Legion World Forums LEGION OUTPOST Bits o' Legionnaire Business Postlo3w stories *LATEST UPDATE 13 AUGUST*

Hi Harbinger, thanks for the detailed feedback

Glad you liked the Danielle/Quislet scene....with Quislet being the most alien member of the team, I do like exploring the things that make him different every now and then!

I imagine there are very few people in general whose opinion Brainy would respect to the extent that he does Imra...and I am glad you brought up Ivy's power potential, that is gonna get explored very soon!

I love the 5YL Legion and it was in fact probably what really made me a Legion fan...some of those guys really would be a shock to the system for the comparitively more innocent Legion of times past though lol...re your observation about Bounty being more callous than expected; I based that on the one issue where she had a fight with Sade and where the Bounty entity left Dawnstar's body and Dawny was mentally and physically traumatised. I kind of see the Bounty entity as being similar to Bob from Twin Peaks; maybe not much more than a little off-putting generally, but really insidious and scary when they decide to show their true face.

To be honest I think I probably could have wrapped up the Durlan adventure better, I guess I wasn't really firing on all cylinders...but I am glad y'all liked it anyway. I am happier with the character stuff that happened in the aftermath; you're 100% right that Dawnstar and Wildfire wouldn't have talked like she and Mon-El did, their relationship is so dysfunctional hahaha...and all I will say about Yera's decision is that might be something somebody else will wonder at some point as well...the stardigrades were something I came up with on the spur of the moment to give Blok a workout and give Mon and Dawny an excuse to be in space together but I won't lie, I kinda love em

MARS
Husband Hill, Legion of Superheroes Headquarters
Arm in arm, Rokk Krinn and Lydda Jath Krinn strolled leisurely toward the front entrance of their home and headquarters. Dressed in stylish formal wear, they’d just returned from the kind of romantic dinner that their busy lives rarely gave them time to appreciate. “Tonight was just what I needed,” Rokk squeezed his wife’s hand. “It feels like we haven’t had two seconds to ourselves since...well, since we got married!”

“Married,” Lydda repeated, a dreamy look in her eye. She held her free hand up beneath the soft light of twin moons, her wedding ring gleaming. “It still feels like a fantasy after everything we’ve been through, you know? I love you, Rokk Krinn.” She leaned across and kissed her husband.

“I love you too,” Rokk held her close and returned the kiss. “Shall we continue this in private?”

Lydda chuckled with her mouth still on her husband’s and then pulled away. “Probably,” she agreed self-consciously. They’d only taken one more step toward the building when she saw something that gave her pause. “Oh. Rokk, wait a second..?” She untangled her hand from his and walked across to a more shaded area of the Legion plaza behind a statue of the Legion’s deceased benefactor RJ Brande. It was dark enough back here that a person could be hidden from the gaze of most other people, but for a woman from the eternally lightless world of Kathoon it may as well be high noon. Sitting on the ground with his back against the base of the larger than life statue, Lullabye Lad was looking particularly dejected.

“Waiane?” Lydda ventured. When the startled teen looked up at her, Lydda could see that he’d been crying. “Oh sweetie, what’s wrong?” Forgetting her elegant black dress, she kneeled down by his side.

“Hi, Night Girl!” he blushed furiously, “It’s okay, I’m okay.” He wiped at his eyes and cleared his throat.

“Are you sure..?” Lydda coaxed gently, placing a hand on his shoulder. “Sweetie, you don’t have to talk to me but do you want to talk to anyone else? Your brother or Gravity Kid maybe..?” She spared a glance to let Rokk know it might be best to keep his distance for now, but she needn’t have bothered. Cosmic Boy may have founded the Legion of Superheroes but when it came to soothing an emotionally distraught teenager he was more than happy to let his wife take point.

“...Tel broke up with me!” Lullabye Lad suddenly blurted, bawling into his hands.

“Ohh, Waiane…” Lydda hugged him. “I’m so sorry!”

“He said he needs to focus on joining the Legion and I’m a...a distraction!” Waiane sobbed helplessly. “I don’t understand, I don’t know what I did wrong!” He cried while Night Girl held him for a few seconds, then jumped back with a start. “What the sprock was that?!”

Night Girl looked down to see a leafy vine had wrapped itself around the boy’s ankle. Without hesitation she reached down and ripped the vine in two, but she could see that it wasn’t alone. More were surrounding them now, crawling over the ground and the platinum likeness of RJ Brande. Lydda’s darkness-fuelled strength and her flight ring allowed her to easily pick Waiane up and ascend a few feet, and she shouted down to her husband. “Rokk! Take to the air, I don’t know what’s going on but it looks like we’re under attack!”

“Not just us,” Cosmic Boy added, activating the electrostatic charge which transformed his suave seamless suit into his Legion uniform. “Look!” He joined Night Girl and Lullabye Lad out of reach of the green tendrils for now and pointed at the more brightly lit front wall of the Legion’s headquarters. Across its surface, a verdant web of vegetation crept in search of prey.

**********
Seven stories above, three Legionnaires who were recent Academy graduates themselves stood in the pleasant night breeze. Laurel Kent wore a revealing fluidress, its mercurial substance shifting slowly across the small area of skin that it did cover. Berta Skye Haris was more modestly attired in a loose-fitting blue hooded garment which was somewhat reminiscent of an early costume she’d worn as Nightwind. Both of the young women looked at the third member of their group who’d just joined them and laughed good-naturedly. “Grava, don’t you ever wear anything else?” Nightwind teased Comet Queen, who was still garbed in her shiny skintight costume.

“Parse me to the C-Span, why would I?” Grava executed a silly twirl on tiptoes, her arms outstretched. “I want the whole galaxy to know I’m a Legionnaire, starshine! Don’t you and Laurel want everyone to know you’re Nightwind and Supergirl?”

“The Supergirl part’s still a sore point with some people,” Laurel Kent rolled her eyes. “Probably best if the all-new girl of steel isn’t seen out on Nightclub Row till a few people have come to better terms with it. Speaking of Nightclub Row, shall we go? The night’s not getting any younger!”

“Starship shiny!” Comet Queen clapped her hands enthusiastically. “Come on, last one there’s a rotten--”

“Excuse me..?” a timid voice approached the trio. “I hope I’m not interrupting..?”

All three of them turned in surprise. Standing in the balcony doorway was their winged comrade Dawnstar. They’d rarely ever seen Dawnstar out of costume, and they had to admit her deep-cut yellow gown was very flattering. “Dawnstar?” Nightwind was the first to reply. “Are we needed for a mission? We checked the roster before we left--”

“No, no, it’s nothing like that!” Dawnstar rushed to assuage her. “I actually was wondering...it looks like you’re all going out for the evening, and well...I was wondering if you had room for one more..?”

Laurel and Berta shared an awkward silent glance, but Grava spared no time at all in responding. “Sure we can, space angel! The more the merrier! Woah, hey! What’s with the handsy floor?” She kicked one foot off the ground and saw that she’d almost been nabbed by a creeping vine. Two more of them slowly pulled their way over the balcony wall.

“What the--” Laurel’s flight ring took her over the edge of the balcony and her eyes widened as she realised the vines were slowly but surely making their way across the whole building’s surface. “You guys, these plants are everywhere! It’s out of control!”

“Plants..?” It dawned on Comet Queen where she’d encountered something like this before and her jaw dropped. “Ohh, nova burn! Plants!” Before the others could say anything more, she was a sparkling wake of comet dust disappearing deep into the bowels of the building.

**********
A couple of floors down and completely oblivious to the chaos outside, Marya Pai and Hadru Jamik skulked down one empty corridor after another. Only several hours ago they had walked these same halls as Dragonwing and Chemical Kid, two of the students training to become future members of the Legion of Superheroes. Right now though they were just rebellious teenagers breaking curfew for a night out on the town like any other teenagers on any other world.

“How did you shake your new sidekick?” Hadru teased.

“Fire Lass?” Marya spoke her name spitefully. “I just told her I needed some time to myself. Which is the truth, she sprockin’ follows me everywhere -- woah!” The pair of them flattened against the wall just in time to prevent a collision with Comet Queen as Grava zoomed past at breakneck speed. “How did that one make it into the Legion anyway?” Marya cocked a thumb in Comet Queen’s direction. “She’s more of an airhead than Gas Girl!”

“Hey, if they’ll let Quislet in...” Hadru snickered at his own snide remark as he rounded a corner, then stumbled clumsily backwards in urgent retreat.

“What’s your problem, Jamik?” the fiery tempered girl hissed. “You nearly knocked me over!”

“Sorry,” he whispered hastily, “But look!”

Both of them ever so cautiously poked their heads around the corner, where they saw Sun Boy and Polar Boy having just exited a turbolift. The two Legionnaires were approaching this direction but hadn’t seen either of the students yet. Hadru and Marya quickly ducked back behind the wall, their minds racing. There was nowhere here for Chemical Kid and Dragonwing to hide, and no way to explain why they were dressed like they were about to hit the hottest clubs in Marsopolis.

“Maybe it’ll be okay?” Hadru shrugged, clutching on to hope. “I mean it’s Sun Boy, right? If any of the Legion are gonna turn a blind eye to a couple of kids having some fun…”

“Morgna might not have a stick up his butt,” Marya countered, “But Polar Boy’s got one big enough for both of them. Face it, we’re screwed. We - grife!” She flinched as something brushed by her bare arm, and when she turned to see three leafy vines reaching out toward them she incinerated them in an exhalation of bright green flame.

“So much for stealth,” Hadru muttered as alarms and fire suppression systems activated in response to Dragonwing’s power. He heard a ventilation grate above him pop out of the wall but even as he turned his head to look, more of the thick green tendrils exploded forth and wrapped around his face and neck. Pulling at the vines in a panic, he struggled to think of any chemical reaction at all which would affect animated plant life. The vines were constricting uncomfortably tight now, and Chemical Kid screamed a muffled plea for help.

“I don’t know what to do!” Dragonwing cried out as she immolated more of the plants coming from the other side of the corridor. “I don’t want to melt your face off!”

Chemical Kid felt the temperature drop dramatically, and suddenly the vines stopped crawling over him. There was the distinctive crack of ice breaking and once he pulled away the now dead plants from his face, Hadru saw that the vent duct had been covered in a huge plug of ice. Where the vines stuck out of the misshapen chunk, they’d been as brittle as glass; no longer supporting their own weight, they’d simply fallen away to the floor. “Are you two okay?” Polar Boy asked, freezing more of the encroaching plants as he spoke. “We came running as soon as we heard the commotion!”

“I am now,” Hadru heaved a deep breath. “Thanks Polar Boy! I don’t care what anyone says, your power’s not lame at all!”

“Thanks!” Brek Bannin replied automatically. A second later he opened his mouth to protest when Sun Boy cut him off.

“Next time try slowing down its auxin production,” Sun Boy addressed Hadru. “It’s a plant growth hormone.” Dirk noticed incredulous stares from the other three and his face dropped. “Brainy’s not the only one around here who ever looked at a science text, you guys...okay Dragonwing, take the opposite side of the corridor and help me give us some breathing room. Once the corridor’s clear Brek can put up a couple of ice walls and we might have two nanos of peace and quiet to find out what’s actually going on!”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Polar Boy retorted. “Who lives here and makes plants grow, Dirk? Something else else must have happened to Chlorophyll Kid’s power!”

“It’s not Chlorophyll Kid,” a new voice entered the conversation. The quartet looked up to see Phantom Girl descending through the ceiling. “You’re not far wrong though, Polar Boy. I’m on my way now to see Brainy, apparently he’s working on a solution.”

“Of course he is,” remarked an amused Sun Boy as he incinerated a wide swath of the animated plants. “Let us know if you need any help, PG!”

“Just be careful, Dirk!” Tinya cautioned as she bypassed the four of them and sank into the floor. “If this is anything like our encounter on Mardru, those plants are a lot more dangerous than you’d think!”

Tinya didn’t stay to hear Dirk’s comeback, but she’d known him long enough to know exactly how he’d respond. His cockiness and his belief in the natural superiority of his own power would lead Dirk Morgna to treat this threat with very little credibility until he saw for himself just how cunning and versatile these plants could be. In that sense, she supposed she and Sun Boy were alike; as Phantom Girl, Tinya waded into battle without a second thought for her own safety. She had always trusted in her intangibility to protect her from threats that might cause even Mon-El pause for thought and the truth was that her power had saved her far more often than it had failed, but she thought about those two kids up there with Sun Boy and Polar Boy and she wondered...now that the Legion of Superheroes were actually living with these students, was it time for them to take a more careful approach to the way they fought their battles? After all, they were full-time role models now. It was something she’d need to think about, but not right now.

Phasing through to a lower level she came across more of her teammates fighting alongside a woman Tinya took a moment to recognise as Taryn Loy, the sometime heroine known as Calorie Queen. Wearing a fashionable red jumpsuit, the blonde Bismollian was using her super-strength to tear thick leafy vines into shreds. An acrid haze floated nearby, causing vegetation to instantly wither where the plants came across it; Tinya realised this must be Gas Girl. Together Calorie Queen and Gas Girl were having much more luck with the invading plant life than Light Lad and Matter-Eater Lad, backed into a corner as they tried their best to defend Light Lad’s unpowered boyfriend Dr Kent Shakespeare. Even so, it was only a matter of moments till they were all overwhelmed.

It had just occurred to Tinya that if Calorie Queen was here then her girlfriend Shrinking Violet must also be close when she heard a familiar voice in her ear. “Phantom Girl! Do you have any idea what this is all about?” Vi was hovering near her cheek, barely larger than a bug. “Taryn and I were just on our way to the hangar with Gas Girl when we came across these things trying to tear the boys apart!”

“I could kill every plant in this corridor,” Gas Girl added, “But if I spread myself that wide I can’t guarantee the others won’t breathe me in!”

“I can’t stay to help,” Phantom Girl admitted apologetically, “But guys, Brainy’s got a solution so just hang in there...at least these things are just creepers at the moment so maybe try and get to open air where they’ll have less reach!”

“Open air…” Vi repeated, thinking on Tinya’s words as the heroine from Bgltz disappeared through the floor below them. Easily avoiding the vines at her current height, Vi darted through what was to her perspective a giant-size battle to join Matter-Eater Lad, Light Lad and Kent. “Tenzil!” the tiny woman barked. “The exit’s all the way down the other end of the corridor, can you make us a closer escape route..?”

“Say no more!” Matter-Eater Lad cracked his jaw. “Yo, Cal and Tal!” he hollered at Calorie Queen and Gas Girl. “Do your magic for another couple of seconds, Wall-Eater Lad’s about to save the day!” He turned briefly to Kent and winked. “Hope you and Darvan have gotten in some zero-g playtime ‘cause we’re still gonna be three floors up when we get outta here and one of us doesn’t have a flight ring! I don’t want you to hurl in front of your man!”

“Tenzil, just eat!!” Light Lad and Shrinking Violet shouted in unison.

“Grife,” Matter-Eater Lad mumbled through a mouthful of reinforced omnisteel while Kent coughed to hide an embarassed smirk. “Tough crowd…”

**********
On her way to the multilab, Phantom Girl passed other groups of Legionnaires. Some, like Lightning Lass and Lightning Lad, were easily repulsing the vines encroaching upon Garth and Imra’s quarters while Saturn Girl herself remained safely ensconced in a forcefield-fortified room with young Graym and Garridan. Others, like Shadow Lass and Mwindaji, were lucky enough to have been near someone as unstoppable as Diamond Damsel when the attack had begun. In truth, the Legion as a whole had been lucky; on Mardru, the plants had adapted and evolved to counter their enemies and as yet that wasn’t the case here. Tinya couldn’t help feeling it was only a matter of time before that happened, but she pushed it out of her mind.

Finally, she was here. She made her way to one of the specially designated areas where it was safe for her to phase through the wall to Brainiac 5’s multilab and came across the Legion’s leader hard at work alongside Dream Girl. “You know,” Phantom Girl greeted the pair, “I was going to ask how even Brainy as smart as he is could be working on a solution to this already, but seeing you here Dreamy, I don’t think I need precognition myself to answer that question.”

“I’m just glad I had my vision after Thom left Mars with Kid Quantum to go visit her brother on Xanthu,” Nura Nal replied in a distracted tone as she focused on the delicate task of manipulating a micro-solder. “These plants certainly are relentless...for someone so young, that Ivy girl has a frightening amount of power available to her!”

“So it is Ivy?” Phantom Girl asked glumly. “I mean I guess I knew it had to be, but I was still hoping...has anyone been able to reach Chlorophyll Kid since this all began?”

“His biosignature places him in his quarters,” Brainiac 5 answered. “But he’s not responding to calls placed to either his flight ring or his rooms. He’s still alive and his biometrics are stable, but we have to assume she’s overpowered him.” He stood back from the device that he and Dream Girl had been working on and looked it over. “However...this should make sure that Ivy Arcane doesn’t provide us with any further difficulties!”

“What is that thing?” Phantom Girl asked as Brainiac 5 presented a web of wiring to her, each intersection meeting inside a rounded disc with a closed iris. She solidified to take the device from his hands; though the net was a few feet across when she held it out, it folded down to a compact enough mass that her phasing power could include it with no more effort than it took to affect her own clothes.

“I call it a Phase Re-Alignment Module,” Brainiac 5 answered dryly.

“He won’t call it a PRAM,” Dream Girl shook her head in mock judgement. “What’s the point of coming up with a perfect acronym if you won’t use it, honestly!”

“Okay, but what does it actually do?” Phantom Girl shrugged. “How is this going to help with our overgrown garden situation?”

“Once you place this around the child and activate it, the Phase Re-Alignment Module will shift Ivy Arcane partially out of sync with our dimensional plane,” Brainiac explained. “In that respect, it somewhat replicates your own abilities, Phantom Girl. Our reasoning is that if she is no longer in sync with our plane she will no longer be able to create and control the plant life which is currently menacing us.”

“Wait,” Tinya’s brow furrowed. “Create plant life? Brainy, are you saying she created these plants from scratch?”

“That’s quite a claim,” Dream Girl chimed in. “What makes you think that, Brainiac?”

Brainiac 5 blinked at the two women as though it should be the simplest observation in the world. “These plants are all classified as Vitanucissus Mardruidata,” he explained. “They are native solely to Mardru, Ivy Arcane’s homeworld. Chlorophyll Kid certainly doesn’t possess enough seed samples to infiltrate our headquarters to the extent that they have, and at any rate the soil surrounding our building is in no way fit to support plant life naturally without some additional terraforming.”

“Of course you can recognise what world a random plant came from on sight,” Nura deadpanned with a slight smile. “There’s that 12th level intellect we all know and love!”

“It isn’t as though I have an extensive knowledge of phytology generally,” Brainiac returned, mildly annoyed. “When Chlorophyll Kid joined the Legion of Superheroes, I simply thought it prudent to familiarise myself with the plant life of the homeworlds of Legionnaires, the students of the Legion Academy and our most commonly recurring allies and enemies...none of which is relevant to the task at hand, namely stopping Ivy Arcane’s outburst before anybody is injured.” He turned his attention fully to Tinya again. “Phantom Girl, the child is currently in Chlorophyll Kid’s quarters. When you reach her, place the Phase Re-Alignment Module over her and alert me. Once I activate it, the module will enclose her and shunt her from this plane.”

“I thought you were going to make a remote for it so Phantom Girl or Chlorophyll Kid could turn it on and off at will?” Dream Girl asked.

“We did not have sufficient time,” Brainiac answered simply. “At any rate, I feel more confident being able to exert control over the device myself.” He saw the concerned glance exchanged between Phantom Girl and Dream Girl and sighed in frustration. “Ivy Arcane will still be visible in this plane, and she will still be able to interact with people in this plane to a degree. She will simply be intangible. When she needs to take nutrition I will disengage the module.”

“Is this really the only answer?” Tinya asked hesitantly. “She’s just a baby, Brainy...I don’t know if I’m comfortable with cutting her off from everyone like this.”

“It is the only answer we have available to us right now,” Brainiac 5 said flatly. “We can discuss this later, but the longer you delay now the more likely it is that someone will be hurt or worse.”

Phantom Girl looked at Dream Girl, who nodded half-heartedly. Realising this wasn’t the time for dissension, Tinya took the module and ascended through the ceiling. She passed through Colossal Boy’s empty quarters on her way through the base and was glad that Gim and Yera hadn’t moved back into the building yet; an invasion of plants was the last thing either of them needed to worry about while Yera completed her recovery from radiation poisoning. Passing through the quarters she shared with Ultra Boy, Tinya grimaced at the damage the plants had wrought there and tried not to think too much about it. She comforted herself that like Colossal Boy, at least Jo was off-planet.

Then Tinya came across the last wall she needed to breach to enter Chlorophyll Kid’s quarters. For the first time she really thought about what she might find on the other side of this wall and it gave her pause. All of this had happened so fast; from the time Braniac 5 had called her to his multilab till now barely 15 minutes had passed...still, these plants were capable of such unbelievable violence that Phantom Girl shuddered to imagine the sight that awaited her. Steeling herself, she took a deep breath and walked through the wall.

Ral Benem’s bedroom was crawling with plants and all of them were snaking their way around the screaming infant in the centre of the room, forming a protective shell of vegetation around her. Ral himself was nowhere to be seen though, and Tinya’s heart was in her throat. Then she heard the insistent buzzing of his flight ring from deep within the green mass on the other side of the room and she felt even worse. “Chlorophyll Kid, hang on! I’m coming!” She flew straight for the muffled sound, passing through the plants as though they weren’t even there. Homing in on the sound of the flight ring, her fear changed to confusion when she saw that the small golden band was dangling from a thin stem and completely unattached to its owner. There was no blood, there was no sign of Chlorophyll Kid at all. With skill honed by years of practice, Phantom Girl solidified only enough of her hand to palm the ring and then rendered it as intangible as the rest of her. She heard a surprised exclamation from elsewhere in the room, and then the plants dramatically peeled away from her and left Tinya exposed out in the open.

“Phantom Girl?” Ral Benem was standing in the doorway to his bathroom clad only in a towel. “What are you doing in my room? What’s going on? Where the sprock did all these plants come from?!” He blushed, unconsciously backing behind the doorway to hide his almost naked form from the attractive young woman.

“Where have you been?!” she snapped more defensively than she’d intended. “Chlorophyll Kid, the whole base is under attack! It’s Ivy!”

“Ivy..? Oh sprock, Ivy!!” Forgetting his own self-consciousness, he bolted to Ivy’s cot. Plants moved almost instinctively aside for him, as though they recognised that he meant her no harm. The child herself was bawling hysterically, and she clutched for Ral as he picked her up. “I was in the tub!” he explained hurriedly. “Ivy’s been asleep for the past hour, I thought I’d be able to relax, I’ve had music blaring the whole time...she must have had a nightmare, and when I wasn’t here to help her...oh grife, I’m so sorry Phantom Girl!” He rocked Ivy back and forth, but she wasn’t calming down.

“We have to put this on her!” Phantom Girl held out Brainiac 5’s device. “Chlorophyll Kid, it’s not just your room - she’s going to turn Husband Hill into another Moorte Island if we don’t stop her!”

The main entry portal irised open, and a grazed and scratched up Comet Queen suddenly torpedoed into the room. “Chlory!!” she wailed. “Oh, thank the stars you’re still shiny!! What happened to poor Ivy, starshine?”

“Grava, you’re hurt!” Chlorophyll Kid looked her up and down, her costume torn in places and a long gash along her thigh.

“Guys, we don’t have time for this!” Phantom Girl stepped forward into the protective area which enclosed the four of them now that the plants had receded somewhat. “Brainiac 5 made this for Ivy, it’ll shunt her into interdimensional space and cut off her power.”

“What? No!!” Comet Queen stepped in front of Ral and the crying baby. “We’re not sending her into the--the Phantom Zone or whatever! She’s fresh out of the nebula, we can’t treat her like she’s a rogue planetoid!”

“Grava, I have no idea what you just said and I don’t have time to decipher it--” Phantom Girl began.

“He already put a bomb in Quislet!!” Comet Queen screamed shrilly. "I don't want him to hurt her too!"

Phantom Girl was visibly taken aback. “Wait, Brainy did what--?!”

“Grava...we might need Brainy’s device,” Chlorophyll Kid interjected glumly. “I can’t focus on the plants outside this room if I can’t settle Ivy, and you saw what they did back on my homeworld. I don’t want to hurt her either, but if these plants hurt any of our friends or if they expand beyond the base I couldn’t live with myself.”

“Oh, for--” Comet Queen turned to face Chlorophyll Kid and snatched Ivy from him. “Chlory...teamwork, starshine!” She rocked Ivy gently in her arms, cooing gently at the baby. “We work better together than alone,” she continued in a playful hushed tone as Ivy’s cries began to subside. “Duplicate Damsel always taught us that back at the Academy...isn’t that right, little nebula sprout? Yes it is, isn’t it..?” She kissed Ivy gently on the forehead and the infant girl giggled once, yawned and dozed off.

Chlorophyll Kid and Phantom Girl shared a look of mute shock for a second, then Tinya mouthed “the plants?” at him and Ral realised the crisis wasn’t quite over. Without Ivy’s wordless fear driving the plants they were beginning to lose their drive to protect her anyway so it was a simple matter for Chlorophyll Kid to reach out with his own enhanced power and force them to retreat throughout the whole building.

Still holding the web of circuitry that Brainiac 5 had given her, Phantom Girl looked down at it somberly. “We’re still going to need to find a longer term solution,” Tinya announced quietly. “You two can’t be expected to spend every moment of every day watching Ivy till she’s old enough to learn to control her powers...but right now, there’s something else I want to talk about.” Phantom Girl folded her arms across her chest and fixed her teammates with a look which left no doubt that she was the senior hero in the room.

“Comet Queen...tell me about this bomb.”

**********
ELSEWHERE
Ankle deep in the shores of a fetid bog, a dark-skinned man stood before a macabre altar of his own making. The altar was composed of bones, some of them fresh with the stink of still attached meat. The man wore an elaborate ceremonial outfit, a long black cloak draped behind him in the marshy waters. He seemed aged prematurely, with the athletic body of a man in his prime but the sunken cheekbones and deep wrinkles of someone far far older. His frizzy close-cropped hair was stark white, only two streaks of black at the temples revealing the color it had once held. A low croak disturbed the stillness of the night air, and the mage looked down to find the skeletal remains of what had once been some kind of crocodilian swamp dweller nuzzling at his calf.

“Soon, my pet.” The man turned his attention back to the altar and scattered the rotted plants and baby bones which he’d earlier placed there with painstaking ritual significance. “I must tread gently for now...if I probe too bluntly in my search for my granddaughter, I risk alerting whomever the Green has charged with her protection. No matter who guards little Ivy now though, they’ll soon enough fall before the power of Alek Arcane.”

He poured some rank liquid across the altar and whispered ancient words into the thick air...then while a sickly green flame burned the altar and its spell components to ash, Alek Arcane and his undead attendants walked into the dark embrace of the swamplands.

yikes, this isn’t over yet! nice cliffhanger, it will be interesting to see the team up against a magical foe

loved Comet Queen saving the day

Hah! your power isn’t lame... one of my fave running gags back during the JLI days

Nice seeing Cal, and nice seeing Darvan and Kent a couple

can’t wait for more!

Raz loving the wrap up for the Durla mission.

You've covered every question that I could have possibly had and setting up some interesting things to come.

I'm happy Infinity Boy didn't join as he makes a great point about the TT possibly appearing...is that a hint??
I agree, its funny Gim didn't react to Brainy offering it second.

Gim and Year's moment was bitter sweet and I'm happy she finally told Gim what was going on and the reason why she didn't let MWINDAJI heal her. I hope this does keep that future from coming true.

It's funny how much Supergirl (Laurel Kent) reminds me of Supergirl (Kara Zor-el). Her wanting to believe the best in Roy is so great to hear. I can see Jo's side though and it was nice to see him ask himself "What would Tinya do?"

I hope Roy can turn over a new leaf after this gift he's been given.

I'm not a huge Dawnstar fan at all. But you've finally found away to make me empathize with her. Her moment with M'Onel was great and I love that she doesn't want to be able to be replaced. But it drives me slightly insane that she keeps pushing Wildfire away...although he's a bit over barring. so i get it. But to not be replaceable you gotta let people in. I would imagine her she could talk to and maybe build a relationship with Vi because of this experience as Vi was someone who was replaced herself.

That's all for now. Looking forward to getting to read the latest post!

Alek Arcane will definitely pop up again in a more menacing capacity soonish...and Darvan and Kent kind of wrote themselves so I'm glad you like em IB

I never thought of it at the time but that scene with Polar Boy and Chemical Kid was pretty classic JLI now you mention it hahahaha

I do have a Time Trapper idea percolating but it'll probably be a while yet before I get a chance to do anything with it...I don't think the Legion are gonna be wanting for bad guys in the meantime though



I am glad you liked the developments with Gim and Yera...I have been wanting to get them back together for a while now so it's good to get it happening

And glad you liked the stuff with Laurel and Jo as well...we'll have to see where Roy goes from here, it's not like he really made good choices even before his power was hurting him, but this might be a wake-up call for him too...



Dawnstar and Wildfire honestly have the worst relationship lol...they are as bad as each other, but hopefully this might be one of those wake up calls for Dawny too. I actually didn't think about Vi being able to help her but that's a good idea Omni! I might see if I can work that in somewhere

Thoroughly enjoyable Raz, your take on Grava is so delightful and I love your continuing development of Laurel's character. Brainy will face it soon, and it's overdue. I wonder if it's time for Omega to appear to distract the team from Brainy's plans?

Great stuff, more, more, more!

Omega was one of my favourite one-shot villains, but I think the Legion are gonna be distracted enough with upcoming events as it is that Brainy won't need the help

You are right that Brainy's definitely gonna face it soon though, Tinya might even be getting a bit of extra ammo after the next instalment

MARS
Husband Hill, Legion of Superheroes Headquarters
Phantom Girl rose up through the floor of the mission monitor room, her neophyte teammate Mwindaji completely oblivious as he pored over more than a dozen holoscreens flickering constantly through newsfeeds from different worlds and outposts in search of anything which might need the Legion’s attention. Though this room had been brimming with plants only yesterday, Chlorophyll Kid’s power and the base’s automated cleaning systems had already restored everything to normal. “Hi Mwindaji!” Tinya announced herself cheerfully.

The young tracker from Kirinyaga nearly jumped out of his seat in surprise, quickly recovering as he turned to face Tinya. “Phantom Girl! I apologise, I did not hear you enter! I have been assigned to monitoring duty and I find the task…”

“Monitor duty,” Tinya corrected him with a friendly smile. “...and it’s kind of overwhelming, huh? All this info flashing at you from every direction..?”

“I am certain that I will become accustomed to the monitors,” he replied in his clipped Interlac, “It is just that...Kirinyaga is not a very technologically forward world...not compared to other worlds I have seen in my brief time with the Legion of Superheroes.”

“Oh Mwin, it’s not your fault!” Phantom Girl squeezed his shoulder casually as though they were already old friends. “This really was a lot for most of us to take in at first...I mean I’m sure Brainy and Kid Computo are completely at home, but it takes some practice for those of us burdened with normal fleshy brains. You want me to make it a little easier for you?”

“How--” One thick eyebrow shot up, his curiosity piqued.

Phantom Girl’s eyes perused the console till she found the slide lever she was looking for, and she adjusted it to the right slightly. “This lever controls how much Brainy’s trouble alert algorithm takes over...you should never let it take more than 30% of the workload because even the most advanced algorithm might miss stuff that we’d pick up, but till you get more comfortable being in here this should help anyway.” She stood back with her hands on her hips, and they both watched as several of the holoscreens vanished entirely and the remaining screens grew larger to use the extra space.

A beaming grin crossed Mwindaji’s face. “That is a help, thank you Phantom Girl!”

“Any time….don’t feel scared to ask for assistance, you’ve done an amazing job of adjusting to life in the Legion but nobody expects you to pick up everything straight away! ...Oh!” Tinya remembered why she’d come here in the first place. “I’ve actually been looking for Brainy, I need to talk to him about something Comet Queen raised with me...do you know where he is?”

Mwindaji concentrated for a moment. “...He is not anywhere within close range of our home but I can locate him if you wish.”

“While you’re in here, you should try and get used to using the mission monitor board as a resource just like your tracking power,” Tinya suggested. “If he’s left the planet on a mission, we’ll be able to find out why he’s gone and not just where he is.”

“Of course,” Mwindaji nodded, seeing the logic. He found the team’s distinctive icons and started scanning through them all while Phantom Girl waited patiently. “So...Shrinking Violet and Gas Girl are en route to Lallor for a memorial ceremony....Ultra Boy is bringing a contingent of Legionnaires back home from Xolnar, they just re-entered our solar system minutes ago….oh, yes! Here it is….Brainiac 5, Elastic Lad and Color Kid have gone to take part in...a solar photonic modulation experiment..?” He looked at Tinya helplessly.

The perky heroine shrugged. “Don’t look at me, I’m as much in the dark as you are. Still,” she sighed, “It sounds like science to me, and Brainy plus Elastic Lad plus science doesn’t sound like it equals anything good for anyone else...”

**********
DEEP SPACE
30 million miles from Sol
Color Kid had made the mistake 25 minutes ago of asking Elastic Lad exactly why Brainiac 5 was dragging them all out here to roughly halfway between Mercury and the sun. Somehow, the excitable redhead’s explanation involved three separate seques to the original Legion of Substitute Heroes’ long ago conflict with the Plant Men, the technological and scientific advances of Color Kid’s homeworld Lupra, and perhaps most strangely of all a dissertation on each romantic couple in the Legion and how effectively each person’s power complimented that of their partner. Ulu had been curious about their mission earlier but now he was utterly mystified. Jams-Ols 5 had finally stopped talking though, and so a resigned Color Kid slumped into an empty seat in the back of the Legion shuttle feeling that boredom was clearly the preferable alternative to spiralling confusion.

Soon growing tired of using his power to change the ceiling into different colors, Ulu’s attention shifted to Brainiac 5 and Elastic Lad. The shuttle had been stopped here a while, and Ulu had determined that Brainiac 5 was remotely assembling some kind of photonic cannon tethered to the underside of their hull. The device itself was mildly interesting, but what really intrigued him was watching Brainiac and Elastic Lad work together.

Elastic Lad obviously held the Coluan in high regard, and in fact was like a child who’d been given the chance to meet one of his idols. Jams-Ols 5 doted on Brainiac’s every word, leaped at the opportunity to display his own understanding where he could, even gave his best effort to reign in his natural hyperactivity so as not to annoy the notoriously terse 12th level intellect. Ulu couldn’t imagine Elastic Lad accomplishing that for literally anybody else in the galaxy.

“Color Kid,” Brainiac 5 interrupted Ulu’s reverie. “We’re ready for you.”

Ulu flinched at the sound of his codename. “Sorry Brainiac, can you please explain again what we’re actually doing here?” He stood up and approached the round console where his teammates were standing. “Elastic Lad told me earlier, but uhh...it kind of went over my head,” he finished as tactfully as possible.

In response, Brainiac 5 gestured at the sun glaring on the other side of a specially polarised window. “Recent events have made it clear to me that we have at our disposal a remarkable tool for reducing or increasing the power levels of Kryptonian or Daxamite allies and enemies as necessary, one which till now has been largely untapped.”

“...Solar photonic modulation…” Color Kid let the phrase he’d heard many times on this trip roll over his tongue. “...You want to change the sun’s color? That cannon thing you made is going to increase my power’s range of effect?”

“No,” Brainiac 5 answered bluntly. “The secondary purpose of this experiment is to reduce our need to rely solely on yourself and Sun Boy to affect Kryptonian and Daxamite powers. If this cannon does the task I designed it to do, I will be able to render a radical color shift in the closest star at any time without actually affecting the physical makeup of that star. Your task, Color Kid, is to observe and report. The photoreceptive cones in your eyes are far more advanced than any easily transported equipment to which I currently have access.”

“Oh…” Color Kid replied, slightly dejected. “Well, nice to know I’m easily transported I guess.”

“Indeed,” Brainiac 5 didn’t react to the obvious sarcasm as he handed Ulu a transparent sheath of material. “If I could ask you to don this please? You’ll need to be outside the vessel during the experiment.”

“A transuit?” Color Kid held it out in front of himself. “Can’t I just use the transuit function in my flight ring?”

“This has been specially modified,” Brainiac explained. “With a voice command from myself, this transuit has a polarising function which can be switched on and off. I’ll need you to observe the experiment without the filter that polarisation causes, but even your eyes can only look directly at the sun for so long at this proximity so I’ll need to ensure that your vision is protected at all other times while you’re outside the vehicle.”

A chill ran down Color Kid’s spine. He’d been blinded twice before, and he hadn’t really consciously considered it prior to this moment but the thought of risking that a third time was unsettling. He took a deep breath and centred himself, then with shaking hands he climbed inside the transuit. Seconds later, he was outside the vessel. “Brainiac?” he asked with obvious anxiety. “Can we please get this over with?”

“The cannon is primed,” Brainiac 5’s voice came back. “Please observe the star and tell me what you see. In 3...2...1.”

The dark filter of the polarisation faded as Brainiac counted down, so as to allow Color Kid’s eyes to safely acclimatise to the influx of light. Still, even knowing consciously that the risk was minimal Ulu just wanted it all to be over. The cannon fired without a sound, and he narrated dutifully. “A rainbow beam of light just shot out...I mean...more than a rainbow really, I’m losing track of how many colors there are. I’m waiting for the sun to react….no response...Brainiac, how long is this going to take? Oh! Something else else just happened! The sun...the sun’s red now!”

The transformation was so dramatic that Color Kid couldn’t imagine they needed any kind of enhanced color vision to see it, but then he saw something else that he thought they actually might have missed. Maybe this is why he was necessary after all? “Brainiac, Elastic Lad...I think...I think I just saw a blue spark...I mean it was tiny but...wait! Not a spark, it’s...uhh guys, I think something’s coming out of the sun!”

Moving so fast that none of the Legionnaires had any hope of identifying what it was, an icy blue streak zoomed straight past all three of them and continued on a beeline for the tiny azure world some 60 million miles away...

**********
EARTH
Metropolis, Weisinger Plaza
As soon as Bobb Kohan left the United Planets Museum of the Superhero (which also served as the home base of his team the Legion of Substitute Heroes), he was almost knocked off of his feet by a rambunctious hug from Comet Queen. “Starshine, it’s nova bright to glom you again!” Grava squealed.

“Grava, let Crystal Kid breathe.” Berta Skye Haris gently pulled her hyperactive teammate aside and gave Bobb a more subdued embrace. “It is good to see you again, Bobb; it’s been too long since we had a proper catch-up!”

“It has been a while!” Crystal Kid agreed as he turned from Nightwind to Laurel Kent. “It’s too bad we couldn't get the rest of our old classmates here, huh? Would have been a real school reunion!” He saw Dawnstar standing off to one side and nodded in her direction. “Oh...hello Dawnstar, the others said you’d be coming tonight.”

“Thank you for allowing me to tag along,” an uncommonly demure Dawnstar spoke. “I know that we don’t have so close a relationship. I...appreciate the inclusion.”

“Hey, us Academy kids gotta stick together huh?” Crystal Kid winked. “Have any of you seen the museum yet?”

“I have!” Grava clapped her hands with glee.

“Of course you have,” Laurel rolled her eyes as she placed an arm each around Comet Queen and Crystal Kid. “You were born a superhero groupie, Grava...come on then, show us our holos. They better not have made me look fat.”

The three of them giggled as they disappeared into the building, while Nightwind hung back slightly and gestured for Dawnstar to follow. Once everyone else was inside, Nightwind sighed inwardly. She didn’t know why Dawnstar had chosen now of all times to want to play friends with them all, but she hadn’t gotten any less awkward since they’d left Mars to come visit Crystal Kid. Something else else told her this was going to be a long night…

A little over 90 minutes later, Crystal Kid had finished showing the girls through the museum and the Subs’ headquarters and the quintet had decided to take advantage of the balmy night air to convene in a sectioned off area of the rooftop with comfortable furniture and a few flowering plants. “Where are the rest of the Substitute Heroes?” Nightwind asked as she accepted a glass of sparkling wine from their host.

Crystal Kid counted on his fingers as he spoke. “Porcupine Pete, Rainbow Girl and Polecat are off in the Antarctic...one of Polecat’s old work colleagues said something about unearthing an ancient Justice League base or something that he wanted us to check out? And Antennae Lad’s got a birthday party back on Grxyor. So I guess I’m the Subs tonight!”

“Not tonight, starshine!” Grava clinked her soft drink against Crystal Kid’s kono juice. “We’ve totally got enough flight rings here to make a whole Legion of Superheroes solar system, I say we make you an honorary member of our Legion! All in favour?” Laurel and Berta raised their glasses with a cheerful “aye!” and Grava banged an imaginary gavel. “Motion carried!” the golden teenager declared.

Crystal Kid laughed heartily. “I wish it were that easy! Hopefully one day…”

“Don’t feel badly,” Dawnstar attempted to join the conversation. “Not everybody is initially good enough to join the Legion--”

The mood instantly plummeted. “...Not good enough?” Nightwind challenged her. “What do you mean not good enough, Dawnstar? Bobb’s had exactly the same training that we’ve had, it’s just bad luck that he hasn’t been chosen yet.”

“I apologise,” Dawnstar blushed furiously. “I did not mean that the way it came out, it’s just - just that Bouncing Boy for example--”

“I mean we haven’t all had the same training,” Laurel cut her off. “But then not all of us were lucky enough to have Wildfire get a crush on us and find us a spot on the team before we’d come anywhere close to finishing school, I guess.”

“Guys,” Bobb placed his drink on a table and held his hands up. “It’s okay, really. I’m sure Dawnstar was--”

“I earned my place on the Legion!” Dawnstar shot back at Laurel, her earlier nervousness now forgotten in her anger. “Just as we all did, Laurel! Just as I’m certain Crystal Kid will one day have the opportunity to do--”

“When he’s good enough,” Berta interjected sarcastically.

While this was happening, Comet Queen had seen something in the night sky that caught her attention. “Whoa...hey, everyone? Swing your scopes this way!”

“Why are you even here?” Laurel derided Dawnstar, not having heard Grava at all. “I mean it’s not like we were particularly great pals in school, and we definitely never have been the entire time you’ve been in the Legion...what, now that we’re all on the same team we’re good enough for you to finally deign to hold a conversation with?”

“Guys?” Comet Queen persisted, leaning over the balcony. “I think it’s a for real meteor, you guys! I mean like for real real a celestial object! Maybe we should--”

“It was never my intention to stand above you,” Dawnstar responded to Laurel, a familiar haughtiness returning to her tone. “All I have ever known is duty, I am sorry if that is not something you can relate to.”

Grava said something else, but it was lost in the thunder and rattle of an explosive impact somewhere in the city. The group recovered their bearings quickly and ran to join Grava at the edge of the balcony. “What the sprock was that?” Laurel gaped.

“I told you!” Grava moaned, “But nobody ever listens to Comet Queen, noooo...I think it was a meteor, I saw something blue and shiny coming down from outer space like zip bam BOOM! Let’s go scan the crash site!”

“Grava, hold it.” Nightwind grabbed her shoulder before she could take flight. “What do you think we should do, Dawnstar?”

“M-me?” the startled Starhavenite stammered.

Laurel was aghast. “Her?”

“Whatever else is going on, she’s the senior Legionnaire here,” Nightwind clarified. “So what’s it going to be, Dawnstar?”

Dawnstar froze for only a fraction of a second more before she realised Nightwind was right; She needed to make a decision. “Comet Queen, lead us toward the object but stay close. Crystal Kid...you are welcome to join us, but our first priority has to be ensuring that no innocents have been harmed. We won’t be able to protect you.”

“That’s the most nass-backwards way anyone’s ever asked me for help before,” Bobb remarked dryly, “But I want to make sure nobody’s hurt too. Lead on, ladies.”

It didn’t take them long to find the impact site. Even if the stream of traffic fleeing the area thanks to Science Police emergency override signals wasn’t a clue, they could hear the sound of buildings being demolished from blocks away. They came into view of the galaxy-famed Superman Museum just in time to see one whole wing collapse into itself as a well-built woman with blue-tinged white skin ascended from the rubble. She wore a darker blue one-piece leotard with matching thigh high boots and fingerless opera gloves. A mane of snow white hair cascaded past her waist, and she was very clearly the architect of this destruction. “Where is he?” she roared to the vast city around her as she hovered in place. “Where is the last son of the House of El?”

“House of El..?” The newly christened Supergirl looked down at her own distinctive poncho. “You don’t think she’s talking about my dad..?”

“I doubt it,” Nightwind replied. “She’s trashing the Superman Museum and everyone knows Superboy’s been a member of the Legion of Superheroes in the past...I mean it’s not like we ever publicly announced that he went back to his own time, but people must have noticed by now that he’s not been around for a while, right?”

“Regardless of this woman’s quarry we must prevent her from causing any more destruction,” Dawnstar decreed. “Supergirl, we need to gauge her power level. With your invulnerability, you are the best person to do this while the rest of us ensure the surrounding area is successfully evacuated.”

“My pleasure,” Laurel Kent gave a wicked smile. “That’s my family’s legacy she’s tearing down.” She punched a fist into her palm and flew off toward the rampaging stranger. At the same time Crystal Kid and Nightwind used their powers to extinguish fires and reinforce damaged structures, and Comet Queen and Dawnstar sped innocent sentients to a safer distance; all four made sure to keep an eye on Laurel as they went to work, hoping that she’d help them learn something more about their mysterious opponent.

The strange woman had landed in the wreckage of the museum and was effortlessly tearing down the remaining walls when Laurel Kent made a dramatic entrance by dropping out of the sky to land right in front of her. “Hi!” the plucky teenager introduced herself. “I’m Supergirl, you want to tell me why you’re destroying my family’s museum?”

“Supergirl?” The woman approached her fearlessly. “Superman is the one I seek, but wait...I sense that you too are a product of Rao’s hated bloodline, girl.” The taller woman stood over Laurel, fixing her with a glare of obvious disdain. “It matters not to me whether I slay you or Superman first, I suppose.”

Laurel saw the woman’s arm draw back for a slap and made no effort to avoid it, assuming that her flight ring would hold her in place and that her natural invulnerability would protect her from actual harm. She was as surprised as any of her friends when both failed.

The most casual gesture from this woman sent Laurel Kent flying through an entire building and out the other side where she smashed through a second building still under construction and brought the whole thing crashing down on herself. Laurel was grateful that the building hadn't been occupied yet, the only casualties here were engineering droids and her pride. Still, her vision was blurry and it was going to take a while to wriggle out of here.

“Parse me to the C-Span!” Comet Queen exclaimed, eyes wide. “Nobody slaps my friend around like that and gets away with it! I don’t care how pretty you are, white star!”

Dawnstar barked at Grava to hold back, but the impulsive youngster was already gone. She flew sparkling trails around the destructive stranger, her cloudy wake expanding in size until both women were hidden by glittering plumes of gas. There came a peculiar chink that both Dawnstar and Nightwind had heard before from Polar Boy, and Comet Queen dropped out of the sky frozen solid within an enormous misshapen chunk of ice.

“Comet Queen!” Crystal Kid’s voice strained.

“Comet Queen can exist comfortably in deep space,” Dawnstar intercepted him before he could rush the stranger. “Cold and a lack of oxygen are not going to harm her, Crystal Kid.”

“I hate to admit it,” Nightwind scowled, “But I think Dawnstar’s right. I’m more worried about Laurel to be honest, I’ve never seen someone smack her around like that.”

“I will find her,” Dawnstar announced. “Nightwind, contain her as much as you are able.” She spread her wings and departed before either Berta or Bobb could dissent.

“Sure thing,” Nightwind grumbled. “I’ll go throw a strong breeze at the woman who’s been dropping Legionnaires and buildings both like it was her hobby.”

“I’ll come with you,” Crystal Kid offered.

“No,” Berta touched his arm. “You stay hidden...but close by.”

Crystal Kid was horrified. “You saw what she did to Grava and Laurel! You can’t go up against her alone, Berta!”

“Bobb, don’t take this the wrong way but if that woman decides to hurt me I doubt very much you’ll be able to stop her. You might be able to take her by surprise though...if I fall as well, Crystal Kid might be Metropolis’s last hope.” Without waiting for his response, Nightwind flew out toward the rampaging woman.

“Hey lady!” Nightwind called out from above, hoping her mastery of the winds would give her a greater advantage here than on the ground. “If you’re looking for Superman, you’re about a thousand years too late!”

The fiercely beautiful woman turned on her with the speed of a predator, her icy cold hand around Berta’s throat before the young hero even registered the motion. “Explain yourself,” the woman snarled. “And for your sake, you had best hope your explanation satisfies.”

“...Who...who are you?” Nightwind rasped, clutching helplessly at the woman’s iron grip.

“Who am I?” The woman’s lips curled into a cruel smile. “I am the goddess of ice and darkness, the ancient embodiment of rage and terror, she who will ensure that any trace of the House of El is forever erased from the firmament. I am Cythonna….and I have never asked for an explanation more than twice in all my millenia, girl. Do I make myself clear?”

Cythonna’s grip tightened and Nightwind found herself unable to speak. Helpless to fight the woman’s superior strength, Berta nodded furiously with tears streaming down her pale yellow cheeks. With a theatrical gesture, Cythonna released her and stars danced in Berta’s vision as blood rushed back into her head.

Nightwind fell a couple of feet before she found the self-control to correct her descent, and hovering below Cythonna she hacked and coughed while she discreetly drifted away from the woman in an attempt to escape what she’d just seen coming. “You want...the House of El..?” Nightwind croaked. “Careful what you...wish for, batwitch.” There was a blur of motion as Dawnstar yanked Nightwind to a safe distance, then like a bullet in primary colors Supergirl charged straight down into Cythonna. Laurel had flown high enough to reach maximum velocity before starting her power dive, and the impact when she hit her target was deafeningly loud. To the assembled Legionnaires’ horror Laurel simply glanced off like a rock on a pond and found herself buried in the wreckage of the museum while Cythonna barely moved a foot.

“Oh, sprock this…” Nightwind gathered all of her power, and being sure to avoid the area where Laurel had landed she lifted countless tons of debris which had been a tourist attraction only minutes ago into a swirling tornado nearly a hundred feet high. The plasteel and animatronic exhibits and merchandise and glass and wiring and everything else which had been part of the building spun and swirled at lethal speeds above them all, then Nightwind gestured as though she were directing an enchantment and all of that mess flew with needlepoint precision straight at Cythonna. In less than two seconds the icy-skinned woman was buried in a mountain of rubble and an exhausted Nightwind collapsed by the side of Laurel, who for the second time today had found that she had to extricate herself from a collapsed building.

Crystal Kid came running and helped the two girls stand. “Grife, remind me not to piss you two off,” he laughed nervously. “Holy...Laurel, you’re bleeding!!”

Laurel Kent shook her aching hands in the cool night air. Where she’d hit Cythonna, her knuckles were grazed. “It’s okay,” she lied to distract herself from the pain. “It’s just a couple scratches, Bobb.” The truth was that they were just scratches; Laurel had seen any ordinary person she could name endure far worse, and on a couple of occasions she’d felt worse herself. She wasn’t used to feeling pain at all though, and it was taking everything she had not to cry.

“That’s not gonna hold her long,” Nightwind cautioned, and right on cue the mountain of debris exploded outwards.

Thanks to Bobb, a crystalline wall protected them from the rubble but that too was easily shattered by the mighty Cythonna. “I have been more than patient with you insects,” Cythonna sneered. “It is time for this to end.”

“Yeah,” Crystal Kid stepped up. “I think you’re right, lady.” He used his power on Cythonna herself, and her skin began to gleam where the light bounced off of it. Still, she didn’t transform. “She...she’s resisting me!” Bobb was wide-eyed. “That’s never happened before! I don’t know how that can happen!”

“I am a goddess,” she announced imperiously. “And soon you will be naught but forgotten distractions left in my wake.” She dug her fingers into the first chunk of metal that came to hand and found what had once been the head of an eighty foot tall statue of Superman. With an overarm swing, she brought it down on Berta, Laurel and Bobb.

From above the chaos, Dawnstar watched helplessly. She might be able to pull one of them away before the projectile struck but she couldn’t risk safely collecting both Nightwind and Crystal Kid in time. The enormous disembodied head’s shadow fell over the trio of heroes, then surrounded by an emerald aura it abruptly froze in mid-air.

“Hi gang!” All of them looked up past Dawnstar to see Neon holding the head in an emerald field. Blok, Mon-El, Element Lad, Firecrest, Ultra Boy and Kid Computo flanked her, and behind them floated the partially transparent Invisible Kid and a 16 foot tall Colossal Boy. “We were on Medicus One picking up Colossal Boy and his wife when we heard some bad fem was tearing apart downtown Metropolis,” Zoe continued. “I’m gonna go out on a limb and say this is our bad fem?”

“I am Cythonna!” the villain raged. “And I will brook no further insolence!”

“Okay yeah, that definitely sounds like villain talk.” Using her power, Zoe spun the Superman head around to face Cythonna and it shot twin green eyebeams straight at the ice goddess. The surprise assault rocked Cythonna backwards a few feet, but she recovered quickly and charged straight through Zoe’s power and the enormous head that it had been enclosing. Zoe reinforced the nimbus of energy which surrounded herself, perhaps the only thing which kept her head on her shoulders when Cythonna slammed her up and back through a nearby apartment complex.

“Dawnstar, go make sure she’s okay!” Ultra Boy bellowed, catching the head before it could land on anybody. “Mon, help me get rid of this thing! Blok--”

“I take it you are the leader of this motley crew,” Cythonna addressed Jo, suddenly floating right in front of him. “Let us see how well your team function without you.” She drew one arm back in a punch, and Ultra Boy winced. Either invulnerability or superspeed would save him now, but he’d no longer be able to hold the Superman head aloft if he switched his power slots. He’d have to rely on one of his friends to save him this time.

With perfect timing, Colossal Boy’s gigantic hand closed around Cythonna’s torso. “I think you’ve done enough punching for one day, why don’t we talk this out?” Gim asked her, raising her up to meet his eye.

“Unhand me!” Cythonna raged. She grabbed his oversized thumb with both hands and bent it backwards with a crack that resounded across the plaza. Gim roared with pain then surrendered himself to merciful unconsciousness as Cythonna freed herself from his grasp and ricocheted off of his forehead like a human bullet.

Blok and Mon-El rushed to catch the aptly named Colossal Boy before his falling form could cause even more damage, and Ultra Boy felt his load inexplicably lighten. He gawked in confusion as the giant replica of Superman’s head dissolved into nothingness. “Let us take care of the peripherals!” Element Lad cried out, his power converting the statue’s head into free-floating oxygen. “Go stop that woman before she kills someone, Ultra Boy!”

Jo didn’t waste breath in response, but instead switched his ultra-energy to invulnerability and confronted Cythonna again. “What is it you want, lady? You might as well tell us; you’re tough but there’s no way you’re gonna beat all of us!”

“I want to eradicate every last child borne to the House of El,” Cythonna sneered. “And I will reduce all of you to a bloody smear in pursuit of that goal if I must!” She charged Jo faster than he could react, held him aloft in both arms and slammed him into the ground where Nightwind, Crystal Kid and Supergirl were still gathered. Debris exploded everywhere as the force of the throw sent Jo deep underground.

“I’m diverting power from the area,” Kid Computo announced to her teammates. “The last thing we need is the powergrid exploding on top of everything else! You guys are going to need to do something about her though!”

“You’re absolutely right, Danielle.” Mon-El descended from above, having finally found a safe place to rest the oversized Colossal Boy. He intercepted Cythonna as she advanced on Laurel, Berta and Bobb and held a hand up in warning, his eyes glowing red. “I’m not going to allow you to hurt anybody else, Cythonna. Surrender now and we won’t need to hurt you.”

“You remind me of him,” she replied coolly. “Superman. You are not of his bloodline though, I would know. Thank whatever weak gods you worship for that, it means I will dispatch you swiftly.” She raised a hand and Mon-El was instantly encased in ice. She knocked him over with the same hand and the frozen hero toppled. Cythonna had only taken another step though when the ice cracked and crumbled, and Mon-El tackled the self-proclaimed goddess and flew straight up into the night sky with her.

The two disappeared from view in less than a second, though Danielle could still follow their path by virtue of the Science Police surveillance equipment all around them. “Get back!” she suddenly bellowed. “They’re coming back down fast!” She flew up and away as she shouted the warning, Firecrest’s leathery wings flapping right behind her. Blok shielded Element Lad with his own form, and Crystal Kid hastily erected a shield to protect himself and anybody else by his side. The crystalline wall shattered purely from the shockwave of Cythonna slamming Mon-El into the ground, and he and Nightwind were lucky not to be shredded or buried beneath the wave of wreckage that came their way as they tumbled painfully backwards. The plaza outside the Superman Museum had finally sustained too much damage to remain standing, and with a sickly wrenching scream the whole street collapsed into the sub-basement levels beneath their feet.

Cythonna reappeared a moment later none the worse for wear, a badly battered Ultra Boy hanging from her left hand and Mon-El hanging limply at the end of a tattered cape from her right. Both men were unconscious, but still breathing. “You can have these two back,” she sneered at the astonished Legionnaires, “I’m done with them.” She hurled the men away without a second thought, collecting Firecrest purely by accident with Mon-El’s hurtling body while Blok rushed to catch Ultra Boy before he hit something more unyielding.

Kid Computo followed Staq’s flight path to find he’d crashed through the wall of an empty apartment and destroyed some unlucky sentient’s home aquarium. “Holy nass, how strong is that woman that she took out a Daxamite that quickly??” Danielle wondered aloud while Mon-El and Firecrest stirred in the broken glass with tiny fish flip-flopping all about them. “Are you guys badly hurt?” She finally noticed the fish and ran into the adjoining kitchen to find a receptacle for them.

“She’s...monstrously powerful,” Mon-El groaned, rubbing his jaw. “Kara with the Red Lantern ring wasn’t as strong as this woman, whoever she is. You all need to clear the area...get Night Girl and Shady here if you can, maybe even Dragonmage and Tellus...it may be possible that brute strength won’t be enough.”

“You think sshe’ss tough enough to take on you, Blok and Lydda at full sstrength..?” Firecrest hissed incredulously. “We’re ssprocked!”

“We’ve gotta try though, right?” Kid Computo asked, making a face as she gingerly scooped up fish and dropped them into a pot full of water. “We--” She stopped mid-sentence, her head cocked as she noticed sparks flying from Firecrest’s Legion insignia at his waist. As thick-skinned as he was in his dragon form he hadn’t even noticed, but Danielle realised it must have been damaged when Mon-El and he had plummeted into this apartment. More importantly, she realised exactly what type of circuitry had been damaged.

“Danielle?” Mon-El asked, seeing her puzzled expression.

“Ssomething new we need to worry about?” Firecrest groused.

“Uhh, no.” She shook the cobwebs from her head and resumed saving whatever fish she could. “Nothing that can’t wait.” After all this is over though, she promised herself, Someone’s gonna have a very interesting discussion with a certain 12th level intellect…

“What have you done with her?!” Cythonna’s outraged scream suddenly filled the air, and the three Legionnaires peered outside the hole in the apartment wall to see her far below in what remained of the street with Nightwind and Crystal Kid at her feet.

“Where is Supergirl?!”

**********
“Full disclosure,” Laurel Kent remarked sardonically as she and Jacques Foccart shimmered into view two blocks away, “I’m not a huge fan of running away, Invisible Kid.”

“You are welcome, mademoiselle.” Jacques replied with equal sarcasm, leaning against as a wall as he wiped sweat from his brow. “I might inform you that rendering another person invisible is tres difficult...also, in the event that you did not notice, that monstre dispatched Mon-El and Ultra Boy with frightening ease. She seems quite intent on killing you...I know that you are invincible under normal circumstances, but these are far from normal circumstances, non?”

“Well...yeah, you’ve got me there.” Laurel opened and closed her hands, wincing at her grazed knuckles. “Why has she got such a mad on for me anyway? Do you really think she’s one of Superman’s old enemies from a thousand years ago?”

“I do not know,” Jacques responded, his voice seeming very far away as he gazed at some wreckage embedded in an advertising billboard above their heads. The Legion had tried to keep their fight with Cythonna as contained as possible, but they couldn’t prevent collateral damage entirely. “I think I know how we may find out however…”

“What? How?” Laurel followed Invisible Kid’s stare, then broke out in a grin as she saw what it was that had caught his attention. Flickering on and off intermittently, a free-standing console from the Superman Museum had found its way here still partially intact. Small holographic representations of instantly recognisable figures from ancient history like Lex Luthor and the original Brainiac appeared and disappeared again, and an Interlac banner above the villains bore the title The Many Foes of Superman.

“...Gotcha!” Laurel crowed.

Back in the wreckage of the Superman Museum, Blok and Cythonna were trading blows which made nearby buildings shake. Element Lad watched awestruck from behind an inertron wall alongside a recovering Nightwind and Crystal Kid. Jan had tried encasing Cythonna herself in inertron already, and she’d shattered the supposedly indestructible substance as though it were tissue paper; he decided he was probably better put to use keeping the others around him as safe as he could. Jan could barely believe what he was seeing; Blok had been one of the toughest Legionnaires before he’d been imbued with a portion of the power of Shazam, but since then Jan hadn’t seen anything come anywhere near being a physical threat to him. This woman though was staggering him with every blow, and he seemed little more than a nuisance to her. Jan knew the Science Police hadn’t actively stepped in yet because they were giving the Legion a chance to end this, but he was beginning to worry that they might not be able to end this without resorting to lethal means. Even Satan Girl, even Darkseid paled in comparison to this woman’s power.

Mon-El and Firecrest suddenly descended from the night sky and bathed Cythonna in flames thanks to heat vision and fire breath respectively. She screamed as she was immolated, but it seemed to Jan to be a scream of outrage more than pain. Still, when Blok’s fist met her jaw this time he did knock her off of her feet for the first time; maybe they were on to something. Jan was so accustomed to Polar Boy’s Tharrian adaptation to intense heat that it had never even occurred to him that another cryokinetic might actually be more susceptible to heat-based attacks. His flight ring breeped at him while the ambient temperature suddenly took a nosedive. In as little time as it took for Element Lad to notice the drop in temperature, he was shivering and a light slurry of snow carried on rising winds.

“Element Lad? It’s Supergirl, I’m with Invisible Kid!” Laurel Kent’s voice barely carried over the wailing winds and Element Lad had to extend the wall he’d created to act as a windbreaker.

“Laurel, this isn’t the best time!” Jan yelled back. “If you two are safe, call for reinforcements! Maybe Sun Boy--”

“No, just listen!” Laurel cut him off. “We found a database of Superman’s old foes...you know how Cythonna keeps saying she’s an ice goddess?”

Snow was now falling heavily all around him, and the cold was almost intense enough for Jan to consider activating his transuit. “I’m beginning to have very little trouble believing that,” he replied, trading worried glances with Nightwind and Crystal Kid beside him.

“That’s just the thing!” Laurel shouted. “She’s a Kryptonian ice goddess! Superman trapped her in the sun when he fought her, something must have let her out after all this time!”

“I suppose that would make sense why she wants to wipe out the House of El,” Jan pondered, “But it doesn’t help us defeat her any more easily, I doubt she’s going to let us drag her all the way to the sun.”

Invisible Kid’s voice now came across the comm channel. “Element Lad, mon ami...you are missing the point! If Cythonna is a Kryptonian goddess then surely she must have Kryptonian vulnerabilities!”

Realisation finally dawned on Element Lad and he stared at his own hands. “Thanks, you two! Brilliant work!” He turned to Nightwind. “Berta, I know you’re injured but I’m not sure I’ll be able to get close to that fracas with this weather as extreme as it is. Do you think you can calm these winds down?”

Nightwind gave a resolute frown. “If it’ll help defeat that psycho, try and stop me.” She focused through her throbbing headache and the freezing cold to back up her words; thankfully, Cythonna was distracted enough fighting Blok, Mon-El and Firecrest that she wasn’t consciously opposing Berta’s efforts and a moment later Element Lad was flying through the preternaturally still air toward the titanic battle.

“Element Lad, I must warn caution!” Blok called out even as Cythonna’s fist slammed into him with a worrying crack. “I do not know if even I can sustain much more of this violence, she will surely slay you if you stray too close!”

“Hopefully I might be able to do something about that,” Jan called back. “Just give the kryptonite a second to kick in!” Blok instantly realised Jan’s plan, and waved for Mon-El and Firecrest to delay their next assault. Element Lad circled the combatants, transforming every inch of debris and fallen snow around him. Within scant seconds, Blok and Cythonna found themselves surrounded by eerily radiant green kryptonite.

“What...what is this?” Cythonna exclaimed, swaying on her feet. “What sorcery..?”

She took to the air, weaving as though she were drunk in an effort to escape the inexplicable weakness infecting her marrow. “It’s not sorcery,” Mon-El cut off her escape route. “I don’t know how Element Lad knew to try it but it’s pure science, Cythonna.”

She screamed in defiance and charged into Mon-El with both fists. Surprising everyone present, the force of her blow sent him flying up into the night sky. “The kryptonite issn’t working!” Firecrest hissed as Mon-El hurtled out of view.

“No,” Blok disagreed. “The kryptonite works as it is supposed to but Cythonna was so mighty to begin with that even weakened, she is still a more than credible threat.” With speed that still surprised his teammates, Blok took off after Cythonna and grabbed her by the ankle. He flung her into the kryptonite she’d been trying to escape, then before she could mount a counter-attack he charged straight into her.

The two fought so brutally that Element Lad and Firecrest couldn’t risk getting close enough to help their friend. Cythonna and Blok were certainly more evenly matched now than they had been, but she still held the upper hand. “Iss it jusst me?” Firecrest asked, “Or iss Blok sslowing down? I thought he didn’t get tired after hiss powerss were boossted?”

“She’s using her control over the cold to freeze him while she’s hitting him,” Element Lad noted, his breath coming out as a small cloud in the freezing night. “Look at the ice forming around his joints. This isn’t good...I didn’t think Blok had a physical equal anymore, but even with radiation poisoning she’s stronger than him; stronger than all of us.”

At that exact moment, Cythonna dealt Blok a double-handed blow that saw him collapse down to one knee. She brought her fists down again, and the stone giant caught them in his own gold-flecked hands. “Do what you will,” Blok glared up at her. “I will never stop fighting, Cythonna...and if you kill me, every member of the Legion of Superheroes will fight you in my stead. You will fall eventually, I can promise you this.”

“Then I suppose I will have to kill you,” she retorted through a pained grimace, “Along with every member of your Legion of Superheroes, creature.” Surprising Blok, she brought one knee up to smash him savagely in the face. Tiny grey shards flew off from his cheek and Blok lost his balance and fell to the ground. Using the advantage she’d gained, Cythonna froze him in a solid half-dome of ice and turned to face the others. “I know that none of you are wise enough to hand over your Supergirl,” she sneered at them, “So my only question now is whom among you wishes to die next at my hand?”

Element Lad moved closer to her, the kryptonite’s glow giving his face a greenish tinge. “I’ve sworn never to use my power to kill, but if I have to I can turn you into free-floating atoms.”

“Fret not,” she grinned, “I won’t give you the chance.” She pointed an outstretched finger at him, then suddenly screamed and doubled over. Suddenly, anticlimactically, she was unmoving crystal gleaming in the kryptonite’s light.

“I thought...I hoped the kryptonite might have made her weak enough for that to work this time,” Crystal Kid’s exhausted voice got Jan’s attention. Bobb staggered forward, he and Nightwind supporting one another. “Sorry to steal your thunder, Element Lad.”

Element Lad immediately moved to help Bobb and Berta. “Don’t apologise, Crystal Kid. I really wasn’t looking forward to having to make that choice.” A cracking sound made all of them turn with fear toward the crystalline goddess, but they breathed a collective sigh of relief when they realised it was just Blok breaking through his frozen prison.

“Cythonna..?” Blok queried uncertainly.

“I saw the whole thing on my way back,” Mon-El rejoined the others and helped Blok to his feet. “It looks like Crystal Kid really saved the day!”

“Happy...happy to help,” Bobb Kohan smiled wearily before the cold, the exertion and his injuries finally caught up with him and he collapsed in the snow.

**********
TALOK III
A restricted access government warehouse
Four robed men made their way through darkened aisles, specially constructed radar goggles granting them vision in the enormous lightless room while their invisibility cloaks deflected all attempts at detection. <I can’t believe we lost Jutar and Shim> one of the blue-skinned men shared via the telepathic headsets they all wore.

<We all knew the risks when we embarked upon this mission, Mort> another of the four replied over the artificial psi-link. <Their sacrifices will be remembered. Without them we would not have slain those guards and we would not have made it this far in our holy mission.>

<Then we are here?> the man named Mort questioned. <We have finally succeeded?>

<See for yourself, brother.> The leader of the quartet removed a flashlight from his belt and illuminated their target. Here in one of Talok III’s secret depositories of arcane weapons and unexplained technology, thousands of tools, tomes and talismans held power and knowledge unknown to the world’s general population. None of that mattered to these men though. To the Cult of Malias, there was only one prize worth possessing. On a raised platform, a woman frozen eternally in crystalline form stood over them in the beam of their flashlight.

<Take her with caution> the group’s leader ordered.

<By nightfall tomorrow, the Invisible Queen will live again!>

TO BE CONTINUED..!


EDITOR'S NOTES:
* If anyone missed what Kid Computo found out about Firecrest's costume, don't stress - all will be revealed next instalment!
* Cythonna is a real DC character and she is as over the top as she seems here. More info on her at www.superman.wikia.com/wiki/Cythonna
* Malias the Invisible Queen has appeared a couple of times before in my fic. She originally faced Shadow Lass and Mon-El as part of a group of supervillains named the Forgotten Four, you can read that adventure at http://www.legionworld.net/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=124277#Post124277
* The Invisible Queen's next encounter with the Legion and the Subs shed a little more light on her true nature, and this encounter ended with Crystal Kid transmuting her into crystal. This can be found at http://www.legionworld.net/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=803467#Post803467 and http://www.legionworld.net/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=804336#Post804336

Another cool installment, raz!

no pun intended.

Brainy is really stirring up trouble. That should be a fun confrontation, first about his “booby traps”, and second about inadvertently freeing Cythonna.

Poor Dawny, but she is trying. Trying very hard

nice to see Crystal Kid get a chance to save the day! was the conversation at Subs HQ foreshadowing, or...? in any case, he gained my respect this outing

many fun moments and creative power uses, as usual

Danielle diverting power one moment, and saving flopping aquarium fish the next made me laugh

you depicted everyone’s power levels nicely. Mon is tougher than Jo (Mon recovered first), but Blok is tougher than Mon, and Laurel I think equals Mon, or something like that. in any case, you presented Cythonna’s threat level very well. while still giving every Legionnaire something to do

smart move by Jacques, and I like that you’re using the “make one other person invisible” trick from the Reboot

For a while there, I was worried that Berta and Bobb were always left with Cythonna while everyone else was getting knocked away from the fight

Invisible Queen I remember as being one of your more frequent villains, and I did enjoy her last appearance (though I don’t remember all the details at the moment!)

Brainy has definitely got some chickens coming home to roost, hasn't he?

I will confirm or deny no speculation on Crystal Kid's future or lack thereof with the Legion, but he has certainly proven his worth the past couple times he's been around...

I didn't realise Jacques could make other people invisible in the reboot, cool! I just thought surely by now he's gotta have learned to do SOMETHING with his power other than teleport Khunds to their death lol

IB, I think either you or Harbi were saying you wanted to see Blok really face a challenge now that he's been powered up? I thought Cythonna might be a convenient way to do it while kind of unofficially ranking some of the other guys as well....glad you picked up on it! I am not really a fan of tying characters' powers down too precisely because strength and durability in real life aren't generally static traits, but I do like the idea of everyone having a rough idea where characters are placed against one another when they have similar powers

MARS
Legion of Superheroes Headquarters, Chlorophyll Kid’s residential quarters

ROLL CALL
Chlorophyll Kid aka Ral Benem: hyper-stimulated plant growth
Comet Queen aka Grava: flight, gas generation
Saturn Girl aka Imra Ardeen Ranzz: reserve Legionnaire, telepathy

Chlorophyll Kid and Comet Queen watched silently as Saturn Girl kneeled on the floor before them; doing anything silently didn’t come at all easily to Comet Queen, but Saturn Girl had made very clear to both of them that interrupting her concentration would not be well received.

Saturn Girl’s eyes were lightly closed, only the mildest furrow in her brow. She was bent over and her fingers were splayed out, gently enclosing the head of the infant Ivy Arcane who lay in a peaceful induced sleep on a soft rug on the ground.

A few minutes more, and Imra’s eyes fluttered open. Ivy’s own eyes opened in turn, and the baby gave a happy little gurgling sound as she reached for the Titanian woman’s fingers. Imra picked up the baby girl and held her close to her breast as she stood up, then handed Ivy to the waiting Comet Queen. “You’re a natural with her,” Imra complimented the golden skinned teenager while Comet Queen cooed at Ivy. “Do you have younger brothers or sisters back home, Grava?”

“Everyone’s somebody’s little satellite on Quaal III,” Grava answered Saturn Girl’s question without shifting her attention from the baby in her arms. “We’re all just stardust totally gleaming for each other, isn’t that right little nebula sprout? We gotta look out for every little dwarf planet and space dragon egg, don’t we?” She tickled Ivy’s nose and the dark-skinned baby giggled appreciatively.

“So what do you think?” Chlorophyll Kid asked Saturn Girl, “Can you teach Ivy to rein in her powers? I really don’t want to have to use that dimensional exile device that Brainiac 5 invented.”

“She’s far too young to even understand the concept of control just yet,” Saturn Girl replied, “And I’d strongly advise against instituting any psionic blocks at this formative state of her development...it’s quite strange though, Ivy seems to be carrying an undue amount of stress for an infant her age; if I didn’t know any better I’d almost think that she’s reacting against a domineering authority figure. From what you told me about the way you found her on your homeworld, it could just be residual psychic hurt from the plants that were trying to claim her. I’ve helped soothe some of her emotional trauma, I’d recommend we touch base maybe every week or two for the time being so that I can monitor her wellbeing.”

“Saturn Girl, I don’t know how to thank you.” Chlorophyll Kid’s smile brightened up his whole face. “I want you to know I’m so grateful to you for helping us with this!”

“Don’t be silly,” Imra returned his smile with one of her own, though hers was more reserved. “She’s a lovely little girl, I’m happy to do what I can.” Imra let Ivy squeeze her finger then tenderly pulled away from the baby. “Right now though, I’ve got two little boys to check up on who are equally adorable and just as much a handful in their own way, so I’ll leave you two to it.”

“Bye, Saturn Girl!” Comet Queen held Ivy’s tiny arm up to give the closest thing to a wave that Ivy could muster. “Say g’bye to the shiny lady, Ivy!”

Saturn Girl humored Grava by waving at the baby girl, then left Chlorophyll Kid’s quarters. As she walked away, she ruminated on the odd little family the three of them were forming. It didn’t really surprise Imra greatly that Comet Queen had so quickly taken to the role of Ivy’s surrogate mother; what Grava lacked in discipline, she more than made up for in her enthusiasm and devotion to those she cared for. Chlorophyll Kid on the other hand had always been as capable as any other Legionnaire, but with the new sense of purpose that Ivy had given him he’d overcome the self-esteem issues and insecurity which had held him back in the past. As for Ivy Arcane herself, Imra still found the child’s power to be incredibly daunting but she couldn’t think of a better place for that power to be monitored and managed while still allowing her as normal a childhood as possible.

Any further thoughts about her were temporarily forgotten when Ultra Boy, Phantom Girl and Kid Computo turned the corridor a couple of metres ahead. “Saturn Girl, do you have a moment?” Phantom Girl asked. “I hope you don’t mind, but Kid Computo traced your flight ring here and there’s something that we’d really like to discuss with you.”

The raven-haired heroine’s tone was relaxed, but Imra had known Tinya Wazzo almost as long as she’d known her own husband; she could immediately tell by the set of Tinya’s facial features and her body language that this was Legion business. “Hello you three, what’s the situation?” Imra asked.

“I’m sorry to do this, I know you’re not an active member of the team anymore,” Jo approached Imra apologetically. “But I--” He turned to Kid Computo at his side. “--Kid C, are we good?”

Danielle nodded easily. “My brother couldn’t do a better job of keeping us invisible from any monitoring equipment in the area. As far as anybody checking audio or visual records knows, this corridor’s empty aside from Saturn Girl.”

“I’m intrigued now,” Saturn Girl replied. “Come, walk with me back to my quarters and tell me more.”

Ultra Boy looked to Phantom Girl for support, and when she gave him an almost imperceptible nod he released a weary sigh.

“It’s about Brainy…”

**********
LALLOR
Heroes of Lallor Homebase, guest lounge

ROLL CALL
Calorie Queen aka Taryn Loy: Legion ally, super-strength fuelled by Bismollian digestion
Gas Girl aka Tal Nahii: can transform into any gas
Shrinking Violet aka Salu Digby: shrinking

The Heroes of Lallor’s home and headquarters included a guest lounge which was noticeably more luxurious than the rest of the building. It was more often than not this room where Lallor’s mutant heroes met visiting politicians, dignitaries and the celebrity journalists who reported on their exploits for a voracious public. Plush sofas were dotted around the vast open room with various exotic plants providing a subtly fragrant perfume. One whole wall had been designed to mimic a huge curved picture window, visually spectacular alien landscapes scrolling across it on a timed loop in place of the bland utilitarian buildings outside which constituted the architectural standard on Lallor. Floating autochefs of Evolvo Lad’s design made themselves available upon request to dispense an impressive menu of food and beverages, and the ambient music playing softly in the background was generated by a program which made ongoing alterations in response to low-level brainwave scans of the room’s current inhabitants. Despite all of these comfort-enhancing features, the Imskian Legionnaire known as Shrinking Violet was anything but comfortable.

Arms folded tightly, Vi’s posture was rigid as she looked out over the lush rainforest that currently dominated the guest room’s virtual window. “I don’t know why I need to be here for Duplicate Boy’s memorial ceremony at all to be honest,” she groused. “Our relationship died long before he did.”

Sitting on a sofa just outside of Vi’s field of vision, Gas Girl took a moment to compose herself before she replied. She completely understood the reason for Shrinking Violet’s animosity toward Duplicate Boy; when Vi had been abducted by Imskian terrorists and replaced in the Legion of Superheroes by the woman who would become Colossal Boy’s wife, Duplicate Boy had been one of the first people to detect that there was anything amiss. Rather than bring Vi’s imposter to anyone else’s attention, he’d thrown a tantrum and kept what he knew to himself. Still, Duplicate Boy and Shrinking Violet’s relationship had only ever been a long distance one. Vi had never known him like Gas Girl had. Gas Girl had grown up with Ord, had shared a bond with him that only Evolvo Lad and Life Lass could ever equal. He may not have been the most perceptive hero in the galaxy but he was still a hero. The only reason Ord hadn’t exposed Chameleon Girl as Vi’s replacement was that it genuinely hadn’t occurred to him that Vi had been replaced against her will. Gas Girl could understand Vi’s bitterness, but she’d seen Ord’s regret first-hand when the truth had come out. He wasn’t the self-centred egotist that Vi had been making him out to be since they’d started on this trip, and Gas Girl was getting tired of indulging that attitude. “He specifically asked for you to attend the reading of his will,” the Lalloran Legionnaire answered with a hint of vexation. “Once that’s done you can leave whenever you want, Violet.”

The third member of their party was Vi’s girlfriend Taryn Loy, the occasional heroine known as Calorie Queen. Neither a Legionnaire nor a Hero of Lallor, Taryn had come only for emotional support at Vi’s request but the growing tension between Vi and Gas Girl wasn’t lost on her. “I hope you don’t mind me asking,” Taryn spoke up in an effort to clear the air, “Is it normal on Lallor for the will to be read and a memorial service to be carried out this long after someone passes away?”

“It’s a remnant of our past,” a male voice answered. The three women turned to see a brown-haired man in a blue bodysuit enter the room, a yellow stripe down his torso which turned into a short tunic below his belt. A few steps behind the man followed a dark-haired woman in a red bodysuit accented by various black & white striped accessories; they were Evolvo Lad and Life Lass, the only two currently active members of the Heroes of Lallor. “Shrinking Violet, Calorie Queen, welcome to Lallor. I wish our meeting could be under better circumstances...and welcome home, Tal. It’s good to see you in person again after so long!” He gave Gas Girl a warm hug, one in which Life Lass joined when Gas Girl waved her over.

After a few moments, Evolvo Lad separated himself from the girls and addressed Calorie Queen directly. “I’m sure you know that Lallor was the victim of terrible nuclear devastation in the past. We’ve recovered as a society, but we still bear some marks from that awful time. When our world was rebuilding itself, it was common for people to be presumed dead for weeks or even months before turning up somewhere else having done whatever they had to do to survive. Some people found that their return home was more of a problem than a cause for celebration; in a lot of cases their assets had already been divided amongst their families, partners had moved on. It became commonplace for the reading of someone’s will to be delayed for a year after reports of someone’s death, just in case a mistake had been made and the person turned up again alive and well. Obviously that’s not really a problem anymore, but it’s just become something that we got used to here.”

“That makes sense,” Taryn nodded thoughtfully. She’d noticed the landscape across this continent was bleak earlier on, but it hadn’t occurred to her at the time to wonder why that was. Now she couldn’t help but be impressed by the resilience of the Lalloran people if they could bounce back from something that had wreaked such terrible damage upon their world.

“Shall we?” Evolvo Lad gestured for the others to follow him. “I’m sure everybody’s eager to get the legal formalities out of the way.”

“You don’t know the half of it,” Vi grumbled under her breath, walking after Evolvo Lad while Calorie Queen squeezed her shoulder affectionately.

“I’m so happy to see you again,” Life Lass spoke softly to Gas Girl, the two of them hanging back from the others. “I hope it’s not too painful being back here.”

“You know, I was scared that it would be painful but it’s really not.” Gas Girl smiled warmly at her lifelong friend. “I’ve been avoiding Lallor and I know I’ve made a difference being in the Legion of Superheroes, but you know...now that I’m back here, it’s easier to remember all the good times we had and to not be surrounded by the pain of Ord’s death everywhere like I was afraid was going to happen. The Legion are great and some of them have become good friends but you guys are my family, Somi. Maybe it’s time for me to--”

“Heroes of Lallor!” A booming voice filled the corridor. “It’s time for you to face your destiny!”

The assembled heroes turned toward the voice, and saw five unknown men and women before them. There was a man who appeared to be composed of porcelain; he was naked except for a pair of red trunks, and his body was covered from head to toe in fine interlocking cracks. Two young women stood by his side, each in variations of the same red and white costume. One of them had an Asiatic appearance, her black hair cropped in a neat bob. The other looked more Caucasian, her own longer dark hair tied back in twin ponytails and a red skirt in place of the pants her teammate wore. A younger boy stood at the rear of the group, his pale skin dotted with freckles and his hair a rusty ginger colour. An emblem of a key took up most of the space on the chest of his own bodysuit. None of them were the man who’d spoken however; he stood proudly front and centre, his brown hair parted neatly to the right while he wore a green bodysuit with diamond-shaped highlights which immediately reminded Shrinking Violet and the Heroes of Lallor of the deceased Duplicate Boy.

“How did you people get in here?” Evolvo Lad demanded. “I designed our security measures myself!”

“There isn’t a security measure in existence that Key Kid here can’t bypass,” the ersatz Duplicate Boy replied, looking over at the nervous young redhead on his team. “It’s about time the people of Lallor learned the truth, Evolvo Lad!”

“What truth?” Evolvo Lad asked while his allies tensed for battle. “Who are you people? And why are you wearing that uniform, especially today of all days? It’s in tremendously bad taste!”

“We are the mutants of Lallor you people kept hidden for so long!” the green-garbed man shouted theatrically. “You celebrate the life of Duplicate Boy, a fool who almost brought ruin to the United Planets while you keep us underground for your own glory! It’s fitting that I take Duplicate Boy’s name and costume, because today the people of this world will learn that we deserve to be the Heroes of Lallor just as much as you!” He ran toward Evolvo Lad, growing in size and mass with each step and sprouting hair all over his body. In no time at all, Duplicate Boy was unrecognisable and the neanderthal man in his place pounced at Evolvo Lad.

“Subdue them but try not to harm anybody until we know what’s going on here!” Evolvo Lad commanded the others, devolving himself at the same time so that his last word ended on a menacing growl. He launched himself at this new Duplicate Boy, but was as shocked as anybody else present when he continued to devolve. Evolvo Lad lost all the extra mass he’d just taken on and he was soon a four-limbed creature resembling an Earth axolotl scuttering frightened across the corridor to cower against a wall.

“You were right, Duplicate Boy!” the girl with the bob cried out. “He did copy your move! All I had to do was amplify his power, and Evolvo Lad devolved so far back he can’t return on his own!”

“Good work, Amp!” the other woman congratulated her teammate. “Let’s see how his friends stand up against Rain Girl!” She threw her arms wide, and out of nowhere driving rain filled the corridor before her. Calorie Queen had already rushed to take on Duplicate Boy in his caveman form and Life Lass was using her power on the cover of a nearby air vent to corral the now mindless Evolvo Lad, but Gas Girl’s cloudy form and an inch high Shrinking Violet both found themselves stymied by the impossible downpour.

“I was already having a lousy day,” Vi muttered, growing to full size so the rain was once more an inconvenience rather than death from above. “If you think some bad weather is going to stop me from kicking your nass, you’d better think again.” She marched through the rain, fists balled.

Before she could punch Rain Girl though, the porcelain skinned man stepped between them. “I don’t know why Legionnaires are here,” his voice grated, “But you’re not going to stop us from getting what we deserve, Shrinking Violet.”

“Don’t worry about that,” Vi snapped, “You’re gonna get exactly what you deserve.” She planted her fist in the man’s face, surprised even despite his fragile appearance to hear the delicate shatter of porcelain when her blow connected.

The man’s body flew apart into a hundred pieces, each of them absurdly a miniscule replica of his normal-sized self. “This is why they call me Brittle,” the little men spoke in unison. “You hit me, I fall apart. But you’ll find each part is as dangerous as the whole!” The miniature army rushed Vi, clambering up her legs before she could react.

Gas Girl was glad that nobody could see her blush when she was discorporeal. She was so accustomed to fighting in gas form that until she saw Violet grow to full size it never occurred to her to simply switch her power off and walk through the rain that had so effectively been hampering her till now. “Somi, make sure Evolvo Lad stays safe!” she called to Life Lass. “These jerks had better have a way to return him to normal or they’re gonna get a lot worse than a face full of knockout gas!” She marched through the rain, a look of determination on her face while her rarely seen blonde hair clung wetly to her skull.

“Rain Girl, do something!” Key Kid gulped. “My power to get through barriers isn’t going to help us here!”

“Of course it isn’t,” Rain Girl rolled her eyes. “Amp, you want to lend me a hand?”

“Happy to!” Amp used her own power to increase the effect of Rain Girl’s, and an instant later the drops of water slapping against Gas Girl’s body were coming fast and hard enough to hurt.

“You people are just - oww - making me mad!” Gas Girl pushed on through the onslaught of water. The rain was falling so furiously now that she was losing her footing and it was difficult to even see the other side. This is ridiculous, Gas Girl thought. They can’t be more than 12 feet away, but I might as well be on the other side of the city as bad as my visibility is here. She held her hand up to protect her eyes from the rain, and allowed herself a victorious smirk when she saw the golden band wrapped around one finger. Again, she relied on her natural power so much that she’d completely forgotten she was wearing her flight ring...she still couldn’t see her foes on the other side of this mini-monsoon though, she needed some way to make them an easier target. “Rain Girl!” she yelled, suddenly inspired. “Duplicate Boy said you’re all mutants, what are you playing at? We know there are no other mutants alive on Lallor aside from me, Life Lass and Evolvo Lad!”

“Oh sure, that’s what you want everyone to think!” Rain Girl shouted back. “It’s awfully convenient that the only five mutants ever born on this planet just happen to be Lallor’s most feted champions though, isn’t it?”

Gas Girl homed in on her enemy’s reedy voice and then with her flight ring charged shoulder-first straight at her. By the time Rain Girl realised she was coming, Tal had already slammed into the surprised young woman and driven them both into Key Kid behind her. Dazed by the attack, Rain Girl’s assault abruptly ended and the downpour of rain dried up as quickly as it had begun. Gas Girl’s shoulder was blooming with pain, but she knew that would fade as soon as she took on her gas form again. Her hair was already transforming into wisps of vapor as she turned on Amp. “Don’t worry,” Gas Girl smirked. “You’re gonna go down a lot less painfully than they did.”

The girl called Amp was surprisingly unflustered. “I’m not gonna go down at all once I amplify your power to the point you discorporate altogether. You’ll come back eventually, but -- ohhhh.” She wobbled on her feet and fell into the wall.

A fully grown Shrinking Violet suddenly appeared as if from thin air. “That Brittle guy just kept splitting into smaller copies every time I hit him,” Vi explained. “So I thought maybe I could do more good in this idiot’s inner ear.”

“Thanks Violet,” Gas Girl replied as she completed her transformation into pale green cloud form. “Now let’s wrap this up.”

“I couldn’t have said it better myself,” a new voice sounded in the corridor. Everyone still conscious turned to see two very well-dressed older men standing before them in hologram form.

“Who the sprock are you?” Vi challenged him before she noticed the neanderthal man pinning her girlfriend to the floor. “Taryn!” Vi leaped forward to help her when the man who’d just spoken held up a hand to stop her.

“Further violence is unnecessary,” the stranger spoke with quiet authority. “Duplicate Boy, why don’t you use Evolvo Lad’s power to ascend the evolutionary scale and restore the no doubt confused fellow to his normal state?”

The primitive man that Duplicate Boy had become only barely understood the command, but he did understand. He released Calorie Queen and activated his mimicked power once more. In seconds, a pale-skinned hairless male with a massively enlarged cranium floated cross-legged a few inches above the floor in the neanderthal’s place. He glanced across at the axolotl creature and his pale blue eyes glowed as he made mental contact with what remained of Evolvo Lad’s mind to trigger the hero’s own power. Life Lass moved her makeshift enclosure away as Evolvo Lad resumed his normal human form, then ran to support him as he climbed to his feet. “Who...who are you people?” Life Lass asked fearfully. “Why did you attack us?”

“Yes, please accept our apologies for that misunderstanding,” the holographic man answered calmly while his associate tapped away at an omnicom. “Unfortunately our agents were operating under incomplete information.”

“Misunderstanding?” Calorie Queen threw the word back in his face. “If I didn’t have super-strength, your caveman here would have ripped my arms off! By the way, someone owes me a new omnicom!” She threw the remains of the electronic device she’d eaten to fuel her strength through the holographic men.

“I recognise you,” Evolvo Lad’s eyes narrowed. “You’re with Lallorgov, aren’t you..?”

“An astute observation, Mr Tcheru.” the holographic man responded using Evolvo Lad’s real name. “I have been leading an extremely troubling investigation after uncovering an underground cell of mutants who’d been raised in secret; very much unlike you and your associates in the Heroes of Lallor. Our investigation had initially revealed that the Heroes of Lallor themselves were complicit with the abuse of these talented young men and women, thus the assault upon your base today. We have since learned that this is not the case, and I hope that you accept our sincere apologies for the trouble.”

“That’s not good enough!” Shrinking Violet exclaimed angrily. “You can’t just attack people in their homes!”

“This is not your home though, is it Legionnaire?” The second man looked up from his omnicom and spoke for the first time, and there was something in his voice that Vi found maddeningly familiar. “It is not home to the Legion of Superheroes, and it is not home to Bismollian vigilantes. Today’s events involve only the Heroes of Lallor and our nanocams show that even despite the unexpected presence of Calorie Queen and you Legionnaires, these brave youths acquitted themselves sufficiently well.” Duplicate Boy had by now resumed his normal form as had Brittle, and the two of them stood alongside the rest of their team next to the government agents.

“You did well to take me out first as I’m team leader,” Evolvo Lad remarked carefully. Like Vi, he instinctively knew that something deeper was happening here, but he couldn’t read what that was yet. “But I have every confidence that Life Lass and Gas Girl would have found victory, even if we hadn’t been fortunate enough to have Shrinking Violet and Calorie Queen’s assistance today.” He turned now to the assembled team who’d invaded his home today. “I’m deeply sorry for any trauma you’ve suffered and I hope that now you realise the Heroes of Lallor had no part in that you’ll accept our help in bringing whomever was responsible to justice.”

“How do we know we can trust them?” Brittle asked, just as wary.

“You’ll learn to trust them once you’re all more used to being on the same team,” the first Lallorgov agent spoke again. While everyone else uttered surprised exclamations, Evolvo Lad realised that neither of the holographic men had yet given their names; he didn’t find that at all encouraging. One of the nameless men continued speaking. “Evolvo Lad, Life Lass, say hello to your new teammates in the Heroes of Lallor; Duplicate Boy, Amp, Brittle, Rain Girl and Key Kid.”

“But...but you can’t do that!” Life Lass protested. “Sev and I have known each other since we were children! The Heroes of Lallor are a family as much as we’re a superhero team!”

“The Heroes of Lallor are an enterprise fully funded and owned by Lallorgov,” the agent replied. “Suffice it to say, Ms Gan, Lallorgov can expand your team’s ranks as we see fit. And given the terrible treatment these poor young people have endured, it’s frankly the least we can do to help them.” Duplicate Boy’s team were clearly exuberant at this statement, but nobody else liked it at all.

“Fine then.” Gas Girl recondensed into her normal human form and stood proudly by Life Lass and Evolvo Lad. “Something else else about this isn’t right at all, and I’m not letting my friends go through it on their own.” She removed her flight ring and handed it to Vi. “Shrinking Violet, I’m sorry to have to leave this way but I hope the Legion understands - Life Lass is right, the Heroes of Lallor are a family and I need to stand by my family right now.”

“I understand, Gas Girl.” Vi took the golden band from her and placed it in a hidden pouch on her belt. “And don’t worry, the rest of the Legion will understand too.”

The two holographic agents had been whispering to one another while this exchange took place, and the man holding the omnicom spoke up once again now. “You seem to be operating under the wrong impression, Gas Girl. As I said earlier, this building is no home to the Legion of Superheroes; and you are a member of the Legion of Superheroes. We are going to have to ask you, Shrinking Violet and your associate Calorie Queen to vacate the premises immediately.”

“You can’t do that!” Gas Girl’s eyes grew wide with shock. “This is my home!”

“Not anymore,” the Lallorgov agent countered. “You chose to join the Legion of Superheroes at a time when your homeworld greatly needed your power and experience. Your loyalty has been shown to be an unreliable asset at best. Let me make this as clear as possible…

...Gas Girl, you are no longer welcome on the planet Lallor.”

**********
TALOK III
The Eye of the World
The Eye of the World was the colloquial name given to a large impact crater near Talok III’s North Pole. Where most of this world’s natural features had long since been sacrificed before the twin machines of progress and population, Talok III’s North and South Poles both held such strong magnetic charges that the effort involved with settling these barren areas was not worth the outcome. Where most of the planet was covered in skyscrapers of crystal and gleaming plasteel, the Eye of the World was a lifeless lip of rock where bitterly cold winds howled night and day. In millenia past, this site had held great significance for a number of mystics and religious adherents. Magical energies once thrived here, but magic had long since been almost entirely absent from the world called Talok III.

Still, almost entirely absent did not mean entirely absent.

In the centre of the Eye of the World under a moonless night, four robed men kneeled in supplication around the unmoving crystalline form of the woman called the Invisible Queen. This close to the North Pole, electromagnetic disruption made technological devices useless; the invisibility circuits in their cloaks and the radar goggles which had served the men so well in liberating their queen did nothing for them here. The Eye of the World held its own kind of invisibility however; no electronic scanning equipment could hope to find them here. The only way the Cult of Malias would be found was if somebody physically travelled here to search for them, and nobody was going to risk the freezing climate and the few natural predators Talok III still possessed to come here in search of four men who’d stolen a crystal statue.

“Are you ready, brothers?” the Cult’s leader rasped over the howling winds.

“Grair, I’m...I’m scared!” one of them men answered him.

“Fear is natural, brother Mort!” the men’s leader shouted back. “But our toil will be rewarded! Let us give tribute to our queen...for Malias!”

The four men removed their hoods and held gloved palms to their eyes. “For Malias!” they shouted in unison, trembling with terror as much as cold. Then their wordless screams echoed throughout the Eye of the World as they all thumbed a catch that released small but sharp spring-loaded blades hidden in their gloves and they tore their own eyes to shreds. Fighting the urge to lose themselves in literally blind panic, the men leaned forward and lay their heads in specially crafted receptacles which carried their spilled blood in trickling dark ribbons down to the feet of the Invisible Queen.

None of them saw what came next as their blood bathed their queen’s feet and travelled impossibly up her gleaming crystal form until her whole form was covered in a thin red sheath. None of them saw the fractures which formed across the crystal’s surface, and over the wind none of them heard the hum and the crack of crystal breaking or the tinkling explosion of a million little shards which left tiny bleeding cuts in all of them. Somehow though, even over the roar of the winds and the pained moans which had replaced their frantic screams, they all heard the husky but decidedly feminine voice which spoke next.

“You have done well, my subjects…

...the time has come for the Invisible Queen to reign.”

TO BE CONTINUED!!!

I love how you make Grava's dialogue so unique, yet the metaphors are still so easy to understand!

Eagerly awaiting the next installment re Brainy. Not surprised that Imra was brought in; she has a strong moral compass (though she also has her own brand of ethics), and she knows Brainy very well.

Uh oh, I did not see Gas Girl's exile coming! Good way to keep her on the Legion though, despite her personal feelings. This seems like trouble though, Evolvo Lad's thoughts showed that. And I'm sure there's a lot hidden underneath the surface here, I don't buy the "oh, we thought you Heroes of Lallor were BAD guys, now we know it's not true!" talk. I have a feeling the Lallorgov guys were really planning on using their new heroes to eliminate Sev and Somi, and just changed plans because they were winning. Then, there's the tantalizingly familiar voice Vi heard... Way to set up a mystery!

And the Invisible Queen, yikes! Looking forward to her character bio. I do remember her being crazy powerful, much more than any Invisible Kid!

Thanks IB, it is fun coming up with Grava-talk...y'all have been very patient with Brainy's shenanigans but it's safe to say that all should come to a conclusive point in the next couple of instalments

I kinda felt bad for bringing Gas Girl into the team and then not really doing much with her as far as character development goes, so hopefully this Lallor business should help with that!

I've been going through all my character tags alphabetically and had decided just to do team write-ups instead of individual ones for the team players, so it was gonna take me a while to get to Invisible Queen...your comment made me realise it would probably help people to have as a refresher though considering she's about to be the focus of a big story, so here she is along with the rest of the Forgotten Four

"It's about Brainy..." reminded me of that movie title "We Have to Talk about Kevin"'. A foreboding statement!

Interesting developments on Lallor, with Gas Girl getting the boot just when she wants to return to be with her original team.

I hadn't encountered Cythonna before. She's batshit crazy - and a serious challenge!

Dawnstar put on the spot to lead the team as the "senior" Legionnaire - after dissing Crystal Kid - I liked that scene. Uncomfortable for her, but good for the story. She's never been team leader on any adventure in the comic, has she?

Hey FC, thanks for commenting! "It's about Brainy" is probably the last thing any longtime Legionnaire wants to hear really

Glad Cythonna's craziness came through - I have only read bits and pieces of her story online but she definitely strikes me as a raving nutter!

And Dawnstar....I am pretty sure you're right! The closest I've seen to her taking a leadership role was in LO3W but even there it wasn't really in an official capacity, she was just decisive. I reckon she'd be an interesting choice though, a lot of Legion leaders are pretty safe bets in terms of their social skills so it would be fun seeing someone take on the role who's not really a people person!

DEEP SPACE
Aboard a Legion cruiser
A surly Gas Girl watched as her homeworld’s sun became one more indistinct twinkle among many in the viewscreen of the cruiser that was taking herself, Shrinking Violet and Calorie Queen back to Mars. The normally vivacious young heroine had barely said a word to her fellow passengers since leaving Lallor, and even Shrinking Violet was reading the room well enough to refrain from the bitter commentary she’d been throwing out since the three of them had begun this journey.

“Is there anything we can do to help, Gas Girl?” Calorie Queen asked with well-meaning awkwardness. The blonde Bismollian was generally the last person to show her sensitive side, but she didn’t know if she could stand this thick silence for the whole trip; someone had to say something.

“I just can’t believe they’d exile me from my own homeworld!” Gas Girl exploded. “And on today of all days! We didn’t even get to stay for the reading of Duplicate Boy’s will, let alone the memorial ceremony!”

Calorie Queen shot a quick glance at her girlfriend, but as glad as Violet was to have avoided both of those things she knew this wasn’t the time to say so.

“I mean, really!” Gas Girl continued. “I feel sorry for whatever those other mutants have been through, but after everything the Heroes of Lallor have done for that world our own government couldn’t have given us one more day? I thought poor Somi was going to start bawling!”

“It was definitely bad timing,” Calorie Queen sympathised. “I’m sure when we get back to Mars we can appeal the decision though, Gas Girl.”

“You know…” Vi finally joined the conversation. “I’m not so sure it was bad timing.”

“Salu!” Calorie Queen exclaimed Violet’s real name in shock.

“Really, Violet?” Gas Girl spun in her chair to face her fellow Legionnaire. “You couldn’t let this go without getting in one more jab?!”

“What? No!” Vi blushed a furious crimson as she realised what she’d said. “I didn’t mean that how it came out! It's just...if you wanted to hit the Heroes of Lallor when they’re too demoralised and distraught to mount a winning defence, what better time to hit them? I don’t think there was anything coincidental about the timing of today’s events, Gas Girl.”

“What are you implying, Violet?” Gas Girl was still too clouded with anger to see Vi’s point but she was starting to think the Imskian woman might actually be on to something.

“All I’m saying,” Vi responded cautiously, “Is that it wasn’t all that long ago all three of us had to watch Earthgov exile the Legion of Superheroes from a planet most of us considered our home in favour of their own handpicked team of replacements...and we all know who was behind that in the end.”

Gas Girl and Calorie Queen’s eyes grew wide as the pair of them finally saw the similarities. “Oh my gawf!” Gas Girl gasped. “Do you mean….you really think it’s…” The idea so horrified her she couldn’t even bring herself to finish her question.

“I don’t know,” Vi frowned. “But you’ve got to admit, it would be just like those sleazy diskheads to try something like this again.”

“We need to warn Evolvo Lad and Life Lass!” Gas Girl reached for the comms equipment in a panic.

“No, Gas Girl...we can’t.” Violet crossed the distance between them and gently grasped her teammate’s wrist. “Believe me, I know how you feel...but if Dominators have infiltrated Lallorgov, they’re very likely monitoring every communication that goes in and out of that base. I’m sure Evolvo Lad and Life Lass could put up a solid fight against those new recruits they’ve had foisted upon them, but I’m not so sure they’d survive.”

“Then...then what do we do?” Gas Girl gazed hopelessly at Vi, her large black eyes welling with tears.

“Hey, hey...it’ll be okay.” Calorie Queen joined the women and handed Gas Girl a tissue. “Salu’s been doing this a long time, she’ll know the right way to handle this. Isn’t that right, love?”

“By damn it’s right.” Vi put her arm around Calorie Queen’s waist and despite the circumstances allowed herself a smug smirk. “You know, Gas Girl…

...I always thought your abilities would make you a natural for the Legion Espionage Squad.”

**********
MARS
Legion of Superheroes Headquarters, Mission Monitor Room
Dawnstar entered the mission monitor room to begin her shift and was visibly startled to find Nightwind preparing to log out as she ended her own shift of duty.

“Nightwind!” The name escaped Dawnstar’s lips before she could stop herself. “What are you doing here..? I was under the impression that Neon had the morning shift?”

“She did,” Berta replied casually. “But Xao told me it's her mom’s birthday; I offered to fill in for Zoe so she and Xao can make the party. You should be in for a very boring afternoon anyway, the most exciting thing to happen all day has been Element Lad’s girlfriend and a couple other SPs arresting Fireface on Earth a little while ago.” Berta finished the process of logging out all of her access codes so that Dawnstar could log in, but something drove the yellow-skinned hero to stick around a moment longer. “Dawnstar?” she eventually asked. “Is everything okay with you?”

“Of course,” the winged woman replied a little too quickly. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

“Okay, look.” Nightwind remained standing, but walked closer to her seated teammate. “I know things got a little heated between us back on Earth, and then Cythonna nearly killed us all and we were all kind of distracted making sure Blok threw her back into the sun again after Bobb turned her to crystal so we haven’t had a chance to really debrief since then, and I know I see red as soon I think someone might be insulting one of my Academy friends, so I guess what I’m saying is I’m sorry if Laurel and I kinda ganged up on you after what you said about Crystal Kid, and...no hard feelings?”

“Thank you,” Dawnstar responded without looking at her for more than a moment. “I appreciate the sentiment.”

“Sooo,” Nightwind continued despite herself, “If you wanted to hang out again some time--”

Dawnstar did look at her now, and Nightwind wasn’t sure how to read the expression she saw there but she could swear it was one of unexpected vulnerability. “That is not necessary,” Dawnstar said simply. “I realise now that I just made things awkward for all of us, and it is my turn to apologise. I won’t subject any of you to that again.”

“You didn’t subject us to anything,” Nightwind laughed. She saw that Dawnstar’s expression hadn’t changed so Berta crouched down to speak to her on her own level. “Look, Dawnstar...honestly we’re probably not that compatible, but that’s not a failing on your part; sometimes people are just about different things. We might give you grief but you’re a good person. I mean that cranky nasshead Wildfire loves you so you must have something going for you...don’t feel bad if you didn’t really click with us; that's just life, you know?”

Dawnstar smiled tightly at her, and Nightwind felt the same aloof distance between them that by now she’d become familiar with. “Anyway,” Berta exhaled, standing up again. “Hope the rest of your day’s as uneventful as mine has been.”

She left the room, and left Dawnstar to her thoughts.

**********
Brainiac 5 watched the door to his personal quarters iris open to reveal Phantom Girl and Saturn Girl standing on the other side. Initially surprised to see them, his advanced intellect had already deduced the most likely reason for their unexpected visit before Saturn Girl had even opened her mouth.

“Good afternoon Brainiac,” Imra greeted him gently, “Do you have a moment?”

“Nobody has a moment,” the Coluan replied sardonically. “Time is quite outside the capacity of most sentients to claim ownership.” He stepped past the two women and walked away at a brisk pace.

“Grife, Brainy!” Phantom Girl phased through her leader’s back and partially emerged through his abdomen, looking up at him in concern. “When’s the last time you slept? You look terrible!”

“I just now allowed myself 25 standard minutes of inactivity,” he answered Tinya without breaking stride. “It is not a commendable long-term replacement to sleep but given the sheer volume of incoming transmissions I’ve been fielding from various planetary authorities throughout this system in regards to my recent solar photonic modulation experiment, I can’t afford the luxury of anything further right now.”

“That’s one of the things we want to talk to you about actually,” Saturn Girl pressed on, keeping pace with her longtime comrade.

Brainiac 5 finally stopped in his tracks and visibly tensed. He released a sigh of frustration and looked at the pair. “Do you honestly think I don’t know why you’re here, Saturn Girl? It doesn’t take a 12th level intellect to see that every time I make a decision based on logical necessity rather than sentiment, you people all think - rather ironically, might I say - that I’m losing my mind.”

“Nobody thinks you’re losing your mind, Brainy.” Having emerged fully and solidified beside him, Phantom Girl touched Brainiac 5’s arm. “We’re just worried about you.”

“We know about the self-destruct device you implanted in Quislet’s ship and the stunweb woven into Firecrest’s suit,” Saturn Girl continued. “Your immediate response to Ivy Arcane’s display of power was to exile her to another dimension, you didn’t even consider any other options beforehand. None of us could have anticipated Cythonna’s attack in Metropolis, but you must have been aware that sentients all throughout this system would become scared and confused when they saw their sun change color without warning. You’re behaving recklessly and without regard to the feelings of anybody else, Brainy; there’s obviously something wrong and we just want to help you.”

“Of course I was aware of the reaction my experiment would cause!” Brainiac huffed, mildly insulted at the idea that it might have escaped his attention. “Are we to stifle scientific research every time stupidity and superstitious paranoia stands in its way? I refuse to rationalise my actions in regards to the other alleged infractions which you’ve raised, I think it should be obvious even to you two that I did what I did in each of those cases in service to this team and the safety of innocents. Am I to allow unpredictable factors such as Quislet’s caprice, Staq Mavlen’s questionable self-control or the whims of an infant child to menace others just so I don’t hurt anybody’s feelings?”

Saturn Girl and Phantom Girl were mildly taken aback by his vehemence. “Brainy,” Imra finally spoke carefully, “Querl...you can’t continue to go about things the way you have been. We have a responsibility to help others, yes. But the second we start doing that from a position of superiority, we’re no longer helping them, we’re exerting our will upon them.”

“Frankly, Saturn Girl,” Brainiac 5 said coldly, “I fail to see how any action taken by the Legion of Superheroes is a concern of yours any longer; you’re the one who chose to leave this team to play schoolteacher, are you not?” He turned now to Tinya, his expression as icy as his voice. “As for you, Phantom Girl; if you feel so strongly about the matter, the next leadership election will be held in two days. Perhaps you can stand against me and we’ll see whether the majority of this team votes in support of irrational histrionics or a leader who possesses greater mental acuity than the rest of you combined. Now if you two will excuse me, I have actual work to do.” He turned away and walked off without a second thought.

Phantom Girl slumped against a wall.

“That went well, don’t you think?”

**********
TALOK III
North Pole, Temple of Malias
The procession was a strange one; an otherworldly woman with midnight blue skin and stark white hair, four blind men following closely behind clutching the chain that bound them to her with shivering desperation. The deceptively fragile-seeming woman stopped before a humble single storey building erected here at the top of the world, built by her insane devotees in a place no sane man would choose to venture.

“I suppose I should be insulted that this is the best you can come to honoring your queen,” the woman named Malias spoke, “But I can appreciate the irony of an invisible queen bearing a palace so unassuming as to be invisible itself so I’ll let it go. Of course we’ll need to do better moving forward.”

“Of course,” the first of the four men answered quickly. “My apologies, my queen; when we discovered your whereabouts we were compelled to act as swiftly as possible.”

“No apologies are necessary, disciple Grair.” The Invisible Queen’s voice was soothing, but still held an undercurrent of menace. “Not so long as the mighty weapon you’ve promised me lies within. Now that the rest of the Forgotten Four have been taken care of, the time has come for Malias to rule.”

“The Luqiti orb awaits your touch,” Grair responded. “If my queen will be so magnanimous as to lead her humble servants, I will gladly direct you.”

The odd quintet made their way out of the freezing cold of Talok III’s most inhospitable region and into the hastily erected shack the Cult of Malias had built for their Invisible Queen. Before the recent reemergence of the Forgotten Four, it had been centuries since Malias had been worshipped; she saw this in the sparse utilitarianism of this alleged temple. She couldn’t blame her cultists for their ignorance of her tastes, but it was something she vowed to remedy. Soon, these corridors and rooms would be lined in treasures only she and her devotees would ever see. “Tell me again about this orb,” she declared imperiously as Grair navigated to the room where it was held.

“We discovered it in the same facility the Talokkian authorities had kept you, my queen.” Grair had told her this story many times during their long trek here from the Eye of the World where Malias had been returned to life, but it wasn’t a story he had tired of telling. “It is a dormant techno-organic lifeform, and one of immense power. In past times even the legendary Terran warrior Wonder Woman partnered with one of the Luqiti. I firmly believe that it will serve you as faithfully as we have hoped to ourselves.”

The Invisible Queen opened the final door standing between her and this artifact she’d been promised, and she was happy with what she found. In the centre of a simple empty room stood a small table, and upon that table like some huge transparent egg sat the Luqiti orb. It seemed more fragile than glass, but she could feel its power even here from several feet away. “This will do,” Malias allowed herself a satisfied smile. “This will do nicely.”

“Then my queen is pleased?” her blind follower asked hopefully.

“Your queen is very pleased.” She stepped forward, in one hand holding the chain which bound her to her followers. Her other hand reached for the almost unseen orb, and without thinking twice she jabbed her hand into it. She felt an invigorating rush of power and some infant consciousness not yet fully borne. When she withdrew her hand she saw that the substance of the Luqiti coated her hand and her forearm, leaving her flesh as invisible as if she’d used her own power. Malias felt inspiration. “Come forward,” she commanded.

Grair came forward first, his desire to please the Invisible Queen overpowering his fear and the pain of his shredded eyes. When he was close enough, Malias placed her hand upon his scalp and shoved his whole head roughly into the orb. He convulsed involuntarily, but soon his shuddering stopped and he collapsed to the ground. The viscous substance of the Luqiti paired with him, merged with him and transformed him. Moaning in agony and ecstacy both, Grair’s skin turned translucent and eventually invisible while he grew in stature and a spiky armoured carapace formed around him.

“G-Grair?” One of the other Cultists stammered fearfully. All of them had willingly blinded themselves to restore Malias to life, but some of them had begun now to doubt they’d done the right thing.

“Silence,” Malias breathed. “Come forward.”

Despite himself, the man named Mort obeyed. Malias shoved him too into the orb, and the other two Cultists after him. Minutes later where four blind men had previously cowered, a quartet of ten foot tall unseen juggernauts stood ready to fight and die for their maker.

“My Invisible Destroyers,” Malias named them with perverse pride. “How beautiful and terrible you all are...and now, let us have a world worthy of such as we.” She grasped the Luqiti orb in both hands and lifted it from the table. Somehow instinctively knowing how to command this thing, Malias the Invisible Queen focused her concentration.

Minutes later, the third world of the sun named Talok was no longer a visible part of the firmament.

TO BE CONTINUED!!!

Another great entry, raz!

Love how you're taking characters like Nightwind, Calorie Queen, Gas Girl and making them your own.

Espionage Sqaud hijinks on Lallor! I didn't suspect the Dominators before. I was thinking Vi's finding the voice familiar would lead somewhere else... though I have an inkling it still might!

Nice bit, with Nightwind apologizing and Dawnstar still being all aloof. Ah, Dawny. Hey, at least her teammates are trying. Very mature of Berta. I love how you're portraying her as a super competent Legionnaire. Zoe and Xao make a good pair of friends too, one of the friendships you've introduced that I especially like.

Whew. The plot thickens re Brainy. He seems under a lot of stress here. I was wondering if there was another angle to it (him conducting comprehensive threat assessments of every inhabitant of Legion HQ, or something like that). Will Tinya run against him? I think the next leader elections are going to be pretty interesting.

Yikes! The plot thickens. Those Invisible Destroyers sound dangerous already, especially if they can conceal themselves as well as Invisible Queen can!

Thanks IB...the next leader elections should be very interesting, but maybe not for the reason you think

Still, all should become clear very soon

MARS
Husband Hill, Legion of Superheroes Headquarters
Tenzil Kem passed Stone Boy’s younger brother Waiane as he entered one of the many canteens dotted throughout the Legion of Superheroes’ headquarters. He greeted the younger boy cheerily, but Lullabye Lad barely nodded in response as he shuffled by. Tenzil shrugged and made his way across to where the cutlery and trays were stored. He vaguely remembered Night Girl saying something about Lullabye Lad and Gravity Kid having broken up, he supposed it must still be on Waiane’s mind. Weekly emotional breakdowns are definitely not something I miss about being a teenager, Tenzil mused while he grabbed a handful of assorted knives, forks and spoons and bypassed the autochef altogether to make his way outside to the balcony.

Mars’ weather control software had programmed a pleasantly warm afternoon, and several other Legionnaires had obviously decided to take their lunch out here in the sunshine as well. Mwindaji sat at a corner table carrying on a lively omnicom conversation with his parents back on Kirinyaga. The Legion’s new Supergirl looked up briefly from her online shopping to smile politely as Tenzil walked past. Lightning Lass was eating with her young nephews Graym and Garridan, and when Ayla saw Matter-Eater Lad she waved him over. “Hey Tenz! Come here, would you? I’m telling these two brats about when the Time Trapper turned us into babies and they won’t believe me!”

Graym and Garridan giggled self-consciously as Matter-Eater Lad feigned shock. “You guys think a Legionnaire would lie about something like that? It’s true, you know! You would have had to babysit us if you were around back then, we were younger than the pair of you!” The twins’ giggling turned into outright laughter and Matter-Eater Lad continued. “It wasn’t even the only time it happened! Hang tight for a nano and I’ll tell you all about it!” The boys returned to bombarding Ayla with questions, and Tenzil made his way over to another Legionnaire he’d just noticed eating on her own.

More accurately, Gas Girl was pushing food around her plate; she’d barely touched her pasta dish. “This seat taken?” Tenzil asked.

“Hmm?” The clearly distracted heroine looked up and offered a weak smile. “Oh hi, Matter-Eater Lad...feel free, I’m afraid I’m not very good conversation today though.”

“You don’t look your normal chirpy self,” he admitted as he sat down. “Anything I can help with?” He picked up a fork and bit the tines off.

“Not really,” she sighed. “Evolvo Lad and Life Lass are in a lot of trouble...well, they might be in a lot of trouble. I don’t know for sure and that’s just making it worse. Shrinking Violet said the Espionage Squad will help, but Chameleon Boy and Invisible Kid are on a mission so we have to wait for them to get back. In the meantime I can’t even try and warn my friends they might be in danger.”

“Hey, you Heroes of Lallor are no pushovers,” Tenzil smiled. “I’m sure if anything happens they can look after themselves...and Cham loves unravelling a good mystery, he’ll give it everything he’s got when he gets back.”

“I suppose…” She actually paid attention to him for the first time and gave him a bemused smirk. “Are you just eating knives and forks for lunch, Tenzil? I’m not Bismollian, but that doesn’t seem very filling.”

“Hey, there are spoons in here too!” he protested as he picked one up and bit the end off. “You know, you can sit here and be miserable on your own if you want but I think we both know that’s not gonna help Evolvo Lad or Life Lass or you for that matter...if you wanna come join me and Ayla though, we’re about to give Graym and Garridan enough ammunition to embarass their father for weeks.”

Gas Girl thought about it for a moment. She really couldn’t do much to help her friends right now, and dwelling on it was just depressing her. “Sure,” she eventually decided. She reached across to squeeze Matter-Eater Lad’s hand and gave him a smile which was much warmer than her earlier effort. “And thanks, Tenzil...I really appreciate it.”

**********
LUNA
Tranquility Bay, Armstrong Point
Chameleon Boy aka Reep Daggle: Durlan shapeshifter
Colossal Boy aka Gim Allon: growth powers
Dawnstar: translightspeed flight, interstellar tracking
Invisible Kid II aka Jacques Foccart: invisibility
Wildfire aka Drake Burroughs: anti-energy being

Earth’s moon had been colonised for centuries now but for most of the quintet of Legionnaires currently standing on a grassy peak looking out over the still waters of the aptly named Sea of Tranquility, this was their first visit.

“I came here with my folks once when I was a kid,” Gim Allon reminisced, leaning casually on the safety barrier which kept careless visitors from straying too close to the edge of the steep cliff. “I gotta say, it’s a lot nicer when you don’t have to fight through crowds of tourists to see the view. It’s too bad Yera couldn’t come, she’d love this place.”

“As would mon frere Michel,” Jacques Foccart added. “When we were children we all thought for certain he would become a lunar engineer he adored the moon so...by the way, how is Chameleon Girl recovering from her injuries, Colossal Boy?”

“Really well, all things considered.” Gim turned away from the starlit waters to face his teammate. “Though Yera’s adamant that her Chameleon Girl days are over...I’m not gonna lie, part of me feels happier knowing she’s not throwing herself into danger as a Legionnaire anymore, but I wish I could at least talk her into letting Mwindaji’s power heal her from her radiation poisoning instead of doing it the old-fashioned way.”

“Why won’t she let Mwindaji help her?” Chameleon Boy pondered. “I mean even Brainy’s vouched for him, she must see that he’s proven himself?”

“She’s got her reasons,” Gim replied. “I don’t know if I agree with them necessarily, but I can understand.” Colossal Boy hoped that he sounded more supportive than he felt. He knew that Yera was terrified of the monster she’d seen their child become in the future she’d visited; as much as Gim would have loved to be a father some day, he loved Yera more. Her happiness here and now far outweighed any hypothetical future child they might one day bear.

What he didn’t understand and couldn’t understand no matter how he tried was why she wouldn’t just undergo anti-fertility treatments like millions of sentients did across the UP every day. There was a part of Gim Allon that wondered if his wife was punishing herself for the future she’d seen, first by abandoning their relationship and now by choosing radiation sickness over a relatively simple medical procedure which would render her incapable of bearing children far more safely. He didn’t have the first clue how to enunciate any of this dread feeling however, or how he could even begin to approach her with his fears.

“Legionnaires?” a soft voice broke Gim’s brooding. He turned along with the rest of his teammates to see a naturally attractive young woman approach from down the tourist trail. Her long straight hair was raven black, and she wore a modest white outfit with rose gold moon-themed jewellery and accessories. She carried herself with a quiet confidence, but she also seemed to exude compassion. Though this was their first meeting, Colossal Boy had the strangest feeling that the lunar heroine named Tranquility could be trusted completely. “Thank you so much for agreeing to help me,” she continued with a placid smile. “You have no idea how much I appreciate it.”

“Your gratitude is welcome but unnecessary,” Dawnstar spoke with uncommon warmth. “The Legion of Superheroes are always available to help those in need.”

“Besides,” Wildfire quipped, “I studied astrophysics here at Octavia Monae, nobody’s trashing my old stomping ground if I can avoid it.”

“I can’t help but notice you asked us to meet you somewhere that’s been closed to the general public for the past week for maintenance and upkeep,” Chameleon Boy joined the conversation. “I take it you need our discretion as much as our power, Tranquility?”

“Please feel free to call me Amoris if it makes you feel more comfortable,” the pale skinned beauty addressed the team as a whole. “That’s my real name...I suppose as Tranquility I’m nominally Luna’s resident superhero, but I don’t really have the kind of adventures that you’re all no doubt used to. Here in Tranquility Bay the closest thing we normally have to a supervillain is the occasional tourist who’s drunk too much Blue Moon and gotten a little space crazy. That’s why I requested the Legion’s assistance in the first place, I must admit I’m quite out of my depth with this Fundament fellow.”

“With his control over the forces of gravity, Fundament was one of the most powerful members of the Judgement League,” Dawnstar noted. “You did the right thing to call on us.”

Cham stroked his chin thoughtfully. “He’s also one of the few members of that team to have stayed on the straight and narrow since the Judgement League disbanded...Colossal Boy and I checked his Science Police file on the way here and he’s been doing a very good job of keeping under the radar.”

“Ma’amselle, perhaps if it is not too much trouble you could tell us exactly what Fundament has done to provoke our presence?” Invisible Kid asked politely.

“Of course,” Tranquility agreed instantly. “To be completely honest, he hasn’t overtly done anything illegal yet. He arrived in Tranquility Bay about six sidereal months ago, and almost immediately he began holding religious services in town. While it’s unusual for anyone in these parts to be devotees of any of the old Terran religions, it’s not unheard of. If all he were doing were preaching the tenets of Old Christianity nobody would have an issue with it. But the sermons began to take on a troubling tone, one of xenophobia where Terrans are the rightful inheritors of the stars. Crimes against non-Terrans began to escalate, and when it became apparent that Fundament was fuelling this activity with his hate speech I asked the Science Police to let me speak to him before they stepped in. I’ve always had an ability to calm others and to help them see other perspectives, and I had hoped that I could avert any further violence. Apparently my reputation preceded me however; Fundament was already aware of my “demonic powers” by the time we met, and he refused to allow me to approach him closely enough to make use of them. He also made it quite clear that he would accept no attempts on my part to stand in the way of his message. I have some empathic gifts but I’m nowhere near his level when it comes to sheer power, Legionnaires. I knew it was time to call in support. He’s gone underground now, but his converts have been increasing and with them their hate crimes. That’s the reason I asked you all to meet me here where we can talk without fear of him being forewarned of any action we might take. Can you help me? Before Fundament came along, Luna was a lovely place where neighbours genuinely cared about one another regardless of their background. I want to make sure it stays that way.”

“Of course we’ll help!” Wildfire blurted. “We’ll make this jerkwit wish he’d stayed in whatever backwater past Earth-Man dragged him out of!”

“It may not be that easy,” Chameleon Boy rejoined. “Fundament really is awfully powerful, Wildfire. Frankly, you and Colossal Boy are the only two here who pose any threat to him and no offence to either of you but I doubt it’ll be enough to win this one.”

“Wow Cham, it’s not like you to give up that quick!” Wildfire taunted his Durlan comrade.

“Who said anything about giving up?” Cham retorted. “All I’m saying is I don’t think brute force is going to save the day this time.”

“You’ve already got a plan, you sneaky bastich!” Colossal Boy punched Cham’s shoulder playfully, having read his best friend’s expression as clearly as if it were an open book. “Are you gonna fill the rest of us in?”

“Since you asked so nicely,” Chameleon Boy flashed a cheeky grin, “Here’s how I think we should handle it…”

**********
A couple of hours later, Dawnstar and Wildfire flew together high over the domed surface of the lunar colony and far beyond the limits of what passed for the small satellite’s natural atmosphere. “How’s the search going, Dawny?” Wildfire asked, the circuitry within his containment suit calibrated to interact as easily with the Legion’s telepathic earplugs as it did their flight rings.

<I will let you know when I lock on to Fundament>, Dawnstar thought back at him. The Legion’s telepathic earplugs weren’t as adept at carrying emotional context as organic telepathic communication, but Wildfire didn’t need to feel Dawnstar’s annoyance to know she was feeling it. <You should have stayed with the others; Fundament can’t possibly know I’m trying to track him as long as I stay out here in space and you’re just distracting me, Drake.>

“Dawny, is something wrong?” Wildfire asked gingerly. “I noticed you’ve been spending more time with Nightwind and Laurel Kent recently, and I almost feel like you’ve been avoiding me. Have I done something wrong?”

Dawnstar looked over her shoulder at him flying close behind and opened her mouth, then turned forward once more and away from him. <I have a task to fulfill, Wildfire. This is not the appropriate time for me to assauge your ego.>

She began to accelerate, but before she could take leave of Wildfire he rocketed ahead and intercepted her. “Dawny, I don’t want to do this anymore. We always do this. I say something stupid or insensitive and you fly off in a huff and we never actually talk about what’s going on with us. I love you, you know I love you. And I know I can be a huge jerk, I know I am a huge jerk a lot of the time. But I don’t want to be. I want to be there for you, but you have to let me be. What we do, the way we are with each other...I don’t think it’s healthy, you know? I want us to be better. And I know you could leave me in the dust without raising a sweat but you’re still here listening to me ramble like an idiot, so I think you want us to be better too.”

Rattled by Wildfire’s rare display of humility, Dawnstar was at a loss for words. She found herself simultaneously glad that the telepathic earplugs didn’t relay emotion effectively while also wishing she could show Wildfire just how deeply his admission had affected her. <Wildfire - Drake - you’re right. We will talk. But now is not the time.>

Wildfire flew closer and held her hands in his. “Dawny--”

<No Drake, you don’t understand.> Dawnstar squeezed his hand affectionately though she knew he’d barely register the sensation physically, and she saw her own face filled with turbulent emotion reflected in his visor.

<I’ve found Fundament. We need to call in the others.>

**********
In another time and place, the man named Michael Unterrsen had once been a Catholic priest. The Quebec Territories of 2198 were not a welcome place for a man of God however, and Michael Unterrsen had watched his parish fade away until his once proud flock had been reduced to a few stray birds scavenging what faith they could find. Still, through it all Father Michael had kept his own faith. No matter how many youngsters he saw succumb to the allure of drugs and crime, no matter how many of God’s children allowed economic depression and a poisoned and dying natural environment to tempt them into a life of fatalism and sin, Father Michael stayed resolute in his belief that God had a plan for them all and that in the end after all of these trials their belief in Him would be rewarded.

The one and only time Father Michael’s faith had ever been tested was the day an orbiting satellite crashed to Earth and smashed his beloved church to pieces. Buried in rubble, Father Michael had found himself miraculously blessed with the power to move that rubble and the fallen satellite both and to save the few parishioners he had left from being crushed to death. The poor and downtrodden of rural Byrneville escaped to safety while countless tons of debris floated absurdly overhead, but Father Michael Unterrsen was not so lucky. If he’d looked out for himself first, he would have been able to fly to a hospital in time for his injuries to be treated. Instead, he was bleeding out here in the wreckage of an abandoned church while people who only ever came here for a free meal escaped unscathed to beg and steal another day.

It was after his display of power exceeded his stamina and Father Michael lay once more under a collapsed building that it occurred to him God wasn’t looking out for him at all; his faith was a joke, and the only reward he had coming to him was a lonely and painful death here under the ruins of an institution he’d literally devoted his life to.

Then Earth-Man came along.

Kirt Neidrigh appeared from the 31st Century like some kind of cosmic messenger, and he brought the dying priest to a shiny and sparkling future where his injuries could be treated as though they were nothing more than a nasty cut. Earth-Man explained to Father Michael that he’d been destined to die that day, but here he’d been given a second chance at life. In that moment, Father Michael knew that God was real, and that God had bestowed upon him a great blessing. Father Michael briefly wondered what the purpose of that blessing might be but when he found out the satellite which had almost killed him had been a secret Dominator base, that it had been destroyed by Superman’s descendant Lara Kent, and that the Dominators’ own gravitic drive had been responsible for his newfound powers, he realised he was meant to use his new control of gravity to drive satanic alien menaces from the people of Earth. The fact that Earth-Man’s mission dovetailed with this simply reinforced that he was right, and Father Michael Unterrsen renamed himself Fundament after God’s generous boon in allowing him to control one of the fundamental forces of the universe.

It was Fundament now who stood on the moon before a room full of more people than had ever bothered to come to his church in Byrneville. When he’d discovered that Earth’s moon had been long colonised by the 31st Century, Fundament felt it was his mission to ensure that colonisation was being done only by God’s children. Fundament had the power to expel alien threats from this sphere himself, but he thought he’d be doing God’s work more faithfully if he taught his flock to do that for themselves. After all, for all his power he might not be here for them forever; and God helped those who helped themselves.

Standing on a podium in a decrepit windowless room, his deep blue cape framing his sheer white bodysuit dramatically, Fundament had just finished telling his audience that God wanted them to take matters of alien infestation into their own hands when the roof of his makeshift church was wrenched away in the hands of a muscular giant. “Like we planned!” the Legionnaire named Colossal Boy bellowed. “Wildfire, Dawnstar, go!”

Fundament gestured at the young hero, but before he could send him careening through the moon’s polymer dome and into space, Wildfire was between them. “I hear you’ve been giving us Earthmen a bad name,” Drake Burroughs remarked. “Afraid we can’t have that!” A beam of anti-energy blasted forth from Wildfire’s open palm and was immediately intercepted by a wall of rock raised by Fundament’s power.

“I have heard of your origins,” Fundament replied, effortlessly ascending to hover above Wildfire. “I feel for you Mr Burroughs, but it is not too late for you to turn to God. You sully yourself with these aliens when you could be carrying out his work alongside me.” Fundament used a different application of his power on Wildfire himself, and the Legionnaire slammed into the ground where he shuddered unmoving.

“I’m as human as you,” Colossal Boy joined the conversation, “But my wife is one of those aliens you hate so much, buddy.” Having dropped the roof of the underground church into the street outside, Gim reached for Fundament with enormous outstretched fingers.

Fundament’s power was initially divided between keeping Wildfire immobile and holding Colossal Boy at range, but he soon realised he could kill two birds with one stone. “Forgive me for using you in this manner, Mr Burroughs.” He focused his attention on Wildfire, and Gim’s hand inched forward ever so slowly through Fundament’s weakened gravity field. Fundament turned to look at Colossal Boy before continuing. “As for you, Colossal Boy; it is not for me to judge whether there is any salvation for one who mocks the sanctity of marriage with the most disgusting of these extraterrestrial species, but perhaps you can ask God yourself.” Fundament scowled, and against his will Wildfire was thrust into Colossal Boy’s chest with enough force to rupture his containment suit. Gim saw what was coming just in time to grow even larger to better absorb the impact, and he doubled over when Wildfire struck to try and contain as much of the blast as possible. Colossal Boy still roared with pain and he wanted desperately to pass out, but he held onto consciousness with grim resolve even as Wildfire’s anti-energy form dissipated into nothingness around him.

“You may have beaten them,” a woman’s voice spoke up from below, “But you won’t have a chance against me, Fundament.” The time-displaced fanatic looked down to see the local heroine Tranquility walking through the now empty room towards him. Fundament wondered briefly where his fervent churchgoers had gone, but then he remembered seeing that winged abomination Dawnstar earlier when Colossal Boy had removed the roof. With her speed, she’d have been able to empty this room of people before Fundament had even defended himself from Wildfire’s assault.

“You have allied yourself with demons and the consorts of demons,” Fundament declared imperiously. “And I admit, their mastery of deceipt has served you well. But I will allow nobody to cease my holy work, woman; not even someone of human stock such as yourself.” He hoisted Tranquility into the air with his power, careful to keep her far enough distant that she couldn’t use her ungodly manipulative talents against him. “I take no pleasure in this, but if you repent now I can promise that you will avoid unending torment in the afterlife at least.” He began crushing her with gradually escalating gravitic forces, soon reaching a point where the tortured woman began groaning with discomfort. When she opened her mouth to speak, Fundament released the pressure just slightly; he wanted to give her at least the chance to ask her maker for forgiveness.

“...Maybe you’re not as in with your deity as you think,” Tranquility taunted him through gritted teeth. “Because I would have thought he’d let you know how much human stock I’ve really got in me…” Though the effort was painful, Tranquility’s features rippled and changed and her skin changed from pale pink to orange until the Legionnaire called Chameleon Boy floated instead before Fundament.

The masked priest was visibly shocked, his jaw dropping as he realised he’d played right into the Legion’s hands. “But...where…?” he mouthed helplessly.

“Oh, Fundament.” Tranquility’s voice was right in his ear now, and he started at the sound of it. She appeared out of thin air, Invisible Kid’s flight ring bearing the both of them aloft right next to Fundament. “Your faith in a higher power is heartwarming, but your dogmatic attitude is hurting you as it hurts others. Can’t you see that?”

He suddenly could see that. He could see that very clearly. All this time he’d been acting not from divine right but from fear. All of these aliens he’d railed against, these aliens he’d felt nothing for but spite and rage, he realised now they were just people with their own hopes and dreams and ideals, and none of them were any worse than him, they were just different. “What have I done?” Fundament’s voice broke. “Dear God, what have I done?” He buried his face in his hands and began sobbing aching heart-wrenching sobs as he realised that the hatred he’d been propagating was everything he thought he’d always stood against.

“It’s gonna be okay,” Tranquility soothed. “The important thing is you know better now…you’ve hurt people and that can’t be changed, but you can change. You can always change.” She offered her open arms and he let her embrace him while Jacques Foccart lowered them all to the ground.

By the time the Science Police arrived to take Fundament into custody, Dawnstar had retrieved a spare containment suit for Wildfire and Colossal Boy had received medical attention for his chest wound. “Acting as Tranquility’s decoy to allow us to approach Fundament unseen was an inspired idea,” Invisible Kid complimented Chameleon Boy. “But it was also tres dangerous, mon ami. He may have slain you before he dropped his defences enough for us to draw near.”

“All part of being a Legionnaire,” Chameleon Boy replied. “If I’m gonna do my part, I need to trust you all to do yours. I’m more impressed with the way you handled Fundament, Amoris. It seems to me you might have undersold your power...maybe you should think about joining the Legion?”

“Thank you,” the lunar heroine looked away shyly. “But I’m quite happy here in my little neighbourhood. To be honest, all I did was open Fundament’s mind to the perspective of the people he’s hurt; the reaction was all him. My hope now is that he won’t be able to go back to thinking of others as less than human when he’s felt what they feel for himself. If he can heal, I think he has the potential to be a great force for good.”

“You’re a better person than me then,” Wildfire said. “I don’t think there’s hope for any of these nassheads. But I do hope I get proven wrong. Should we go home, Legion? We might make it back to Mars in time for the election if we leave now.”

“I’m with Wildfire,” Colossal Boy added. “I don’t much care to see Brainy’s smug face when he wins this one again, but all this xenophobic crap today just makes me want to hug my wife for a while.”

“Thank you again for your help today, Legion.” Tranquility smiled at each of them in turn. “Your plan was wonderful, Chameleon Boy. I’m glad it worked.”

“If I can call you Amoris you can call me Reep,” Cham returned her smile. “And you’re very welcome. With any luck we’ll meet under different circumstances next time. Come on Legion, let’s go.”

The five of them flew away, leaving Tranquility behind. Cham spared her a final glance, and Colossal Boy spared a glance to watch his friend look back behind them. Yera might not want to be an active Legionnaire anymore, but Gim was starting to think he had a way for her to apply the sneakiness she’d developed when she was in the Espionage Squad. After all, different circumstances might not necessarily make themselves...

**********
MARS
Husband Hill, Legion of Superheroes Headquarters
The quintet of Legionnaires who’d journeyed to Earth’s moon hadn’t quite made it back to Mars in time to vote in the Legion of Superheroes’ scheduled leadership election in person, but they’d remotely attended the meeting where voting had been declared open just like the eight other Legionnaires currently off planet.

Walking back to his office after the meeting, Brainiac 5 reflected on the main items that had been covered. Now that Laurel Kent as Supergirl was an active Legionnaire, the Legion had voted almost unanimously to allow Gravity Kid to take the open position of Legion intern. Brainiac had already anticipated the reaction of course, and had advised Lightning Lad to pass on the news to his students before the meeting had even started.

The Coluan hypergenius had also anticipated the uproar he’d cause when he announced tryouts for new members were going to be held in a week’s time. The Legion of Superheroes had been limiting its roster size based on Earthgov tax regulations, but it had been some time since the Legion had been based on Earth. Mars’ regulations were far more lax in that respect, and there was no reason the Legion couldn’t double in size. Of course, it was impractical to add so many new members all at once but Brainiac could see no reason not to get the ball rolling. Predictably, several members of the team responded negatively against the very idea of change but equally predictably Brainiac had swayed the opinion of a majority of members.

He wasn’t terribly surprised that Phantom Girl hadn’t raised concerns about his recent actions to the team as a whole as she had done with him privately. Open confrontation wasn’t Tinya Wazzo’s style, but Brainiac knew without reservation that there were at least a dozen members of the team who’d heard her interpretation of events by now and who would side with her and whomever she cast her vote for. He had no fear of her taking leadership from him; if anybody was to be considered a threat, it was Mon-El, Element Lad or Dream Girl (with Lightning Lass and Blok as possible outliers). Still, the rational thing to do right now would be to come up with a way to ensure the majority of Legionnaires had a valid reason to vote Brainiac 5 in for another term. He’d already come up with 27 possible ways to ensure this outcome and was mentally examining each of those options when he opened the door to his office and immediately noticed that his light was already on. The next thing he realised was that someone was sitting in his chair, and almost without conscious thought Brainiac 5 reached for his belt and activated his forcefield.

For the first time in recent memory, Brainiac 5 was legitimately shocked as he recognised the woman sitting in his seat. “Makkia Vei?? I presume 89 gave you the tools to bypass our security, but what are you doing here?”

The blonde Coluan woman met his gaze and there was something haunted about her eyes. “89 is dead,” her voice cracked.

“89 is dead, and if the Invisible Queen has her way a lot of other sentients might be next.”

NEXT: INVISIBLE REIGN!!!

Hi all! Because I am a masochist at heart I thought it might be fun to throw the leadership election to YOU!

That's right, in the spirit of old-school Legion I will let you guys decide who you want to see leading the Legion of Superheroes into some oncoming fun times...anyone can vote, and to keep us all on our toes I'll calculate the tally privately and then post results at the end (without saying who voted for which characters, though you're welcome to come forward if you want bragging rights). Rules are as follows:

*Give me your top 3 choices. Points will be assigned as per below:
1st choice: 3 points
2nd choice: 2 points
3rd choice: 1 point

*Highest number of votes gets to be leader, second highest gets to be deputy - if there's a tie I'll pick one of them randomly, and if there's lack of interest altogether in voting I'll invoke the Quislet/Comet Queen clause (please see below)

*Y'all have got some time to think about it...while the voting process is obviously over very quickly for our heroes, it won't be incorporated into my series until this 5 part story with Invisible Queen is finished (I seem to be posting 1-2 updates a month these days so we're probably looking at January at the earliest).

*I will be upfront about it now; one character in the current roster is not gonna be eligible by the end of the Invisible Queen story for reasons to be revealed....if anyone votes for them, I'll distribute their points evenly among your other two choices.

*I have got no problem with people discussing it in this thread, but for the actual votes please send me a private message (just so I can keep track of the votes in one place)

*The current roster you have to choose from is:
BLOK
BRAINIAC 5
CHAMELEON BOY
CHLOROPHYLL KID
COLOR KID
COLOSSAL BOY
COMET QUEEN
COSMIC BOY
DAWNSTAR
DIAMOND DAMSEL
DRAGONMAGE
DREAM GIRL
ELASTIC LAD
ELEMENT LAD
FIRECREST
GAS GIRL
INFECTIOUS LASS
INVISIBLE KID II
KID COMPUTO
LIGHT LAD
LIGHTNING LASS
MATTER-EATER LAD
MON-EL
MWINDAJI
NEON
NIGHT GIRL
NIGHTWIND
PHANTOM GIRL
POLAR BOY
QUISLET
SHADOW LASS
SHRINKING VIOLET
STAR BOY
STONE BOY
SUN BOY
SUPERGIRL II
TELLUS
TIMBER WOLF
ULTRA BOY
WILDFIRE

I know there are a couple of folks who read this series when they can although they don't comment regularly, so don't feel shy about voting if this is you...I am curious to see what everyone inflicts on me hahaha (and hopefully this won't fizzle out with no responses or you're all getting stuck with Quislet and Comet Queen as leader and deputy respectively )

ooh this is fun! i’m tempted to just go ahead and vote for Quislet and Comet Queen. nice challenge too, as you’re going to potentially have a tough time justifying the vote! (kinda like when Timber Wolf became deputy leader at the end of V3, and even he was surprised)

Hey Raz, sorry I haven't been around forever so haven't given you any decent feedback in a while - been dealing with very ill elderly relatives - but can't miss the opportunity to vote for Brainy and Tinya, it'll be fun reading their sniping at each other.

The temptation to vote for Comet Queen and Quislet was pretty high though

As well as loving your story here I really enjoy your bio's thread too, it's very neatly done.

Would love to see more of Light Lad as we haven't seen much of him for a while.

Great stuff Raz, as always I'm looking forward to more, more, more!

It is kinda the challenge I am looking forward to tbh I have my own ideas for a couple choices, but they are narratively pretty safe in the sense that they are characters I have stories planned for anyway, so making them leader just makes it easier to keep them in the spotlight. I figure you guys will pick characters you actually want to read about for the next little while (Harbi's post above being a good example of that) so I'm not too worried about the result being really unworkable...although y'all may be surprised to find that I do have a justification up my sleeve if Quislet were to sneak in there hahaha...like Batman, I am prepared for everything

Also, no need to apologise Harbi....real life takes precedence, especially when it comes to stuff like that I hope everything is as well as it can be!

I am about to go update the bio thread with Fundament and Tranquility...this is her first appearance unless you count me writing her up in the Heroes of Other Worlds threads a thousand years ago, but if anyone wants a refresher on Fundament it might be worth checking out (though tbh it's pretty much all covered in my above post anyway).

I do have something planned for Light Lad actually, but I just checked my notes and it's a long way down the track so I have done some last minute adjusting to let him take the spotlight from one of the story hogs a little sooner for you Harbi (Diamond Damsel as well, as I just realised it's been ages since I did anything with her outside of background scenes)

hi raz,

nice bios on Funadament and Tranquility. You're right though, your latest entry gave all the details we needed to know to appreciate your story (a mark of great writing)! I love Tranquility, and we're lucky she's naturally good. Imagine if she were a villain, people near here would never know. Nice job showing Fundament's "take down" too. It was cathartic, seeing someone so full of hate acknowledge WHY he was that way. The modern, real world could use a Tranquility right now

I like the seeds you've planted here. Fundament's potential redemption, the promise of more from Tranquility, the idea Gim has for Yera.

It WOULD be nice to see Light Lad and Diamond Damsel a bit more (especially now that DD can't turn human again!) It's tough juggling a large cast (I have a similar problem), especially when your other plotlines (Gas Girl and Lallor, Dawnstar's trauma from Bounty, Brainy and leadership) are running full steam. On the other hand, I've been looking at your Legionnaire list and most of them have been in some good scenes recently, so that's a good juggling act. Maybe a little more of Star Boy though?

I'm having to put some thought into my leader votes. Although I like a challenge, I also approach it from the point of view of "if I were a Legionnaire who would make a decent leader"?

A little campaigning here, but some of your newer members or underdogs seem to have the people skills for being a good leader. Tenzil's scene with Gas Girl, Nightwind talking to Dawnstar. Dragonmage and Kid Computo are both thoughtful and rather mature. Neon has shown fire and sense in battle and works well with the team despite being very new. Brainy noted Blok is an outlier, and would be cool too. I could see Ayla in that role, and Tinya. Some of the former Subs would be interesting - Color Kid and Night Girl in particular seem to have the chops for it.

And I would like if it were someone who hasn't been leader ever before that would be fun!