The Last Daughter of Krypton - IC

Chloe. Out of nowhere.

The man in dark greenish colours had come from nowhere, and he sent them into nowhere, for a moment, there was void.

There was nothing.

There was... between.

An eternal instant in which, Schrodingerian, she neither existed nor did not exist.

This was... familiar.

And then the acrid stench of burnt flesh exploded into her nostrils, sawdust and the sound of panicked animals, a leaking gas tank and fear and dread and blood.

They appeared in a burst of digital light and chronal flux.

They were in the yard of The Kent Farm, and Chloe staggered a bit, with her landing, clutching Merick and steadying herself, keeping from falling.

"What?" Chloe mumbled, somewhat ironically. "Where?"

"...who?"

Raya and Rose. Up, up, and away.

A red streak soon joined the trio. J'onn, too, came up alongside and settled into a formation with them.

J'onn spoke, part in voice and part in mind, so that even Rose could hear him. "I spoke harshly earlier," he told them, "and for that I am sorry."

Var-Sen said nothing.

"You spoke as a Lawgiver speaks," Raya pointed out. "And as you are a Lawgiver, this requires no reparations."

"Ain't no thing," Rose shrugged.

"This is a troubling time," he declared. "When Zor-El informed me of his plan to send Kara to this world, he asked me to watch over her. I came here to Earth once again, after having been gone for a very long time, and I assumed a non-intrusive identity. I got a job as a farm hand for the Kents, and I was watching the day Kara's space craft landed, and Johnathan and Martha Kent brought her home.

Rose blinked at this. Mister Jenkins had mentioned being a farmhand for The Kents at one point. Tangentially, obliquely, she wondered if there was any crossover there.

...huh.

"I have been watching her ever since. I have watched her grow from a small child to a young woman on the edge of her destiny. This....this crisis...pains me very much," he admitted.

Raya gazed solemnly at J'onn, and nodded quietly.

The title of "The Last Daughter" was more than just the denotation of being Krypton's only survivor. Obviously, Raya had also escaped the fires of Rao and of Krypton's poisoned heart, and Aethyr, though she had since perished.

...but on The House of El, on Kara, rested the legacy of Krypton, the cultural identity. Raya was just a scientist who had studied the wartorn history of her planet, made a science out of battle as well as futurism. But Kara...

Kara was the finest example of their species as had been born in millennia.

To have to combat such a creature, such a legend... this was agony.

J'onn's voice was solemn. "And, in no small part, Kara reminds me of a daughter that I once had."

Rose was... shaken by that.

She remembered hearing the story of J'onn's family.

And for a moment, her steely resolve wavered utterly. No longer was she avenging the crushing damage done to her boyfriend...

...she remembered that she was doing this to save the friend who first taught her in a real way what it meant to be stalwart.

She blinked away tears that were in no way related to the tearing of the wind.

"She reminds me of a sister," Rose mumbled, "that I never had."

Kara was flying. She was soaring high up into the sky until she had breached the heavenly clouds themselves. Up above it was only herself and the beautiful light of the yell Sun. She felt renewed, more so then when she was back on the earth. She did not, however, have enough time to savor every moment.

They were surely after her.

After all that she had done.

But... she had done it to protect herself. They had tried telling her that she was sick and couldn't see things properly. Sure, she had to use force to protect herself, but they had brought it upon themselves.

What did she care?

Why should she care?

'Cause I'm taking mine.
I'm taking mine!

Kara could hear them coming. Her eyes lit up like flames and she released several blasts of her heat vision in their general direction. Not waiting to discover the results of her attack, Kara took off again. After flying for a few seconds, she began her descent towards the Earth, landing in a place that seemed like it didn't belong on the planet. She was on a dazzling white plain that seemed to stretch on for miles.

Such a place was called the Bonneville Salt Flats, and all one had to do was add some crystalline spires and chaotic winds and it reminded her of the Fortress of Solitude.

She waited for them.

Raya and Rose. The Silent Science of Violence.

The Kryptonian binary metabolism was a fascinating thing.

Like many life-forms possessed of bipedal symmetry, so-called "humanoids," throughout the 28 Known Galaxies, the Kryptonian species would ordinarily require food for sustenance. On the other hand, leftover brain structures and subcellular organelles remained extant from prior stages of their species evolution, life-forms that had lived while Rao had burned with a yellow light. As it stood, Kryptonians could still subsist somewhat on the solar energies of their blood-red god... it would at the very least prevent starvation, though it would be in the manner of one who was barely surviving.

It was by this vector that the insidious Kryptonite attacked the people of Krypton; it inhibited the solar metabolism and turned any bio-converted sunlight into poison. Thankfully, such reserves would revert to nutritional energies once the Kryptonite exposure was removed, but during exposure the process was... agonizing, crippling, and eventually, fatal.

However, under the light of a yellow sun, as was Sol, ancient and forgotten aspects of Kryptonian life would reawaken, and the spectra and frequencies and wavelengths of light from a yellow sun would make each and every Kryptonian sufficient a god as to, blasphemously enough, rival Rao Himself.

The light provided many strengths. It enhanced already formidable molecular density. It enhanced sensorium, provided gravitational counterimpetus for flight, it even generated bioelectric force-auras around the skin to provide even greater invulnerability than that molecular density alone.

But one of the most surprising traits of a fully empowered Kryptonian remained the heat vision. A method by which those subcellular organelles would release raw, undigested solar energy through the nervous system and out through the optic apertures, this was a formidable attack, radiant infrared solar heat that no mere ozone layer could deflect.

This was the fire that Kara Zor-El, called Kent, dispensed so viciously and casually after her pursuers, and it was one of the few things that could take The Martian Manhunter out of this fight.

The Martians' primal fear of fire.

(They needed him. Only he would retain sufficient power to defeat Kara in the presence of Kryptonite.)

But even as the heat-blast flew at them, Raya accelerated, she and Rose, hurtled ahead of J'onn... Raya's staff spun, whirled, whooming and thrumming through the air, knocking aside one blast, another, a third...

Two kinds of bluish-white energies flew through the air, at that, as Rose's cold cold lightning struck a fourth heat-blast from the sky, a fifth...

Rose simply reached out and caught the sixth and final blast in the palm of her hand.

It sizzled, it sizzled there in her palm. She stared at it. This salvo that had so desperately wounded the man she loved.

But when the gout of ruby red steam was washed away from her palm by the slipstream...

...her palm was unhurt.

Like the men in that Old Testament furnace... Rose could not be burned.

Raya dove towards the surface of The Flats, bringing Rose with her.

"She's waiting."

The Professors

When the heat vision blasts came, Raya and Rose spurred to action to intercept.

Var-Sen of Krypton turned violently, suddenly, and wrapped himself around J'onn J'onzz, forging in an instant an inpenetrable shield that no heat blast could penetrate.

And when the salvos of fire were over, Var-Sen released J'onn.

"Normally I would not welcome an embrace from the male of a species," the Martian told him. "But thank you."

Var-Sen returned a nod.

"She's waiting."

J'onn J'onzz examined the soon-to-be battlefield of Bonneville. He saw Kara standing there prepared to go to war.

"Flank her," the Martian thought to them, so only they could hear, "Kryptonians on the left and right, Valkyrie in front of her. I will be in the rear."

And with that, J'onn descended behind Kara.

Var-Sen landed to her left.

The Martian Manhunter's voice was loud, commanding, and dangerous. It rolled across the vast whiteness like thunder.

"This ends here, Kara Zor-El. It is time for you to come home."

I Stand Alone

"This ends here, Kara Zor-El. It is time for you to come home."

Why does nothing ever turn out like it should?

Kara Zor-El found herself surrounded on all sides, the Martian standing in the back behind Rose while Var-Sen and Raya positioned themselves to her left and right. Their determination to bring Kara back into the fold was written all over their faces. These were her friends. They were determined to bring her down. To tell her what to do. What she should do.

The ring on her finger glowed brightly for a moment and then faded away.

She felt stronger.

"I'm sick of people telling me what I should do. If you try to take me down... you're going to... BREAK!"

Kara was already on the move.

She had to be quick. Quicker than the rest.

She flew first towards Var-Sen, planting her fist at the center of his gut and then quickly turned her head towards J'onn as he stood behind Rose. Her eyes lit up and she released a blast of heat vision in his direction.

For some reason, the strike to his stomach didn't send him flying across the salt flat. But, it did cause Var-Sen to double over in pain, drop to all fours, and utter a stream of curses in Kryptonian.

When he finally raised his head, he coughed, and spit a mouthful of blood to stain the white ground.

When Kara turned her head towards him, J'onn pushed Rose to the side and took the brunt of the heat blast indirectly. He had already turned to the invisible, and he had moved to the side, and the violent swath of heat vision struck his arm.

The Martian Manhunter began to burn.

Visible fire burned on an invisible body, wreathing and outlining an outstretched arm.

He reverted to visible, then invisible again, then somewhere in between as his arm was sheathed in flame.

A silent scream sounded in the minds present.

And images, conjured from millenia ago on a Red Planet...

Martians in their true forms burning

...burning

...consumed from within by a psychic fire

...cities

...temples

...children

...burning.

Finally, he turned fully visible again. His face was a mask of pain...and....disbelief as he looked at Kara Zor-El.

We love you, Kara.

He dropped to the salty ground. His eyes were pleading. He looked....

...beaten.

Why would you burn me?

Unable to hold himself any longer, overcome by fire, the Martian Manhunter turned into a puddle of green goo that plopped upon the ground.

The puddle bubbled for an instant, then it began to move, sliding across the ground to a place several meters away from the fight.

There the puddle slowly began to reform.

And what it became was something terrible.

Rose and Raya. "I am a Citizen of The Planet."

The ladies followed orders, deploying their landings where J'onn indicated.

But Kara was so far beyond reason...

...Var-Sen went down, coughing up red...

...and Kara whipped her head around, spewing molten crimson light...

Rose set her jaw, half-stepping forward to meet the stream of fire, knowing that her raiment may suffer but that she could weather the storm with ease--

Dude, I'm frostfire spec, you can just bring that right on.

--but then--

Invisible force, irresistible, shoved her aside, and Rose expressed bewilderment, almost stumbling, almost falling, eyes going wide.

(Wait, what?)

J'onn flickered into view like a DVD skipping and he sizzled and burned, and Rose's heart was in her chest except then it was in her throat and it was a fist bashing to get out.

She could hear him screaming.

Double-M.

No.

You--

Why?

Tears burned in her eyes, saltier than even the wide expanse around them.

John was her friend. J'onn was her friend. Kyle was... so way beyond on beyond zebra so much more than a friend.

And Kara just kept... disassembling them.

'Disassemble, dead.'

Rose couldn't figure it out. Why J'onn would have done that. That stupid kamikaze move, so very like a Three Laws Robot refusing to allow a human to come to harm, even in circumstances where the human woulda been fine anyhow...

...but right now Rose had other things on her mind.

Her tears were burning.

Her tears lit on fire and coruscated saffron scarlet vermillion around her eyes.

"I'm stopping you," she breathed. "Because I would want someone to stop me."

...but then Raya blurred into place between them, between Rose and Kara, her eyes colder than the deepest space, colder than the Arctic wastes, colder than the blue suns of The Phantom Zone.

"My husband will heal," she stated simply. "You? Not so much."

Raya moved, faster than a speeding bullet, she moved, she spun her staff and carved a line in the salty hardpan before her, kicking up a spray, a blistering spray, and with a puff of superhuman lungs she blasted the spinning sedimentary shards towards Kara...

...it would obstruct Kara's gaze for an instant, just long enough for her to engage infrared sight, or X-Ray vision, or to blast the smokescreen out of the air with further expenditure of heat vision...

...but Raya was still moving, so very quickly she was moving.

The blade whirled, royal-blue humming hardlight it blurred... slashing open the lead box in Rose's hand.

Exposing the sickly green of the Kryptonite.

Raya felt the poison start to claim her, but she was still moving, she was still moving, already in motion, all one fluid sequence...

...her veins sang with agony...

...she was still moving.

She didn't need to click over to X-Rays, she remembered where Kara was, she grabbed Rose by the collar of her shirt and she threw the staff with her other hand, spinning end over end over end...

...this would be insufficient to damage a Kryptonian, but it hurtled for the ring, the ring on Kara's hand, bursting through the salt-storm (or the firestorm, if Kara were using this to extinguish the salt) and flying for that ring, that gem...

...Raya was still moving, still whirling, she grabbed Rose's waistband with her hand no longer holding the staff and she spun Rose hard and threw her, Kryptonite and all, at The Last Daughter of Krypton.

(Raya went down hard and the impact dislocated her shoulder and broke her arm as emerald poison scrawled her flesh.)

Rose had one instant to process

holy shit I'm a Fastball Special

before she was exploding through the pillar of salt (or the pillar of fire) with her feet towards Kara's face and Kryptonite humming in the slashed box under her arm and then she was in the fray with a roar

"'NOW GUARD THEE, MISCREANT!'"

that would make a Thunderer proud.

Chasnicollette said:

The man in dark greenish colours had come from nowhere, and he sent them into nowhere, for a moment, there was void.

There was nothing.

There was... between.

An eternal instant in which, Schrodingerian, she neither existed nor did not exist.

This was... familiar.

And then the acrid stench of burnt flesh exploded into her nostrils, sawdust and the sound of panicked animals, a leaking gas tank and fear and dread and blood.

They appeared in a burst of digital light and chronal flux.

They were in the yard of The Kent Farm, and Chloe staggered a bit, with her landing, clutching Merick and steadying herself, keeping from falling.

"What?" Chloe mumbled, somewhat ironically. "Where?"

"...who?"

Click to expand...

Merick looked around quickly. Judged the damage to the area. This was bad. In an instant he sheathed himself and Chloe in shimmering armor of emerald.

"Okay, no idea what the hell that was... but looks like this is more important to deal with right now...."

Merick took in Ceri and the Kents first, but then saw Wraith on the ground.

"Hell no...." Merick looked around quickly once more before teleporting him and Chloe to Wraith's side.

"Anyone else hurt?"

Manhunter - Retribution

While Kara was momentarily distracted, Var-Sen moved to check on J'onn J'onzz.

As he stood, however, a whining came to his ears, auditory occlusion he immediately knew. He looked at the back of his hand, and he saw veins tinged with green as the poison of Kryptonite crawled through him.

He turned back to where Raya and Rose where engaged offensive with Kara, and he saw the box that J'onn had made open, and he saw Raya herself overcome with the green poison from their home world.

He turned to go to her, but weakness overcame him, he fell to his knees, and he turned back to where J'onn was re-forming.

Only this wasn't J'onn. It was, but it wasn't. It was unlike anything Var-Sen had ever seen before.

The thing that emerged from the green slime appeared to be the Martian Manhunter as it knelt, hunched over, its arms folded and covering its face. But when that face lifted, when Var-Sen looked into J'onn's eyes, he was looking into the face of Mars - the true form of a Green Martian.

But this was also somewhere in between. J'onn's mouth had changed, elongated somehow, and was filled with sharp fangs. His head had elongated, too, it was almost demon-like, ears swept back, and those eyes, those red, red eyes, burning with the fire of H'ronmeer's curse, those eyes had turned upward, slanted somewhat.

And J'onn hands were claws, not unlike those that Wraith held in his hands.

J'onn J'onzz stood to his full height, and then he raised his arms, folding the claws into fists, tendons popping. And he threw his head back and roared.

Like a lion.

And then those red eyes began to glow.

And J'onn J'onzz began to seemingly grow larger, taller, bigger. There was a pulsation to him, a rhythmic flashing of energy that enveloped him as he siphoned energy from Earth herself.

He took two steps towards Kara, Rose, and Raya. The Earth shook with each.

Chloe and Ceri. "Come to Jesus."

Mer's first thought was defence. Such a good man.

But through the aura of verdant hue, Chloe could see the devastation spread out before her as a tableau.

"Okay, no idea what the hell that was... but looks like this is more important to deal with right now...."

Chloe's hand flew to her mouth, she could see the darkness melting off of Kyle, she could see him reverting to human, he only did that when he was beyond wrecked...

Merick took in Ceri and the Kents first, but then saw Wraith on the ground.

"Hell no...." Merick looked around quickly once more before teleporting him and Chloe to Wraith's side.

"Stupid barbarian," Chloe shuddered, surveying the damage that wracked Kyle's frame worse than even it wracked The Kent Farm. "I am not publishing your goddamned biography post-humously!"

"Anyone else hurt?"

Ceri, shaken, still itching to get civilians out of there in case the fight came back, shook her head. "No, thank God and Everyone. (At least, not that I know of.)"

Chloe rolled up her sleeve. And prayed to God (and Nellie Bly) that she had enough juice left to do this right. She was already feeling better after her bout with John Smith, but this was...

...this was a cataclysm.

She wriggled her fingers. "Okay."

Again, white white bright bright light light danced on her fingers, more light than in all the skies of all of Shadow. And she knew... oh, she knew... this was gonna be rough.

"Mrs. Kent," Chloe murmured, "you might wanna avert your gaze. (Love you, Merick. See you in a minute.)"

And then a white sun rose in the middle of the farmyard, coruscating around Chloe and her fallen comrade. And when that sun set, a moment later, Chloe was dead, clammy and cold, strewn on the ground.

And all her king's horses and all her king's men had put Kyle Greystone together again.

Dinah

Dinah was standing still in a state of shock. Once the Kryptonians and Martian had made their way out of town Dinah shook her self out of her stuper.

'Another reason ye do not piss off an alien that can bench press a small planet.'

She then runs across the street stopping in front of the now destroyed Nell's flower shop. She flinches at the damage. 'After its all said and done I might have Damian put the funds to the side to buy it and restore it. Nell doesn't need the headache. It did happen on me watch after all.' With a skip she continues behind the Talon and gets in to the Charger.

As she peels off she turns onto the street flinching again as she looks at Ceri's Saab. 'Poor lass. She loved that car.'

As she drives with her free hand between shifts she thumbs a text to her 'son', 'Heading to the house what do you need from the workshop.'

Damian and Sandra

Damian felt the shake and he stood up from his desk, 'Hell no! An Apocalypse invasion? Not now.' He then sprints out of class. The teacher screaming for him to return to his seat.

As he looked around he ran passing by the library the girl he saw earlier stepped out and started looking up and down the hall.

Sandra looks at him in confusion and asks, "What is going on?"

The young knight stops running and answers, "I'm not exactly sure. I was going to investigate."

Sandra nods, "I am coming too."

Damian responds, "You sure?"

The girl with intelligent eyes answers, "Yeah, its my study period."

With a nod the former caped crusader begins running again, "Fine, Keep up."

Sandra begins running beside him, "Don't worry, I will. My names Sandra Wu-San, What's yours?"

Damian answers as he looks ahead, "David Cain. Some have taken to calling me D.C."

Eventually they come upon the crater that had been the public restroom Damian covered his nose as his other hand went to his waist but stopped short. 'Thats right. I don't have my utility belt. This smells wrong. It has a smell of sulphur.'

Sandra mimics Damian's motion with covering her nose saying, "Buddha that stinks." She looks over and sees Jamie running of with the Tennysons and the sheriff missing Damians slip. She then turns looking back just in time for his other hand to return to his side saying, "David its Prof. Hamilton. He just ran off that way."

David nods, "Something must have happened. Lets follow him." Just then his Droid vibrates in his pocket. He then pulls it out and texts his 'mother' back,'Banebuster, KryptoGuantlets and as much of the version 2 Lazerous as you can.' He then turns to go towards the parking lot of the school.

Sandra asks curiously, "Where are you going?"

Damian responds, "My mother is coming to pick me up. Family emergency. 这是一个高兴地满足您。 很好(It was a pleasure to meet you. Be well.)"

Sanda stands stunned for a moment before smiling, "高兴地是所有排雷。(The pleasure was all mine.)"

Wraith

The ground rushed up again and breath exploded out of my body as I landed flat on my back. Again.

"You must be faster M'Lord. A man will attack you different than demonkin, and they may both look the same until they attack. Everyone, no matter how good, will telegraph their attack, if only for an instant. You must make those instants yours, then strike." Said Quaan, Weapons Master of Coldreach, and my teacher now.

I got up and dusted myself off. "Aye, and I will not always be in my wrapping of power, which is why you are throwing me around the yard to and fro." I replied back with a grin.

"Learn how to toss me about M'Lord and we may go across the Demonreach to get you a decent partner. Maybe one with six arms so you stay on your toes." He replied back with a grin.

I laughed and walked over to the well, pulling up a bucket and offered the old man the first dipper, which he gladly took.

"I'm getting better. I only landed on my back three times this lesson, and threw you once."

"Aye, you are. But you have years of training yet to go. Don't forget to meet with Mistress Shirlandra after the midday meal. She said to tell you that you were going to go over the landowner laws today, and that they were complex compared to the taxes you learned last time." He said.

I groaned. "Can't you just throw me around some more? It's bound to be less painful!"

"Aye, but then she would come hunting me, and, while you may be my lawful Lord and Master, even I do not want to face that womans wrath." He said with a wry grin.

I laughed and spilled a dipper over my head, then handed it back to my teacher in the Shadow martial arts. "I am off to get my head thrown about not quite unlike you do to my body. Afterwords, it will be time for me to return to my homeworld, and I won't return for a few days. That should give you some time to come up with new ways to torture my poor aching body..."

I was interrupted by the yells of a boy. I couldn't quite make them out until he got closer, but once I did my stomach clenched.

"TROLLS!! TROLLS IN THE HIGH MEADOWS!!" He was screaming as he came up in a staggering run.

I turned and let the power wash over me, cloaking me in my armor of the night.

"Gather a response party. I will go now to handle this myself. Make sure Balin is included. I want these beasts tracked back from where they came from."
I said in my low voice.

"At once M'Lord." He made a short bow and turned off at a run to gather men and horses for the response.

Wings of blackest shadow sprouted from my back and I exploded up into the indigo sky. This was the last time these brutes were going to hurt my people!

Click to expand...

I woke with a start, wildly looking around for ten foot tall monstrosities that hungered for flesh, be it horse, sheep or human mattered not. What I saw was the pale form of Chloe, and I let out a gasp and went to her, pulling her head into my lap in a desperate embrace.

"Oh no! Nononono!!!" I looked over at the people surrounding me, their faces looking funny because of the tears in my eyes. "She's going to come back to us, Right Mer??

Please Chloe, please don't give up your life for mine!

Thanks A&W for the approval.

"Oh no! Nononono!!!" I looked over at the people surrounding me, their faces looking funny because of the tears in my eyes. "She's going to come back to us, Right Mer??"

'Please Chloe, please don't give up your life for mine!'

Merick glared at Kyle. It was a sudden intense shift of emotion. Not like anything he had ever felt. There was just rage.

Merick smiled as he extended his emerald sheathed hand, helping Kyle to his feet. Once Kyle was standing the smile disappeared as Merick threw a blinding right into Kyle's nose. Merick's fist empowered by his force powers, and impossibly fast, crashed hard into Kyle. Merick realized at the last second what he was doing, and pulled the punch enough to not send the unarmored Kyle back for another dirt nap. Force enough to hurt like hell, but not to do lasting damage.

"You damn well better hope she comes back. You playing cowboy just got my girlfriend killed you ass clown!" Merick flared with emerald light as he railed. Merick ignored Kyle after that first shot, not caring what happened. He dropped to his knees and held Chloe. Beneath his emerald armor a tear drop rolled slowly down his cheek.

Kara pulled her fist out of Var-Sen's gut and had fired her heat vision towards the Martian Manhunter. Fire. Fire was her weapon now... kind of fitting considering the stone in her ring was red. It gave her power... power to make Var-Sen bleed and to turn J'onn into a raging inferno. He was powerless against the young Kryptonian, and that made Kara smile.

It didn't have to be like this, but they wouldn't leave her alone.

We love you, Kara.Why would you burn me?

'I wanted to be left alone, and you tried taking me down.'

Soon J'onn had become little more than a puddle of goo on the barren floor, and Kara turned her attention to other things. There was still Rose and Raya to deal with, although Kara knew Var-Sen would soon recover from her attack.

First there was Rose.

The Valkyrie Missile.

Her best friend.

The one person she truly didn't need to whisper to.

"I'm stopping you," she breathed. "Because I would want someone to stop me."

The tears in her eyes became like flames, and for a moment Kara paused in her attack. She welcomed whatever Rose could possibly throw at her, but Raya intervened on her behalf. In sharp contrast to Rose's fiery gaze, Raya had eyes that made even the harshest winter seem mild.

"My husband will heal. You? Not so much."

Before Kara Zor-El could react, Raya had already used her staff to kick up some of the flaky ground that they were battling on, and it blinded the teenage Kryptonian when the dusty shards were blown straight into her face. She could hear a strange whirring noise directly afterward, but she couldn't exactly tell what was happening.

"Damnit,," Kara cursed. Finally she had had enough, and Kara used her heat vision to turn the shards of sediment into fiery ash. Once she had dispensed with the parlor tricks, Kara would see to it that Raya and Rose would have no choice but leave this place with their tails between their legs. But through the fire and the flames came Raya's impressive staff, and Kara made to keep it from striking her by raising her hands to knock it aside.

She might have succeeded had Rose not come rushing through the fire at the last second, holding in her possession a marred container with the bane of all Kryptonians. The green meteorite stone glowed brightly as soon as it came near Kara Zor-El, and the red veins in her skin were quickly replaced with sickly green ones. Kara made one last attempt to protect herself from Rose and from the staff, though the latter struck her school ring when she held up her fist and shattered the Red Kryptonite, rendering it harmless.

Kara Zor-El had traded one master for another, only instead of feeling empowered... she felt incredibly weak.

The teenage titan came crashing down to the ground hard, cutting herself but being unable to do anything about it. She was sick, and growing sicker by the second. All the energy she had stored up inside of her was like a poison now, spreading throughout her body and slowly killing her off. She didn't have time to think. She could barely breath, and everything around her was growing dark and hazy.

As long as she remained close-by to the green meteorite, Kara Zor-El would eventually die.

The ground shook, and tears came to Kara's eyes.

"R...Ro...Rose..."

Damian and Dinah

Dinah hauls a bag to the Charger placing it into the back seat with a grunt. 'Damian would choose the heaviest and bulkiest armer in his inventory. The lad said he was lowering the weight. God i hate to imagine what this thing used to weigh.'

She then takes what looks like a tire with a seat sitting on it and tossing it in the trunk. 'He didn't mention it but I am sure he wants a faster mode of transportation.'

The blond woman then gets into the car and speeds off to the school. Once she gets there she finds The young dark knight waiting at the parking lot. His long coat fluttering in the cool breeze. She hits the e brake as she turns the will skidding to a stop just inches in front of the boy.

He looks down and replies with a slight scowl as she gets out, "We're you playing it safe you still had a good six inches left."

Dinah responds, "No time for jokes, we have a wild Kryptonian on the loose.

He nods and gets in the back seat with his bag as she gets back into the driver seat and begins to pull off. Damian as he lays out the armer asks, "Any idea where she could have went?"

Dinah corrects, "They. Professor Smith and Jones went north with Kara."

The son of the bat lays down on the armer and it begins to fold in around him covering him in metal plates as gyros twirl silently sealing them into place comments, "And Ceri?"

"Teleported out of her car, she used a fire extinguisher to place the compartment into shadows." Dinah responds.

Damian grunts as he sits up and places the utility belt on and slides on the lead lined gauntlets. he squeezes his fists and the knuckles flip revealing embedded green kryptonite stones. He squeezes again reverting them back to lead covered knuckles. He then says, "That means that Wraith, Smith, The Manhunter, and possibly Rose and Ceri are already in the fight."

The elder 'Cain' then says, "Not to mention I believe i saw a green aura in the alley."

"So that places Merrick and possibly Chloe on the chessboard." Damian responds as he goes through his utility belt.

"Aye, That it does, lad." Dinah smiles, "Transportation is in the boot."

Damian nods as he places his new helm on a mirrored black piece. The centre a black chrome strip that covers most of the face. the sides a dull black like the graphite composite of his old helm. after a moment the visual comes online and he pops the seat down and pulls out the pod bike. with out letting Dinah stop the vehicle he opens the door and jumps out he hits the activation button as he sits on the pod in mid air the wheels separate transforming it to a small motorcycle like device.

Once it lands, he takes off riding on ahead of Dinah to which she places her bluetooth to her ear and activates it. "Where are ye going."

"Kent Farm. Jonathan and Martha deserve to know the situation." comes over her bluetooth. to which Dinah smiles. 'He is growing up.'

"I'll meet you there." and she gasses the Charger more.

Damian pulls into the drive way on the pod and notices the wreckage as he slows down, 'Kami, I guess the battle isn't in the Fortress any more.'

Rose. Pardon me while I burst into tears.

Kara went down.

She went down hard.

But as she crashed to the ground, and that ring went all to pieces, that damned ring slashed to bits...

The sundered box of Kryptonite crashed to the hardpan beside Kara, almost forgotten...

...and Kara began to cry.

"R...Ro...Rose..."

Rose landed standing astride Kara, her upper body's outfit singed almost beyond recognition by the fire of Kara's eyes, blackened, patches near her shoulder, near her hip, flaking off like ash.

Rose's fingers, her fingers, five of them, they grabbed hold of Kara's front and dragged her up, dragged her up six inches, her other five fingers were curled into a fist and that fist was cocked as Rose stood astride Kara's fallen form, ready to let fly just like her mother'd taught her.

But Rose stopped. Stopped.

Kara was bleeding and there were flecks of green in her blood, tiny flecks that slightly superhuman eyes could barely see.

...Kara was bleeding.

...the wind was gone from her sails.

...the ring was gone from her finger.

...Kara was bleeding.

And the fire, the fire slowly faded from Rose's tearful eyes and left behind only glistening saline, only tears cutting trails through the salty ash that stained Rose's cheeks.

She hesitated.

She didn't even notice, at first, the trembling of the ground, the roaring of that Great Martian Cat...

She stared into Kara's eyes and the tears tumbled down along with gravity, adding their own small salt to the billows of salt that filled the air from their speeding, crashing combat. Her fist hung in the air like a cloud, threatening to unleash a downpour. It quivered slightly.

Kara really was... beautiful.

And to see her like this was... agony.

"What have you done?" she demanded, plaintive and furious, her fist unfurling so she could swipe angrily at her tears with the heel of that hand. "What have you made of us?"

And then, then she glanced up, and saw J'onn, leonine, leoanthropic, she drank this in, and for a moment, aside from the thunder of J'onn's geokinetic footfalls, aside from the howling distant wind of The Flats, there was silence.

And Rose, Rose, Rose, she hauled Kara up a little bit further by the front of her shirt, and she used her other tear-stained hand to turn Kara's head to look at J'onn.

"You've turned us into monsters," Rose declared, simply, achingly.

"You would have turned the whole world into monsters as they burned The Earth down stopping you," Rose sniffled, shaking her head, her nose running along with her eyes, she couldn't stop it, "they would have just kept coming at you until they were all gone or all hiding and then you would have been alone."

Sinking to her knees, kneeling straddling Kara's legs, Rose turned Kara's head and pressed her own forehead to Kara's, pressed it tightly, her eyes scrunched shut and full of tears that burned like chlorine.

"I am," Rose mumbled, "scared of a lot of things. Still, so very very scared. But one thing that scares me almost most of all is being alone. 'Autophobia.'

"But I'm even more scared, Kara, even more than I'm scared of being alone," she shuddered, pulling back some scant inches and searching Kara's eyes, "I'm scared of you. Being. Alone.

"I can't let that happen to you.

"Not again.

"You've turned us all into monsters while you were trying to drive us all away," she admonished, she sobbed, she ached, "and I know I know I know it wasn't really you, it wasn't really, it wasn't you because I love you and I hated the you that did this, but all the same--"

"--all the same. Here in the settling of the dust?"

She drew in one more last deep shuddery breath, as J'onn loomed o'er, promising such crushing death as to be irrevocable.

And she spoke her final words to Kara, with the import of a religious declaration, of utmost betrayal, of a heart stung to the razor-cut quick, of love and forgiveness yet to come but so many walls and stiles and briars to clamber to reach that forgiveness, she spoke her final words to Kara seemingly uncaring that they might both die at J'onn's perhaps-unreasoning hand because at least they'd die together:

"You scared me."

I stood up slowly, blinking back tears. Whether they were from Mer trying to break my nose or from seeing my best friends girl so cold and lifeless I didn't know. I looked over and saw Ceri with the Kent's. I made my way over and stopped in front of Ceri. "I tried Ceri. All the training in Shadow and here, and I couldn't stop her. I couldn't stop her." Then quieter, barely a whisper, I said "But I stopped myself before I killed her. Too close Ceri, I got too close to loosing myself."

I sank to my knees in the dirt in front of Ceri. I didn't have anything left on me right now but exhaustion.

Chloe. "I am following my fish."

Chloe's eyes fluttered, and closed again.

And then they opened fully, and she was gazing up at a ceiling that was by now almost familiar.

It was raining outside, raining in Soho or SoHo.

The room was lit by a television.

An angel was perched on the coffee table, crouched in birdlike posture. His skin was golden-white and engraved with impossible runes; he wore golden armour, and his great seraphimic wings were golden white also.

He had a golden helmet beside him on the coffee table.

In his slender, strong-looking hands, he held an X-Box controller.

He was playing "Halo." Which, Chloe supposed, made a kind of sense.

Sitting not far from the coffee table was an impossibly large and broad-shouldered fellow, dressed in a plaid workman's shirt and jeans, his reddish-blond hair tied back in a ponytail.

He, too, was playing "Halo." Against the angel. And he appeared to be winning without overmuch effort.

"If I weren't," the angel muttered through his teeth, "beyond the jealous pangs of mortal flesh, I would totally think you were cheating right now."

"Tch," replied the large man with a fathoms-deep voice, "it's war. It's all variations on a theme."

The angel glanced over at Chloe and waved to her while he was waiting to respawn, offering her an arguably cheerful nod. "Hey."

Chloe smiled a wobbly little smile. "Hey. She home?"

"Mm," the large man nodded. "Through the other room."

Chloe stared long and hard at the large man. He... reminded her of someone. Someone she'd never met. Someone she'd never meet.

"Oh. Kay."

She got up off the couch, and left the two to their game.

As she moved into the other room, she heard the angel cry out in dismay: "Agh, hey, spawn camper!"

And the large man had a laugh that literally rattled the floorboards: "HAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAH!"

Chloe found Death in the bedroom, standing in front of a full-length mirror.

Clothes were everywhere, there were at least three top hats, and oh, the shoes, so many shoes.

Death herself had a Little Black Dress pressed to her front, and she was squinting udjat-painted eyes at her reflection.

At the foot of the bed on the floor sat a beautiful antique carpet bag.

Chloe paused, and arched an eyebrow. "Going somewhere?"

Death turned to gaze at her, lowering the dress from her front so that the ankh necklace gleamed, and she smiled softly. "Right now, I'm walking the front lines of a battle in Qurac. Right now, right now, even while I'm here with you, out there beyond the stars The Khunds are attempting to drive another planet under their empire's bootheel. Right now, right now, I'm sitting in front of a locked gate in Venice, waiting for a boy to grow up and come back and let me in."

Death shrugged a bit, adjusting the spaghetti strap of her top on her left pale shoulder. "Wherever there's Life, there's me. Waiting. I don't need to go anywhere."

Chloe sat down on the edge of the bed, bewildered, nodding to the array of garments. "Oh. So why the, uh, packing?"

Death pondered this for a moment. "Well. Fortune favours the prepared, don't you think?"

Chloe smirked faintly, thinking of the flash-bang grenade in the box under her bed. "Can't argue with that."

Setting down the LBD, Death picked up a feminine cut of a suit coat and trousers, and wandered into the walk-in closet beside the full-length mirror.

Chloe waited patiently, but Death exited the wardrobe again a moment later, clad in the black pinstripe suit, a black blouse and tie, and a long long black coat with all these buttons...

...she was wearing black Chuck Taylors and she was teasing her hair, suddenly short, into a bit of a spike in the front, not unlike Calvin from "Calvin and Hobbes.'

Chloe smirked vaguely. "You look like someone I know. In that outfit."

Death turned this way and that in the mirror, running her tongue over her teeth, chuckling softly, leaning forward, getting herself from every angle, the ankh glinted as a pin on that black tie...

"He was here once," Death murmured, "before you were born. He was just a boy."

Chloe hesitated. She hadn't heard this part. "Really? He's-- he's never mentioned you."

Death winced, putting her hands in her pockets. "He didn't handle it well. Frightened little boy. He just kept saying... tears were running down his face and he kept saying 'I don't wanna go.' Besides, my... 'visitors' ...don't usually remember this place. There was a boy called Tim, once, and there's you. You remembered it once because of J'onn, now you remember it every time. Ted remembers this place while he's here, but forgets when he leaves."

Chloe tucked her knees up to her chest, rested her chin on her arms crossed over her knees. "Lucky me. I guess whether it's good or bad luck depends on the circumstances."

The Endless woman chuckled faintly. "'There's nothing good or bad but thinking makes it so.'"

Chloe chuckled faintly. "Hamlet. Don't you start."

Ducking back into the wardrobe, Death called back over her shoulder. "Forgive me. It's something about this outfit."

"(I rather liked Bill. He was one of my brother's favourites, too. When I took his son... I hated that he had to go through that.)"

"Mm," Chloe murmured. "Hamnet."

"Titania got her hooks in him, the poor kid," Death harrumphed. "She can be such a witch."

When she emerged this time, she was wearing an amazing dress, a darksome burgundy affair, with all this black lace, the ankh dipping down with her neckline. Her hair, inexplicably, was long again.

She made a face at herself.

"What?" Chloe blinked. "That's lovely."

Death shrugged dismally. "I only wear this to family meetings. Reminds me of a pretty dark time in my life."

Chloe tilted her head. "I can't really imagine you having a dark time. You're pretty... sensible and optimistic."

Death smirked softly, her darkly-painted lips taking on a curve. "I was not always as you see me now."

Death returned to the wardrobe, talking to Chloe from within its depths. "This was before there was any actual Life on Earth. Mars hadn't even gotten started by that point, and seriously, they had a major headstart on that floppy lungfish thingy that was your great-granddad."

Chloe grinned at that. "Hey, do I make fun of your family?"

Death stuck her head out of the wardrobe, her hair in a mess, a glint in her eye. "If you knew them, you might."

She paused, and got a funny little look on her face. "Oh. Hey. You met Destruction."

Chloe blinked. "Yeah. I kind of did. He's cute..."

Death smiled a little wider at that. "...but he's not your type?"

Chloe shook her head. "Maybe once upon a time. But I'm trying to work on the whole wandering eye thing. I got a gig that's... well, not to jinx it, but I think this is a long-haul sort of affair."

Death got all cheerfully mysterious at that. "Kids these days grow up so fast."

And ducked back into the wardrobe.

The Song of Sands

J'onn J'onzz had become something alien.

Not that he wasn't already, but this thing he had become was a result of a reformation of rage. It had been channeled, and it had been forged. And, through J'onn's coldly calculating mind, he had become wrath incarnate.

He would have beaten Kara until she submitted. Until he could have stripped the Red Kryptonite ring from her hand and flung it into space.

But the Valkyrie Missile had not failed him.

He had given her a task to complete, and she had executed the mission with precision.

She had delivered the Green Kryptonite to its intended target.

The Martian Manhunter gave a great sigh and released the stored energy he had siphoned from Planet Earth.

He reverted back to his normal self, blue and crimson uniform, and a smoothly sloping face with hard, but compassionate red eyes.

He reached to where the green rock lay. He picked it up, and he reached back, and he hurled the rock into the sky as hard as he could.

That piece of Kryptonite would be somewhere near Alpha Centauri before it even slowed down.

And then J'onn J'onzz of Ma'lecand'ra knelt beside the two girls, the Last Daughter of Krypton and the Valkyrie Missile, and he opened his arms wide and pulled them both into his embrace.

"Shhh," he said to them both, "it is over."

He began to rock slowly to and fro, comforting them, his voice soft and deep.

And J'onn summoned an ancient language, Martian as it was heard so long ago when the Red Planet teemed with his kind.

And there, on the white endless desert of the salt flat, J'onn J'onzz began to sing an ancient song full of heroism and sadness, redemption and rebirth, a chorus of melodic highs, and an overture of enduring voice.

Var-Sen took a knee next to them, listening, understanding, and himself laying a hand on Kara's shoulder, all the while fighting to keep tears at bay.

J'onn finished the song, wiped sandy and salty tears from the girls' eyes, and he stood.

"It is time to go home, now," he said.

Chloe. "Be seeing you..."

She sat quietly, watching Death load up a rather large bunch of clothing and shoes, picking and choosing from the best of that which was there arrayed, and placing this in the carpet bag. Everything fit, rather inexplicably, though Chloe took this in stride.

The rest of the clothing eventually went back into the wardrobe, until Death and Chloe were sitting side-by-side at the head of Death's bed.

Death was wearing a black-and-grey hoodie jacket with a black tee underneath, her ankh on a long black ribbon that actually vanished beneath the neckline of the shirt. She was throwing old postcards at a top hat that sat in the middle of the bed, and her accuracy was annoyingly on-target.

Chloe, meanwhile, was acquainting herself with a little yellow teddy bear Death had called "Cavendish."

"So why all the, uh," Chloe murmured, "fashion show? If you don't mind my asking?"

"You'll find out," Death murmured, a postcard of Big Ben whicking by the brim of the hat. "I can't tell you that, that's not why you're here. Each trip, I tell you something about The Universe you couldn't possibly have known, but it's really really one factoid one trip, I can't hand this stuff out like Hallowe'en candy."

Chloe's eye twitched. "You have something important you want to tell me? Because I've been trying to find my mother ever since you told me--"

Death looked at Chloe, looked right at Chloe as a postcard of The Statue of Liberty dropped right into the hat, nothing but net. "When gods live, they can manifest all number of aspects of themselves, bifurcating and multifaceting all over the place depending on the manner and locales in which they are worshiped. When gods die, when their sacrifices dwindle and there are aught left in the waking world who believe in them still, they wander off into Dream and are never heard from again. Sometimes, sometimes, there's an aspect of a god that lives longer than another."

Chloe went quiet, silently infuriated that she would not be learning of her mother's location, but not wanting to miss this all the same.

"Say there's a big red-haired red-bearded aspect," Death harrumphed, "who only ever thinks about drinking and sex and hitting things and shitting things out, whose chief weapon is a sexual innuendo and whose primary mode of transportation is a chariot with a couple of goats. He might live longer, say, than a nobler aspect of himself, whose hair is blond, whose hammer is a sacred thing--"

"You. Mean," Chloe mumbled, eyes a little wider now.

"Sometimes gods go off into Dream," Death murmured, "and they are never heard from again. But everything changes and nothing is truly lost and if they are... remembered... by a precious few, a 'remnant,' if you will..."

Chloe stared to nowhere. "'Sometimes they come back.'"

Death reached out and gently plucked Cavendish from Chloe's lap, cuddling her bear close before leaning forward and popping Cavendish into the still-open carpet bag.

"'Sometimes they come back.'"

All of a sudden, from down the hall, there came a great cracking noise like a giant tearing down a redwood, and a yell of dismay.

Chloe's eyes went wide, and Death's face was hidden by her palm.

"Uh, ma'am?" the angel's voice came, sounding strained. "Your brother just, uh, celebrated a Running Riot and he... accidentally destructed your coffee table."

"Sorry, sis, I'll just--" Destruction's voice rang out, sounding rather startled, "--it's simple carpentry, I think I can fix it."

Death sighed miserably. "He broke my coffee table."

Chloe stared at Death, a wobbly little smile on the corner of her lips. "And here I said he wasn't my type."

Despite being weakened by the Green Kryptonite, Kara had enough senses left to realize that she was being moved. Rose had landed next to her, one hand lifting her up while the other was ready to pound her into submission. The young Kryptonian could not blame her friend if she had let loose her fist. After what she had done... she couldn't blame Rose if she didn't want to ever speak to her again.

But Rose had stopped.

Why?

Why had she stopped?

'Why?' Kara cried to herself.

Her body shook again as the green meteor rock continued to turn her energy into poison, spreading throughout her body and corrupting her from the inside out. It was difficult for Kara to remain conscious, but she found some strength in the company of her true friends.

Her best friends.

"What have you done? What have you made of us?"

"I'm s-"

Kara shook again, her body being moved once more while Rose helped turn her head so that Kara could see the profound changes her behavior had had on them all. On J'onn... on what he had become.

Rose was right. She had turned them all into monsters because of her selfish acts. While wearing that ring... Kara was oblivious to the consequences of her actions, or at least she didn't really care. Hadn't cared. It hadn't mattered who she'd hurt. She would have turned the entire world into a barren wasteland, filled with death and violence...

As Rose pressed her forehead against Kara's and expressed her most profound fears, J'onn had reverted back to his former self and picked up the Green Kryptonite rock. The vile stone had served its purpose, and with its task completed J'onn had thrown it into the vast reaches of space where it would never harm anyone else.

At least that particular piece wouldn't.

There was still much left of her former homeworld.

With the meteor rock gone, Kara felt her strength return to her.

She felt normal again, but she also felt absolutely horrible. She broke down crying, wrapping her arms around Rose once she had the strength to do so. Words alone could not describe how sorry the daughter of Zor-El was, but she repeated them over and over and over.

"Shhh," J'onn said tenderly, wrapping his arms around the pair. "It is over."

Even as he slowly rocked them back and forth in a loving manner, Kara continued to cry like she had never cried before, her entire body shaking from all the violent deeds that she had wrought with her two hands. But then the Martian Manhunter began to sing a song of utmost beauty and resilience, slowly assuaging her fears and turning away any lingering darkness that plagued her thoughts.

When J'onn had finished, Kara stood up slowly and helped Rose to her feet. Another tear slid down her cheek, but with the song still playing in her mind, Kara began to feel a little more hopeful about the future.

She would not be its unmaker.

"It is time to go home, now."

Time to rebuild.

Kara wrapped her arms around her best friend and held on tight.

"I'll make things better. I promise," she whispered softly.

For Every King a Castle

He had traveled far.

Not so much in the physical sense, but in the great distance from bridging one plane to the other. The crossing of time and space from the astral to the physical was a feat not easily accomplished. Well, actually, yes, it was easy, but that was a one-way trip, generally speaking.

It had been said that as long as there was some remembrance, a remnant of their fabric of being, gods never truly died.

And thus it was so with the Mighty Thor.

A cycle had been completed, and things that were old were new again.

But, not all things, as all things aren't always woven into the skein of existence, and as such, all things are not reborn.

They must be re-created.

As Thor found himself alone, he found himself without a home.

The others, his brethren, were not with him now, nor were the great halls and keeps of Asgard.

He stood now, alone, in a sandy patch of seemingly endless prairie in the heart of Oklahoma. It was barren for miles and miles.

And the Thunder God knelt down and scooped up a handful of sand. He looked at it for a moment before he let it sift through his fingers to be carried away by the wind.

Still kneeling, he took the hammer Mjolnir from its carrier on his back under his crimson cape. He set the handle into the ground, and he then set his will upon it.

There was thunder first, and then there was lightning.

Earth responded.

She moved.

Opened up.

And, from the chasm created came forth boulder and rock and stone, sand and dirt, and water.

And these elements combined.

And they began to build.

"Misty, Help who?" Lex had asked over the phone.

"I don't know everyone Lex. There is nothing but mass chaos here now Lex. All I know is there have been multiple explosions and I'm sensing lots of fighting and confusion. I can't make anything out because of all the chaos in everyone's minds. Many are even trying to just forget what has happened and aren't very coherent mentally at all. I don't know what to do Lex." Misty was nearly crying over the phone sure she wasn't making any sense herself. The pain confusion and everything else was overwhelming.

"What what do I do Lex I no we have to help them."