her genetic source material. "Him!"

A holodroid activated and took on Superman's appearance. She rushed him slugging him in the face. As the fight drug on she could feel an ache. She had him pinned on the ground she leaned in and kissed him.

[DrewVonAwesome]

Even though Bulk Lad valiantly struggled to keep his guard up. The numbers game started to stagger him. Even though he kept his arms up he felt what felt like a million tiny hits that were all piling up on him quickly. Leaving him having to put himself against a building to muster whatever little defense he could. He was only used to fighting one guy at a time. Not how ever many this Multiplus was throwing at him. Making it impossible for him to even think straight let alone fight back.

Finally though Momentum and Captain Marvel stepped in, cleaning out the remaining clones and their original person. Bulk Lad silently laid against the brick wall. Feeling all those muscles deep within him aching and all the bruises on him welled up and making it hard for him to even breathe. Finally he felt the trickling of something against his forehead. Bringing a massive hand up he swiped his forehead and immediately saw red. Blood, his own from a cut on the top of his head. The faint metallic like smell coming quickly afterwards. Almost like a bull, seeing his own plasma seemed to wake him up, making him furious.

Suddenly he felt Pano trying to hoist him back to his feet. “Get off of me...” Bulk Lad simply mumbled. Though when it seemed like just when Pano was getting off of him. Bulk Lad slowly got back to his own feet. Immediately shoving Pano with a single stiff shove. “GET OFF OF ME!” He demanded as he wiped his uniform off with his still blood covered hands. Feeling the red substance drip down off the tip of his nose even from behind the goggles his eyes clearly seethed with fury.

“This is BULL SHIT!” Bulk Lad screamed, stomping his large foot against the asphalt and kicking a fire hydrant which got launched well out of view. Bulk Lad had prided himself on his abilities as a fighter in hypersu. For him, all he just did was embarrass himself, though his shameful performance was now being followed up with even more shameful behavior. Bulk Lad didn’t care, he was angry and needed to take it out on someone.

Stopping for a moment Bulk Lad glared a hole through Captain Marvel. Finally sighing in frustration as he stopped doing so. Shaking his head Bulk Lad simply took off. Planning on flying back to base, though at this rate just flying back to Glucona and pretending this entire thing didn’t happened seemed like as good an idea.

As soon as Dai was back at the headquarters, he immediately pulled off the top of his costume. Which quickly snapped back to its usual small size as it dangled off of Dai’s backside. His body being exposed with its strange mix of flab and muscle. As he pulled his goggles down, letting them hang off of his neck. He let the blood drip from his head onto the floor, only to momentarily watch some drops go onto the palm of his hand to see if it was still flowing. Dai shook his head in self-degust as he went to go find the medic area.

[Omega Man]

Days later, Legion HQ...

"Brainiac's ship teleported into sector 2811 four hours ago and lost power shortly after. Most of the beings in the ship are coming up as deactivated robots by our scanners. I think it's a trap, but the United Planets Defense is certain this is the main ship in Brainiac's fleet." Cosmic Boy told the group. "We've taken more losses over the last week with Hawk being taken out, Superforce suffering spine damage, and Bolt going into some kind of static coma. I don't know if such a small group can risk going into Brainiac 5's ship in the dark."

"That bastard destroyed my planet, Rokk." Ultra Boy said speaking up, "I don't care if the lights are off or on, I lost my parents and my kid sister when Daxam blew up..."

"We can't go in half cocked and without some sort of ace in the hole in case something goes wrong." Cosmic Boy commented looking at Ferro Lad to back him up, "I don't think you kids are ready..."

The last son of Daxam stormed off, because in his mind it was now or never. He wanted the alien tyrant to pay for what he'd done to his planet, and for betraying the Legion.

That left Momentum, Ferro Lad, the green clad alien that Momentum insists on calling 'Captain Marvel', the new girl with the sword calling herself Maxima, and Bulk Lad in the monitor room with Cosmic Boy floating around in his hover chair. Bulk Lad seemed a bit antsy to get back into battle as well after under-performing in the fight with Multiplus in Bludhaven.

"I don't think they're ready, Andrew. I don't want anybody else dying on my watch..." Cosmic Boy said to his oldest friend and teammate Ferro Lad, however he had no idea what the steel skinned man behind the iron mask was thinking.

~KL~

[Burning Kitty]

Shortly after Maxima kissed the Holodroid version of Superman, Cosmic Boy excused himself and shut the door. "We are alone at last." Several minutes later Maxima left the gym, with a huge grin. "Best work out ever."

Several days later she and the rest of the Legion were alerted to evil Brain Boy 5's return to the sector. "Quick question. No kill policy does that include evil robots who used to be your friend then betrayed, hurt, and killed the lot of you? If so I think I may have to readjust my decision to be here. If not and anyone of you think it will be to hard for to kill your 'friend' leave it to me, I'll make the bastard suffer or do it quick, whichever you want." She really wanted to kill Brain Boy 5 his very existence made her blood boil, his very name made her want to go into bloody berserker rage on his robotic ass, hence the nickname. She had no idea why, she never met him. She would have to speak with Cosmic Boy about it. Maybe he might know something or help her in the research. She was hoping to not reveal what little she knew of her past which was microscopic at best. She knew four things about her past the thing she woke up in labeled her as Subject 24F, she was part of or is Project Maxima, something called Cadmus, and she has only been conscious for a little over a month but she appears to be in her late teens or early twenties. Lost memories?

[rocketrobie2]

"I'd say the no kill policy still applies Maxima." Momentum said, a little irritated by her response to the events that were now unfolding. Pano-Zu never knew Brainiac 5 personally but he heard of all the great things he did while he was a member of the Legeion of Superheroes. Organic or not, Momentum still believed that killing should be an absolute last resort in their line of work especially in a case such as this. Pano still believed that deep down in the reaches of the android's mind was a shred of his heroic personality, fighting for control over his body.

"If we kill willy nilly then what happens when one day we find out that a criminal was actually an innocent. Theres plenty of mind controllers, desperate people or kids who don't know what their doing out there and if we just take them out without trying for an alternative then we're no better than them." Pano preached passionately to his comrades. It was a personal mission of Pano's to try to learn from the heroes of old and implement their solutions into his own heroic career.

Pano then turned to address Cosmic Boy in order to go on a rant once more but one that he felt necessary. "And I think we should go after Brainiac Cosmic. I mean if anyone has a chance of getting through to him right now it would probably be Ferro since at the moment he's the only active veteran Legionnaire. Would you rather a bunch of UDP goons go after him and possibly take him down but defiantly at a hige cost or would you rather send us-" Pano spread his arms out, gesturing to the rest of the team "...the few that have managed to make it through these past few days mostly unharmed and still very much alive." Pano put his arms down to his sides and took a step forwards to address the chair-bound veteran.

"We're the people who fight threats too big, too powerful and downright impossible to beat. We're the Legion of Superheroes and I for one am going out there regardless of how this conversation goes and I'm going to do my best to uphold the ideals of the Legion. My ideals." Pano explained with the most confidence that he'd ever felt in his life. He turned around for just a moment to see his teammate's reactions to his two speeches. All week he'd been trying to come up with some sort of wise-crack or something to say to really cement his role in the group as a trickster or the stoic type but the one time he finds the right words its in the privacy of HQ. If that wasn't ironic then Pano-Zu didn't know what irony was.

[Bluetommy]

@The Kid Lantern@rocketrobie2

Andrew looked at Rokk and smacked him over the shoulder with a little too much force. He backed away and apologized before taking a silent look at the rest of the team.

"I understand what you're saying, Rokk, but I think they can do it. They're good kids, and they can fight better than anyone I've ever met when they're ready for it. If you're worried, I'll be there to protect them. I'm good at that if nothing else," he said, smiling, then his face turned downwards and he stared at the ground a moment. "I'm worried about myself more than anything. Sometimes I think I won't be able to take anymore, eventually I'll collapse and I won't be able to get up anymore... but I still go, don't I? Maybe it's just I don't want anyone else to die, maybe it's just selfish glory-hogging, but I know it's there, and I know that I'll always be there for the Legion. I promise you, Rokk, I won't let anyone else die."

Turning to everyone else, he gave Rokk one last thumbs up before addressing Pano.

"You know, I think you're my favorite. Even so, I don't think I can talk Braniac down, I think he's made his mind up. No matter how much it hurts to say it, I'm pretty sure we're going to end up killing him," he managed to get out, frowning invisibly behind his mask. "I know it's against your code, hell, it's against all our codes, but this isn't some comic book anymore, he's shown himself to be willing to kill any number of us, and I don't care if it makes us just as bad as him, we can't be safe until he's dead," he said, steeling himself from the emotions that began collecting in his abdomen.

They couldn't win this if they left Braniac alive, winning is calling the final shot, permanently. They were friends once, but Andrew only felt hate for the man, what he had done to them. He knew Rokk didn't feel the same, but Andrew was not Rokk, and Andrew had grown too attached to the new recruits to let them die a pointless death trying to capture a man who had no good left in him.

[Burning Kitty]

Maxima scoffed and rolled her eyes at Momentum. "It is a machine, soulless, murderer, maimer, thing. Destroying him is no different than destroying a faulty computer that is overheating and threatening to burn your home down. If you were to arrest it, it will eventually get free, and it will kill again, your naive notions of heroics just made you just as guilty of murder as the criminal. It makes me sick. Once I permanently deal with Brain Boy 5 I am done with this group, you lack the balls to be real heroes, your naive version of heroics is little more than ointment applied to necrotic tissue. It does nothing but prolong the suffering. Do not dare attempt to stop me, any attempts to save it's life will get you the same fate as it because you allied yourself with it. You should be ashamed of yourself for even considering allowing it to live while your friends lie dead or still suffer from his attack. You owe it to them to make sure that it can no longer hurt or kill." She turned to leave, she couldn't stand to be around naive fools anymore. "Call me when you are ready to murder that bastard."

[Omega Man]

The debate was strong in the HQ of the Legion of Superheroes. Their mentor, Cosmic Boy, didn't think such a small squad could go in blind with too many risks. The Xudarian was ready, as was Ferro Lad, and even Maxima who had just joined their ranks was ready to rip the machine man apart. That's when a loud noise shook the base. It was the hangar door for the star cruisers. Cosmic Boy sat in his Nth metal hover chair and put his hand over his face...

"Please tell me that's not the hangar doors..?" Rokk almost begged.

He pulled holographic screens up, showing several angles of the headquarters and the hangar door. Ultra Boy had taken a smaller star cruiser, immediately after damaging the right wing of the larger team sized ship on his exit.

"Well team... Sol has decided to go lone wolf and speed off to sector 2811 without the rest of us. He's in my personal cruiser..." he paused for a moment, "..so he'll get there within the hour. On his way out he damaged the other ship and we're stuck here for at least as long as it'll take him to get to Brainiac's location. Hopefully Ultra Boy doesn't get himself killed before we get there..." Cosmic Boy said sternly.

_______________________

Daxam, one year before Brainiac...

"Little sister, can't you find another way?" Sol asked the seven year old blonde girl running around him in the large Daxamite city.

"No! What am I s'posed to do?" she asked from the top of a statuesque piece of art in the vegetation that passed for these aliens parks.

"Just stop growing up for awhile. And get down here. Mom is cooking your favorite tonight..." Sol began to say before she cut him off.

"WE HAVE TO GET HOME RIGHT NOW!" she screamed and ran off towards their home.

"Iana, what would I do without you?" Sol said laughing and jogging towards his little sis.

_______________________

The edge of space sector 2812...

Ultra Boy had the equivalent of the pedal to the metal in the cockpit of this one man cruiser. It was basically a dark purple muscle car crossed with a space ship with small wings and landing gear. Sol had a lot on his mind. His parents. His kid sister. Seeing his world explode. He glanced down at the scanners and noticed he had entered sector 2811. Soon, Daxam would be avenged.

~KL~

[Burning Kitty]

Ultra Boy didn't know it but Maxima had followed him and snuck aboard. While she was sneaking on board she turned to what she thought might be a camera and gave the Legion two very dinstinctly rude one finger gestures. Once far enough away from Earth that Ultra Boy would most likely decided against turning around or kicking her out she said something. "Decided to go lone wolf and kill that monstrous thing. Finally a Legionaire that isn't a pussy." Before Ultra Boy could respond violently. "I am here solely to make sure you don't get yourself killed before the monster dies. I'll let you do the killing and if by chance you fail & die, I'll make that bastard suffer." She knew it was most likely a suicide mission, she figured Ultra Boy did too.