Alexander Luthor stood facing the window, looking out at the brilliant cityscape. Ironically, this was his way of feeling grounded, of reminding him what he was fighting for. Alex couldn't help buy smile as the streets came alive. The sights and sounds, while familiar, always seem to take on a new meaning with each passing day. This was home. This was Metropolis.
Despite the closeness Alex felt with the city, there was still a feeling of disconnect. Alexander Luthor Jr., son of the multibillionaire Lex Luthor, stood atop his perch in the LuthorCorp tower, lording over the city. Looking down on Metropolis and it's inhabitants. Separated from the scene by much more than just glass.
Luthor turned away from the sunrise, instead focusing his attention on those who has just entered his office.
"A new dawn for Metropolis, and a new dawn for the world," said Alex.
"Indeed," replied Superman. "A brighter dawn."
Alex had stood alongside Superman before, most recently on the day the partnership between LuthorCorp and the Justice League was officially announced. On that day they seemingly stood together as equals, but even as man as powerful as Alexander Luthor couldn't help but feel humbled in the Man of Steel's presence.
Superman was joined by two others, a man and a woman. Icons in their own right. The woman stepped forward and spoke.
"When are the new recruits arriving?" asked Wonder Woman, her black hair glistening in the sunlight. Her presence too brought about a sense of humility, accompanied with a mix of other, more primal, feelings.
"Later today," came Luthor's reply, "I trust that LuthorCorp's training simulations will be up to your standards?"
"I tested them myself, Luthor. Very impressive."
"And I understand one recruit in particular has caught your attention?"
"You could say that."
Suddenly, the third man spoke up, remaining submerged in the shaded half of Luthor's office.
"Are you certain we can trust these so-called heroes?" said Batman.
"I've personally vetted all of the recruits," said Alex reassuringly. "The dossiers I compiled were--"
"It's not just the recruits I'm concerned with Luthor."
Alex let out an uneasy laugh, turning away from Batman and looking back out at the Metropolis skyline. Of the three primier Justice League members, the Dark Knight made Luthor feel the most uneasy. By far. An impressive feat given the seemingly god-like power of the others. Alex tried to put his fear aside before responding.
"Something tells me you don't trust very easily, Bats..."
When Luthor turned back, Batman was gone.
"He doesn't," said Superman.
"I look forward to a full report on your training exercise," said Wonder Woman. "If these new heroes are to one day fight alongside the Justice League, they must prove themselves worthy."
"I do not intend to disappoint you," said Luthor with a wink. "I wouldn't dream of it."
"Goodbye Luthor," said Wonder Woman as she stepped out.
Luthor was left alone with Superman, the man responbile for taking his father down. Alex once again found himself glancing through his window, the sun having nearly risen.
"When will you tell them the truth?" asked Superman.
"Superman," replied Alex, still gazing at the sun. "I haven't even told you the truth."
It is an almost universal fact that speedsters always run late. Narrative causality states that the route they take inevitably leads to civilians in danger and criminals in need of punching. Even though Ion had left his lab at the crack of dawn, the involvement of all those scuffles meant he was running late.
"Calender Man? Really? Ido not have time to deal with a third rate Barman Villain." He said, punching the guy in the face. Looking at his Q-Rex wristwatch, he saw that he was now most definitely late. Crud.
Taking off at mach 10, he was like a street of lightning blazing through the streets. Finally arriving at Luthercorp, he slid to a sparking stop. Checking his watch again, he realised his watch was running an hour slow. Dammit...
Whitefire, also known as Mary Anders - had been just five minutes ago on route to LuthorCorp Industries, namely to meet up with the various other heroes and the man in question. Namely the man, whom was trying to help restore his family name - and create another team of superheroes to equal that of the Justice League or Teen Titans.
On the route though, she had caught sight of a burning building - deciding that being late, was worth the price of saving people. As she was at the moment, using her light constructs to create a sliding chute down to the ground below. It was a six-story tall building, so it was hard work - keeping it together, especially with the flames nearby.
"Keep coming...this building, isn't very stable!" yelled one fireman, as they got the people quickly to the ambulances and paramedics - as she kept their corridor of safety open.
"Is that everyone?" asked Whitefire, her cloak helping to shield her from the heat and also remained to cover her face - like it had done with her godmother.
"I think-no wait. Somebody is on the roof-" She heard the voice, and also looked up a family had climbed upto the roof of the burning building. She was about to fly up and get them out, when the building started groaning and slightly bending. "It's going to collapse! Everybody get out of here!"
Whitefire saw the fear in everybody - and decided that this sort of situation, would constitute of letting her powers flow completely. "Azarath Metrion Zuthros!" roared Whitefire, as her eyes glowed white - and she tapped into her Primus Elements. She did one hand-signal, the mark of Earth - as she shifted the ground and reinforced the building back, so it was stable.
Flying up, she did a second one - the mark of Fire. Reaching her hands out, she twisted the fires and commanded it to her - into her palm and out her other hand. As she let the fire pass through her body and away - dissipating the flames. Then came her third sign - Water, as reached out. Pulling the water from the firetrucks and hydrants - gathering it together and soon letting the water flow through the building; letting the water suffocate out any remaining heat in the building.
As she soon flew up and levitated the family back onto the ground - watching as one of them wasn't breathing. Likely due to smoke inhalation - with her fourth and final hand-sign, Air - she reached out and pulled the smoke out from the young girl' lungs and let the clean air flow back into them. Reviving her back to life - thanks to Whitefire' last act. With everything done - Whitefire, merely gave a friendly smile and flew off.
The day Donna Troy was approached to join the Luthor's League Donna was doing her usual daily routine, she ate breakfast, ran around Themyscira twice, climbed the mountain, trained other Amazons. That night when she got home to eat dinner with her mother a woman in a suit had an invitation for Luthor's League. Donna put her sword to the throat of the woman. Hippolyta had to intervene as the Queen to stop Donna from plunging it in. "Fine." Donna sheathed her sword. "What does this Luthor want? Murder the Justice League? Help in murdering Superman?" The suit lady allowed Donna to list off a number of possible motives for Lex Luthor for wanting to recruit supers. As soon as Donna stopped to think of more suggestions she told Donna about how Lex was in jail and Superman has teamed up with Lex's estranged son to form another Justice League. "Superman should have killed Lex. He'll get out eventually, they always do. Look at how many times Joker broke out and Joker is an idiot compared to Lex not to mention crazier than every other mental patient in the world. The superheroes are just as guilty as the criminals. I have no desire to be complicit in the murder of others. Finish your meal and be off with you." The rest of the meal was ate in silence. Donna escorted the woman back to her plane. The landing strip was Diana's idea for when the Justice League has need to visit or she brings that stupid invisible plane of hers. It was little more than a patch of dirt covered in the same stones they used to make their buildings just long enough for a plane to land and take off.
The following morning Hippolyta insisted on talking with her daughter. "I love having you here, after all those years stolen from us." Donna knew there was a but coming. "You are stagnating here you are not making any progress. You really should take that Luthor up on his League. If you really want to prove yourself better than Diana then that will be your best chance at doing so. The decision is yours though. If you do decide I had that woman leave the invitation.
Later that day while on her midday meditation Donna was looking for a sign if she was supposed to leave. She hears something crash into the side of the mountain. Donna races to the crash site and finds a woman in a crater. "Sorry Wonder Woman.." Donna lunges at her and grabs her by the throat. "Whoah easy there girl. Why did you dye your hair red? I like it." Donna growled. "The name is Fury. I am not Diana." The strange woman who was apparently familiar with Wonder Woman. "Oh I remember you, your her sister right?" Donna set the woman down. "Why are you here?" The woman dusts off her cape. "The name is Maxima, I was leaving to take care of business back home on my planet when my ship's core overheated and exploded, I suspect sabotage." Donna not sure if this woman was the sign she was looking for or not, decided to help. "Where do we begin?"
Five days of investigation later Maxima and Donna were fighting side by side against the forces that sabotaged her ship. They share a passionate kiss before Maxima takes off in the ship of those seeking to kill her and take over her throne. "I'll let you know when I am back on the planet. Got a coup to deal with first. Where should I find you?" Donna picks up her shield. "Find one of those Luthor buildings I'll be working with him, they can direct you." The distinction was quite clear to her, he was not her boss. If he didn't know it, he would soon.
Later that day she goes to the Luthor building in Metropolis.
Chuckling at his own joke, Don Damarque glanced out of the Taxi's window as they parked in front of the rather imposing Luthorcorp building. With a swift goodbye he opened the door, a practise returning the picture of his daughter to it's rightful place in his wallet. Stepping out of the cab he made sure to pay the driver before turning towards the titanic construct of steel and glass. The smile faded from his face as he gazed up at the Luthorcorp tower. It towered over the surrounding buildings, stainless and perfect like something from some science fiction movie. This building was owned by Alex Luthor, the man who would determine Don's future. This realisation did nothing to diminish the structure's natural aura of intimidation. A perhaps unintentional side effect of it's size.
As he stepped forward, he mentally reviewed how he'd managed to get at this point. Not two years ago he was just a middle-aged accountant, a single cog in the machine of society. In that time he had become many different things, but most prominently he had become a monster. A man who had forsaken his humanity in exchange for the life of his only daughter. A selfish wish, granted by a fickle god. Even now he did not know whether or not he regretted his actions on that fateful day, but what he did know is that he had been given a second chance. When the rest of the world wanted him dead, the Dark Knight, Batman, had seen the man in him. He could never wash the blood of the innocent off his hands, but he could spend his life saving others. While he might never truly atone for what he had done, the least he could do was to use the gifts that had been given to him in service of the world. And that started here, with the Luthercorp building and this new team of superheroes. His second chance.
Taking in a deep breath, he walked through the building's revolving doors. A secretary noted down his name and told him to wait. He took a seat on a clean plastic chair in a marble-and-steel room. Sunlight filtered in through a series of large windows that lent the waiting area an air of levity, of open spaces. He appreciated it. It helped him suppress the doubts that seemed to have taken hold of his stomach. A short eternity later, or a mere twelve minutes according to the clock, other heroes began to filter in. A lady in green wearing metal bracers, reminiscent of Wonder Woman. Another girl clad in a large brown cloak, who smelled of smoke. The last to arrive was a metal-clad creature that barely looked human, although Don wasn't one to judge. It seemed these were the people that he would be fighting alongside, the other heroes in his team. They certainly looked the part, fancy outfits and inhuman physique. As for himself Don felt slightly out of place, nervously rubbing his hands and smoothing his greying hair.
Smiling as he carefully cleaned his glasses, Don chose to address the assembled crew of heroes. "Ah, hello. My name is Don, Don Damarque, very pleased to meet you. I'm, eh, I'm also a hero. Here for the, eh.. the meeting." He smiled sheepishly, hoping he was not making all too big a fool out of himself.
James slowly opened his eyes as an annoying ringing sounded in his ears. He looked to see that he was supposed to be up 30 minutes ago. That was annoying, but he was, by no stretch of the imagination, late. Just meant he didn't have time to shower or play... Computer games before he went out... Slowly rolling out of bed, he hit the floor with a thud. "Jimmy? That you?" yelled the voice of his mother from downstairs.
"Yes Mum." he replied.
"Good, take out the bins, then get in here and have your breakfast. And for the love of whichever god you want to pray to, do NOT go in my room." she said.
"Oh, Mum, you did not bring ANOTHER date home, did you?" he called.
"What? This one seemed nice." James sighed and mumbled under his breath.
"Dammit, you've not underwear like the lift at the mall..." he grunted. He didn't resent her too much for it, after all, it was due to this fact that he and his brother existed. "I'll be right there." he called.
----
20 minutes later
----
James dropped the bin bags in the metal cans out the front before turning around to see a red and silver streak rush across the skies, away from his mothers bedroom window. He got back inside just in time to see his mother vault down the stairs, obviously trying to make it look like she hadn't been doing what they both knew she had been doing. "What? I'm not ready for you to meet him yet." she laughed.
"Please tell me that was Dad or Marcus' dad." he demanded, already knowing that that clearly wasn't the case.
"He's... Not one of those..."
"Is he a god?" James asked.
"No, the line is "Are you a god" which I, having watched that, know to say "Yes"" She smiled and walked away.
"Fucks sake." he grunted.
"No swearing in this house. Do as much as you like when fighting crime, but whilst I know who you are, you are not doing any of that malarkey." She went back into the kitchen to finish her now luke-warm coffee and watch the news on the small television that they had at the table. James sat down to his already cold pancakes. He still smiled. "You didn't think I was going to let you go off on your big day without making your favourite, did you?" she asked, not taking her eyes off the TV. "Now shut up and eat, Marcus made the headlines." She turned up the TV's volume.
((This is unrelated to the rest of the post, it just gives a good look as to the psyche of Marcus))
"-other news, an attempted school shooting in Houston was brought to a peaceful solution when Supersire stepped in at TSU. This amazing footage was caught by a student, those of a nervous disposition may want to look away." The footage showed a girl crying and looking at her phone, she was under a table. "OH GOD SHE'S HERE, Mom, i'm so sorry, I love y-" at that point, a loud crash was heard as a being stood in a bright blue spandex costume, with shaggy blonde hair and a red cape floated down from the roof. A teenaged girl with long brown hair, sunglasses and a black trenchcoat stood with a 12-gauge shotgun stood in front of him.
"Look, we can talk this out." he said as the girl took aim and fired at him, the bullets clearly didn't affect him as he slowly walked forward. "You can shoot me, but we both know it won't do any good."
"What do I care, my life is fucked anyway, may as well try to go down in a blaze of glory." She grunted. "Now stand the fuck back!" she screamed, before taking aim at a wounded librarian.
"We both know that if you pull that trigger, i'm going to intercept all of those fragments and would probably have enough time to do todays junior jumble before you get the chance to pump it for the next shot, so let's just talk." he said. "Now, my name is Mar-El, what's yours?" he asked. She pulled the trigger and Supersire seemed to blur as the librarian screamed and threw his hands over his head, but Supersire was back, holding a newspaper. "Alright, I'm not that fast, but I got a couple of them." he said, throwing the newspaper on the floor at her feet. She looked down at the newspaper, before looking back at him.
"You think this is a fucking game?" She roared.
"Of course not, there is a girl with a shotgun trying to kill people, this is far from a game." he said in a hushed, yet serious voice. "The only reason you have that gun is because I want you to give it up of your own free will. Let's not pretend I couldn't take it off you anytime I wanted."
"So you get to be the big hero in this? What do you want me to do, throw down this gun and beg forgiveness and go back to my shitty apartment because I sank all of my money into THIS FUCKING PLACE!!!" She fired at the ceiling.
"No, you've tried to kill people, things can never go back to the way things were. But what you can do is give it up, accept responsibility for your actions and we can stop things from getting worse." He said, his hands were up at this point. She looked around.
"Janice..." she said, lowering the gun a little, but still keeping it trained on him. "You asked me my name, it's Janice."
"Nice to meet you, Janice, now, can you give me the 12-Gauge?" he asked.
"No... Not unless you can get me off the hook." She said.
"Alright, we've got to bartering, now we're getting somewhere. As I said, I can't do that. Someone has to pay for this and if you are truly sorry, then you'll realise it is you." he said. "I can help you get as little punishment as possible, but only if you give me the gun without firing again."
"You... You really want to help me, don't you?" she asked.
"If I didn't, you'd be getting processed by Henley State's personel and awaiting trial right now." he said. He walked forwards and opened his arms. "Now, I'm going to ask you for one final thing... Help me to help you." he said. She fired again, and again and again and again, each blast making the camera-girl scream... Then just kept pumping and pulling the trigger, even though she was now out, before finally throwing the gun on the ground as well as her sunglasses and falling into his arms sobbing. It was difficult to hear what he whispered to her, due to the fuzziness of the camera footage, but it then cut back to the newsroom.
"The perpetrator, Janice Freeman, had just failed her semester and had lost her job." the news reader continued. "Supersire had this to say." It cut to Marcus outside with Superman. news crews swarming them.
"I just want to say that, people are capable of horrible things when the chips are down and all hope is lost. Last week, Janice would have found this act unconscionable, but here we stand now. If you are feeling low, don't do something stupid. Please, talk to a loved one, talk to your religious leader. Hell, if you are really by yourself, just shout out the window and i'll come running." It then cut back to the newsroom.
"Shortly after, the Justice League issued the official statement. "Due to natural disasters and supervillain attacks, some calls for Supersire's counselling may go unheard for certain periods of time. For those of you just tuning in, an attempted school shooting, foiled by Supersire. Now, although TSU's main campus was attacked, that didn't stop the Tigers performing well in their latest game aga-"
Andrea turned off the TV. "That's my boy. You can learn a lot from Marcus." She said. She then looked at her watch, before downing the rest of her coffee. "Oh fuckity-fuck. Gotta go." she moaned, running around, looking for her car-keys.
"No swearing in this house." James called in a mocking tone.
"Shut up and look for my keys." she roared at him.
James got up and walked out into the hall. "Did you leave them at the bar?" he asked.
"No of cour-yes... Along with the car..." she moaned.
"Well, lucky for you, your son is a superhero." he said, he stepped outside.
"Please don't, i'll call a taxi." she said. He threw her his front door keys and stepped into the street.
"In the pits of the underworld, it's power stirs Those evil in life, I lay upon thee, a curse Let those who have died, peacefully depart Those who need punishing, i'll eat their heart!"
His body was surrounded by black flowing mana as he suddenly transformed into the large chimera-creature. His mother sighed. She locked the front door and ran over to him and climbed on his back, before he set off down the street.
----
At the Luthorcorp building
----
He finally made it to the building before transforming back, he had dropped Andrea off at the bar she had left her keys and booked it to the building. He walked inside and was shown up to the rest of them. He walked in and looked around at them. "Hi. Don't mind me." he said, clearly the least physically fit of them. He was average build in a room full of god-like/supermodel physiques "Godsire's my name. Dad was a God, so the name kinda fits. I know I don't look like much, but I promise, I've been in this game for a few years now. I know how to handle criminals." he said. "Oh, you may also know my older brother Supersire, full leaguer now." he smiled.
Donna stood silently pressed up against a column measuring up the people coming in. There was one with a metal costume on, he reminded her of something she saw in a comic book once as a child. The pink haired one clearly was not human, she could smell it on her, what she was she didn't know. The one in the hooded sweatshirt she could tell would be troublesome, magical beings always are. The one calling himself Godsire she wanted to cut his head off with a dull sword. None of them looked like they were very good at the business they were here for.
Donna made no outward appearance of paying any attention to them. She stood perfectly still. She was waiting to see if any of them were childish enough to begin the super powered version of who was carrying the biggest bat that some men play.
Ion was zipping around the room, looking at everything... and everyone. There was a wonder woman knockoff with red hair, the brat the Titans were raising (Wally told him about her), plus there was this Godsire punk. The less said about him the better. As for the last guy... ordinary humans could be dismissed unless they were Batman. Probably just a non-powered vigilante to make the rest of them look cooler. He decided it'd be best to intoduce himself As his brain was travelling so fast his words came out at superspeed.
Donna was not thrilled to be working with a Speedster especially one without the proper social etiquette to slow down and give a proper introduction. Between her mother and Maxima, prodding her to join, she was not sure she made the right decision. She pulled from her bag a rag and a bottle. She began to polish her shield, the most recent battle had dulled the shine, she could no longer see her reflection. Certain battles demanded a shield with reflective properties, medusas for one, lasers for another. She began to wonder if this Luthor character wasn't laying the ground work for a trap, she began to prepare mentally for it. The speedster defiantly she wouldn't save to annoying, use up based on the situation.
