by Michele | Nov 7, 2017 | Chronicles
There is an age old saying, ‘Bad things happen in threes.’ One of the many aspects of Murphy’s Law. Anything and everything that can go wrong, probably will. Today has been a pretty rough day for our Heroine. She woke up this morning and went to school. About half-way through the school day she received a call from Freddy Freeman. Racing to the Metro Public Library, she’d found her friend seeking safe harbor after a tremendous disaster in Fawcett City. He had brought with him an amulet, that he turned over to Superboy for safe-keeping. Cassie and Conner took that Amulet to her Mother. Helena Sandsmark, whom Cassie had only recently discovered, was far more than meets the eye. She was someone that the Kids believed would be able to sage-guard the Amulet, allowing them to continue moving about their average day. While Conner and Helena were securing the Amulet? Cassie snuck away. Looking in to clues she’d discovered that took her deep in to the bowels of Metropolis. There she found a sealed battleground, protected from the elements and left almost perfectly in tact. A single lightening bolt was discovered. The remnants of some battle she knew had happened between Agents of N.O.W.H.E.R.E. and the man she also knows as Black Adam. She road the lightning to Olympus, where she met her father for the first time. Not just any Father, but the God of Gods. Zeus. Only to return home where she had a very lengthy, touching, and dramatic confrontation with her boyfriend. Following the Wisdom of Solomon, the two were able to work out their differences just in time for Cassie to get a strange call. Off she went to a meeting with Wally West, aka the Flash. All of this is a day in the life of Cassandra Sandsmark, but it’s not quite over yet.
Helena was due home after work. Even accounting for being the normal amount of late, she was starting to out strip even that. Of course, it’s difficult for Cassie to even know that. Given that she isn’t at home like she should be. Nor is she carrying her Cell Phone, to be called remotely. Alas this means that it isn’t until Cassie returns to Casa Del Sandsmark, that she’ll see the blinking lights on the old fashioned answering machine.
BEEP: Hi, baby. I’m going to be late coming home. Finishing up that project for Conner. Your boy said he was handling Dinner. Love you.
BEEP: Hey, sweetheart. I’m still at the museum. Have you noticed anything strange with Krypto? He’s been acting weird for the last half hour. Can.. uh … we even take him to the Vet? Call me when you get this.
BEEP: Cassandra. It’s nearly 9 o’clock on a school night. Why aren’t you picking up your cell phone? Why aren’t you at home to pick that one up? Call me as soon as you get this. Something is really bothering Krypto. Did Conner let him eat the neighbor’s cat again?
BEEP: ….(glass breaks)… Cass… where are you… something.. something is wrong. I thought Krypto was sick but… (growling)… he’s really angry. I think something is really wrong… He won’t let me leave the office… please baby, send Conner as soon as you can.
BEEP: … what the hell was that? Stay with me, boy… we’ve got to get to the vault… Cassie. Someone is here. Krypto… he’s very angry… did you know your dog gets angry? I think they’re here for the vault… I don’t know what’s going on, but I need to know you’re okay… (loud barking, growling, growing more and more savage)…
The phone line abruptly goes dead. There are no other messages. The last one was almost ten minutes ago.
Cassie: I can’t help but wonder if this is how my life is going to be from now on. This busy. I’m not always going to have things like cropped up today. Am I? I mean, there’s only going to be one first meeting with your father, and he’s not exactly someone I have to drop in and visit now and again. It’s going to take some doing to get back there ever. Until, I guess, I’m ready to decide that’s where I want to be or something drastically changes in the Earth/GodLand relationship. I didn’t even do half of the things that Cassie Sandsmark was supposed to do today. Like most of my classes, or cheerleading.
Coming back home, there’s a few things noticeably different than what I actually expected. For one, my Mother’s car isn’t in the garage. Second, there’s no Conner, or Superman, waiting for and there’s absolutely no way it’s taken him this long to go to France and then come back. That means he got sidetracked by something, and since I haven’t noticed him shooting around the Metropolis skyline that means it’s not around here. In a way, that’s good and bad all at once. I don’t have to explain why I didn’t call him, though this time it really isn’t my fault, but now I’m left wondering what’s going on.
I never realized how dependent I was on my cell phone, especially since I’m not really a play games on it kind of gal, until tonight. Even though I hadn’t actually missedit for the first four hours or so that it was gone and destroyed . I should probably call Tim the old fashioned way and let him know I’m going to need a replacement. And apologize. I may not have noticed the flashing of the answer machine if I hadn’t been going to do that in the first place. Everyone just uses their cells. I don’t even know when the last time this thing had any pertinent calls on it…
The first message isn’t alarming. She’s late, she’s securing the amulet. Conner had indeed handled dinner, which he and I had already eaten and cleaned up by now. Leftovers for her in the fridge, though. The second one? Well. Yes. I’ve noticed a lot of things strange with Krypto, he’s not a normal dog. The third is much the same, but I start to get worried. Alien dog he may be, but usually he hides it. If something is bothering him that much, something must be wrong. And I can’t send Conner because he’s not here. I don’t actually make it all the way through the fifth message before I’m back out the garage’s side door and rocketing up into the sky.
I’m very aware of the whipcrack of noise my path makes in the air, but I don’t actually care. I’ve not really had reason to push myself to move this quickly before, and push it I do. I’m sure they’ll forgive me my complete lack of a subtle entrance, because unless there’s an immediately accessible and open door, which is highly unlikely at this time of night when the place is closed to guests, I’m going in through a window with a crash of broken glass. Down to the basement, where I know that vault is located. At least roughly.
ST: It doesn’t take Cassie long in the air to notice some none-to-subtle differences from only a few moments ago. The air is thick. A roll of thunder crackles the night sky. Clouds are rolling in over Metropolis. Though they’re all too strangely concentrated around the Metropolis Museum of Science and History. In a city like Metropolis with it’s Sky-Rail and it’s towering SkyScrapers, the Museum actually stands apart as a thing of genuine History. Three dual pillars that extend from floor to roof mark it as old, but it’s the large stain glass windows that truly mark it as a marvel of History.
It isn’t overly hard to find an entrance as Wonder Woman arrives on the scene. A large whole is already torn through one of the enormous double doors in the very front of the Museum. From the air she can see flickers of red light, washing through the windows here and there. Along with the terrible sounds of screaming, that accompanies equally loud roars so savage she might not even associate them with Conner’s pet. Once she makes her way through the melted front window? Cassie is bound to see, instantly, that the Museum she has considered a second home is in shambles. Claw marks litter the walls. Scorch marks score exhibits. Splashes of blood line the floor.
Curiously there appears to be no damage from the outside. No visible signs that someone broke -in- to the Museum.
It won’t take long for Cassie to understand why either. Orienting herself toward one of four different stair cases or two different elevators (one of which is a freight elevator). All of those signs of battle begin at the Khandaq Exhibit. She’s been here before. Not so long ago in fact. When Tim Drake took her on a holographic tour of this very place. Showing her the sights, sounds and wonders of a land she’s never been too. Now though it takes her little time noticing the difference. The Holographic displays, showing all of the cultural information is left undisturbed, but the actual physical exhibits? Every single one of them is trashed. Sarcophagus overturned. Urns upended. A perfectly outlined form of a body, forever burned in to the wall as if something flash-fired a body out of existence.
There’s far more signs of this very thing littered through out the museum, but Cassie seems to be in a hurry. Nothing stops her from quickly descending the first flight of stairs down in to the “Science” portion of the museum. The damage there is more the same, but far less spread out. More of a path, spreading from a ruined civilian elevator down towards a stairwell. She won’t encounter any resistance down those stairs either, though she’s going to see signs of battle growing more congested as she goes. A shattered skeleton, who’s limbs still reach for her. What looks like a host of carrion beetles all scorched in to dust that crumbles when the breezes past in flight.
It isn’t until she reaches the next level that she even encounters what might be considered resistance. As she clears the stairs leading beyond the Historical Archive, where books, texts and tomes are kept? She flies right in to what can only be compared to a scene from the Walking Dead or the Mummy. As every undead corpse in the Museum has congregated in the stairwells. All forcing their way down to where Cassie seeks to get too.
She might try another way down. Perhaps the last functional elevator. She could. That is. If it were not for the fact that she has apparently picked the one staircase with a reincarnated trio of Velociraptors. We’ve all seen the movies. The way the wicked little menaces catch a scent. Their nearly feathered carcasses turning in her direction…. and then like a pack of wolves rushing her. They sure don’t move like Zombie Dinosaurs. Chomp Chomp.
Cassie: That’s the entrance, right through the double doors and their gaping hole. Collateral damage may be about the least of my concerns right now, but most of the time I do at least stop to think about it. This is clearly a disaster already in progress, which is exactly the sort of thing Wonder Woman is supposed to move in and stop. Or Superman. Equal opportunity city. But they’re blown out. Not in. So was it something already inside, or something that got in another way? Questions that only barely scratch my awareness, because there’s other things to focus on.
The blood. The claws. Where things were clearly melted or roasted. So was that Krypto’s doing, or someone or something else? What is he fighting? It’s not hard to figure out where the carnage spreads out from though. Khandaq. Damnit The newest exhibit, arranged by my friend through an intermediary, where I’d been getting my personal history lessons on the foes I might have to face. I don’t hang around long to agonize over the what and why, again, because there’s still screaming. The roars. That means there’s still people to save, and that they’re also still in danger.
“What the ….?!”
We’ve all seen night at the museum. It’s a funny little thing, that couldn’t possibly be true but what if, right? Well. It seems to have managed it. For whatever reason. On the night that the Amulet from Fawcett was brought in for safe keeping. Not a fact I glaze over in my rush. I ‘skid’ to a halt, if you can really skid in mid-air when your feet have nothing to stop and skid upon, just in time to see the zombie raptors turn and face me. There’s a moment of wide eyed concern, before it turns into narrow-eyed anger and annoyance. There’s no herky-jerky motions like you would expect from something that shouldn’t have had any proper sinews or connective tissues. No. They’re moving like I’d imagine a real predator like that might. But that still doesn’t make them as fast as me.
I give them a second to begin to rush, but I’ve learned from my recent encounters with giant, sentient reptile men. Then I’m rocketing away, a punch of air in my wake as I zip towards the freight elevator. It requires a keycard, if I remember correctly. I don’t have one of those. I do have super strength though, and it’s highly unlikely that an elevator door is going to stop me. With any luck, it won’t even be on this floor, because I’m not looking for the car. I’m just going to fly down the shaft.
St: There’s simply nothing for the Raptors to pounce upon. Cassie is gone so quickly that they can’t catch up. Though they move with the speed they would have had in life, despite obviously not being alive, they don’t move with any sort of preternatural super-speed. Leaving them in the dust isn’t difficult. Though the skittering, whistling cries of the Raptors suggest that they haven’t given up the hunt just because she outran them.
Cassie knows her way about the Museum. She’s been there a multitude of times. She even interned with her Mom their first year in Metropolis. Getting around is not a problem. Doing so quickly isn’t a problem. At the Freight Elevator there’s only a handful of shambling Mummies awaiting her. Almost stationed like sentries, there is very little difficulty avoiding them all together if she wished. Though, let’s face it. Those elevator doors that she rips off their hinges have to go somewhere right?
Then she ‘steps’ in to the elevator. It’s just her luck that the freight elevator is not on this floor. Allowing her to hover right in to the shaft, then drop down past the archival floor and the restoration floor. At the lowest level of the Museum is a sub-basement, which is where they normally store specific antiquities that are rare but no longer on display. Sometimes those are being stored to be sent elsewhere, other times they’re interred for storing until they can be put back on display. As Cassie just learned this morning, there’s another floor beneath that. One that isn’t on any map and it isn’t on the elevator’s selector for floors. You ordinarily would have to have a special key, as she saw in the hands of her mother earlier. Which overrides the normal controls and allows you to take the car down that last floor.
Cassie’s trek down the shaft comes to an end there. One floor up from where she wishes to be. The floor beneath her feels solid. During her trip to the vault with Conner and her Mom earlier, her Mom told her all about the layered defenses the vault had. Someone has triggered those. An enormous bulkhead has come in to play. Strong. Durable. Heavy. She could pound her way through it, given time. But that is all too suddenly in short supply.
Because the freight elevator car is now on it’s way down. This isn’t a controlled descend. Someone or something. Has cut the cables. Those twitter whistles suggest perhaps the Raptors did it.
Freddy: What sucks about not being able to get back into the Sanctum? Freddy actually have to leave the library. Can’t hide away in the archives they actually do sweeps when the library starts to close down. Good thing about the library it stays open later than most cities, but it simply means he was going to have to book a motel room for the night. That was going to be the plan until he stepped outside. There was something in the air, literally.
There were a few people that were gathering at the corner of the street pointing in the direction that wasn’t too far off. Being the curious person he was Freddy walked in that direction only to see something that looked all too familiar.
“Crap on a cracker.” This was not happening. That’s what was going through Freddy’s mind as he stared in the direction of the of the museum.
It was all that he said as he pulled himself towards the nearest alley because there was only one thing to do right now. It wasn’t that Freddy was unsure, he was curious as to how things might change now that he had three of the six. Either way he needed to get there fast, faster than his feet would carry. “SHAZHAM!”….
And just like that Freddy Freeman is…well not quite Shazam, but not quite Freddy. He was a touch taller and why in the world was his hair black? He didn’t even know where to begin with that, but there was definitely something there was a little bit of different. He felt different. He didn’t have the strength of Hercules that might he knew but there was an aura, Achilles. Chief Callahan. Whatever needed to be done he knew he was needed and he knew where he had to go.
Thankfully Solomon was there to balance it all, but there was something else. His clothing changed. He had a suit. Didn’t have a mask to cover his face, but his face well it wasn’t exactly his face. He looked in the reflection of the glass and paused for a moment his lips parting, but there was no time. Instead there was unnatural storm to see about and just like that Freddy was gone his feet carrying him quickly down the street as he poured it on moving in and around people and cars that might make people think he was the Central City streak or whatever they were calling him the days. He doubted he was that fast, but he was fast enough to get him from point A to B while keeping his eyes on those clouds as he arrived at his destination.
The museum. Wait.
Cassie’s mom works at one. She’s an archaeology brat. Crap on a cracker squared.
Freddy takes a moment to scan the entire area to look for anything that looks out of the place beyond the obvious clouds. Anyone or anything that could be responsible or associated with the current gathering micro storm that’s centered around this area. Remember how things were at the bank. Things went sideways inside, but right now he had to use the precious moment his speed could by him to do a quick run of the perimeter to find the easiest way because something told him.
Museum of antiquities + amulet arrival in the city + unnatural looking storm = trouble.
Cassie: That definitely seems like a suitable place to send the elevator doors, doesn’t it? There’s no real room for a good wind up and Frisbee sort of maneuver, but I don’t need a lot of speed or accuracy. Brute force and the weight of the metal will make up for that. I don’t actually stick around long enough to see how successful I am, because they’re a secondary concern to my getting where I needed to be. Down. Down and down. Which is precisely where I go. Keeping track of the openings in the shaft alongside me so that I know exactly how far down I am. It should be three…but I come up short at two. There’s a brief moment of confusion until I remember what my mother had said.
About the time I’m rearing back to start trying to punch my way through the barrier? I hear the sound. It’s not something that my ears immediately would have recognized, how many people know what a plummeting elevator car sounds like when you’re below it? I didn’t until right now. With a hiss of surprise and annoyance, blue eyes whirl around me, falling on the currently closed door panels that would have allowed for entry, or exit, from the elevator. I don’t really want to see if it will hurt at that speed, and while I could rise up to meet it and then slow its decent?
A considering look is spared for the barrier again, before I throw myself through the doors leading out, instead of down. Maybe the crash will net me a two birds, one elevator result.
ST: Cassie gets nadda. Unless what she was hoping for was an elevator crashing down upon a sealed bulkhead. Completely littering it with debris that she would now have to clear, just to start punching her way through. On the good side of things, plowing through those double doors created a compressed expulsion of them. Sending them careening through the little vault area. Leaving her, ultimately, free to move along. Where ever it is that she might be headed. The flip-side to this is that Mr. Freeman now has -no- clear way to follow. Leaving him three zombie filled stairways and two remaining elevator doors. Neither of which actually go down in to the subbasements without key-cards.
While this may seem to be a moment to take a breathe? Another scream rings out for Cassie. This one is much closer. It won’t take her long to find the cause of it. Members of the Night Staff, Curators, Janitors…etc. have barricaded themselves in to the commodities cages and air-tight vacuum sealed rooms. Even now they’re being harassed by yet more undead creatures that have risen from their various states of eternal slumber. Not all of these creatures are entirely whole. A hand recovered from the Tar Pits, tries to attack the curator that had been attempting to carbon date it. A pair of enormous teeth, that look as though they came from a meglodon shark, snap at a pair of curators who had been trying to store it away. A pair of janitors duel with two skeleton armored up in what looks like armor from the crusade’s period.
All around them. History has risen up to fight back.
None of which, likely, matters one tenth as much as the flash of red light in the staff-only stairwell. A rolling growl, that sounds the part of a lion until it ends in an ear-shattering bark, signals that Cassie has found Krypto. Though getting to him is another story. While she circumvented that stairwell for two stories? She now is faced with a veritable horde of Zombie creatures. All fighting not just Krypto, but themselves, to get down in to that final area. And this is a fight that audibly, Krypto is actually losing if only by weight of the sheer numbers at work here.
Outside, Freddy is in place to see the change as it begins to happen. The clouds which were centralized upon the Museum begin to crackle with lightening and roll with thunder more by the moment. Someone up there is angry. Very angry. With a crackle of electricity. A strike of lightning hits the ground outside of the Library. Melting the pavement. Setting off car alarms for blocks. Dampening the electricity for more than a mile in all directions. From the crater of melted asphalt steps a single being.
A woman. The Goddess; Isis has come to Metropolis and she isn’t a little old lady anymore.
Cassie: It was worth a shot. On the upside, I’ve not been smashed in, but clearly neither has the opening that I would have liked to get through. I don’t stick around to mope over the lack of success however. Who knows how long anyone can afford for me to do so. And who knows how many people were still here when this started. The after hours crew varied, depending upon what was going on. With a new exhibit? I’m better there was a lot more than usual here. And soon enough I find them. They seem terrified, obviously, but…managing. Breaking in to ‘rescue’ them might only result in my allowing even more of the risen exhibits to join them.
And someone else looks like he needs my help.
“Krypto! I’m here! Coming in!”
A warning, mostly because I’d like to avoid getting eye-lasered for a moment. Which. Yes. Our family ‘pet’ is capable of doing. This time, I don’t try to avoid the zombies in order to get to him, though I still move at much the same speed I did before. This time, however, it’s with a lowered shoulder as I plow my way through the horde, knocking over or splattering as many as I can on the way.
Freddy: All Freddy could think of was those times when people said that the clouds look angry. That was an angry storm. No that wasn’t an angry storm that was descending upon the area, it was a furious storm. Summoning all the presence that he could at the moment he watched as the leader line came down. that faint flash that occurred before lightning traveled down along it branching out but this one didn’t terminate before it touched the ground it hit and it hit hard.
The wrath of a god has been felt by everyone within the immediate area. Still Freddy did what he needed to do. “Clear the area people. Let’s go!” He said. “Nothing to be afraid of. Just back away from the area. He moves out in front of the people to get their attention. “We have a dangerous storm in the area. Get inside and stay inside until it passes.”
He saw who emerged out of the lightning. Hopefully he could draw by standers attention away from that and get them headed where they neeaded to, because he could only focus on that for a moment, because the kind of sort question that he and Cassie wanted and answer too had just answered itself.
Isis had arrive in quite the fit of rage. Freddy didn’t rush in, he kept his distance. As much as he could while making sure any and ,everyone, that might be lingering were plucked away with the speed he possessed. He needed to clear the area, because, honestly, he didn’t know what was about to happen, but he was going to need everything he had to try and slow Isis down it was a matter of how, but first thing all the innocents needed to be removed and taken at out of the area.
Compartmentalize, Freddy. Theorize.
One. I saw Sobek. Sobek saw me. He may have seen what Callaghan did.
Two. He told Isis.
Three. Isis may have tracked the amulet or me to Metropolis. More than likely the amulet.
Four. Isis is super pissed and I’m the last person she wants to see. Another brick in the wall to be ripped out and shattered.
Five.
“ISIS! WIFE OF TETH ADAM! MOTHER OF OSIRIS!”
Plan A. Death. No. No not death. She’s in there somewhere. Damn it. He wanted to know where she was. She’s here so fallen champion I need you to run interference. Follow the lightning. Fight for her.
If he could pinch the bridge of his nose Solomon probably would, but hey there are no handbooks on this and it’s definitely not something you can punch your way through.
St: It doesn’t take a -lot- of speed, added to strength, to hit the skeletons from behind and plow through them. These aren’t full mass bodies here. What she’s seeing aren’t even really Zombies, but more like truly animated skeletons. Just in time for halloween. Whoever has clean up duty at the Museum is going to hate her though. Because when she hits the group with blunt force the majority of the faster skeletons, had managed to get to the front of the line. Those who got too close to the entry had met with a disastrous mauling at the paws of Krypto the Wonder Dog.
Krypto happens to look anything but wonderful right now. His features are drawn back, revealing a savage beast beneath the normally playful creature. He actually seems to be looming, making him look visually larger. Though he hasn’t come through all of this unscathed. Normally pure white fur actually has scores of cuts and lines of missing fur. Something had managed to actually puncture his skin and strip away entire gouges of fur. Though it doesn’t take much to see that the alien canine is positively slobbering with the taste of battle. Eyes glowing and venting heat. There’s a quite little ‘muur’ of acknowledgement when Cassie bursts through the doorway.
That is when Cassie gets to see what had actually damaged her Dog. At first it might seem like one of the Crocodile Men, but a second look will tell her that something -in- here. In the ‘Super Secret Vault Room’ had actually attacked them upon arrival. Leading her to realize that while her Mother had come here to protect the Vault, the Vault itself had then attacked them. And Cassie, no sooner beyond the doorway than Krypto launches back in to the fray. His eyes lancing the downed Skeletons with full fury heat-vision that turns them to little more than fire and ashes. Just fire and ashes that are none-the-less still animated and coming. As Cassie has seen even dismembered bits of the dead animate in to motion.
Outside young Freddy Freeman has seen the arrival of Isis. In all of her Glory. Gone are the trappings of Minerva, the elderly woman from Fawcett City. In it’s place are the shapely curves of an Khandaqian Princess. Adrianna Tomaz is a striking figure all on her own, but when empowered by the Goddess she is quite literally difficult to look away from. Her beauty is quite literally the thing of myth and mystery. Only the courageousness of Achillies allows Freddy to not fall under her spell. More importantly, his Presence in the field mutes the effect she has upon the average person. Emergency Workers, Onlookers. All take heed from him and move to give the Hero some distance to face off against this unknown threat.
It takes only a split-second for Isis to take notice of Shazam. Though Freddie had sought to slow her, he perhaps did not think to do so quite as literally as it happens. Her firsts crackle with electricity. A gesture at Freddy with one hand sends a gust of wind at his back. Like the actual air around him begins to solidify in an effort take hold of him and carry him to her.
“… when last we spoke, I gave you a choice … now I will make that choice for you.”
Cassie: Knowing what Krypto was supposedly capable of, and seeing it in action are two totally different things. Conner and I are usually in the city, and he’s pretty on top of keeping track of the people who are important to him with x-ray vision, but the family ‘pet’ was a contingency. He follows my Mother to work. Tails her wherever she goes more or less. And now we get to see what would have happened to anyone stupid enough to try and mess with Helena Sandsmark. My snuggly white shepherd doesn’t look nearly so snuggly right now. I want to help him, but after that moment of watching him slag them and…still have them get back up again?
That tells me that nothing is going to stop them, until whatever is causing this is stopped. They’re all plainly trying to get down here.
There’s a set of slagged doors, and then… something beyond them. Whatever had attacked Krypto and done this damage. I still haven’t seen my mother, and that’s worrisome on its own, but Krypto is clearly still holding them off the doorway as best he can. Hopefully because she’s still in, and whatever got the giant dog? Hasn’t gotten my Mother, as well. Picking up speed once more, I kick into flight through the first set of already opened doors, and plow into the second set. Trying to force my way into one of the only places in the museum that I’ve never set foot, and frankly didn’t know existed until today.
I’m ready for a fight. I may not know what kind or what against, but anything that moves that isn’t Helena Sandsmark is going to get punched.
Freddy: Freddy meant to draw her attention away from what she was going to do, but he also hoped that it wouldn’t come to something like this. You know him being pushed towards her like he was about to be served up like a Christmas ham. This is definitely not what he wanted. Plan A wasn’t looking good right about now. He needed a little guidance on this. He needed to figure this out. There were ways that this that this could end, ways this could go.
She was going to suck him dry which would only serve to make a bad situation worse. Rather than propel himself forward instead he chose to go up. He was pushed towards her, but unless that was strapping him down up was always an option as he moved to the air, because well, it was something he was capable off. He flew as high as it took to keep his distance. He wasn’t about to give her what she wanted.
“You don’t understand Isis. You got it wrong. I’m giving you a choice. I’m giving you a chance to show not just me, but the world around you that you’re capable of so much more than this. That you are still the goddess magic and life. That you are an honorable being. You have a choice. To be who you were and abandon this before you lose everything.”
Wally: Well. When, you see flashes, and hear screaming coming from a museum. Things can’t be going well. This so wasn’t Wally’s deal. But, while he was in Metropolis, figure he’d check it out and see if he could help. Zooming towards the museum, he figured it was probably some villain trying to make a name for himself. Because that’s what newbie… villains….do….? This is new. Is she the bad guy? Or the good guy? Who’s the dude in red? And there’s screaming inside…which he… should take care of? He had no idea. But it looked like the dude in red had it.
(Great color choice, by the way).
The dude was talking with her, so he’d run in only to be met by a Velociraptor skeleton. Wait. Why was it running at him?!!? WHY WAS IT ATTACKING HIM!!?!?! He needed to talk to Wonder Woman and her choice of villains. But first, he needed to make sure he wasn’t going to become a skeletal snack first.
ST: This is one of those moments that is very surreal. The first set of doors would normally be a simple security check. Those doors are actually melted slags, puddling on the floor in to molten metal heaps. Followed by a second set that don’t actually yield immediately beneath the brute force approach that has gotten Cassie this far. In fact, the moment she comes in to contact with them? Their hue changes to a golden glow and it feels as though they actually grow warmer to the touch instantly. As she applies more and more force, they hold steady. Even though they too have taken the brunt of something powerful, they manage to hold against her might.
It isn’t until Cassie truly exerts herself, that she gets even the slightest give in the doors. But even then it is not Brute Force that sees her through. Much like she recently discovered with her suit and the Lasso of Fleece, the doors only begin to give way because Cassie’s divine right is employed to make her Worthy of Entrance. Even still the doors seem to -fight- her. Because she is seeking entry for the wrong reasons. Those doors are damaged. Their structural integrity challenged. They can’t actually hold against her. Not when she is so motivated to get to what lays beyond. As they crumple inward, she’ll begin to see through the opening crease to what lays beyond. Then she has to re-think everything she ever knew about the word surreal.
Beyond the doors is a sprawling cavern. Bigger on the inside, that it is on the outside. It might well be taken from the pages of Warehouse Thirteen. With it’s sweeping isle upon isle of items thought lost to the Ages. Not your average trifles. These are the thing of LEGEND. The Ark of Covenant. Excalibur. The actual, legitimate, Dead Sea Scrolls. And one Helena Sandsmark. Adorned in full Roman Legionaire’s armor, sword and shield. Bouncing from floor, to shelves. Perhaps lacking in the strength her daughter has, but moving with a quickness that seems entirely out of place. Hacking, slashing with sword and bashing with shield. Within the vault itself were many a great thing. Some of them now animated themselves. Helena does not appear to be retreating at this point. If anything she seems to be steadily advancing, cutting her way through animated creatures and corpses. Towards a being that stands just inside those doors, nearer to Cassie than her mother. Swathed in white robes, with a long bearded face and balding head. His hands gesturing like a puppeteer.
All the while outside things have gone from surreal to horrific. Though Freddy’s gambit works. Carrying him up, up and away. It does not take him to safety. Because his foe is not playing nicely. No longer bound to the form of an elder old hag, Isis is actually unbound. Untethered and apparently uncaring for Freddy’s attempts at negotiation. What’s even worse is that she doesn’t seem to be playing at all.
You dare tell a Goddess what she does not understand? You are not even a Champion yet… feel what it means to bring upon you the wrath of a God, Child.
Up, up and Away. Does not take you out of Isis’ grasp. Not when you’re her sole focus. Though he has begun to gain the blessings of his Gods, Freddy still requires air to breathe. Air which fills his lungs and gives the breathe with which to speak in such an insolent tongue to Isis. Air which she was commanding to bring him close, but now… with a wrenching of her talon like nails… she calls all the air from around Freddy back to her. Creating a vacuum, not just around him but inside of him.
Perhaps Poseidon blessed you with gills, Pretender?
The Flash, much like Cassie, is going to have a series of choices. Three sets of ‘Zombie Chow’ filled stairways. One still functioning elevator. He’s already seen the three Velociraptor-skeletons. Oh and their pal. The enormous skeletal Tyrannosaurus Rex. Good thing he’s fast. That might help him not get eaten.
Cassie: They have to know who or what they’re supposed to let in. That doesn’t happen to be me, right now. I assume it’s only a matter of permission, maybe some enchantment or other, and not because of my motivation to get into the room. I only really want two things. To help my Mom, and also the other people inside, and to stop all of the rest of this. The latter should, in theory, lead to the former.
If I weren’t gritting my teeth as I try to get my way through the first door that’s been able to stop me since my powers kicked in? I’d probably be whistling a swear word or two right now. This would be maybe a little more unbelievable to me if the rest of my day had gone differently. If I hadn’t been to Olympus, from the bowels of the subway. If I didn’t know first hand that gods and magic, and imbuements and blessings were… well. Things.
I’ve always known my mother was a badass. I knew it when I was five years old and the opinion didn’t change as I got old older. What I see through that widening crack as I push, and push with a building desperation? Tells me that I had no idea. I should probably be oogling the Ark. Which is clearly real. Excalibur. All of these things that shouldn’t be real but are… or even the fact that there’s a whole cavern underneath the museum. Or not actually underneath the museum and this is just another door that leads somewhere else. For the moment I’m not sure that distinction matters.
She’s trying to fight towards me. No, not towards me, towards the man in front of me. I’m coming, Mom. Digging in with my shoulder, I try to wedge myself between the two sides of the opening, so that I can use my feet to push opposite my back and free up a hand. Fingertips brushing the tendrils of my belt, which is really the Fleece born lasso. It answers my wants, like always, uncoiling so that I can snap it towards the man, aiming to take his feet out from under him. Or give him a buzz. Both would be great.
Freddy: Up and away was good, but now she was pretty much trying to suck the air out of his lungs which was starting to burn. He could definitely use Solomon’s aid in this, but at the moment he was the focus, he was the one that she was intent on ripping to pieces not heading towards anyone else, but how long could he keep it up that was a difficult one to say. He didn’t have the strength, but he had the speed, but he also had Achilles.
Courage. Yes he was known for his courage and his martial prowess, but direct combat? That was something Freddy didn’t want to lean into not yet. But Achilles was the fabled to be son of Zeus depending on who’s account you followed but he was invulnerable except the tell tale spot if you believe it, but different accounts son of Zeus, dipped in the River of Styx. It didn’t make him immortal or allow him to heal, but it could work in his face, but at the moment he needed something right now, because he dared.
“I DARE!” He said as he began to rotate his body in opposition to her. Slowly but hoping to gain enough speed to draw the air in direction the faster he spun. “I DARE!” He stated again. One does not tell themselves they are the champion they either are or they aren’t and it’s not for Freddy to state it’s for Freddy to show.
“Not another life. Not another god. Your prize is denied.” He would do whatever it took whatever was in his power. “I swore before them to protect this world from danger whether it be mundane or not. You’re a danger so here I am. Standing in your way. ” Spin, Freddy spin. He needed to get his breath back. Anything Solomon wanted to share he could at this time. What was he missing? He wanted a peaceful resolution, but sometimes sacrifices are necessary. Sometimes they had to be done, but had it come to that? No way back?
Wally: Great. Juuuust great.
Wally LOVES museums and the one in Metropolis is one of best in the country. The amount of history on hand is amazing. But, generally…history doesn’t come back to try and eat, or kill you. While he’s able to plow through them easily, it doesn’t mean a few get some lucky strikes in. The Roman Legionnaires are some of the most accomplished soldiers in history, and when they set their mind… or whatever they have now, to it? They’re damn near impossible. Wally’s able to avoid most of their blows and steal their skulls at the same time.
Their short swords slice him on the arm, and along his side. It hurts like a son of a bitch. But luckily they’re not able to stab him in time. He’s just too fast for them to keep up. Once he’s done with his stairway of horrors, he looks himself over with an armfull of skulls. If they can’t see, they can’t attack…right?
Why couldn’t history be just a little less violent?
ST: Alas poor Cassie. You hath been denied. Because while you do not realize that your motivation matters? It actually does. though saving your mother might seem noble, it comes at the price of intent to do violence. Which is what Cassie acts upon at the first chance she has. Utilizing an item that no doubt actually belongs in this vault, to lash out towards the man her mother so valiantly fights to approach as well. In every other case, her Lasso has obeyed her demands. Perhaps it does this time too, but she she all not know of the results as the moment she lashes out? The doors -push- back. Turning her struggle from one she was winning, to one she is losing all too quickly. Who would have thought, that in a fight with animated skeletons, the real struggle would be with a door?
Beyond which she can perhaps make out that she had succeeded. At least in part. Her lasso had managed to entangle the sorcerer. Though it hadn’t wrenched him off his feet. The doorway denying Cassie also seemed to be denying her the ability to control her Lasso. It loops around the man, but is more inconvenience than actually stopping him. It does one thing though. It interrupts his control of the things that attack her Mother. Leaving Helena free to toss a shield careening through the terracotta warriors she’s been harassing for gods know how long.
If Cassie listens, she can hear her Mother questioning ‘Amentep,’ as to why he would side with Isis. She could probably make out that the older man’s answer was something akin to ‘Having no choice.’ Because he motions with that little scepter in his hand towards Cassie’s mother and entire Museum seems to gain new furor in it’s attempt get to Helena Sandsmark.
Hey. Flash. Meet Krypto. The wonder dog. He’s the giant Wolf-like dog with the flamey eyes that pounces you. Right before the skulls in your hands tear you to pieces with their teeth. What’s a couple bites between Roman Friends, right? At least you’ve come to the right place.
Outside is not getting any better for Freddy. Who’s right not getting what amounts to Solomon’s version of Gandolf’s vaunted, ‘Run you fool.’ Because Isis is only getting angrier by the second. If something can be said for Freddy’s stance? It’s that he’s definitely keeping Isis from making it to the Vault where Cassie, Wally and Helena are fighting Ibis the Invincible.
Isis does not just control air. Not electicity. She has dominion over each of the elements and it would seem her intent is to try using each one until she finds one that Shazam isn’t apt at foiling. Next is heat. Which Freddy is helping with by spinning. Friction creates it. Which then brings forth sweat, moisture. Water, another thing at her bidding. And bid she does. Commanding it to leave Freddy, to evaporate away. Clearly she understands that Freddy has been blessed with Speed, with Courage and Will, to go with Wisdom. None of it matters to her, as she works to break his down element by element.
You are a fool. If you die here, now, I can still harvest the essence from your corpse and use it to bring back my beloved Osris.
Cassie: “Nnngh!”
What changed? I didn’t get weaker, but all the sudden the door started fighting me that much harder. It can’t just be a matter of permission, because I have to assume the man in front of me wasn’t just allowed in. Unless he was a traitor of some sort. I could feel it though. The way it was responding to me, not a whole lot differently than the trident had. The way the lariat that’s even now hanging like a noodle over/roughly around this Amentap. Blowing out a frustrated breath that ruffles the hair in my face, I close my eyes and focus on what I’m doing. Why I’m actually here. With everything that happened today. Everything my Mother had told me this week, or that my Father had today.
“There is always a choice.”
Maybe I shouldn’t know that so well as I do at seventeen, but I do know it. Sometimes it’s a choice between two crummy choices, but it’s still there just the same. I focus on my need to get in there. The urge to protect. But more than that? I focus up my right to be in there. That’s my Mother. These are the things she protects. And while she hasn’t exactly been able to be totally forthcoming (…like about how she’s even more of a badass than I thought, for example), I think they’re mine, too. Hadn’t Zeus more or less said as much? Twice?
Wally: Giant…Dog?
Really? Well, thankfully for the giant dog because when he pounces onto Wally, the skulls go clattering onto the ground. Their jaws snapping to try and bite something. But to no avail. So, now his problem is a giant dog that was currently keeping him pinned to the ground.
“…Oh, hey…” check “…Boy. Don’t suppose you know what’s going on?” asking as he looked up into the giant face of a big white dog. First. Dinosaur Skeletons. Second. Roman Legionaries Skeletons. And now? A Giant dog. “Good..boy?” Wally wasn’t going to move an inch while this giant dog was on top of him.
Freddy: Freddy felt that he was retreating each time he encounter Isis. He had a thought, but given the previous encounter that was not the route to go. Instead he pulled back he put distance between the two of them. He withdrew pulling himself back as quickly as he flight and speed could. He considered what would happen if he did die she would take more and everything would be loss and she would be triumphant. Would it be a bad thing if he failed? If he died?
If it all ended perhaps…perhaps because he would have did what was required of him to protect the world and people in but, this right now, no. If there was no way to ensure that Isis would not continue to move forward that was not an option. It was not a choice to make. There was always a choice. She would not listen to reason and it seemed that the woman within was not strong enough to take action. She was not blessed she was cursed and possessed.
The potential of losing Hercules and Atlas….but would it stop Isis? She wished to restore herself and Osiris, but could they truly be restored or would this be their new life sucking power from other divine beings. The gods weren’t batteries for them to use. There had to be a way. Instead of rushing towards her Freddy fled, he fled into the museum with only a question Freddy could ask.
Would he be strong enough to hold the spirit of Osiris at bay? He had the blessing of three gods. Would he be overwhelmed. Did he possess the strength of will to take on Osiris to bargain to perhaps put an end to this. He didn’t know, but he knew that the museum was going to e ripped apart, because Isis would only be here for one reason and one reason alone.
Destroying the amulet was a possibility, but was it the right choice? If that could have been done it would have, but you know wrath of a goddess, but was there a potential in that possibility. Would she risk that if it could be done?
Crazy Freddy idea 265.
ST: There it is. It takes a moment. More than just one. Cassie is getting it. Starting to understand. Working her way through the problem, to the solution. The door is not a puzzle to be riddled out. Nor is it some impediment that she can simply push past. To go within, to the chamber beyond, Cassie must accept that which she is even now recognizing. The Vault was her’s. She has every right to it. Divine Right, in fact. As she comes to think this the resistance slackens. In fully accepting it, the door begins to give way.
In the time it takes Cassie to come to that, no more than a handful of seconds tick past. It might seem like a short span, but ask Wally what can happen in those seconds. Cassie is unable to participate, forced instead to give witness through the ever widening crease between the double doors. The moment she bought Helena, when the animated warriors hesitated because their master was shrugging off the lasso, was enough for the elder Sandsmark to gain headway. No longer forced to hedge between trying to make headway, while not being overwhelmed, Helena was able to take the complete offensive. Leaping over Warriors, slicing through others. The shield that she was using to keep them at bay only heart beats before, is now being throw with such force and accuracy that terracotta warriors are broken to pieces in it’s assault.
Cassie might notice, as Helena draws close, she had freed up her hand by using the shield as a discus. Then she takes up one of the long staves from a fallen warrior. It takes Helena a mere step to unleash the stave as well. The accuracy with which she throws it is miraculous. Truly Olympian, given the way it strikes firm in to the hand of Amentap. Forcing him to lose his grip on the scepter he’d been using to animate all of the skeletons with.
Giant Dog?! Krypto the Wonder Dog is more than merely giant. He’s actually an intelligent alien species of canine, hailing from Krypton! Though Cassie might call him Conner’s, the Pup actually belonged to the original Superman. When Kal-El left, the pup took up residence with the only Kryptonian it could find to protect. He only has one job! And he does it very well! Such as the way he licks Wally’s face graciously for all the bone presents the speedster brought him. Which… Wally gets a very close view of the Dog eye-lasering them to cinders one at a time. Until there is nothing left to bite the Crimson Speedster. Krypto pats Wally, when it’s safe to get up.
Freddy’s ‘escape’ from Isis is terribly easy in comparison to what had awaited Wally and Cassie before him. By the time Freddy finally enters the Museum, Helena Sandsmark has disrupted the control of the animated skeletons. Leaving the workers within faced with the uneviable position of having to clean up this titanic mess. Freddy is as fast as greased lightening. Allowing him to skim down the stairs and find himself before the door to the vault, that Cassie is even now just finally pushing open.
He and Wally might both get a moment to see the withering husk of Amentap as it withers upon the pike that dislodged him from the Ibis-stick. Freddy knows what is coming. Who is coming. Between the Wisdom of Solomon -and- his own intuition, he knows exactly what the Goddess is there for as well. But before he has time to actually tell any of them?
Bring your friends in, quickly, Cassandra. Then shut the door.
Freddy has felt something like this before. Wally has probably never seen or heard of anything like this at all, but is he really going to argue with Cassie’s hot mother in Roman Legionnaire’s armor? Once the door shuts, the Vault seals. Locking them in. Not exactly the best solution one might think.
She’s not worthy. So she can’t come in, but she’ll probably destroy everything trying to. Helena takes charge -quickly-, like she was born to it. Let me explain to you all quickly. Keep up, don’t dawdle. One vault. Many doors. Each exits in a different place. That creature calling herself Isis isn’t going to stop. As long as she’s in Metropolis, she’s going to put everyone there in Danger. Take the Amulet. Pick a door. Lead her away from the City.
Cassie: We’re safe, here in this Vault, which is all well and good but no one else is. Metropolis is my home, at least for now it is, the most permanent place I’ve ever had in my life that I can remember. Technically I lived in Gateway City longer than I have here, but I was a toddler at the time and I’m not sure it technically counts. I don’t want her to have any excuse to wreak further havoc on it, nor do I want anymore of the museum’s collection to be destroyed. That’s secondary to the risk to lives. We have to lead her away from here, to somewhere that she’s not going to cause an equal amount of damage just to a different set of the population.
Freddy’s got questions for my Mother, though I haven’t actually introduced her as such to Wally. I suppose it’s not exactly hard to pick up on my very obvious relief that she’s okay though. I really only have one question for her, and that’s a matter of the doors. There’s so many of them. I don’t want to pick one that’s going to be just as bad as the others.
“Show me where the Coast City door is.”
The place is already destroyed. There’s no one there to hurt. It will give us a battleground with no civilians. My friends have no ‘right’ to any of the treasures inside here. I do, but I’m not going to exercise that right now. Not only would it potentially be telling, but I don’t want to push too far into the side of ‘doing it for him,’ either. Tilting my blonde head slightly to the side, I look at my two companions. Two… Krypto… my mouth purses in a bit of a frown but I can’t go back out for him. All the more reason to give Isis a better reason to vacate the city.
“Unless either of you has a better idea. I think it’s the best option though. If all the doors open to museums, those are almost all connected to cultural meccas and that means…people.”
Flash: “….I have no idea what the hell is happening, who the Roman Legionaire is” gesturing to Helena “Or who this guy is.” gesturing to Freddy “Or where we are!” gesturing all around in a bit of a flailing moment, Pulling his mask down, he looks around at Wonder Woman, then to Helena, and then finally to Freddy, again.
“Why am I the only one FREAKING OUT!?!”
Putting his hands onto his knee, he bends over slightly as if to catch his breath.
“And what was that massive dog?!” flailing once again. It was completely clear this was out of his element. “Did I miss something on the contract signing to be a superhero? Because i’m starting I missed like, an entire chapter.”
Freddy: Holding the Amulet in my hand I shake my head. “Not at present. Getting her away from a populated area is best. At the moment she’s still leaning on the power gained from Atlas and Hercules. If she burns through it it’s gone.” That much Solomon has told me. There’s a choice there to be made one, several actually, but it also makes me me consider another thought. The power of gods themselves. It can be used more than just blessing. If she runs out of the power then she will seek out more.
Looking at the amulet for a moment I still consider the thought I had. I consider everything I’ve been ruminating over lately. I wish there was a to reason with Isis to get through.
“She’s not going to stop until she gets what she wants. She’ll do her best to go through everyone until she gets what she wants and when she gets what she wants she’ll need more power to restore Osiris.” Freddy was listening to everything that was happening around him.
“Her name is Helena Sandsmark. She’s Cassie’s mother, archaeologist, sage, and a quite capable warrior. My name is Freddy Freeman. The Contender to some. Pretender to others. Either way the one of the ones standing in the way of goddess who’s determined to get what she wants, break the rules and up end the status quo. I can either give in and give her or Adam what they want or I can continued to keep it out of their reaches, deny them.” Or….I look at the amulet. Put the final pieces of the puzzle together.
What if they are the trial? It’s a question. It was not a statement, but a question to make me think. “However, Cassie’s right. We need to get Isis out of the area. She’s going to continued to try and rip her way in her and when she can’t get in she’s going to try and draw us out. Either way people are danger.
“Unpopulated is best.” He considered it for a second. ” I consider the possibility of Khandaq itself. Would she threaten it? Would it give her pause? would it wake up the woman within to bring in end to the single minded impulse. What if there was nothing to gain? No Osris. No Shazam. Nothing for her to gain. It crosses my mind as a possibility. Both she and Adam demanded that I give up my blessings to them.
ST: “Coast City? This way.”
No argument from the armor clad Archaeologist. Suggesting that Cassie’s suggestion makes sense and her mother agrees. It doesn’t take a lot to do the Math here. Coast City is mostly abandoned. There aren’t many metropolitan areas where you could go that wouldn’t just be another place with a huge population. Coast City is the home of a fairly recent major disaster. Abandoned until recently. The tie to it’s museum still exists, although it’s little more than rubble at this point.
The trek through the Reliquary isn’t a quick one. Not even for Wally. They have to traverse the interior which looks more like a Warehouse than an Ancient structure built by the Greek Gods. Especially not the portions of it that the group is going to get to see. Essentially making their way from one Modern City to another, even if the secondary one was slightly less modernized when it existed. No real opportunity to take in the true spectacle of the Reliquary’s age. It’s during this trek from the point they enter, to the point they’ll exit that Helena Sandsmark makes an effort to answer any question she can or will.
“No, not gone. She’s not burning through the power of the actual God, Freddy. Just the power the people before you were blessed with. The only way the power is gone for good, is if she kills the actual God associated with it.” Helena’s correction is soft, but firm, as if this is something that she knows for absolute certain. “The Blessings given to the Wizard to create a champion is but a fraction of the actual God’s Divinity. That’s most likely why you Foe needs more of it.”
“I’m the Curator of the Metropolis Museum,” she fills in for the Flash, though she seems to understand his plight. “Don’t worry, Flash. You don’t need to understand everything you’re seeing right now. Just follow your heart. You’re a good man.”
The doorway they’re looking for isn’t anything like the one from Metropolis. Obviously it’s linked to a City that no longer exists. As such the door itself has been blocked off. Literally. Bricked up. Though that’s unlikely to be a problem for these particular individuals. While they worry about the door, Helena continues to speak to the three of them.
“You’re right about the Amulet, she can feel it. She’s connected to it. Isis herself was contained in an Amulet like this once upon a time. The man you spoke of, Black Adam, discovered the Amulet in the Vault of Abu Simbel. He gifted the Amulet of Isis to a woman. We have almost no information on the woman, because she was nothing. A slave of no note or name, until she got the Amulet of Isis. After that, we know that she was consumed by the same desires that got Isis locked away, by the Wizard. She longs for the restoration of her Brother, just as Isis longs for the restoration of Osiris.”
“Before you ask, I only even know this much because the theft of the Vault in Abu Simbel. So I’m not going to be much help in telling you how to deal with this woman, other than to caution you that dark forces are at work here, Mr. Freeman. You’re being tested differently than any Champion before you.”
Cassie: Part of me really wants to reassure Wally, because I sure don’t feel like I know what’s going on either lately, and I’m a whole lot more in the know than he is. And Wonder Woman probably should know what’s going on, and act like she does, in order to inspire some confidence in those around her. So I’m trying to put on a rather stoic face, despite the fact that the last few minutes of my life have been a frantic mish-mash of trying to get to my mother, and fighting off reanimated museum props. Finding a pocket dimension beneath the place. It’s been a day. At this point? I’m just rolling with it. What other choice do I have?
“Flash. Calm down. We are safe for the moment, but we have to go. The woman attacking Metropolis will continue to do so, until we lead her away. We hid something that she wants here today, and she clearly knows that we did. And the dog was Krypto. He’s Superman’s…well. Dog is underselling what Krypto is, but will have to work for now. If you don’t want to stay, you’re free to leave from there, though I appreciate your help so far.”
I leave the introductions to be made by Freddy, because while I know who he is I don’t know if he wants to share. Turns out he does. And shares a bit more than just hisname in the process. Oh well. It’s easy enough to let slide and move on, especially because my Mother’s said something interesting when she corrected Freddy about what happens to the power itself if Isis uses it up. In essence, it would be like destroying what I’m packing around with me even now. Or that divine spark I was born with, maybe. Portions of power that the Gods themselves were willing to part with, even if they’re not handing it out like popcorn.
And the bricked off doorway? Well. I guess that falls to me. Freddy’s gifts don’t currently involve strength, and I don’t want Wally to break his hand again. Brute force is apparently the lady in this group’s forte. With a little input between battering through the bricks.
“So the things that were bad in her, were made even worse in the process. And if the amulet were to be destroyed, that means Osiris’ release, I assume? To…what.. float into the ether until he finds someone he wants to inhabit, to just be back or is this just a portion?”
Flash: “Sorry.” apologizing to Wonder Woman, and then to Helena, nodding to Freddy “I’m Flash. Fastest Man Alive.” offering back, taking a deep breath, he lets it out of his nose slowly. Apparently his life was easy compared to the insanity that was going on here. But seeing Wonder Woman being stoic, he straightens his shoulders and smiles at Helena. “Thank you.” saying as he pulled his mask back on.
“No. I’m not leaving you, Wonder Woman. Besides, we’re friends and teammates now.” offering as he finishes pulling the mask on. “What are friends for, After all?” smiling
“Wait. All we need to do is swipe the amulet?” asking looking at all of them. “I’m fast. I can probably grab the amulet and be halfway across the country before she even realizes it. Then you two can just give her the thuggy beatdown.” offering his own advice. “Does she have any kinds of shields or anything? I’m a little late to the magic party, so forgive me for sounding unknowlegeable.
I guess the question Is…. Is it even possible?” Judging from Wonder Woman’s face the other day when he was running around, he assumed she’d never seen anyone so fast. “Because I have a feeling a Infinite Mass Punch won’t work on her, no matter how hard I hit her.”
Freddy: “Please call me, Freddy,” Freddy offers. No need to rest on formality with him. It just may be her way which he understood, but he could offer.
“She was someone to him. I do not know her name, but I know who she is, this woman that Isis has taken possession of. She is the reincarnated wife of Teth-Adahm. That is why he gave her the amulet that held Isis. Agreed about the things that were bad in her were made worse. There was some kind of intense synergy between her and Isis. Their obsession and grief have been magnified. Isis may have overwhelmed her. It appears that way given Black Adam’s behavior. “ I consider that obsession and what they were after.
“Restoring Osiris has been a thred that links them both and if there’s a possibility that he’s the reincarnated son of Teth-Adahm and his wife who was named Isis then there’s another connection that compounds the need. It sounds complicated I know but it’s what drives and motivates them.” Among other things which makes me think back to our encounter in Fawcett City.
“Aw geez..” I almost want to slap my forehead.
“When Wonder Woman and I encountered Isis as Aunt Minerva in Fawcett City she spoke of there being two hostages taken.” I hadn’t thought about until now stopping in my movements briefly.
“We never saw the second person. If Isis as Aunty Minerva had succeeded she would have simply let Osiris take hold of the second person, but who was that second person? I didn’t see him.” He also thought about the books that he had saw in the Sanctum. It was about resurrection. Could have been Adam or had she been there already. I consider it for a moment.
“The supposed second hostage was never identified. There was an assumption that the crocmaggia and hostages were going to get away. Either she had the body she wanted or she wanted to temporarily stash Osiris in the body until she acquired the body that she really wanted him to reside in. The woman’s brother who if dead would need to be restored, resurrected.” If he hadn’t been already.
There was a question that no one could answer because we didn’t have the information, but it was something to consider.
“Thank you.” For all that she could share, because I know that there are rules that there are thing that I can be aided with and things I can’t. Darker forces. “Like the ones that made Adam fall?” Not truly a direct question, but something to consider. A champion has fallen before and as Ms. Sandsmark stated before I am a Contender. Adam possessed all the abilities of the Champion and he fell. It starts with a choice and that choice slowly or quickly ripples across every aspect of your life consuming you if you allow it. I can’t allow that to consume me, I can remind myself of that often, but I can’t start second guessing myself.
“At one point I wasn’t close enough to see, but then I was a little to close which would have been bad, but I didn’t spot an amulet. She didn’t give me a lot time to look her over. Isis has sway of the elements and she is the Egyptian goddess of life and magic. I’ll say anything is possible at the moment, but with the strength of Hercules and stamina of Atlas she’s upped her game. This is my trial. I have to figure out a way to stop her. Solomon’s been quiet about the amulet.” I had to prove myself worthy of the responsibility and the power.
“Also we need to know what we’re up against. She recruited Sobek and others to aid her not always willingly from what we saw of the crocmaggia. Who was leading the assault in the museum?”
ST: “Okay, let me give you a crash course in Kahndaq’s History. Long ago, before the ‘Kingdoms’ of Egypt united, they were mostly little fiefdoms controlled by Warlords that styled themselves as Kings. Just like every other major culture’s beginnings. One of those was ruled by a Pharaoh of some note, Ramses the second. He was a believer in the Occult, this Ramses, except in that Age it was less occult and more reality than it is now. Ramses employed a High Priest, by the name of Shazam. Shazam was a somewhat ageless Wizard, Sorcerer or Warlock. He’d been imbued as a boy with the Blessings of six Gods, from the Greek Pantheon. As the Shazam got older, he sought to pass his powers along to a worthy successor. He picked the Pharaoh’s son, Teth.”
“The problem is that Shazam’s daughter wished to be the successor and as such she took umbridge with the selection. So she sought to interfere in the transfer of Power,” Helena’s recounting of History is given while she stands aside and allows Cassie to work on the doorway. It’s more for Wally than anything, anyway. “Shazam’s daughter, along with a young woman Teth was in love with, somehow managed to stop Shazam from imbuing Teth with his powers. Instead he received similar powers from the Egyptian Pantheon.”
“Teth served as a successful Champion for decades, but at some point he was drawn away from his Homeland. During that time away his wife, Shiruta, and his two sons were killed. Teth went on a bit of murderous spree of Revenge, which drew notice of the now advanced aged Shazam. He believed that his own daughter had perhaps corrupted Teth with her actions. So he banished Teth, to a scarab just like the Freddy holds now. Teth-Adam was buried and lost for years, until the parents of Mr. Freeman’s successor uncovered him in the tomb of Ramseses.”
“Being a Champion is not the same as being an actual God or even a demi-God. You garner a single aspect of the God you’re imbued with. It then augments that portion of yourself,” Helena actually makes gesture to Freddy then. “As he gains the blessings of the Gods, his own natural charisma, courage, athleticism is enhanced. The same is said for this woman, that Adam gifted the power of Isis. She is now consumed with Loss and is seeking to restore her Family.”
“His name was Ibis, the Invincible. He’s also a reincarnated Egyptian Prince, Amentep. The staff he was using is called the Ibistick. It’s an ancient Totem, of nearly limitless power. Amentep isn’t actually a bad being normally, but his wife’s soul belongs to Osiris. Which I’ve got to assume, Isis promised to free if he assisted in getting her the Amulet you’re holding, Freddy.”
Once Cassie has finished uncovering the doorway, Helena is moving aside. “Beyond this door is the ruins of Coast City. There’s no longer a museum on the other side of this. Once you’re out there, I can’t keep this door open. It’ll have to be shut once more and barricaded again. Worse. Now that people know about this door and the one in Metropolis, we’ll have to sever the connections permanently.”
Cassie: “You don’t need to apologize. It is a lot.”
Wally’s given a warm smile, and a grateful one at that, before I continue with doing what I do best. Smash. Another momentary interruption as I shake brick dust off my knuckles, and look with wide blue eyes at Freddy. I hadn’t made that connection, because I thought either the hostage had been eaten, or maybe someone had misspoken. It would of course make sense that she’d need to have someone there to give that power to, if she wasn’t intending to have it for herself. So who was the person? There hadn’t been anyone else that I could see there in the bank.
“No one else was down there, other than the Crocodile that took off like his tail was on fire before the lightning. I don’t know that anyone would have survived down there. Adam was in Fawcett, too.”
That couldn’t be what she intended, was it? I still can’t quite understand their interplay and the angles they’re working. Why do whatever he’d done to Minerva, when he’d put something in her pocket… but then, people do really stupid things for the ones they love sometimes. With the door cleared again, I nod simply, pausing for a moment before…finally giving in to the urge I’ve been having since I got here. Yanking Helena in for a hug.
“I understand. We can get back from there. I’ll hold the Amulet.”
I wonder if they’ll have to sever all of them, too. Or move them. It’s not that hard to make the connection, though now I’m definitely glad I chose somewhere in this time. It’s a rough enough day without some decade displacement going on. Then I’m going through, without much more said or done on the matter.
Freddy: “Right. I suspect she was going to take a hostage and give them the amulet. If you had been separated from the most important person in your life you wouldn’t want to wait another moment. However, I don’t think that was the person’s final resting spot. I think it was a temporary body. It’s a guess at this point, but one that makes sense given the shared grief and longing that both Isis and the woman feels also there were books on resurrection, Osiris and Hades that had been gathered and consulted in the Wizard’s sanctum. I don’t know if it was Adam or Isis.”
I keep walking, but pause for a moment before we start to step through understanding everything Helena said. The same thing happened with the Wizard’s sanctum and being able to return to Fawcett City. It’s no longer possible. It’s closed off. Sealed away. I stop upon hearing Cassie’s remark.
“I have one last question, Ms. Sandsmark. Not sure if you can or are able to answer it and it’s going to sound weird which is hard to imagine given everything we’ve seen. However, with these amulets. The Amulet of Isis…” That’s what i was going to call it. “…was given to the reincarnated wife of Adam and they began their actions. If that’s true can that be passed to another person like it was to Aunty Minerva? I mean can it be shared between two people?” Because that was something I hadn’t quite figured it yet how that happened. I ask, because the woman outside the library was not Minerva. Maybe it was something to lean on Solomon about.
It was odd that she ended up in Minerva started out in the woman Adam called his wife, but then he was searching for her and he fought the crocs. The way someone would think it would add up isn’t adding up. I set that aside to gather what information I can mentally about Ibis, Prince Amentep.
ST: “I’m not sure, Freddy, but it would make sense that she could. I’ve read that previous Champions have done as much. Shared their power with their loved ones. The Gods themselves ‘share’ their power with their family, children… and champions like you seek to be.” She makes a little gesture of her hand towards ‘Wonder Woman.’ “According to the Legends, Isis is not merely a portion of a Goddess but the whole thing. It would therefor make sense that Isis could do the same. Imbue fragments of her power in to others.”
“Freddy, I can’t help you directly, but I can give you some advice. Being blessed with the Wisdom of Solomon doesn’t mean you have to over-think everything. Take a page from your friend, Flash here. Follow your heart. Isn’t that what these Trials are really measuring in the end?”
The hug she’d shared with Cassie felt a little more like ‘Goodbye’ than ‘See you Later.’ Though it passes without any further comment, for now. Once Cassie is through the door in to Coast City? Helena’s gaze affixes first upon the Flash and then Freeman. Clearly expecting the two of them to follow.
That doorway? ‘Magically’ opened in to the former basement of the Museum of Science and Industry, in Coast City. Cassie had to push some rubble out of their way to get out. But for the most part the Wayne Foundation has excavated this area a little more than most, in recent days. Leaving the three of them standing in the center of a Ghost City. Not that far away from where Kyle Rayner and Conner Luthor are having their first meeting.
In the distance a storm is already taking shape. Though it doesn’t quite move with the speed of the Flash, it is coming. Quickly.
by Michele | Oct 24, 2017 | Chronicles
Freddy: Beside myself didn’t even begin to explain what I was experiencing at the moment, but there was no time for that.
Pace yourself. If you begin to overreact you may and will make a mistake. Take a moment to find your center.
Focus on your surroundings. Remember where you stepped out of, because that’s the only way you’ll be entering the Sanctum in this area. Remember the exact area and the people around. Hopefully no one notice you stepping out into the area and begin to question you. Just stare at the big screen and be shocked, appalled and genuinely horrified at what you’re watching. That was pretty easy to do.
The item that had been entrusted to me had been pocketed. Though I seriously needed a better spot than my pocket for it. Somewhere no one could get to it or think to look for it. No tip offs or anything. I have no Idea what Adam saw. He may know that I have it and that immediately becomes an item he wants. Bargaining chip. Probably not, because he’d sooner rip open my chest and get it than bargaining. There’s no bargaining with him not with the state he’s in not to mention I don’t think that was ever in the cards, but doesn’t mean i can’t try. It just means kind of a Bambi versus Godzilla kind of situation.
Scanning the area I see the news and it’s a Metropolis local station. Walking out of the area I head towards a quiet spot, because I’ve only been to Metropolis a handful of times. Class trips and what not. Pulling out my cellphone I start scanning through the numbers I’ve programmed in to call the only person I know in the city and hope…pray she’s in the area.
Cassie: The world is full of terrible things. Evil men, that do evil things in the name of their convictions, or for power. Both equally bad motivations if you ask me. Disasters that just happen, with no rhyme or reason though in ancient times they would have attributed them to some vengeful God. I suppose that could hold true still, except I find it unlikely that were they still actually present that they’d stay so hidden so well. That was a mystery that I at least had some answers to, thanks to the last couple weeks’ experiences. I don’t want to say that they were things I’d never paid attention to before. The bad things. That makes me sound shallow and self-absorbed and I like to think that I’m not. I care about the world and the people around me. There’s a dramatic difference in seeing the world’s problems, and seeing them with the ability to do something about it. With practically an open license to do something about it.
Only to then be hobbled by life. By who I am. I’d had a discussion with Timothy Drake about the ‘mask’ and what a person’s real identity was. Not Wonder Woman, but Cassie Sandsmark who’s in the middle of her AP Chemistry lecture, watching with slack jawed, wide eyed horror what’s playing across the state of the art media wall in St. Mary’s science classroom. Breaking news, about the horrible deaths of school children in Fawcett City. Yes. Bad things happen every day. Bad things don’t always coincidentally happen in a place I’ve just been to be a part of another bad thing. I have to control my grip on the counter, in part to keep me there? And so that I don’t break a part of it off. I can feel as every hair on my body feels like its’ standing up on end, something in the air that maybe is my sense of helplessness in the situation. Or frustration. But I know those feelings. This is a …strange something else.
We’re not supposed to have our phones in class. Everyone does anyway. The fact that I don’t usually use mine, means that I’m easily excused when I get up to leave with sneakers practically squealing as I tear around the corner and out into the hallway. It’s not a number I have programmed into my phone, but I don’t exactly know a lot of people that would make the screen light up with a number and ‘Fawcett City.’ The timing too convenient for it to be anyone else, and I’d told him to call if he needed help.
“Freddy! Are you okay? Where are you? I’ll be there in…well. It depends where the where you are is but…”
Fifteen minutes to Fawcett. It’s where I assume he is, anyway. I just have to get to somewhere that I can take off without notice. Not as hard as you might think, especially when you’ve got a ‘tutor’ of your own who’s been doing it longer than you have. I could maybe wish for some more…subtle clothes though. The blue and grey plaid of my school uniform would even be preferable but it’s a game day. That means we’re expected to wear a different uniform. The awful cheerleader getup that I actually hate more than the other option. I don’t get the point. It’s not like we go to classes with the boys to show ‘spirit’ for them. I think it’s just an excuse to demonstrate that the squad’s social ‘elite’ are better than everyone else. Moving fast has its advantages though. I’m behind one of the buildings, and then up into the air like a shot, phone still pressed to my ear awaiting directions.
Freddy: If it had been a year or two ago, I would be back home ready to show my school spirit. Sure baseball season was over, but it didn’t mean I didn’t support the other teams. Fighting Spartan all the way. However, my stomping grounds was the site of abject horror. I couldn’t imagine the impact that this was having. Children who were hurt, killed. Police force decimated. Fawcett was going to be hurting for years to come from this. To say that it hurt my heart would be an understatement, but it was boxed away as best I could as I continued to compartmentalize. It was the only way I was going to remain upright instead of falling over as the weight of everything hit me.
I changed back which meant that I only carried Solomon with me. The focus and clarity that he afforded helped. They could use Callaghan right now as he was guiding them through this tragedy, but he was gone. He was no longer with them and what he brought to the town was collected. I was blessed and I felt I was in the wrong place, but I knew it is where I had to be. Away from the fray. I couldn’t let their deaths be in vain. I couldn’t let Callaghan’s death become nothing more than a meaningless gesture. I couldn’t throw way his trust on some foolish notion of all consuming rage and despair.
No, I had to continue moving forward with the information I had. There were some things I had to do, and there were some things that couldn’t be done alone. This wasn’t a time to say I can do it on my own. I saw where that could lead.
“Cassie? Yeah it’s me.” From the sound of her voice. The concern. The elevated tension. She was probably seeing the same thing he was. “I’m not there. I was there, but not any more.” He said softly. “I’m in Metropolis.” How strange was that. “At the library.” Even stranger but actually it made sense for the Sanctum to be connected to places of knowledge and instruction. I wanted to start with a long litany of events and actions that took place. “The main branch.”
What did I need? “I’m ok.” As strange as it sounded I was ok. It was better than fine. You know. Freaked out, insecure, neurotic and emotional. I was slowly coming down from Defcon Five. “But we need to compare notes.” I have no idea what Cassie’s been told. It’s the only thing that makes sense right now.
Cassie: There’s a very initial, mundane reaction to hearing that someone you know who should have been at the site of a tragedy was not there after all. It’s relief, and despite my generally trying not to do so I can’t help thinking the ‘Oh, thank God.’ Though maybe in this case it actually is an appropriate thing. Then my mind keeps spinning. Wait. He wasn’t there? Why wasn’t he there? Not there as in not at the school? Not in Fawcett? Even as he’s telling me where he is. Here. In Metropolis.
I’d say it might have been hard to hear me, given that I’m up in the clouds at the moment, or that I shouldn’t even be getting reception but… a little redbird took it upon himself to replace my iPhone with a half-million dollars worth of hidden Wayne Tech earlier this year. Can You Hear Me Now is something that I will never again have to utter, apparently. Excellent job with noise filtering, too.
“I’ll be there in one minute. Sit tight.”
Well. Less than a minute. Since I’m not going across any great distance, just more or less straight down again, plummeting out of the clouds at a speed that’s going to be too fast for most people to pick up on, but not fast enough to wreck anything. Most people are much too absorbed in their own lives, or what’s on the news right now, to really be looking for a SuperPerson in the sky. That only happens when something’s going wrong in Metropolis.
He doesn’t look okay. Why would he look okay? He said he was there, but now he’s not. It’s not unreasonable that he could have run here. He’s faster than I am, but it also doesn’t actually make sense. So instead of assuming what makes ‘sense’ based on his powers… I just ask.
“How did you go from there to the library?”
I want to hug him. It’s a natural reaction that I can’t really help but I also don’t know him well enough to presume. I instead end up hooking my arm through his, turning us back around and marching him further inside of the pristine building. There’s any number of places to sneak off to in here for some privacy. I’ve used a number of them myself, though I usually just settle for the library at my school. Two people standing out in the open, while one’s dressed like I am especially, is going to get some notice.
“I think note comparing is…at this point kind of more than necessary. What just happened?”
Freddy: I could swear I heard a bit of a whistling from her side of things. Not Cassie whistling, not that kind of sound, but air whistling. It wasn’t loud but kind of thing that happens when you’re outside or have the car door open something to that effect. She had to be in the air. I didn’t question it in fact it made me smile a little perhaps the first smile I had in I don’t know. I can’t remember. Perhaps since burgers. “Alright. I’ll be here. Thanks.” I let that be the end of it, because I don’t know what more I could say. I didn’t want to throw of her off, but going over what happened and I’m sure she she had questions for me. I was still compartmentalizing to bring myself down from the level alertness that I had been at when I arrived in the City of Tomorrow.
Any other time I would want to see the sights, but right now I didn’t want to see anything, because I know what I would see it would be everywhere. Tragedy in the Heartland. The papers and news stations would be all over it. Instead I remained where I was fixed in that point waiting for Cassie to arrive. The moment she came through the doors and found me I offered a weak smile, but my face said it all. Something was terribly wrong. I saw something. something that made it impossible for that light in my eyes to emerge like they did before. Instead of saying anything I walked over and gave her the hug she was uncertain about.
I’m a hugger. I hugged Gramps all the time. I remember all the last hugs I gave. The last hug I gave him. The last hug I gave my parents. The only person I didn’t hug was the Wizard. I hugged him once and he looked at me like i twas a foreign concept and wondered what manner of madness was this? I was a student not someone to hug. Didn’t stop me from being concerned about his well being. “It’s good to see you.” It was rote. It was just part and parcel of who I am. When she hooked her arm into mine I made no attempt to pull away. I walked with her looking around as my mind finally stopped spinning.
When it did my eyes shifted to hers, because she asked me a question. “Magic.” The tone of my voice was low, but it was steady. I didn’t shown shaky, but I did look it, but even them it was starting to be pushed back to the edges. I needed to be calm so I could step through this with a steady and deft hand, because no doubt there would be questions and I needed to weave the tapestry carefully so there were no twists and turns. Silo things into facts and theories.
As we stepped through the building I considered how to start. “A cluster of major portions.” Epic almost slipped of my tongue, but the only thing that would have made that epic is if Isis and Zeus were present so major was what I went with. Cant be epic yet, but we were on the road towards it. “I’m trying to figure out where to start. The beginning seems like so far away. Like I don’t know, but I’ll try to parse it out.” I know get to the what the hell happened, but to start there felt like I would be missing something.
“Before everything happened at the school I started talking to some of the witnesses in and outside of the bank. I needed to figure out what happened and when. Figure out things weren’t completely buggery or not. The storm that gathered that struck down into the bank that was gathering as events began to unfold. People can’t recall what happened in the bank. I think we know who to thank for that, but outside the bank and the reports. There was no storm predicted in the area. That was all Zeus.” I had to be careful not to chime in with my opinions just the facts for the moment.
“What I can theorize is that he was approaching for one of two or both reasons. One to prevent Isis from acquiring a portion of Osiris’ soul, spirit or whatever gods have. His essence. ” That would probably be the best what to describe it. “Also prevent her from taking what power I had through my blessings and the innate power you possess. Which neither of us would give freely meaning she would have taken it by force and we would be dead.” Point blank let’s not sugar coat the seriousness of this. I’m pretty sure Cassie was already there. “Either way Zeus was doing a two for one.” However Cassie wanted to absorb that was up to her.
“His intervention afforded me time to try and collect information which lead me to Chief Callaghan. He remembered everything that happened. He was able to resist the mindwipe. Perhaps was never affected by it. He carried the essence of Achilles.”
Cassie: Well. I don’t know if it makes him feel better, I hope it does, but it makes me feel better. It’s one of the best, and fastest ways to display empathy. Being there for someone. I may not be a hugger all of the time, but it’s definitely the sort of situation that calls for it, so I’m more than ready to return the gesture. While making sure not to squeeze too hard. I’ve had a lot of practice at this point. Just enough pressure to make something felt, but not hurt. I know how I’d felt hearing about the news. How must he have felt for being there and unable to stop it? I can’t even imagine. Well. Actually I can. Hence the hugging.
“Magic, of course, because… well. And maybe makes sense even. I felt… something right before you called. I just assumed it was something. Normal.”
I’d say why not but it seems to be so central to everything that’s going on. Is that going to be a thing I have to look out for now? Magic willies? On top of anything else I might be trying to sense on a normal day, now do I have to be on guard for inklings of those other things?
“It’s alright, Freddy. If I’m confused, I can just ask. I’m half-decent at connect the dots, too.”
I let him go on with the story. No, it’s not really a story so much as relaying facts. Which is more important than feelings in the moment, I suppose. I keep leading him, as he keeps talking, down a quiet hallway and into the reserved study areas. They’re unlikely to be in use this time of day, and finding an empty one to move into isn’t a problem. Then I’ll let him go, taking up a perched seat on the edge of one of the tables as I fold my arms across my chest to listen.
“The combination was enough to make him act against his own rule. Or at least as much as he thought he could get away with at least.”
I know a lot more than I did last time we met. Mostly because after incessant badgering from my best friend and boyfriend I’d finally had a long overdue conversation with her. What he has to say is more insight in that moment than anyone else had been able to give. If the attack was against us, or her.
“…he carried. Past tense. Is he… did he…”
Ugh. I don’t think I really needed to ask. I hadn’t heard names on the news but it’s easy to put the dots together. Like I said.
Conner: There’s no whistle of air displacement. No hum of electricity in the air. Nor a buzz from the phone being way too close to the satellite that is beaming it’s signal. No warning. Nothing. Just one moment the two, Freddie and Cassie, are walking along. Arm in arm. Talking about things most would blow off as some sort flight of fancy or school report. LLeading him down along those back rows of books, in to the large section of study rooms. Used by people who want a public place to tutor or study in groups, that are not so public and distraction filled as Starbucks. When some clumsy doofus steps out from a long line of stacked books, right in to Freddy Freeman. Boy is that Clumsy Doofus sturdy. Very sturdy. And clumsy.
“Oh. Golly. Sorry, Chum, I didn’t see you there,” said with a flick of the expression toward the book in hand. “I should watch where I’m going. It’s so hard. Y’know. Being so absorbed in school projects and reports…”
“…(Gasp!)…. Cassie! Hi there, beautiful. You should have told me you were coming here, we could have car pooled.” Clearly a missed opportunity to save upon World Pollution. Something I’m way worried about as I put the upside down book I’d been holding back upon the nearest shelf, in complete ignorance of books being in some sort of order. “What are the chances? I mean a guy and a gal, from different schools. Dating. Showing up at the Metro-Public Library. At the same time. During school hours. Without any sort of net-working. Happy Coincidence, amIrite?”
“Who’s your friend? Strapping. Young. Good Looking. Friend. Oh, I’m glad you asked. Conner. Conner Luthor. I’m Cassie’s boyfriend. Don’t worry. I’m not the jealous type or anything. It’s good to meet you. Fred, right? Cassie has told me so much about you.” I couldn’t possibly be an octave more monotone than this. Not without finding a way to adapt Black Canary’s vocal control. “Wow. Like. Really. Good to meet you. Mr. Guy-friend-of-my-girlfriend.”
“That I’ve never, ever, seen before.”
Okay. Awkward.
Freddy: I didn’t feel indifferent to the hug that I initiated. I needed it. I needed to feel something real for a moment connected to the world that I knew, both worlds actually. Sometimes you need a beat before you dive back into the chaos that you call life. Chaos that seemed to be spinning faster and faster until it would unleash itself upon the world in terrible ways. I welcomed the moment, the beat, the pause the all-important breath. I also welcomed the fact that I wasn’t alone in this that I could talk to someone about it without receiving a questioning, disappointed or annoyed look. I was grateful for it.
“Yeah. I had no idea that the Wizard’s sanctum was connected here. I knew about the door in the high school, but who knew it could open here, but it makes sense. Library.” And the such, but I was getting ahead of myself. “Think of it like Howl’s Moving Castle or the seen in the Matrix Reloaded with the hallways of doors, but there were no hallways just one door.”
I was about to tell her more about Callaghan who she deduced from the look in her eyes was no longer of the living despite the fact that it could mean that I know carry Achilles, but I didn’t get a chance to do anything as I ran into a what I thought was a wall, but not a wall, but a person. A person that was far more solid than he should be at the size he was. He was rather dense, physically speaking not mentally, but the moment he opened his mouth I thought I might have to reconsider my assessment.
Taking a step back I just watched in some weird blended milkshake of horror, awkwardness and humor as Cassie’s boyfriend introduced himself. Cassie’s boyfriend. She was Wonder Woman then…yeah. This was …wait was this happening? He was Superman, but right at the moment he was…I felt like I was in an episode of Friends no joke. She was Rachel. Her boyfriend was Ross and I was…wait…whoa. Whoa. Whoa!
Compartmentalize. My eyes scanned everything quickly and I caught the fact that the book was upside down. Was he spying on her? Somehow the soundtrack of my life had skipped a track and gone from Obi Wan Kenobi revelations to I don’t know some smash up Ewoks meets Jar Jar Binks.
“Freddy. Freddy Freeman, Mister Luthor.” I offer my freehand to Conner with a good nature smile that would give Clark Kent a run for his money. “Cassandra’s told me a lot about you. It’s nice to finally get to meet you.” There’s no impish grin or indication that I’m doing anything but being earnest in a way that reads Smallville thought Fawcett City is no Smallville, but you had to wonder. Those Midwesterners with their aww schucks charm.
“I just got in today. It was a bit of a surprise actually. Checking out a few local universities in the area. I’ve delayed enrolling long enough. Just getting my ducks in a row before I make any decisions for next fall. Dropped a line to Cassie and she happened to have a free period to meet up at the library. It’s like my third time to City of Tomorrow. Can’t get lost at the library. Don’t tell her mom that I coaxed her out of school. Don’t want to cause any trouble.”
Freddy turned to Cassie. “He’s cuter than you described.”
Cassie: “Can you open it back up again? Was he there? Were you able to get some answers or…”
It’s possible that that was the whole situation. Why else would he have emerged here instead of there? Then maybe it won’t open back up again. Or maybe it just doesn’t work like that at all.
Of all the things I should have seen coming today, this moment is pretty much it. I’d just been in too much of a hurry after that phone call to do anything except get to where Freddy was so that I could help. I hadn’t covered my tracks like when I’d gone to Fawcett, or Central. I’d just gone. Clearly, I’m not any good at this sneaking around on my boyfriend thing. Actually that would be a good point towards my character in any other situation, but right now it’s not so great. It wouldn’t be such a worry, except my boyfriend has x-ray vision. Enhanced senses. An overly developed sense of paranoia and a penchant for being a nosy, snooping spy.
He’s also holding that book upside down. Which looks to be a copy of Crocheting for Dummies. Well…
“I would have Con but I figured you’d be busy with school things. At your own school.”
There’s a warning look that’s being shot at Conner, especially as he carries on his monotone that reads yup, I’m interfering because you’re doing something without me with someone else and I don’t like it and so here I am! A look that says so help me, I will make you suffer in a way only your loving girlfriend actually can. My brain’s spinning through how to actually handle this. I can think of a pretty simple way, actually but I don’t think that simple is best. Or that I’ve got things set up enough that it would be safe. I let the two boys introduce themselves to one another, though Freddy is much more polite about it. Friendly even. And I run with his version of events, because it plays in with my own alibi for being in Fawcett in the first place.
Well done, Freeman. Seriously.
“Freddy is from Fawcett. He showed me around there, so I thought it’d be nice to return the favor here since he was in. I figured you’d think it was boring.”
My mouth pulls to the side in an expression that would have put that displeased gymnast from the Olympics a few years back to shame at Fred’s compliment towards my other half.
“Yes, well. He sure thinks he is. But he’s got his moments.”
Conner: Oh, there are two types of smile for a Luthor. There is the type that says ‘I won, you lost, eat me.’ Then there is the one that says you should sleep with one eye opened. Guess which one I’ve affixed ‘Aww Shucks’ Freeman with? Spoiler Alert: It’s the latter. I’m well schooled in manners though, so I’m aware of the offered hand and how to accept it without reducing every bone in it to some akin to rock salt. All the while maintaining both smile and charm. If by Charm you were you mean a granite statue chiseled in to some sort of approximation of Charm.
“You’re like way Cuter than Cass said you were too,” it’s not hard to hear the unspoken ‘too cute for my tastes,’ that is heavily implied there. “Part of me just wants to scoop you up and eat you like a bowl of ice cream.”
This is followed by a leveled look upon my girlfriend. If I were any more chipper? It would cause a galactic implosion. Extinction. Level. Event.
“Yes. As you should have figured. Since, I’m such a schoolboy. Study study study. All the live long day. It’s hard to know exactly where the Student ends and Conner Luthor socialite begins. It’s a hard life, y’know what I mean Freddy Freeman of Fawcett City. Purveyor of Hamburgers.” There is an ease with which I slide an arm over Freddy’s shoulders and bring him in tight. He’s a hugger right? Let’s pretend I didn’t hear that bit for now. “First trip to Metropolis then? Why didn’t you say that? Who could possibly be a better tour guide than me? My Father built this City.”
“My Car’s out front. I bet the doorman didn’t even have time to park it yet.” We all know the public library doesn’t have doormen, but maybe us Luthor’s really think that. I don’t, but who really knows with the rich elite types. “We can head out. See the sights. Visit all those schools. Cassie and I spent the summer touring ourselves, I’m sure we can hum a few bars and fake a tour. Cassie’s a natural at making things up as she goes along.”
“So. It’s a damn good thing you’re here today of all days, Fred. Surely you’ve seen the news. Man, you never heard about Fawcett City until a couple weeks ago. Now? Hostage situations. Bank robberies. Broiler room access. It’s like… I dunno. Kharma or something. I hope you’re insurance covers ‘Act of God.'”
“Speaking of Kharma being a bitch, do you know what’s really a bitch, Fred. It’s that moment when you realize your girlfriend is about to totally ignore the fact that she knows I’ve been listening to every word you two said, but she was still committed to that bullshit story about University Tours. So either you’re best kept secret my girlfriend has ever had reduced to sandy ashes by heat-vision. Or you’re connected to what’s on the news and she’s trying to save you.”
“So. Let’s start with Wizard’s Sanctum and that Amulet in your pocket. Unless you’re real happy to see my girlfriend. In which case I’m re-visiting the sandy-ashes version of this story.”
Freddy: Now comes the tricky part. It was being blasted all over the news what happened so I could play dumb like I didn’t know. I was completely oblivious to the tragedy that had befallen my home town or I could dive right in to it, but it all depended on what came out of Conner’s mouth though given what I had shared thus far it was probably best to play the oblivious one. It was better for everyone.
Listening as Cassie recounted how they met I offered another smile. “Did she tell you about the burgers? Best burgers on the planet.” I was totally committed to that. It wasn’t until I was pulled in close for a hug that was not a hug after receiving a smile that was anything but a smile. A smile that was akin to the one the wolf gave Little Red Riding Hood before he decided she was going to be nothing but bones and fat after he was done with her.
The entire thing went down a house of cards. It was all over the place and apparently I should have stepped out to call Cassie and then stepped back in to wait for her to arrive, but who knows she’s probably been chipped electronically and mystically.
I could give it my best and try to slip out of his grasp, but the last thing I want to do is cause ruckus instead I turn my head and stare straight into Conner’s eyes. I’ve seen what death looks like several times over. I’ve seen what the god style wrath looks like. If he thinks I’m about to crumble because he wants to shake me down from information then he’s sorely mistaken.
“Billy. Batson. Remember him? If you want to talk Karma let’s talk about the door you opened when the decision was made to remove him from the picture.” Mic drop.
Cassie: Yes, yes. With the rubbing in of how I hadn’t mentioned Freddy to Conner. For perfectly good reason, like how there was entire ruse in place to keep him from noticing I was going to Fawcett in the first place, followed by telling Freddy to stay the heck away from the NOWHERE MindWhammySquad, and continuously referencing the things that ‘I’ had done at the bank, not a ‘we.’ All to keep Conner Luthor from knowing that this guy existed for what was actually a perfectly innocent reason. Well. Innocent as far as our relationship goes. Not so much when you take into account his job. No. Not the Superman one. No one’s meant to know that Superman used to be Superboy, and they’re definitely not supposed to know that he’s on the government’s payroll. It’s not like it’s public knowledge that the President For Life’s son is … well. What he is.
Then Freddy mentions the burgers, and the force that my palm smacks against my forehead, and the resulting sigh, is audible. Oh. Great.
We’re already had a fight about/around Fawcett. I’d prefer to avoid another and yet. Here we are. Awkward is right. And schoolboy charm is giving way to the fact that my darling boyfriend is clearly going to make this a fight. We don’t need that. At all. My expression gets even more visibly displeased at the comment of my making things up as I go. Calling me out on my lie, the story we were spinning, and then giving away the secrets that I was trying to keep on his behalf. Fine.Fine. Since no one’s in here to see me, that doesn’t already know, I close the distance between the two of them and myself with an abrupt whoosh of air, jabbing my index finger right into the middle of Conner’s prep-school tie.
“You. Stop. I wasn’t going to blab your secrets, but if that’s how we’re playing it. Freddy? I’d like you to meet Superman, who I promise is ordinarily at least a little more charming when he’s not playing jealous boyfriend.”
In hindsight? I see the dots he connected. See. I’m good at those dots. I just don’t have the same frame of mind as Conner to put together how I snuck off to Fawcett, then didn’t leave with him when he arrived. With Freddy, who was the reason, just not the reason he’s clearly thinking. Again. I should have. But it’s just not the tack my mind takes.
“Superman. This is Freddy Freeman. Who helped Wonder Woman in Fawcett, and frankly saved my ass from getting a lot more than just a little light chomping. Yes, I was trying to save him.”
Then the finger swings to Freddy. They’re both taller than me, but that doesn’t mean I’m not fully capable of drawing myself up to an indignant height that makes me look like I”m looming. I learned from Helena Sandsmark. She does it all the time. I’m just not quite as furious looking at the blonde. He doesn’t entirely know what he’s doing.
“And you. You need to stop, too. It’s not entirely what you think it was, and if I’m going to manage to stop what happened to Billy Batson from ever happening again I need this? Right here? To stop.”
Conner: There’s a small part of me that cringes over the topic of Billy Batson. Another part of me that is worried that I’m cringing over it being brought up. Not over it actually happening. Because the reality is? I’m not remotely guilty about the whole thing. There are other things I’ve done that I’m aware I should feel some guilt over. Even if I don’t actually think I do feel guilty, I know I should. But when it comes to this topic? The truth, really, does set me free.
“He was out of control. Really. Out of control. It was him or a chunk of the entire city. I made the right choice, Hamburger Boy. Kinda questioning you though. Being here. Safe in Metro. While such a tragedy plays out on the News. What a Marvel of Heroism, huh?”
Well we’ve accelerated well beyond calling one another cute haven’t we? It isn’t difficult to connect the dots. To see how Freddy is connected to Cassie being in Fawcett City. Which means that he is also somehow connected to the Crocodile Men that she called me to have picked up. Cassie randomly goes to Fawcett City and suddenly bad things are happening? Now this guy is here? It is real hard for me not to wonder what excuse Cassie was going to make up, to tell me why she needed to ferry Mr. Freeman off to her pals in the underground resistance. Probably a ‘Tour’ of the Gotham University.
The problem I’ve got right now? Surprisingly has nothing to do with Freddy, per say. Nor him being handsie with Cass. Nor him being the person who introduced her to the Hamburgers of infamy. In fact it bothers me that this is all tied together, somehow and it is making me a little angrier by the moment that she’s not coming clean about all of this. If this ‘resistance’ of her’s is so important, why can’t she talk to me about it? I tell her everything. Even about the Harlots that try to seduce me on rooftops. Why is she hiding this pretty boy from me? And what in the name of Great Caesar’s Ghost is a Wizard’s Sanctum.
The only thing that keeps me from questioning all of this even more? Is Cassie getting affronted. As with the other thing? I normally understand, at the very least, why she’s getting pissy. This time I’m a little lost as to why she has even a morsel of claim to being mad. I’m not the one who has lied. Not the one sneaking around. Not the one keeping secrets. I haven’t been intentionally working in opposition to Her. I’m not sure I’ve ever got to say this in my entire, albeit short, life. For once I’m innocent on all charges.
Well. All but that jealous, possessive boyfriend stuff. My turn for the ‘Aww Shucks’ smile. “I’m not exactly the one keeping secrets, Cass. But, don’t worry. I’m not even planning to try to hurt you, Fred. Unless you tell me that you’re somehow behind that Fawcett City melt down. In which case all bets are off.”
Freddy: “What exactly do you think Billy Batson was going to do?” I look at them both. “Did you talk to him? Did you say a word or did you lead with your fist. Did you go in with the objective to put him down or attempt to reason with him? Did you go in with the intentions to aid or suppress?” I turn from Conner to Cassie. “The reason I am on this path is because the Champion before me died. There was no one left to stand between Black Adam. No one to prevent the death of gods. No one to recognize events for what they were to project mortals from magic and magic from mortals. Just control people thinking they can control things just like Adam did.” I explain.
“Someone tell me what it was, because what I know is that I stand here because the previous Champion was felled before he had a chance to try. Perhaps he was rash. Perhaps he thought might was better. Perhaps he saw what I saw and had no one to turn to to talk to instead he was attacked. ” I didn’t throw my hands up but I let my head fall back for a second.
“You’re the second person who’s insinuated that I’ve caused some great harm to people and I get it. I know things you don’t, but your first act is to intimidate me instead of asking me without veiled threats and “Luthor Charm.” ” And it’s not said in the kindest light at all. “The reason I am here is because a hero a real hero recognized his mistake and tried to make it right and it cost him his life. He died saving me and projecting the world for now.” My eyes shut for a moment just a moment as I compartmentalize again.
Don’t get angry Freddy. Anger is the path that…you saw what happened. Taking a deep breath I take a step back from them.
“Seeing how you heard a portion of what I said I will go over the rest. ” Freddy looked to Cassie and gave her the slightest of nods.
“Zeus prevented Isis from retrieving the portion of Osiris essence. What happened to Isis I can’t say. No one has seen her. She could be licking her wounds, but she’s not gone. She’s alive and she’s coming for what she wants. What she needs to restore Osiris. You spoke of rules, there are rules, but they’ve broken. I took Callaghan into my confidence as best I could as he took me into his. Because of him I was able to access memories of who Black Adam was before he was the Champion. During and after he fell. ” It was a lot to take in but that was neither here or there.
“Isis is Adam’s with and the wife of Osiris. It’s difficult to explain, because there wasn’t enough time. I went to the Sanctum in search of the Wizard to learn what he knew. He has been uncharacteristically quiet, but when I arrived Adam was there and he was everything I lived and more. The Sanctum looked like it had been ransacked. Someone was researching Osiris, Hades and other elements connected with death. ” I try to parse it out as best I could.
“Adam wanted me to relinquish what I had. It might save me from his wrath not to give to Isis, but I suspect to take on himself. Either to lure her out or be strong enough to face her and make her release his wife. It’s working theory. Adam was restored. Somehow his wife came back to him. How I don’t know, but she was distraught over what had been done to their people and Adam is not one for puppies, kittens and rainbows. He’s Old Testament through and through. If he believed in God like God God he would definitely be down for the smiting everyone and that’s what he intended to do, but he wanted to empower his Isis with the essence of Isis. My theory is Isis overwhelmed her, because Isis tends to be single minded . Osiris. Not Adam’s son, but the god. He must be free. He must walk the earth again and that takes power. Lots of it. She’s killed a Titan for it and suspect she may have done the same to your half brother Cassie. Adam wants to stop her, but for that to happen he has to have enough power to put her down without killing her, because to kill her is to kill his wife and he won’t do that. He loves her too much.”
That’s the working theory at least.
I hadn’t gotten to the explosion yet. It was a lot to digest.
Cassie: There’s a whole lot of things that could be said in response to the words being slung around. I know I’ve handled the whole thing poorly, but the fact of the matter was I didn’t have time to plan. To set this up better. To text Conner on my way to say something like, hey. I’ve got some world saving business can you maybe look the other way? Maybe that would have bubbled over catastrophically, too, and I definitely don’t want him connecting me using that line to stepping around on him. Which I wouldn’t ever do anyway. For someone who knows (and will tell you, just ask him) that he’s so superior to everyone else in every way imaginable, and just a couple days ago was telling me that the keeping an eye on me wasn’t because of jealousy… Ugh. Just. Ugh. I settle for pinching the bridge of my nose between thumb and forefingers hard enough that it’s a good thing I’m as durable as I am strong.
I don’t exactly think I’ve gotten to see Conner jealous before. He seems a lot more affronted than just that, however. And he looks like he’s only building up to a bigger head of steam.
“And I would love it if I didn’t have to.”
Because I hate this. I told Timothy Drake up front, when he asked me to keep Conner out of Gotham, that I didn’t want to keep secrets from Conner. If he doesn’t trust me then we’ve got a giant problem. Keeping secrets that aren’t mine to tell? Is one thing. This has all steadily evolved into something else entirely. I’m silently thankful for Freddy at least collecting himself and muscling on through the story. Sharing his ‘notes’ as it were, as had been the intention in the first place. I have to struggle to focus on that. The pieces of information. Instead of continuing to let my mind race and my frustration build. It’s already turning into a churning feeling in my stomach as it is.
“If Goddess Isis is riding driver’s seat of Isis, Adam’s wife then it makes even more sense why all the lightning. There’s rules in place. Zeus’ rules. So if he thinks she’s flaunting them.. you were there for the fallout of that. My half-brother?”
There’s a moment of puzzlement before a bulb clicks on. I’m still not used to thinking of myself as having siblings of any sort. Half or otherwise.
“…strength of Hercules.”
He’s not imbued with power like Freddy, not in the same way I assume because he was able to share it through the trials himself if I understood all I’d been told by either Freddy or Tim correctly. It was his divine birthright. Just like my powers were, even though they were kept from me by my mother until I turned sixteen.
“So if she tracked down any other demi-gods she would only get progressively more powerful. In addition to whatever trials she hijacks and steals. Can anyone do them? Or it is like… a limited entrant sort of affair. She must be technically within the rules to some degree or I’d think he. Zeus. Would just end it alogether.”
Conner: The way I cant my head is a telling sign that I’m not going to ‘Eye Laser’ Freddy right now. Although that is certainly not off the table long term, it’s certainly not a short term goal. With my arm around him, it would get my shirt dirty. Which, yeah, is actually a much bigger consideration than it probably should be in the measuring someone’s worthiness for Life or Death. But let’s face it, Freddy has a lot of bad juju going for him right now in my eyes. Not all of which is actually his fault and though I’m not one to split hairs, I do think he’s entitled to a little discussion before sentence is passed.
The two of them and this entire sharing of information? Probably should be soothing. But it isn’t. Because the questions I want answered aren’t really being discussed. Honestly, I can see why Cassie would keep me out of the loop on her aiding the Resistance. It makes sense. I’m too connected. Even under the them of the people she’s resisting. What I don’t get, is why she isn’t cluing me in to the broad strokes. Letting me in on the ruse, so that I can apply why she calls the ‘Luthor Genes’ to being subversive. That’s a skill set that I have in spades. That keeps bringing me back to Freddy Freeman here and his hug of my barely dressed girlfriend. He’s offered an answer to what I’d asked, if not to what I was actually seeking, so I feel like I sort of owe a quid pro quo…
“Whatever happened with your ‘Predecessor’, to get him in to the state he was when I first saw him? I don’t have a clue. Frankly, I’m sure you’re not going to want to hear it? I didn’t care at the time what was causing him to lose control. I was tasked with shutting it down. Needs of the Many, Outweigh the Needs of the Few. It was him or me, I picked me. I almost always pick me. Except when the choice is Her.”
The yarn he spins is not one I’ve got any real ideals about. Though I might seem to be a Bone Head, I’m actually not. These two just happen to be talking about a whole bunch of stuff that I have little basis for knowledge on. “Wow. Nerd-speak and me without my Wayne Corp Translator Droid. Just to be clear. Are you saying that Black Adam was in Fawcett City? The Black Adam? Like the Protector, slash Uncontested Ruler of Khandaq, Black Adam?”
“Raven says he is a dick. She’s who my ‘Boss’ sent to deal with him the last time he was in town. Over in New Troy. He dug up a half-mile trench of sewer system, before she managed to teleport him away from the City.” Hey, I’m not sure what she did. I just know she called it ‘Banishing’ like the guy was some sort of Demon from one of those Supernatural shows I like to watch with Momma Sandsmark. “Hey. I’ve heard of that too. The thing where one God can get the power of another God. There’s a N.O.W.H.E.R.E. open case on something like that.”
“I’ve mentioned it before. Y’know. When I was explaining why I’m not Jealous, so much as Protective. Do you ever have those moments, Frederick, where you don’t think anyone really listens to you?”
Freddy: Standing there I watch as two and half different conversations taking place and I wasn’t sure if I should participate or become a spectator. My eyes shut for a moment while I let both Cassie and Conner’s words rush over me. I understood the problems we were facing on my side of things. However, we there was another storm that was brewing that wasn’t going to halt anytime soon.
There were many things that I could speak about, but I wanted to stay on point, and that was going to happen as long we kept all of the air in the room some of it needed to be let out. So, I did just that I let a loud audible stream of air that both of them would have to take notice off while I looked between the brewing Conner versus Cassie event that was started to reach critical mass.
“This isn’t going to work. Not at all.” I said finally upon opening eyes and I don’t cower or look at my feet. I state simple and true.
“This going to end in a disaster. There’s a wall we’re headed towards and it’s going to end badly for all parties that are and are not involved if doesn’t get fixed. I would say table it, but I’m thinking that it’s been tabled to long.”
I can shrug it off and rush off to who knows where and do who knows what and I’m sure there are reasons on top of reasons why things are the way they are, but right now there needs to either be a détente or reckoning and I would prefer the later right now, because I don’t have time to be looking over my shoulder.
“So right now Clash of the Titans aside just talk. Say something, because I’m not going to quarterback this out there. Trust is fracturing and damn it I need that more than anything else right now. Trust in me. Trust in you and right now the trust between the two people who should have the most trust of all right now if I’m listening to seems like it’s surpassed frayed beyond the edges.” Did I know ever know and yes I could stay on point push through, but I can’t.
“I’ll be damned if I watch History repeat itself right before my eyes.” Right now Conner is little Baby Black Adam not in the making he’s there. Cassie is his wife Isis. It doesn’t take a wise man to know what would happen if something happened to her.
“See past the anger. Look past the rage. Face the fear. You are both afraid of losing one another…” Not to me. That is well established. “…to the roles you have chosen to play. The moment you turn away from one another is the moment you lose each other and if you lose one another things happen. Terrible things. Things that you might not be able to take back. Cassie you are Wonder Woman. Capable of great and amazing things and it has nothing to do with the fact that you can fly, take a punch and give better than 10 Tysons in his prime. However, all of that is outshined by your spirit and your effort to do the right thing. You are more radiant than the brightest star and your compassion no knows end from what I can tell. You could stand alone, but you choose not to.”
I look at Conner and smile. “Conner, you’re opinionated. Without a doubt an arrogant ass with a superiority complex. My might is right and fuck everyone else is how you live your life, but you save people. You protect the world. I haven’t seen you close up until now so I don’t have the all the insight, but I’ve seen what you do. You are the ends justify the means. Good or bad. Right or wrong. Doesn’t matter what they say, it matters what you say. I’m not going to pretend to know it all I don’t, but I know this. You love her and right now you’re terrified in so many ways. Terrified that I’m going to get her hurt possibly more. Terrified that you won’t be able to do what you’re known for saving people. Fuck the world if you can’t save the person you care about the most…fuck the world.” Not what good is he no fuck the world. In the game of chess he is King and Knight all in one and he will wreck the board if he has to.
“Get it out. I could be 100 percent wrong, but this has to stop. I’m not saying he’s wrong, she’s right, but fear is driving you both. Fear of the truth. Fear of the possibility and sooner or later that fear can be used against you. Fear makes us do terrible things, reckless things. Conner doesn’t trust me. He doesn’t know me, but he trusts you Cassie. He knows you. Don’t box him out. If he can’t trust you then he’s the last thing he would probably want to admit.” Alone and another person’s chess piece to be maneuvered and positioned as they see fit and neither of them want that. This isn’t want it is.
“Conner, you’re going to have to decide where you stand. You know it. Sneer, grind me into dust zap me into ash, but we all know it’s true. Just enough rope will be supplied until one of two things will happen for everyone involved. If it didn’t matter you wouldn’t be so scared right now. Scared that each step she takes is away from you and what you can offer.”
Figure it out.
“Isis has been at this a lot longer than any of us and if we’re going to stop her and deal with Adam then we can’t give them a quarter.” Adam’s raw power in her path. Isis goddess of life and magic can fuck with you in unimaginable ways. “Just as you are right now wanting answers. Isis is out there gathering what power she can to get what she wants and we’re that line that’s going to stand in her way. Shit show doesn’t even begin to explain what she’s going to throw our way.”
Order swung hard for years, decades now. Play by the rules. Chaos has been fueled and even Zeus knows that it must have its due.
“So, before I say one more thing about what happened and why the city I love is experiencing one of the if not the most horrible tragedy its ever faced. Fix this.” Can we please have one fractured couple on the field at a time please?
Cassie: Ugh. Conner’s addressing Freddy, but you can practically hear what he’s really saying. That he feels like I’m not listening. It takes about all of my willpower to not fire back with my own along the lines of ‘Yeah, Freddy, that is a funny feeling. Do you know what it’s like when someone listens to your opinions and then does what he wants anyway?’ Actually, it’s not so much willpower that stops me, I mean. My mouth’s partway open to return fire, when my new friend interjects. Wait. What? This isn’t going to work? What part of this isn’t going to work? Is he saying that he doesn’t want to help or accept help anymore? The open mouth then is about to start stammering out questions and assurances, until what he’s actually saying clicks.
He doesn’t mean Fawcett, and Isis and Adam and all the rest. He’s talking about my boyfriend and I squabbling and the entire mess of this little meet and greet. People fight. I mean, I have to assume it’s pretty common for a pair of teenagers who are learning who and what they are to step on each others’ toes more than once and to get into arguments accordingly. Except we’re not just Cassie and Conner, we’re Superman and Wonder Woman and we’re supposed to be doing something else. I know I’m sure not good enough at compartmentalizing to totally shut one off from the other, and I’m pretty much just as sure Conner’s not either.
Being called out and scolded is one thing, and no one likes that. But the reason I drop my eyes and my cheeks flare into an almost immediate and ashamed shade of pink has a lot more to do with the fact that he’s right. Wisdom of Damn Solomon. In one little diatribe, that I sure don’t interrupt once my mouth has closed again, he’s summed up what he knows of me from the three times we’ve met. Probably a lot more nice things that I would have ever said about me, or in those words but he’s still not wrong. I can feel the truth in them, or at least his belief that they’re true.
His summation of Conner, who he’s only met once but I spoke of at length (in much more positive notes than this conversation would have you believe), is uncannily spot on as well. The named qualities might seem like insults but nothing that he actually says is wrong. They’re all things I’ve known to be true about the boy for as long as I’ve known him. All except that last part. He’s the one that pushed me into this. All of this. The superheroing. The training. I know that NOWHERE’s involvement in my life was unavoidable, because I’m too powerful as a loose canon, and he’d tempered it. But he also taught me what it was. Set my back against everything they stood for before I even realized I could run faster than your average blonde. Conner thought he was doing what I wanted, by shoving me out into the great hero spotlight so why would he be scared about me embracing it?
Because you’re doing it without him, dumb dumb. And he knows it.
“…you’re. Right. I’m sorry.”
What is he right about, and which he am I speaking to? Jeez, it could be either and/or both of them right now. I’m just going to leave that up for interpretation by either party but frankly…what a week. I don’t think I’ve apologized to Conner twice in six months before, let alone twice in a week. Being sorry would require us really spending much time having conversations that those fit into. There’s an awkward moment where I’m folding my arms defensively across my chest. Then more protectively lower, across my half exposed stomach, before forcing myself to drop my arms to my sides though the clenched fists I don’t entirely manage to get rid of.
Seriously though. How did this guy get all that from not even a handful of conversation and some bickering? Superpowers. Or maybe he’s just a good read and the two of us are open books. Some of it I’d known. Some things I hadn’t but if he was right about part, he’ probably right about all. And if I’ve been making Conner feel scared or anxious? Well. I feel just about as awful right now as I did when Tim Drake guilt tripped me about not talking to my Mother when he doesn’t have his parents anymore. Any of them. Probably worse, actually, because this is Conner. And apparently there’s more we need to talk about than I even could have guessed. Open forum presented for us or not, there’s a lot that should probably be for his ears only. But I think I can sum up the most pertinent concerns in a way that could…hopefully let us move on.
Blue eyes come up, with lips pursed, to my boyfriend’s face before I suck in a breath like I’m not sure if I really want to say like I’m about to say and I’m bracing, then it’s exhaled in a loud sigh before I continue.
“I don’t want to sneak around on you and keep secrets, but I’m only doing this…” there’s a vague gesture of my hand to the group of us, but it’s meant more to imply everything. Fawcett. The other trips he doesn’t know all about. “… without you until I’ve got things right to do it with you.”
That was vague. More vague than I really meant it to be.
“Because I don’t know that we’re not on different sides of this war that’s setting up.”
And that was probably said in more of a doubting light than I really meant it. I know Conner wouldn’t act against me directly. But I also know that he’ll do whatever he thinks he has to do to keep me safe. Up to and including coercing me away from what I think is right, in order to keep NOWHERE and his father from using my mother, or him, or any number of things against me.
Conner: There are a lot of things in life that I don’t do well. Like being humble. When you literally have it all, it is very difficult to be humble. I can leap small buildings, I’m stronger than a locomotive, and I’m faster than a speeding bullet. That’s just my kryptonian side. My human side is born from an Evil Genius, who has more money than most entire countries. I’ve got it all, with a side of Tactile Telekinesis. It’s easier to be full of myself, than it is to be humble and I’ve never had a reason to doubt myself.
Another thing I don’t do well, is criticism. I stand there, arm around Freddy’s shoulder, as he dresses me down. Doing so with a set to my jaw that says I’m digging in with every word. Solomon doesn’t have to clue the guy in, I’m not buying in to some stranger telling us our problems. When you also add in that this is a stranger, who somehow knew about what happened with the one thing in life, that I feel a small shred of guilt about? There is a level of willpower being invested, for Cassie’s sake, in my not shutting his pretty mouth. Yeah. I’m also not exactly Boyscout that talks out their problems, I’m more of that Mike Tyson type that punches out their problems. Sorry, I can’t help it.
What most people don’t know about me, though? I wasn’t raised, I was grown in a test tube. Over time the tube got bigger, but I existed in a tube for two years before I met Cassie. During that time I was ‘raised’ in a Virtual Reality Simulation. The VRS was a comprehensive dream-like state that accessed deep rooted genetic memories from my two genetic donors. My ‘Parents,’ the Kryptonian Superman and the Human Lex Luthor. My virtual childhood was a mish-mash of Smallville, Kansas. That then became a teenage time at ‘Prep-School.’ By the time I was the ripe old age of Virtual 10, I had become to fully materialize my powers. One of which allowed me to begin to disassemble the world around me. Giving me the insight of my world being one construct inside another. This created a disconnected. One that gave me the ability to test the people who were ‘training me.’ I could act against my upbringing to test how I would be rewarded or punished.
Whenever I set a fire? The world reset. If I beat up the bully, instead of turning the other cheek? The world reset. If I killed the bully? I got a lecture from Pa Kent and then the world reset. When I raped a girl? The world reset. When I stole a car? The world reset. When I stole -all- of the Cars. The world reset. Over and over, I did whatever I wanted and learned, time and time again that there were no consequences for someone like me. Because who the fuck can stop me? For all of her Power? Cassie can’t. Freddy is on his way to being the Champion of the World. Can he stop me? No. Not a chance. Could they team up and stop me? They might last a few more minutes, but the result would be the same. There are no consequences in this world for me or people like me.
And then. I met Cassie Sandsmark. Who I showed my disregard for consequences on the first day. She in turn taught me something new. Something unique to this world, unlike the virtual reality one. I can’t just do whatever I want and get the reset until I get the results I want. She denied me. Time and time again. Over and over and over… until -I- did what she wanted. It was the first consequence I’d ever known. Over the last two years, I’ve learned that this world, this real world, will tell me no. It won’t reset. Things can go wrong. I can’t rely on the reset to fix them. And the truth is? I wouldn’t care. If it weren’t for the fact that the one thing I want? Seems to be categorically against bending to my every desire, at all times. She has her own plans, her own agenda.
In the last year, I’ve started to understand that I can still have what I want. There’s just a level of effort to be made. All the things I want aren’t necessarily given to me. I need to earn some of them. Unfortunately, just as I’ve learned that lesson. Just as I feel like I’ve started to get a sense of how this world works? The one thing I actually want, seems to be going in a different direction. We seem to be travelling on opposite paths. Honestly, I’m still considering popping Freddy’s head off of his shoulders when Cassie speaks. But. I’m actually listening. I’ve heard what he said. Some of it makes sense. Some of it makes more sense. A lot of it makes me want to ask if all they did was eat a burger, because this guy knows too much. In the end, only one thing is important.
“Stop,” the way I lift a hand to cut Cassie off is imperious and might leave them both thinking that I’m about to revert to standard Luthor-type, but then; “The only side that I’m on is your’s, Cass. I have my own thoughts, I distinctly have my own opinions. But. There is only ever one side. If there’s a ‘War Coming,’ then I’ll be on her side. Every. Single. Time. I’ll pick her side.”
“You’re right though, Cass. I’m not sure if we’re of the same mind on the politics of the world. I know you don’t like who I work for. Truth be told, I don’t like them either. I’m all too aware that if I don’t do what they want? They can’t punish me directly. So they’ll punish Cassie. I’m also aware, that if I go too far in to the opposition, that the person who made me can always make another me.” Finally unlacing my arm from around Freddy’s shoulders and letting him for from the impending threat that my closeness intimated, in order to take a step away and form a triangle between the three of us. “What you don’t know Mr. Freeman. Is that I’m only allowed to have Cassie, because they needed me to have a weakness. All the other kryptonian defects were bread out of me.”
“That puts me in a particularly precarious position. I have to protect her. Even if that means working in opposition to her Gotham Underground.”
Freddy: I wasn’t here to lecture. I was here because the door opened here. I was here because the door opened here. The door could have opened to any place the Wizard connected his sanctum to, but it opened here. Was it me or did it know through some compulsion I was unaware of. Some hand of fate that knew that this is where I needed to be. The only place that I could be.
I let that play through my mind as Cassie speaks and then Conner. I digest the words, but the thing is I am largely irrelevant. I’m a bit player in this tapestry that they’ve woven together. Just one strand of a larger design, but then again perhaps I am connected. I can ponder that another day. However, I have to use the tools that have been provide to me the best way I can the only way I know through talking Not ever battle fought is done with fists. Sometimes it’s done with words.
This has little to do with the truth setting anyone free and more about forging the trust that’s going to be required to get through all of this. I can feel Conner’s hold on me shifting until I’m released and we’re standing across from one another three equal points.
“Alright. You two have a lot more to discuss, but what I can offer is this. You’re not alone, Conner. You don’t have to look out for me if you don’t want to, but I will look out for you and Cassie and anyone else that needs it. Not because it’s what I’m supposed to do. Not because I have to do it or need to do it, but because I want to do it. I don’t know everything, but I do know when someone needs that hand up. When they need someone to back them up. I can’t tell you to trust me I have to show you and if that‘s what it takes then that’s what it takes.”
It’s who I am. It’s who I need to be. It’s who I want to be. “You’re part of this Conner. You’re a part of this world. Everyone needs protecting, but she is not a weakness any more than you are a weakness. She’s a strength. She’s your true north and nothing they can do will ever change that. If they come for one of us they come for all of us. I want to be your friend. Believe it or not I don’t have many that can understand what I’m going through. I need more. I want more. Let me be your friend. Better yet let me be your family. Family is more than blood. Family are the people you turn to when you can’t turn to anyone else. Family are the people who go to the wall for you. You were probably told who your family were, but you’ve already shrugged that. Don’t answer today. Let me earn that, but I promise you if you need me I will be there. We’ll figure whatever it is out.” It’s what I could offer.
As for Cassie. “Fair enough?”
Cassie: Conner laying off the buddy-buddy closeness probably ought to be a relief, but there’s always a chance. Because there’s always a chance he’s not moving to seem less menacing, but to be in better position to do something drastic. From the new vantage, slagging Freddy wouldn’t get shmutz on his shirt. I think it’s mostly off the table though, if anything because we would have words about it. More than words. Obliterating a criminal crocodile man that had tried to bite my arm off? I’m still not okay with that, but I’d be well past ‘not okay’ if anything were to happen right now. Or to Freddy at all.
I know Conner would take my side, I didn’t really need to question that. I know in most things he’s going to always have my back, and he frequently does things that at the time seem like the opposite of what I want, and then later turn out to be something I internally thank him for. That’s the instinct in him I have to worry about. Deep down, I’ve got warm and fuzzies at his words, but then the higher thought processes of the brain know that he’s actually just confirming the fear I expressed in different words. The doing things for my own good part means that he has my back, up until he feels the need to relocate my back away from the fight I want to fight, and taking me there kicking and screaming.
“It’s not the same thing, though Con. Because if I have to do something, and you think you have to do something counter to it to protect me, I know you will.”
He’s just said as much. I’m mostly reiterating to cement the point. And to illustrate my problem a little more for Freddy. I’ve been working to assemble pieces on my side, allies and heroes, setting up the board so that I can make a move. Steal some of their pawns for myself, and then make my move. That all sounds impersonal, and it’s not really how I think about it. I just know I can’t actually do what I need to do alone, and so I’m finding like minded people and trying to motivate them towards a common goal.
Most, if not all, of the anger’s gone out of my sails but I still let out a harumph of air as I push a hand through blonde curls.
“Conner. There really isn’t a Gotham Underground. And thank you Freddy. Yes. Fair enough. More than fair. And there’s more people out there like you that just want to help because it’s the right thing. I have to help them because there’s no one else in the …unique position I am to be able to.”
That’s something I suppose I haven’t said out loud before either, really. My eyes drift back towards Conner as I say them. They let him have me as a weakness, but it’s also something that gives me a lot of room to do this thing. And that’s why it has to be me, and now that I’ve seen it? There’s not going to be any backing down from it. Clearing my throat with a slight purse of my lips, I circle back a little.
“But. Yes. That Black Adam. He was in Fawcett before the robbery. I think he’s who introduced the players into it. And he is a giant dick, Raven isn’t wrong. And unreasonably powerful. ”
Pausing, blue eyes drift to Freddy again with a thoughtful tilt of my head.
“Has anyone actually seen Aunty Minerva since the robbery?”
Conner: Freddy seems to be awfully clued in to the world, in general and us specifically. I’m dubious at best over him knowing too much, but as he started to speak I had bought in. Felt comfortable talking about myself, my situation and my choices. It was easy, natural and instinctive. It was also out of character for me. Born of a frustration that stems from exactly what Freddy intuited. His intuition, while spot on, was more than a little bit perturbing. Because once he shifts from that tone of clearing the air, to actually talking about… Helping me. His three musketeers anthem. Each word makes me suspicious. I can’t even help it, I don’t trust people like that. According to my Father, people who offer something for nothing? Are really just after something they haven’t told you yet.
There’s nothing defensive about my posture now. But that’s a deceptive stance, as my hands slip in to my pockets. I’m rarely defensive, because -I- don’t actually understand the concept of being threatened. Literal or figurative threats have mostly just been people spitting in to the wind. It’s never worked with me. Freddy’s insights. Cassie’s comments. I’m not threatened by what they say, so I’ve got nothing to be defensive about. But that doesn’t mean that I’m buying in to a good deal of it. Especially the ‘Ra-Ra’ cheer from Freddy.
Whether I buy in to the hippie crap that the Hamburglar is saying, is up for debate another time. He started -this- portion of the conversation and he did it in a very good way. Better than she or I have been able to do. That leads me to accepting, at least, that this is now a dialogue that I’m not going to be ‘punished’ for later. “You’re right, Cassie. About most of that. I’m always on your side, but I will protect you. Even if that means protecting you from yourself. You’re the one who taught me that. Isn’t that exactly why you keep trying to teach me this ‘Better Way?’ This is one of our problems, Brighteyes. -I- think you keep a running set of these high moral double standards that you hold everyone else too.”
“It’s okay for you to keep secrets. It’s not okay for me to keep secrets. It’s okay for you to ditch me. Not the other way around. It’s perfectly fine for you to run off and go on a date with someone else? But you’re mad at me about trying to save a girl from my ‘Evil Overlords.’ It’s never black and white. You want me to play around these shades of grey all the time, but the rules change every time we talk switch subjects. At the risk of sounding like a petulant child, that’s stamping his foot…
“If you don’t want me doing what I think is best to protect you? Then swallow that spoon full of medicine yourself. Tell me what the hell is going on and let me make up my own Gods damned mind. You’re managing me. It might not be the same as physically dragging you off to the Moon, to save your life. But it’s still making decisions for me. It’s still not letting me make them myself. But… you don’t trust me to make the right ones. Because you also don’t think there is any other right choice but the one you’re making.”
Giving the two of them a slight shrug at the ‘rest of this.’ I don’t know any Aunty Minerva. Black Adam is a known entity to the people I work for, but it’s hard for him not to be. He’s the rare Meta-Human who doesn’t hide from N.O.W.H.E.R.E. because he doesn’t have too. Not only does he have the power to keep most of the Project at bay, but he’s also a recognized sovereign leader of a foreign country. He’s just about as ‘Off Limits’ as you can possibly get. While he’s in his own country, that is.
I haven’t agreed to any of this Circle of Trust stuff, because it’s clear I’m more than a little hurt about some of the topic we’re openly discussing. But I’m able to fix upon the ‘Business Aspect’ of all of this too. “You’re wrong, Cass. There actually is a Gotham Underground. You think you’ve been getting sent all over the country by the tooth fairy? Does the Tooth Fairy have good intel? Where would that intel actually come from? Come on, Beautiful. Your ‘best friend’ was actually a shape-shifting alien from Mars, that can read minds. Do you really think -my- best friend was an accident?”
Tilting my head in the direction of Freddy then, I take a deep breathe. Even by my standards. “Look. You have problems with Black Adam? Fine. You need help? Superman helps those who need it. I’ll help you. And not just because Cassie seems to trust you. I don’t need to trust you. Or her. To know that Black Adam is bad news.”
“You want that Amulet that you’re carrying protected? From him? Give it to me.” Just like that, I offer my hand to Freddy Freeman. “There’s someone here in the City that can keep it safe.”
Freddy: I take in what Cassie says and remember how we came in contact with one another. It wasn’t happenstance. She was there to find me. Someone sent her to connect with me. Thing is that as much as I know there needs to be focus there was a much larger focus to be concerned about, but right now if I can help I would.
It’s never as easy as anyone would like it to be. Life’s not built that way. Life’s messy. It’s ugly and disorganized. It pushes you to the brink and demands more, it demands a lot. Thing is hearing, knowing, seeing and believing are totally different things. Effort has to be made everywhere. Someone has to be willing to stand upon the edge, but again a longer conversation.
Hopefully this puts everyone on the path towards that.
As to Cassie’s statement about Black Adam do I dare say I sympathize on a level. Not excuse. Not explain. Sympathize. I’m not here to plead his case. I’m here to try and figure out how to prevent what I think is going to occur from occurring.
I think if Cassie does meet Black Adam it will be an eye opener. As for Conner I don’t know. He could go anywhere from this is a bad dude to #lifegoals selfie. I don’t know. I have to believe it would be the former.
“No, not a peep. Thing is given who she is when she stepped outside the bank to make the list of demands known no one said anything about her. No recognition.” Zero from what I could tell. Which let on that perhaps something was going on even then. Either way she was off the radar.
If they were back on track to discuss what was happening he needed to tell them. “Adam shared that Hercules strength was acquired and Atlas his heart was devoured. That in itself would break the Trials. To begin them an initiate has to be stand before the gods and judged whether or not they can complete. I doubt that was done. Power was stolen. Not only that Isis is actively working on the mortal plane which I believe is a non-even if she’s possessed a human. It’s less human and more Isis the goddess from what I can tell.” So right there you have a loophole to actively work, but then a breaking of at the trials.
“But the trials remain because…of a technicality. Zeus isn’t going to award Isis when she doesn’t play by the rules nor is he going to award me because I have technically not completed the trials.” I suck my teeth trying to weave it together some.
“Isis can’t afford a stalemate. She’s going to force his hand. Adam said she has her own power everything else is just juice for her to use, but for what. To restore Osiris? Perhaps, but to what degree. Life, death there has to be a balance. That much life has to be balanced by that much death to restore and to do whatever else she wants. I didn’t have a chance to look over the books, but it’s in there somewhere.” I explain
Once the power is gone it’s gone. It doesn’t come back.
“I didn’t get much more from Adam after that, because the Boiler Room was under siege by Crocodile Men and women some of them were high school students. Others were policemen. They could have been there for me, but I don’t even know if they knew I was there. I think they were there for Adam. Under orders from Isis. Could have been a clean-up crew, but these weren’t fake Tommy gun holding guys. They were even more vicious. They were wild ready to do death rolls with anyone that got in their way, but Adam marched out and tore through them like a lawnmower through grass. He didn’t just knock them down. He tore them apart one after the another. Bones shattering, flesh ripping, bodies torn in half.”
I could feel the blood draining away from my face. “I could hear it before I saw it and when I saw it that’s when I saw it that’s when I realized that these Croc People were students and probably teachers. Their clothing was hanging off them. There had been gun fire, because the FCPD arrived. Callaghan. He tracked me down, because he believed I was connected but he thought I was the one doing this. He realized he was wrong, but it was too late. All he could do was push me back and make sure none of the crocs could get me. His own men and women had been turned and that’s when I saw the responsible party. Sobek. With one slash he can turn someone into a crocperson. I watched Callaghan change before my eyes, but instead of lunging at me he shut the door.”
Sighing I don’t stop. “That Boiler Room melt down was Adam putting an end to it.” End justify the means. “When I opened the door I was here.” Here again. I could have been brought anywhere. The Sanctum is connected to places all over the world. I have to believe it brought me here for a reason.
“Not just Adam, but from Isis from both of them. Hell all of them.” Considering how screwed up this was. I made an impassioned plea for trust and now I was being asked to hand over the amulet. I hold my reflexes in check, because they’ll do me great disservice if I look at Cassie to get a nod of approval. That would shatter everything I just said.
Sliding my hand into my pocket I remove the amulet from it. Callaghan died to get this to me. He believed I would know what to do about it. Part of me wants to hold onto it to see if there was someone I could talk with Osiris. Is that a possibility without having him possess me? I could consult Solomon, but right now I press the amulet into Conner’s hand.
If this is going to work. If there is going to start somewhere it has to start here.
“We have to keep this out of play as long as we can. When this is over I’m going to want this back so it can be dealt with properly. Thank you, Superman.”
Cassie: No. It’s not okay for me to keep secrets, while he’s not allowed to. Just like it’s not actually okay for him to be murdering people while I’m not. Murder is still murder. Dishonesty is still dishonesty. Whether it’s against a CrocodileMoster that tried to disarm your girlfriend, or to keep your boyfriend from doing something you don’t want to do. It’s not that I don’t understand the disconnect here. I actually do. I feel awful for the secrets and the sneaking. I told Tim up front that I had a problem with it. I was just doing it anyway, managing the situation as best I could, because I needed to. I’m not sure that Conner would feel bad either way. He didn’t feel bad for the Crocodile in Fawcett. He was completely upfront about it, too. Wouldn’t apologize because he wasn’t sorry. And would have made the same choice over, and over if it were presented to him. Motivations don’t change an act being right or wrong. Conner just doens’t look at things the same way, and I’ve known that all along.
He’s also vastly oversimplifying everything that he’s just used as his examples but I’m not actually going to engage, or re-engage, in the argument right now. Because I don’t want to ramp it up again, but also because… this is exactly what he’d been building his indignation up towards earlier I think. That he thinks I keep changing the rules without letting him know I am. And that unlike in his VR childhood, he doesn’t get a do-over to get it right once I have. No take backsies. So how to break this down yet again to something simple…and hopefully inarguable…
“It’s not that, Conner. I trust you to be on my side, and I actually trust you more to make the good choices now than I did before. But I also know that you work with mind readers that I don’t trust at all, and I am not entirely sure how solid your mental Fortress of Solitude is.”
Or if it just basically consists of constantly projecting awful and lewd things so that the rest of his ‘team’ does their best to shut him out. Knowing him that’s a great strategy. Unless they have to look for something because. Say. Wonder Woman just trounced one of NOWHERE’s agents with Batman in Central City and they need to find out if he knows what I’m up to.
“…and she is not my best friend, and all of that was by attrition and you damn well know it.”
The two most likely to be labeled best friend for me are, well. Him. Or his best friend. Definitely not any of the girls I know from school, and double definitely not M’gan/Kelsey. Maybe if I met her in different circumstances, or she hadn’t gotten the impression that high school should be like Gossip Girl and she spent a solid year bullying the bejeezus out of me. That one I think drank the Koolaid without realizing what it was. And as for Raven. Well. Raven I can’t say the same for. Still. I’m squinting at Conner for a moment. Not because of his manipulations at getting a well connected ‘best friend.’ But because I don’t actually know if Tim told Conner his secret or not. It would make my life a lot easier, and all of this easier to talk about with him if he had.
So I go the route that was public. The world saw Wonder Woman out with Batman in Central City. Obviously we were working together, because the Bat was outside of Gotham, which meant something brought us there together.
“No Tooth Fairy. Just from Batman. And so far his intell seems to be pretty spot on.”
I end up folding my arms across my chest again, but not because I’m on guard from more verbal sparring with my boyfriend. Freddy’s finally telling the story of what landed him here in Metropolis today, and I’m listening with rapt attention because I need to know. Anything and everything to understand what’s going on, and to piece it all together. My expression goes pretty quickly from attentive to ill and distressed.
“…oh, Freddy…”
It’s barely above a whisper. I felt awful from hearing the news, and the truth is so much worse. Having the men from the bank be people that were at least crooks to begin with had softened their situation a little. These were kids. Innocent people that were used, and then torn apart without a care in the world because it was convenient or useful for an opposing set of Gods and Monsters. My shoulders shift quickly, partly shaking myself back into the present and partly out of a shudder of disgust.
“With all that lightning… do you think it’s possible she’s dead? That Isis is possessing someone else now? Did Adam say what he wanted in the Sanctum?”
I’m more than a little shocked that Conner offers to take the amulet. A degree of extra shocked past that when Freddy actually does it. I assume he means to give it to my Mother, actually, but I’m not going to question or clarify. It’s a display of attempted trust and I’m not going to ruin it on accident.
“It’s not the only one. There’s more of them. Like. Tons of them. Supposedly they’ve all got protectors in place but…”
So did this one. Freddy just wasn’t ready, and Billy was dead. And it means it’s only a matter of time if we let this drag out.
Conner: So. She trusts me, but not the people I work with. I can actually see that point, accept it as valid and even to a point agree with it. But. “Babe, listen to yourself. You don’t trust the people I work with. But at least -I- trusted you enough to let you know them and make that choice not to trust them. Again. You don’t even trust me to make that choice. So you make it -for- me. You want me to buy in to a War, for the side that I don’t even know. With not a single person I have a single reason to trust. Except … your side has a secret ninja meta-human that attacked me while I was trying to help her.”
“Yeah. Your friends sound loads better.” That scowl tells the story of my sarcasm, but… “I’m not trying to prolong our … disagreement… I just don’t think you -see- how unfair you’re treating me. And I’m the jerk in this relationship. You’re totally stealing my thunder.”
It’s probably best to leave the discussion about M’Gann alone for now. We’re getting a little deep in to other people’s business. Giving away details that might get us both in trouble. Or get Freddy mind-wiped. So I’m choosing, with a shrug of the broad shoulders, to accept her point. Look there? Turning the other cheek from one thing, to the other. Freddy’s ‘story’ is more like a nightmare. Not for the first time, am I more than a little okay with the fact that stuff like this doesn’t make me cringe quite like it makes Cassie’s shoulders hunch up.
“Gods can’t die,” I seem awfully firm on this subject. “There are states they can be taken to that are ‘good as death,’ but they don’t die. Not in any conventional way. Captured? Taken Prisoner? Sure. Tortured. Tormented. Even vivisected. Can do. Sent away. Teleported in to space. Shot in to the sun? Even banished to other dimensions or having their astral essence separated from their corporeal form? Doable. But they’re a lot like the Universe’s cockroaches. They always turn back up. Trust me on this. N.O.W.H.E.R.E. has done extensive research and testing.”
Which is also a bit more information. For Freddy, but also for Cassie. We’ve talked before about the sacrifices I was forced to make to be allowed to ‘Keep her.’ She held a wealth of benefit as an asset, but there were clearly other things she could have provided to the Project. Not all of which would have required her to be complicit. A demigod to test? She’s prime, grade-A, material.
I didn’t expect him to give the Amulet to me in the first place, but the moment it’s in my palm? The ‘Wisdom of Solomon,’ is no doubt going to pick out the way the artifact actually doesn’t touch my skin. It’s maybe a micro-meter off the surface of my flesh. Kept just a bit away from actual contact. I’ve dealt with magical items before. They were one of Superman’s weaknesses. Like I said. Those were bread out of me. I’m all but immune to the effects of magic because, for the most part, they simply can’t touch me. My fingers close around the amulet, and it’s carefully tucked in to my pocket.
“Don’t worry,” shooting a glance from Freddy to Cassie as I speak. “I’m not going to give it to NOWHERE. Despite the fact that I’m pretty sure they’d take your side in this against Adam. I’m equally sure Raven shouldn’t be allowed near this anymore than Him. Until it’s safe, I’ll hold on to it personally.”
“We should put this in your Mom’s vault, Cassie. The one in the Museum Basement that she thinks I can’t see because it’s lined with Lead.”
FreddY:One compartment was closed and another had opened. It was all about getting the job done now. Which meant that if the amulet was safe I had to figure out what the next move was. “It’s possible that the human shell, Aunty Minerva , was destroyed and now Isis was back in the body of Adam’s wife. As Mister Spock says, “There are always possibilities,” and right now all I can do is speculate. Given that she hasn’t reemerged I would say yes she’s gone, but if someone’s aware of who she is if they can check into that they could probably find out faster than we could. Callaghan could.” But that’s no longer possible. Either way it’s difficult to say.
He nodded to what Conner said about killing a god. He had seen that first hand when Callaghan was killed and Achilles blessing was transferred to him. “In the end energy is energy. It cannot be created or destroyed, but it can be transferred or converted.” It was another way of thinking about it.
“Also, Adam said she that she was delayed. That we were only delaying her. I think if I had to hedge a guess, Aunty Minerva was a mule of sorts.” That’s what it felt like the more he thought about it. There was something a thought that crossed my mind, but I wasn’t sure if I should share it. I was a stray thought of look at me while I’m here instead of looking over there.
Apparently, there were a lot of moving pieces in other areas, but it was best not to engage. The air had been let out of the room and continued to be let out of the room, but add anything to it and it would only build back up. I had a good idea of where everyone stood in general. Navigating that would become an art onto itself, but for the moment I had to focus my thoughts on what I knew, what I thought and how to best use that information so I could act.
I still had the lingering question of where was the Wizard? Was he out of harm’s way? I couldn’t sit and chat with Adam he wasn’t in a chatting mood.
“When I first arrived I thought he may have come to seek the Wizard, but he may have been on the heels of Isis. Before the almost heist at the bank I had been out of the area.” My trials had taken me away from the City. “It’s possible he was attempting to determine how to safely separate his wife and Isis or determine what her end goal was. Adam said she suffered because their people had suffered.” He considered that.
“Perhaps that’s a place to start. If Isis has returned to his wife I’m at a loss, because I don’t know what his wife looks like in the here and now. That would take time, but maybe by removing the amulet we’re force her hand and she’ll expose herself.” I need to collect my thoughts and go over everything that happened, but right now at least I knew the amulet was out of play.
Solmon gathered information about Conner, information that would be tucked away to go over at another time or perhaps now. It may be something to use. Just a matter of how and when. Right now I needed to look at the books. Those books on Osiris and Hades those might hold something. I needed to take another look at them. We need time and right now it was slipping away.
“I need to go back to the Sanctum. There might be something there I overlooked. I have more time than I did before. I need to review those books. It may give us clues.” A chance to keep pace with Isis and predict Adam’s next move.
Cassie: Yes, darling you are the jerk in this relationship. It goes unsaid though, at least out loud. Conner said it for me, I suppose. My lips purse and pull sharply to the side once again. Clearly I don’t agree. Well, actually I do agree that my friends are better, but he’s being sarcastic about it. He knows more about Black Canary than I do, and otherwise my ‘friends’ consist of his best friend, Freddy here, and hopefully a speedster from Central City. Who has an outlook a lot like Freddy’s. He wants to help people. So I let my face say what I’m not saying. And that we’re definitely not done with this topic in the long haul but for now?
“Which is why she tried to get you to give up yours before. Why the Gods only have one champion at a time, even though there might be dozens of people worthy of being one.”
Absently nodding to what both of the boys are saying. Freddy takes my thought, and fleshes it out with something that makes sense. We’d seen ‘Minerva’ explode in the lightning. That was an amount of power and force meant to destroy the shell at least. Minerva herself not being around would be a kind of confirmation, and Isis’ energy having to return to where it came from, or to its previous host made sense. There’s just something that doesn’t click or connect for me. What hadAdam given to Minerva on that security footage I saw? If she were an unwitting mule maybe that had been the transfer but it doesn’t make sense to me. If he’s trying to stop his wife, why would he help her get closer? Or maybe Isis had already been in Minerva and he was trying to act against her… except I think that the display would have been a lot more than scowling if that were the case.
I’m in agreement with my Superboyfriend. Maybe not for the same reasoning but ancient artifacts are Mom’s thing. I just didn’t know exactly how MUCH of Mom’s thing they were until the other night.
“…ugh. Lead lined? Really? Do these people not understand you don’t put giant red buttons with ‘dont’ push me’ signs on them if you don’t expect them to be pushed…”
I’d like to think my Mom’s smarter than that. She also knows Conner almost as well as I do. She’d probably take his side in all this, too, in fact. Either way, it’s a perfectly good place to stash the thing. I turn back to Freddy one last time, nodding my understanding. I want to give him another reassuring hug, or at least a solid arm pat but I opt to stay at my point of the triangle we’ve formed here. I don’t need to antagonize anyone further than I already have.
“Okay. Stay safe. Let me… us… know if you find anything, and we’ll do the same.”
Conner: This entire discussion has left me feeling… strange about a lot of things. Not just about the resentment I’m feeling, but also about how I’ve been viewing a lot of the world. How much of what I’ve heard Raven say did I actually retain? Not a whole lot. A lot of the things she or Doctor Fairchild say is in one ear and out the other, because it’s information that I’ve considered up until now to be inapplicable to my life. Even while dating Cassie, we didn’t have to deal with things of this nature because she wouldn’t venture out of her backyard to fight crime. Much less fighting other demigods, real gods or clandestine organization. Now that things have changed, I’m regretting that I didn’t pay more attention.
“When Black Adam caused all that damage to New Troy, he was looking for something. I’ll find out what he was looking for and exactly where. While you’re looking in to this ‘Sanctum,’ I’ll get as much information as I can from my sources. Then Cassie and I can check in to whatever this Adam guy was looking for.”
I’m not entirely sure what they’re talking about when it comes to ‘giving up his,’ nor this Aunty Minerva stuff. I’m more than a little lost on about half of the things they’re discussing. But what I do know, is that the three of us actually agree on a central ‘Bad Guy’ here. That no matter which set of friends we, Cassie and I, agree upon? Both sets don’t care for people like Black Adam. There is a bridge there, that she and I can walk upon to find a way out of this quagmire of irritation at one another.
There’s also a very strange surety over this just being irritation. Not genuine anger. Because as much as it makes me angry, I’m not angry at Cassie. I’m angry that a situation exists that would cause me to -be- angry even near her. Which in and of itself serves to make me a little annoyed, because I’ve got all the impact of being mad at Cassie. Without the actual anger at her specifically. It’s like this terribly inconvenient black hole of anger. With no one for me to aim that anger at or make pay for the problem.
“In the mean time. You and I have a date, Cass. This time you’d better stock up on carbs before hand.”
The fire engine red Ferrari isn’t actually parked outside. No way I could have gotten here that quickly in a car, no matter how poorly I drove it. So in lue of that, I offer her my other hand. She doesn’t have to take it, but I want her too. Because the truth is, we need some alone time to discuss things and I can get the two of us out of here without being seen. Even by the Security Cameras.
Cassie: That little teeny part of me that likes to act counter to what sense and my usual sort of behavior would have me do wants very much to just look at that offered hand and speed my own self out of here. Or to just walk out, much as I walked in, like a normal sort of human girl would do. But the truth is, despite the continued lesser bickering that went on afterwards Freddy’d made a lot of sense. About a lot of things. And pointed out things I should have known and didn’t.Conner had, too. Just maybe without as much clarity. Or maybe he could have been crystal clear and it still wouldn’t have come across quite the same because of my irritation.
But not so deep down? In fact most of the conscious parts of me… feel pretty poorly about the entire thing. Have for a while. Having to be confronted with the actually hurt feelings of my invulnerable boyfriend makes it exponentially worse. So I take what I’m going to pretend is an olive branch and I lace my fingers into his. Taking it past that and moving in so my shoulder bumps his. Not necessary for him to move me. Tactile Telekinesis… but still. Nice. And a little body language micro-apology.
“…yikes. Before? I didn’t need to go to the rest of those classes today anyway.”
by Marc | Oct 23, 2017 | Chronicles
Synopsis: Freddy races to the Wizard’s sanctum through the broom closest in Fawcett High only to come face to face with Black Adam. After some enlightening conversation the school boiler room is besieged by new group Crocodile People leading to the awe and horror that is Black Adam, a revelation, multiple tragedies and a Pyrrhic victory.
BLACK ADAM: “Welcome, Boy.”
When you think of all the ways to make an entrance? Those two words aren’t likely in it. There are no fireworks. No parade of a theme song. You might even expect thunder and lightning, given what and who we’re dealing with. None of which are present. One moment you’re looking through a broiler room at the basement of Fawcett City High School, home of the Fighting Spartans. You’ve spent a considerable amount of time conferring with the Wisdom of Solomon about what such a ‘Door’ might look like. It never occurs to you that opening the Broom Closet door is going to transport you through time and space.
Leaving you standing at the door to what looks like a Museum of Oddities. The Sanctum of the Wizard is not like the Tales of a Book. In this particular case it looks like something ripped from the pages of a History book. Shazam’s Sanctum would be right at home in Ancient Greece. With all its marble and candle lighting. From experience you know that it’s got several stories and that each one is like a glimpse in to another time period. The Wizard adapted to each Age he was forced to exist in with the passage of time.
But really. None of that is important right now. Because it’s very difficult to get beyond what literally sits right before you. On a throne of books, torn from the walls of the Wizard’s sanctum. His face may be shrouded but nothing stops Solomon from recognizing exactly what Freddy’s seeing. Cloaked though he may be, lightning crackles around him. The sights of just that first room tell Freddy that Black Adam has been waiting upon him for some time.
“I’m afraid the Wizard isn’t at home right now.”
FREDDY: It happened it all came tumbling in ways that Freddy hadn’t expected. He didn’t abandon Chief Callaghan, not in the least. He left him with a warning that not all is as it seems in Fawcett City to trust his instincts and his eyes. The ones that were connected to his gut. Be that bastion of strength and leadership that Fawcett City knew and depended upon. They needed it, because there was far too much happening just behind the veil that seemed ready to push through and they were going to need people with solid and clear-headed thinking so they wouldn’t panic. However, Freddy was panicked to a degree. He was worried about the Wizard.
When he touched the broach he saw, no he lived everything that happened. From Teth-Adam to Mighty Adam to Khem-Adam. The three faces of a man who touched the gods, walked as one of them in a sense then fell and fell again. How does one begin to comprehend that? They don’t. The compartmentalized. With the knowledge that Solomon allowed him to glean Freddy understood on several levels what was happening which lead him to run out of the Fawcett City police department as quickly as he could into the night and down the alley towards the one once he needed to be.
He called out Shazam’s name to empower him not because he believed there would be danger right then and there only to get him there faster. He needed Mercury with him, the wind at his back to carry him to the Fawcett High School. The Fighting Spartans. He was one of them. Once a Spartan always a Spartan they said as he began to seek out the door that would gain him entry into the Sanctum. Solomon aided him in his search until he pulled it opened and stepped through.
Gone where the locker filled hallways and the drab colors of school. Gone where the homecoming banners and trophy cases. It was all replaced with something that looked straight out of a history book. Perhaps a research room of a classical building of some kind. It’s something Freddy would conjure up from Ancient Greece or perhaps a research room from the Library of Alexandria if it had been erected in Athens perhaps. Marble and candle light. Scroll and quills. Books and jars. It all looked quite beautiful, but beautiful. He wasn’t here to take it in instead he searched for someone, but instead he found someone all-together different it was enough to make Freddy to take a step back.
It was like that episode of Charmed (yes, he watched it) where Phoebe was trying to tell Piper that they were standing in front of the Source who had possessed someone through looking through the enchanted glasses. Solomon didn’t need to whisper in his mind who was in front of him, Freddy knew full well who the hooded man was from the stature, posture and bearing.
“Khem-Adam.” He said his jaw tightening. Definitely not a tea and scones moment.
“Oh. Darn. I guess we missed him. Well, if you’d like me to leave note for him let me get to the ink pot and quill there and I’ll jot one down. Back in town. Thought we could catch up. We need to talk. Hugs and kisses, Teth That about covers it right?”
BLACK ADAM: “Jokes? The Wizard is Gone. Your Trial is shattered. You stand before your better and the first thing that comes to mind are Jokes?”
If that’s you think that’s the sound of impatience? You’ve misjudged just how annoyed that tone of voice actually is. The ‘Heavens’ actually seem to roll with ominous thunder with the vitriol that slides off the tongue of Black Adam. His reclined posture broken only then, when he rises off his throne of spell-books and sends them scattered with the force his defiance of gravity exerts. There are no footfalls that bring Adam closer, because he doesn’t consider the ground of this place worthy of his own feet. Such is the broiling power that Freddy is standing in the face of.
Bravado only carries someone so far. Eventually you have no choice but to stand face to face with the object of your fear and make a choice. Stand firm or flee. There are no other choices when you are in the face of one such as him. “Surrender the blessings you have and perhaps you’ll live to actually regret speaking to me thus.”
Beyond Black Adam’s bristling is a Sanctum filled with wonders. The signs of it being ransacked are present. Obviously, the books from the shelves have been pilled upon the floor, but so too are the scrolls. Each one unbound and obviously read. Those candles which seem to burn for an eternity are withering down to the wick. How long has Adam been here, waiting? It’s barely been a handful of days since the Bank Robbery, but this looks as if the would-be God has been here far longer.
“Of course, that depends on if you tell me where she is, Boy.”
FREDDY: Freddy needed the moment precious moments to look upon the room see what needed to be seen. Was there anything here that might give a clue as to where the Wizard where he might have gone. Freddy had come to warn but he himself was perhaps a day or two late. There were things that needed to be done. You couldn’t bust into a police station and demand to speak with the Police Chief or anyone of the sort same goes for any type of law enforcement individual or first responder
Additionally, he did speak with some of the witnesses it’s where he could start as someone not in a kind of official capacity. He had no fancy Department of Extranormal Affairs badge to flash. Nor did he want to from everything Cassie told him, but it would be pretty cool. Psychic Paper would be real handy, but back to the regularly schedule programming.
Interior the Wizard Shazam’s Sanctum. Our intrepid hero Freddy Freeman has come face to face with the man whose life he just lived moments ago, Teth-Adam, who appears to be rather unpleasant at the moment as he rose from his throne of books. Game of Thrones much? He approached Freddy who dared to be an insolent cur in his eyes. He did not walk he floated towards him appearing ready to rend him asunder if he did not acquiesce.
Still moments. This is what Freddy needed. He used all his power of observation to gather what he needed. No blood. No flesh. No pile of ash or charred corpse. The Wizard was not here. He beat feet. When? How long had he been gone? The Sanctum had been invaded. When how? Was it Adam’s doing, another or both? He considered that for a moment wondering when Black Adam arrived.
Freddy considered all of this stared into the dark star itself. Most would turn away. You don’t stare into the sun, but in this case he had to. He wouldn’t say he knew this man, but perhaps he did. Bless you Solomon, he thought. There were somethings you could be told, some things you could be shown, but sometimes you had to live them. To live them is to know them. To breathe them. To breathe them is to know why.
As commanding and authoritative as Adam was being at a moment. This would probably be a bad time to tell him that he probably would make a really good Dom, Freddy thought, there were two things that crossed his mind probably to Solomon’s delight, because let’s face it Freddy had odd thoughts, inappropriate ones at all the time. The candles, the height of them told a store. As did the state of the room. He flashed back to the Bank the desperate search that Isis made. Oh, how that picture and the events swirled in his mind very much like that scene in Jumanji the first movie (there’s going to be a new one!) when the tornado sucked everything that emerged in the game back in. It was like he could see it all before him.
Husband and wife pick up some of their habits. Isis was true to her namesake desperate to bring her husband back to life, but in a different sense bring him back to the life that he had grown accustomed to. Stripped of what he was she bargained for him with the gods of Egypt to restore what had been lost. Give him the life that had been stolen by the villain in this story…the Wizard (more on that to come). Freddy needed to be focused.
There was no sign of Isis after the lightning strike. They escaped. Solomon told him to flee it was Zeus. Zeus you fool.
Confidence. Perhaps, but Freddy finally let his eyes settle upon Black Adam. There was no arrogance in his eyes. Cold hard facts. Confront the brutal truth.
“She broke the rules. The board was reset.” Where she is? There was no escape from the bank. There was no banjo playing as Aunty Minerva and her crocodile boys drove away. She was so close to claiming Osiris…not her husband but her son. A mother desperate to reconnect to bring him back to life as she had been to correct a terrible wrong. To give the Wizard and all the gods a big middle finger. Yet there was the Wizard and there was always Zeus who was to his part trying to keep this fair.
“My Trials remains intact.” Trial. No. Trials. Party’s not over yet.
BLACK ADAM: In approaching Freddie, Adam has put himself momentarily in the path of the young man’s vision. That changes in the span of mere heart-beats though, in demonstration of Black Adam’s own version of the same power that Freddie knows first-hand. Speed which is used to grasp the young man. Strength which is put to pulling him up in to the air several inches. Turning and holding Freddie aloft like a small child that is too repellent to be held close. Yet what Adam does then is perhaps unexpected. He shows Freddie something more.
While the Sanctum is in tatters, there is a certain harmony to the chaos. Books, scrolls and ancient items are strewn all around, but the discarded pile of books which Adam sat upon is different. There the tomes of knowledge all have a common theme. One that Solomon can’t help but whisper in to Freddie’s head about: Osris, Resurrection. Eternal Life, Hades. This theme binds each of the items together. Whom ever did all of this was searching for information in a veritable treasure trove of it. Whether the knowledge that was sought was found or not? Hard to say.
“She came back to me. Rose from the sands of Khandaq. She showed me many things, Boy, but most of all she showed me her disdain for this world’s butchery of our people. We sought to change it, to make it better, but the moment she touched the Amulet of Isis, she was…different. Her disdain for has spread, consumed her.”
This might seem strange. Having a sort of ‘story time with Black Adam,’ but this is no heart to heart. No confession of guilt. There is no remorse to a single word he speaks. No spark of hope that might come with some indicator that Black Adam is here to help. His cruel tone only breaks when speaking of Isis, of her plight and her intentions.
“You think your Trials are intact? You are but a boy, who is a fool. Solomon of not. My Wife has broken your Trials, Boy. You have done nothing but delay her. Already she has stolen the strength of Zeus’ son and eaten the heart that fueled the God who holds the world upon his shoulders. You think Isis needs those powers for her own self? They are but fuel child. No different than the Wax of these candles. Once burned out they are gone. Lost forever.”
“Give me the Amulet, Boy. Give me the Blessings you hold. You are a Mouse, standing before a Lion. Give them to me, before she …”
He was quite clearly ramping up to something when the Sanctum trembles to it’s very foundations. Even Khem Adam is brought to a sort of stunned silence at such a thing. Freddie is discarded, tossed among the rubble of the books on the floor as the lightning begins to course across Adam’s features. Another tremble sends a caress of air through the Sanctum, blotting out the candles and bathing the two ‘Champions’ in utter darkness. Until the door that Freddie just entered through opens once more.
If Black Adam fears whatever tears open the door to Shazam’s Sanctum? It doesn’t show. There is not a split-second of hesitation before he surges with unspoken speed at the first intruder that enters. Freddie gets but a moment to see a horde of Crocodile Men ready to fight their way inside, before Adam tears through them. Even before they’re out of sight he’ll hear the response of gunfire. It sounds like an army is on the other side of that door…
FREDDY: Freddy has cards to play. Cards that present themselves with each passing second. Every word spoken is like another card presented and he can either hold and treasure it or discard it. Was he aiming to win or hold his own. Perhaps a bit of the latter than the former. He could try and reason with Adam, but he couldn’t begin to until he got a little information and the only way to get information sometimes was to play the information you had and frame it into what you believed to be the truth.
Truth is highly subjective, but with a little work the subjectivity can be stripped away and replaced with objectivity until enough information was provided and only the facts remained. Cold hard facts.
One of which Adam believed the Trials to be broken and over, but if that were the case Freddy would have failed and the world would hold a new Champion good or bad. Freddy whether he was wrong or right had to hold onto the idea that the Trials were still in play that he could earn the blessings of the other gods, the other Lords of Magic. Why? The world tilts between order and chaos. Despair and hope. What was has been broken and must be put right one brick a time.
Hope empowers. Not only mortals, but the gods, because Freddy knew from the moment he was tossed about by Isis that not only were mortals in danger, the gods in danger which means magic is danger. This is what he was training for. This is why he was on the trials to protect magic from all. Whether people believed it or not the one that was chosen was meant to protect mortals from magic and magic from mortals. Whether it be mortal or god. Right or wrong he was meant to protect them even if they felt they didn’t need defending themselves.
As quick as Adam was Freddy steeled himself. He focused on Callaghan how he steeled himself through the chaos and remain the bastion of calm and strength. It’s not that Freddy meant to impart that on Adam, but he sorely needed it for himself. He could not allow himself to succumb to chaos and emotions. Freddy lacked the Wizard’s guidance and Solomon only could provide so much, but Freddy was smarter than your average bear. He took in all he could clung to the gifts that Adam lavished upon him in only the way Adam could through fear, intimidation and anger and yes, a little bit of a hate. Hate goes a long way.
He was a foolish. Foolish boy, but even a foolish boy can hear the pain, the agony, the loss. Despite everything that happened the capacity to feel these things were present which whether the Wizard would admit or not or the gods themselves would is the key. The heart of what makes a champion a champion. Pure. Innocent. True. Honorable. These are things that make a good champion, but what makes a great champion.
Empathy. Somewhere Adam lost his. That one moment when you make a decision that darkens your heart. All is not lost, but when it is allowed to fester and only grow as more and more are made then all is lost unless someone intervenes, but who intervened for Adam?
Empathy is what Freddy feels despite the fact that this is not a heart to heart between him and the terrible Black Adam. No empathy is what Freddy summons, because he has to be able to cut through to the fact. Not the power of a god, but a boy, a human a lowly mortal. The most pedestrian of all things when compared to the power of a god or is it?
Adam has unleashed a Pandora’s box upon the world by trying to right what he felt was a terrible wrong. Unite his family. Fix what had gone wrong, but could he had considered what would happen when he presented his wife with the power to right the wrongs that had befallen their people. Instead of empowering magnified her power, her pain and suffering blending it with the pain and suffering of another who knew loss. Freddy could be wrong, but given the few brief seconds to consider it’s where his mind went.
Solomon’s there pushing him to look upon all the things that were searched through. Was it Adam or another. Either way it all of it pointed to death. Life and death. Isis is life. Osiris god of the afterlife connected to death. Death for life. Life for death An atom bomb ready to go off.
Fuel Adam called it and Freddy felt his blood run cold even as he was carried away through the air discarded like a used tissue by a rather odious individual. Freddy landed, but the words pulsed through his mind. Not only his, but Isis’s as well. <i>”The Power of Gods can be used for more than Championing.”</i>
When silence had come to Adam and darkness fell Freddy moved to his feet. Even in darkness he knew where he was not because he could see in the dark, but because he had an eidetic memory. Blessing of Solomon. He knew where he was and knew to move for cover quickly not from Adam, but whatever brought him to silence he moved to a column pressed his back against it ready to act however it was Adam that went forward when the door opened. The light spilled forth and there was a crocodile man and next there was gunfire.
Freddy moved to get closer towards the door in an attempt to catch a glimpse of what was occurring but not offering himself up as a target. Black Adam fully empowered. Freddy Freedman power of two.
The fact that Adam wanted him to give up his powers wasn’t lost on him, but he didn’t seek them for Isis. Perhaps his son? Perhaps himself, but he did have a thought. A cold thought along with an insightful one. If Isis wasn’t in a penalty box and was searching for more power apparently a god of underworld, the god of the dead.
This is where having the Wizard here would be awesome. Think like the wizard. Recreate what he would say.
”Khem-Adam you fool what have you done! She’s taken her over and now you seek my knowledge to undo what you have done! She will ravage the gods themselves to restore Osiris!” It takes power to raise the dead. ”You thought to empower your wife and now she has become possessed by Isis.” Well, maybe that’s what the Wizard would say. Gone was the wife who had the same name of the god he thought to gift her wife like she was a god damned Pokemon and now she’s on a got to collect them all to get Osiris back.
Black Adam’s been jilted and double-crossed? Not the time to spin it Freddy gunshots and divine empowered ex-champion out there who may come back to wrest Solomon and Mercury’s blessings from him.
STORYTELLER: Beyond the door is no mystery. It is a horror show. Freddy peers through the door in time to see Black Adam at his finest or perhaps his worst. Depending on how one looks at it. A Crocodile Man’s throat in one hand and another upon his back. They do to him as they had done with Cassandra in the bank. It’s a swarm of a pack that prey upon the weak. One on one they stand no chance in all of creation against one empowered such as Adam. In small numbers such as the bank job, they stood against Wonder Woman. In the sheer volume of them that lunge at Adam from all directions, there is a true chance to overwhelm any normal man. Even one with the Power of the Gods.
If only Khem Adam was normal. If only he was a man who would fight them, knowing as Freddie does, that these are somehow creatures transformed by Sobek. That beneath the crocodile exterior these are normal people. Perhaps students or teachers of this very school. If Adam were someone like Cassie Sandsmark or Freddy Freeman, the numbers would eventually catch up to him. But he is most assuredly not like them. The sickening crunch of esophagus actually overpowers the other sounds of battle. A fist completely skewers another. While the one upon his back ends in an explosive furry of blood and gore, when Adam flies backward at a super-sonic speed and impales him upon the broiler.
There is no Numbers Game to be played when Black Adam kills each Crocodile Man he touches. Their numbers dwindle before they’re able to overcome him. Maybe Adam knew that. Maybe some spark of reason told him that it was ‘Do or Die.’ That might be what Freddie tries to tell himself later, when he’s replaying his perfect memory of the scene before him. But he’ll never shake the look upon Adam’s face. The cruelty in his eyes, that betrays a small smile when he quite literally pulls a crocodile man in half.
Freddy Freeman has seen enough. Before he can look away there are other details far more important to be seen here. Not all of the Crocodile Men wear the tattered clothing of children. A flicker of golden light catches the eye. The blood scored shape of a badge. Mixed with the gunfire that spatters the room. The Chaos of the Broiler Room is confusing for anyone. Even a trained soldier. But it’s impossible to miss that some of these Crocodile Men were, at one time, Police Officers. As if Freddie needed the confirmation of that…
Chief Callaghan, covered in the gore and blood of the fight that is pressing ever closer to the doorway to the Sanctum, shoves Freddie back. Away from the door, in to the Sanctum. For the second time in as many moments, Freddie finds himself skidding to a halt on his bum. Only this time he’s holding an Amulet. The Amulet from the Bank Heist.
“We tailed you here, Kid, I thought you were part of the problem. Being the only one who seems to not have forgotten what happened at the Bank. We were trying to figure out how you got out of that Broiler Room when the Crocguy from the Bank showed up. He tore through my guys, said he wanted this…”
Half way through the Police Chief’s rambling Solomon kids in to ear again. Only this time he’s showing Freddie something else. Something hidden. Out there beyond the door, people are fighting. Savagely. Black Adam is killing anyone who touches him. Sobek empowers more and more of them to join the fray. But there is a finite number of police officers to turn in to wanton creatures of destruction. As the Chief speaks his hurried explanation, Sobek appears for only as long as it takes him to slash Chief Callaghan’s back. As gruesome as it is to see, Solomon makes Freddie watch as the Chief’s life begin to shift and his skin darkens in to scales. A hue, glowing power forms all about him. Flittering essence flees the Police Chief just as he too becomes one of the Crocodile Men.
.. don’t be afraid…
And with the last vestige of Courage, Callaghan slams shut the door to the Shazam’s Sanctum. Leaving Freddie to sit in darkness while the power of Achilles enters him. Freddie was right. The Trials are not over. So too was Adam right. They have been Broken. When Freddie summons the courage to open the door once more? He will not step in to the Broiler room of the Fawcett City High School, but in to the pristine Labyrinth of Metropolis’ City Library. A television screen is displaying the news, like in most libraries. Only today the News is dominated by reports, coming in live. Of the massive broiler room melt down at Fawcett City High School. A devastating explosion. Unknown amounts of Casualties.
That door to the Sanctum is gone. Physically destroyed. He’s safe. From the Crocodile Men. From Black Adam. From Isis herself. For now. For how long that remains true, seems to depend upon the Amulet that Police Chief Callaghan gave his life to put in to Freddie’s hands.
FREDDY: Unlike most Freddy wasn’t repulsed. He took no joy in this. It wasn’t revelry that spread through his mind it was memory. Memory of Adam in his prime in the past not that he looked past it right in this moment, but the last effects of what he had seen of Adam’s life was strong with in him. It was like raw power unchained and he would not stop until ever last crocodile man dead. The crocodile men were attacking him. They were standing in the way of what was to come. He was no friend to them. Not an ally. Another piece of information that Freddy gathered.
If only that was the only thing that he gathered. The way divined empowered man moved it was a sight to behold it was like being there again, in the past, but he focused on the present. The present that brought into focus that those crocodile men that he was tearing through were wearing clothing, football uniforms, school clothing.
The horror of it settle in as the sounds of bone breaking and flesh rending did nothing to deter the one-man crocodile people killing machine that was Black Adam. Magic like most things in life wasn’t always pretty. It was pain and destruction a ballet of chaos that gave way to nightmarish visions. Unlike the Crocodile Men that he and Cassie face when Adam hit them they stayed down. He didn’t mean to stop them he meant to kill them. They weren’t getting up never again.
Freddy took it all even as Crocodile men came apart at the hand of this man. He could feel his hands balling into fists. There was culling that occurred in the boiler room and only Adam was going to walk away from it unscathed. Still as Freddy continued to look on wanting to yell, but what he could he say all he could do was watch as they kept coming and slowly the clothing changed they changed from that of high schoolers to the police.
The police. The thing about is that they didn’t talk they didn’t even mouth off they were more wild and feral than the crocmaggia like they lost themselves to the orgy of death that they thought they would rain down upon the man instead he was the one sending them to early graves. Compartmentalize. It was all Freddy could do until he found himself being pressed back face to face with the bloodied and gore covered face of Callaghan.
“Chief!” It was the first thing he said the only thing he could say. Freddy was desperate to save someone anyone. “Chief get in and close the door. Get in and close the door,” he said talking over him. He got it. He understood why he would think he was responsible. We’ll face this together…” He pleaded before felt the amulet pressed into his hand as he was pushed back causing him to fall back. He had wanted to grip.
Looking up he stared he couldn’t look away because there he was. It was the composer and conductor of this symphony of death in key of Blood and Gore minor. <b>SOBEK!</b>
Had this been any time Freddy have had a moment of triumph. He knew it! He got something right, but he watched as Callaghan’s hand was torn open by the slash of Sobek’s claws turning him from a pillar of the community, a leader into one of Sobek’s minions. Most would turn away, but Freddy was compelled to watch to see. He couldn’t look away. He was on the floor looking up crying out in frustration as the one person that he could trust with all of this someone that knew what Fawcett City was and could be was taken away from him.
Someone he could look up to someone that Fawcett City could depend on. He was taken from them with just a touch and with that touch his death all but certain by Adam’s hand.
“NOOOOOOOO!” Freddy made his way to his feet, but even with his speed he couldn’t reach Callaghan the man was no longer there, but what he was, who he was fled the defiled flesh settling into where he was meant to be. The glow lasted for a moment, but it settled in his flesh bonding itself to the others. He knew immediately who he was. He was a hero. He was a warrior. He was the bravest man he knew. He was Chief Callaghan the vessel of Achilles he died doing what he did best protecting people. Shutting his eyes Freddy took a moment, the sound and smell of death had vanished.
Walking towards the door he reached for the handle opening it and found himself miles away from home as he stepped out into the sprawling expanse of the Metropolis Public Library, but he couldn’t escape the events that transpired. It was right there on the flat screen to see. Gripping the amulet tightly he took deep breath.
Compartmentalize.
STORYTELLER: News outlets around the world will tell a story tonight. It will be a tale of tragedy; a school in mid-central America that was under funded and ill-equipped. Some will say it was children playing where they shouldn’t. Others will talk about how some ne’er do wells always used the broiler room to deal ‘The Drugs.’ Yet the prevailing story will be about a school’s broiler room malfunctioning. It will be the Tale of a Police Chief and his loyal team that went in to try to get every child out they could. And they did. Many still live because Chief Callaghan followed Freddie Freeman to that school. He did so under the suspicion that Freeman was peculiar. He did so because he thought the young man was connected. Though in the end he was right, he had known in the end that he was also very wrong about Freddie Freeman.
The News won’t tell that story. Strangely enough though, it isn’t like the Bank. There is no cover up to speak of. No clandestine group that went in to wipe the minds of the surviving witnesses. Mostly because the only survivors are the ones that Callaghan’s people saved before things took a turn for the worse. Then another turn for the disastrous. While the Reporters and the Police will never know how it happened, the voice of Solomon can shed some light upon it for Freddie. He had witnessed Black Adam flicker across the room, colliding with the Broiler. He’d seen the desperation of Sobek to get access to the Chief and the Amulet, desperate enough to turn more and more in to his creatures and send them against Khem Adam. In the end there had been no Hope for the Crocodile Men. Not after the Chief closed the door.
Among the news reports is a small sliver of information that few would pick up on. The storm that came, that brought the rain that helped ease the resulting fire. Few people would take notice of the young Egyptian man in the crowd of onlookers. Few outside of Freddie Freeman and the Wisdom of Solomon. Whether Adam caused the explosion to bring an end to all of the Crocodile Men or Sobek did so in a last-ditch effort to stop Adam’s blood lust? It would seem that Black Adam lives.
Out of all of this comes one fleck of good news. Freddie Freeman has passed his third Trial. The Avatar of Achilles has gifted him a blessing. One step closer to being the World’s Champion. One step further away from answers. Was Sobek dead or did he too survive? If Black Adam is searching for Isis too, then where is she? Why was he telling Freddie to surrender the Blessings he already had? These answers and more soon.
S H A Z A M!
by Michele | Sep 29, 2017 | Chronicles
Cassie: That could have gone… so much better.
I’m not talking about the bank robbery. I’m not talking about what happened in the vault, and all the subsequent questions that left me with. I’m not even talking about the super great trip through the sewers. I’m talking about my conversation with Superman on the roof of City Hall. Conner and I bicker. We always have. It’s kind of our thing. It just doesn’t typically end on that kind of note, and it was horribly unfair that it had. He didn’t let me explain! I’m not even sure if I should. Because maybe it’s better that he thinks what he thinks, and doesn’t realize what I’m actually doing. And because maybe now I don’t want to if he’s going to be a jerk about it.
Maybe it even worked out, because that little snit meant that once NOWHERE was done and I made sure to not publicly show off my distaste for the rest of his team, he hadn’t actually waited for me to go back to Metropolis with them. Great. Awesome. Fine. I wasn’t done here yet anyway. No. Really. I wasn’t. Slipping out of ‘uniform’ is as easy as pressing a button, before heading in to my ‘meeting.’ My features are different, the clothes are jeans, t-shirt and sneakers now that I’ve put my ‘plain clothes’ back on. Hair’s still blonde though, I’m just looking like…well. Cassie Sandsmark. Who’s appearance wise at least six years Wonder Woman’s junior. But she’s still sporting a row of gnarly crocodile teeth bruises on her arm, and heading unerringly for the booth that Freddy’s occupying.
“I like it. We have places like this in Metropolis but they feel too…new. Not authentic. Call me Cassie, by the way.”
Sticking out my hand across the table for an ‘official’ introduction. Maybe I shouldn’t be playing this card this early. Maybe I should be more worried about my real identity, but the truth is sitting down to a late night meal with Wonder Woman was going to draw more attention to the guy than I wanted to do just yet.
Freddy: I wasn’t sure if she was going to show, but it was no coincidence that she was in the area. I refuse to believe that also she said she wanted to speak with me afterwards. I’m not even sure what that meant, because one moment there was some discussion with the authorities about what to do with the crocodile men and the next thing I know thing quickly got official and I knew when to make myself scarce.
It’s one thing to linger when the boys in Fawcett City blue are about, but when things tend to go above their paygrade it’s probably better not to give them any reason to look at you sideways. Instead we, that is Wonder Woman and I agreed to meet up later at the local diner. We still had those nothing fancy, something that’s been staple for years passed down between generations. It was a stand up place with good people, good music and good food if you didn’t mind 80s classic from the jukebox which I didn’t when it cued up Sweet Dreams from the Eurhythmics to be followed by The Hardest Part by Blondie. Which was released in 79, but hey it was a few months from being in the 80s.
Unlike my mystery guest I had words with no one but myself and thankfully there was no arguing involved that would be disturbing. Instead I was confused as to everything that happened on the vault level. I wish I could say that I had all the answers, but I didn’t. I had half of the answers and I still lacked definitive answers. Answers that would tie it all together. I wanted to question a few of the witnesses, get an idea of what they saw, but with the arrival of the government types I didn’t get a chance.
Instead I played the events over and over in my head while telling the waitress that someone would be joining me. I didn’t want to be rude and start eating before she arrived. It was only a few moments before Wonder Woman arrived. I saw the marks upon her arm it was definitely her.
I hadn’t really changed I was still myself. I did depower so to speak though I carried Solomon with me no matter where I went. Accessing his abilities, his power was easier than Mercury’s. I didn’t need to speak the words. I carried Solomon’s mark upon my skin a boon perhaps for his trial. One of pain and conversation. Flesh and blood. A decision had to be made that day to continue or walk away. I chose to stay upon the path that I found myself upon.
Offering Cassie a smile as she walked over I stood up because it was the gentlemanly thing to do. Sitting when she did I took her hand nodding. A name to go with a face one that was more than just Wonder Woman. This wasn’t the field of battle this was simply two people who were getting to know what one another. Figure each other perhaps.
“We like it. Been coming here ever since I was little. It’s been a while, but it’s pretty much the same. Call me Freddy.” Not that he had given her anything else to call him. He wasn’t quite who he was meant to be and calling himself the champion to be was a little pretentious. Ok more than a little pretentious.
“I would ask you how you like our city, but I’m pretty sure it’s left a lasting impression.” Probably not a good one.
Cassie: “Nice to meet you, Freddy.”
No ‘I already know your name, thanks’ because that would be rude. Also it would call more attention to the fact that I know a whole lot more about him that he’s going to get to know about me. Or rather, Red Robin knew more, and Batman before him and I’m just the lucky benefactor of the information, as well as the unofficial mission of sorts. Maybe it wasn’t even what they’d fully intended to do with the files originally but I’m running with the plan I’ve got in my head. Maybe I’m the only one that can, and that makes it the doubly right thing for me to be doing with my night. Besides. It’s not like I’m missing a Football game, or I could be making up with my boyfriend right now. Well. One of those things I could be doing, I just…for whatever reason right now? Don’t want to.
“Impression. Hah. Funny guy, too! It’s definitely…different from what I’m used to. I guess I didn’t really know places like this still existed in the world. It’s not a bad thing.”
I’ve just spent my life in little villages, or living in big cities like Gateway or Metropolis, and while small out of the way places in other countries seemed normal enough, I just never imagined that somewhere so… I don’t want to say time lost because it’s not like they don’t have modern conveniences. But it does feel like somewhere everyone but the locals forgot about a little.
“Sorry to have bailed so quick earlier though, I’m betting you understand why. I didn’t want them to feel like they ought to make ‘friends…'” Complete with finger quotes. “…with you. As far as I know, you’re not on their radar and that’s a really good thing.”
Otherwise they probably would have made contact while they were here, and that’s something I definitely want to avoid. Freddy will want to as well, though I don’t know if he knows that yet. NOWHERE is something of a boogeyman. Not someone or something most people know, or even think about but metas tend to be aware of enough to know they don’t want their attention. At all. Ever.
Freddy: I was smarter than your average bear. It didn’t take Solomon to know that something was a foot. It’s not like Isis and the Crocodile Men (totally awesome band name) had been on anyone’s radar unless they were and that’s why Cassie was in the area, but I’m pretty sure that wasn’t the case.
“I have my moments” He smirked. “Thanks for saving my bacon back there.” I know what I wouldn’t be able to handle all of that on my own. Sure, they weren’t the brightest bulbs in the pack, but they made up for it with brute force and you know teeth and trap jaw strength. There could have been far more casualties then there were. I was grateful for that.
“Oh, there are a few places still existence. They’re just off the beaten path that’s all.” Fawcett City was quite the place, but I was starting to wonder exactly why there seemed to be so many mystical converges. First the original Captain Marvel, now me, then Osiris happened to be stored in the vault here? Again that can’t be a coincidence.
“Then again even the sleepiest towns have their secrets.” Not every day that the god of the afterlife or what’s left of him is found in a vault. I don’t know half of the time I was trying to make sense of it the other half I was making up as I went along and making sure that no one died in the process.
“Nothing to worry about there. They seemed to be a bit intense.” Intense in the way that you don’t want to meet anyone of them in a dark alley or even in a bright one. “They didn’t seem big on talk more on action.” The kind of action that nagged at the back of his mind.
“There was something familiar about them.” I couldn’t put my finger on it, but it definitely felt like there was something there. Perhaps it dealt with my predecessor more than me. The whispers were there, but there were more rumblings than actual words. Still coherent enough for me to know that I should vacate the premises.
I considered how I wanted to approach this, because there were two conversations that we could have right now, but I tabled one in favor of the other. Priorities. Can’t unravel a mystery if I’m looking over both my shoulders.
“So, I’m not anyone’s radar well not theirs at least.” Right? Or was it only a matter of time. Still if I wasn’t on their radar whose radar was I on?
Cassie: “Oh, hey no problem. I have a feeling you would have done the same for me.”
Otherwise I’m not sure that I would be the one that was here in the first place. I’ve only seen a few of the MetaFiles, as I’ve started calling them. Mostly in my own head only, since they turn up at my house in the form of college applications to places I’d never heard of. Like. Fawcett City. There’s still a trend though, and it’s not that hard to make sense of. No, not that they’re vigilantes, or people with powers, they’re also people with certain motivations. Character. If it was a whole lot of tool bags and ne’erdowells I have a feeling that they might be getting left to the other team’s tender mercies. You know. The ones that I just voluntarily called in. Whatever doubts I had, I think it was still the right play. Even if it did result in a Superboyfriend fight.
“That’s because they were here on clean-up. Not that recruitment drives are a lot more friendly. Miss Martian’s a mind reader. And wiper. No one’s going to remember anything they don’t want them to know. Except you. And Superman’s…well. Superman. He’s not shy, or covert about what he is and what he can do.”
I’m not really trying to spill all their secrets, I just want to make sure he understands what he’s dealing with here. It’s my honest hope that eventually he won’t have to be on the lookout for them like they’re the bad guys, because they’re really not. But for the time being? Not that he’d necessarily recognize Megan again. She can shapeshift to look like anything or anyone. Usually when I see her? She just looks like my best frenemy at St. Mary’s.
“I’m telling you this so you know what to look out for. If you get on their radar, you’ll get a more directed visit. And it’ll be a very convincing join us or join us speech. I said you weren’t on theirs. There’s someone else who knew about you though. That’s why I was here in the first place. I came to Fawcett to meet you. The bank robbery was kind of … incidental. I think. I sure wasn’t planning on it.”
Leaning back against the booth’s seat, I give an almost helpless shrug as I look over laminated, charming little menu in front of me. The truth is, everything sounds good but that’s because I’m postiively famished after the way my night’s shaped up so far.
“This other …group… has been trying to put me in contact with new metas, or people that have been successfully hiding. I’m hoping that I can protect you guys by association at the least. And… maybe down the line we can help each other out.”
Freddy: Nodding I gave her a bit of a sheepish grin with a shrug. I would have. Now whether or not it would have been the smart thing that’s a different story. I know He doesn’t like when I say it, but sometimes you have to shut your brain off. Sometimes the moment doesn’t allow you the chance to break it down, to seek that perfect solution. Sometimes it’s not about that. It’s about doing what’s right and doing your best. I know that can’t be the creed all the time, but sometimes it’s all you have. It’s what you and anyone around you need.
“Oh that doesn’t sound pleasant not in the least.” The mind wiping business, but it’s not like you would remember either, but a mind reader. Definitely good thing that I left the area. Last thing I need is one riffling through the thoughts then trying to remove them so I can go back to being one of the Shinny Happy People..
The irony of it isn’t lost on me. It’s not that Fawcett City is this place that’s trapped in time where everyone smiles and goes about their business oblivious to the world beyond the city limits. We’re quite aware of what’s happening in the world, but there’s only so much that can be done from here. Besides we have our own problems to focus on. Bad things happen here and while it’s not the type of thing that requires a man with a cape or someone that wipes minds it’s enough to matter to the people who live here. This is there world and when they get knocked down it hurts just as much as it would in the bigger cities.
Idyllic yes, but given what we found just under the surface of the bank were there other secrets that were hidden away in the dark corners of Fawcett City.
I made a soft sound something akin to a grunt of some kind, but it was more of an acknowledgement of what had been said. I wasn’t on their radar, but given what happened I could find myself on it if I wasn’t careful.
“Not the type to take no for an answer.” Which made me wonder if that’s how she got involved with them. She was working it from the inside, but how far would she get before she was compromised herself. Mind readers and what not.
My fingers played along the menu as I thought over what was being shared with me, that and the fact that there were apparently far more players on the field than I was aware of. Not that I was aware of much when it came to that. All I knew was that there were dangers, dangers from man. There was nothing new about the danger that man presented I was told it simply took a new face. New face, old dangers. Control. Greed. New age, old wants in so many words.
“Part of me is appreciates the heads up. The fact that someone is trying to make sure that we don’t run afoul of the men in black.” Let’s just go with that. “The other part of me is concerned that someone else is tracking my movements.” Someone I didn’t know. There was someone always tracking my movements, but this was different.
“Feels all very murky. I see you, but I don’t see them. Is it for their benefit or my own? Can I trust them? Do they trust me? Exactly how much information do they have on me? Are they testing the waters by having you make contact?” Is that the wisest course of action? Sure, she could deflect some of the attention away, but how long before her movements become suspect?
“I’m all for helping each other out.” That was an easy sell. Baseball was my first love and that’s a team sport. There is no single star on a team no matter what anyone says. In baseball, you work as a unit supporting one another and making sure everyone is pulling their weight. Hard to steal a ball from someone and when you do try to one up one another it never works out well for the team.
Cassie: “I kind of imagine it’s not. I mean, it’s entirely possible that you don’t feel a thing and don’t remember a thing after but… I don’t actually know.”
Or…know if I know. Has that ever been done to me? I’m kind of leaning towards ‘no’ because I’m sure if that were going on, there would be any number of things I know about now that I wouldn’t anymore. Little situations and details that an enterprising boyfriend might talk his squadmate into helping me to ‘get over.’ He’s a lot of things, and done a lot of things, but I don’t actually think that’s one of them. His life would probably be a whole lot easier if he had.
“They aren’t, no. I just want to extend some of my …shine…I guess to other people that can use it. And no offense, but I kind of get the impression this is all fairly… newto you. And I know what that feels like, too. Even if all I can really do for you is be an understanding ear at some point? Believe me. I’m happy to. I can’t imagine what it’s like to do this solo.”
Actually I can, because I’d had my powers for a little bit before I go my own shoulder to lean on. How lonely, confusing and scary it was. Not knowing what I was doing, or what I was meant to be doing if anything. I’m not actually a part of NOWHERE myself, though I don’t clarify that detail. It’s only because of Conner that I’m not, and that only lasts so long as they feel it’s handy for me to manage him from the position that I’m in. Huh. Maybe this mission of mine isn’t as entirely selfless as I thought it was. But I still mean it. All of it. I don’t like NOWHERE. I hate what they did to Conner, what they continue to do to people like us. If I’ve found a way, and can work out a way, to tip things away from their favor without endangering anyone? I’m going to do it.
“They don’t know you, Freddy. Trust isn’t really a current factor. Maybe that’s why I’m here, too. I just get names. Background. And then from that point it’s kind of up to me. And I trust you enough right now to show you my real face. I guess it’s kind of only fair. I know yours. ”
Folding my arms and bracing them on the edge of the table, I lean back in again. It’s important that he sees how earnest I am about this, and not just from a selling it standpoint. I don’t want him to feel like he needs to bolt. Or like I want something from him. I mean, I guess I kind of do. Tim had made a point of reminding me that yes. I do have an agenda. It’s just not NOWHERE’s. But I’m also not going to armbar and coerce people into it.
“What I saw in there? The bank? And what I’m getting now is someone that’s just starting to shape up into something big, and important, but more important to me than that is I see someone that wants to do what’s right, no matter if that loses him something in the process. That’s the kind of people I want to meet, and help.”
Freddy: Rather than respond immediately I took the opportunity for what it was, a moment to listen. To truly listen what was being shared and consider all the immediate possibilities. The fact that while Cassie was lending me her shine so to speak that she was also putting herself in a dangerous position. Not only was she doing her best to deflect attention away from me, she was also working to subvert the activities of an organization that people had a passing knowledge of.
That in itself spoke volumes. Was it all together altruistic? Only time could tell. Still we all had our motivations didn’t we? We only shared as much as we felt was necessary. We all had our reasons for doing what we did right? My own as silly as it probably sounded is, because I wanted to make a difference. I want to help people. I was asked before and I don’t know if I gave the best answer I could, but I gave the most honest answer I could and it must have been good enough because here I was in the middle of something I never thought I would be a part of.
“New. More or less.” More less than more. I wasn’t sure if I could get into everything that’s happening and what I’m doing, but she’s seen parts of it and it’s obvious there’s a bit of a schtick to it all. On one hand it’s not complicated, but on the other hand the idea of a someone attempting to acquire the powers of gods…that definitely puts a wrench in it all. Was it over? Was Isis dead? Or..or.
Focus Freddy. Leaning a little myself I considered everything that led me to this point. “Not easy, but you don’t get into this. You don’t accept what’s offered because it’s easy. If it was easy everyone would be doing it.” I try not to take myself seriously, but this. This means something to me. It’s the most important thing I have ever done in my life. I know the score and I don’t want to get all corny, but it’s reads clear on my face.
The danger’s real and ever present. Perhaps that’s the real lesson that Fawcett City teaches. Danger is closer than you think.
“It’s needs to be.” He said honestly. “Has to be. Without trust we have nothing. Not when it counts. Not when we need it to count. I know it takes time and well, it’s not like we’re going to see each other every day, but if we’re headed in that direction where we’re going to be helping one another I’m hoping that we’ll find our way there.” It just needed to be said.
“And trust me I appreciate that. You didn’t have to show me your real face. You could have kept it hidden. You could have done a few dozen things that would have changed the course of this conversation.” I sigh because I’m being far too serious for someone my age. I don’t know.
“The world is full of what happened in the Bank. Something went wrong. Terribly wrong and I wish I need to figure it out before It gets worse. I wasn’t the first. I won’t be the last, but the one before me. The one who should have walked this path he was lost some time ago and I think when that happened it opened the door to something bad. Something that if it can’t be contained, can’t be stopped will upset magic far more than it already has been.” Oh, look at me. I used the M-word.
Cassie: He doesn’t have to say it out loud, and it has nothing to do with me being a mind reader, because I’m not. I mean, not that I know of. The parts that he did put words to I know though, because I’ve felt them. It means I can read the expression on his face. I grew up on the stories of myths and legends far more than I ever did on Disney Princesses and cartoons. By product of who my Mother is, and what her job is, and hell. Maybe it was on purpose because of who I was going to be as well. I wanted to be a hero when I was little, then I grew up and saw them just as stories. Only to have the rude awakening that I had more in common with those figures in the stories than I did my own classmates. And the fact that they weren’t just stories. I didn’t know what I was going to do with all of it. The power. I’m only just figuring that out, honestly. I’m seventeen though, and by all accounts I’ve gathered so far?
I’m going to have a really, really, really long time to sort out that stuff.
“Wonder Woman’s kind of… overt. And… sparkly.”
Man, that outfit. I mean. I don’t hate it as much as I did the first time I got tricked into putting it on, and I’d worn it a good number of times before that press conference of Luthor’s, I’ve just never intentionally drawn that much attention to myself before. Shrugging my shoulders again like it’s not any sort of big deal, but I know it is and I think Freddy does, too. I can count on one hand including him the number of people that I know that know.
“I don’t know a lot about Magic. I do know a little though. The other person I know that is…well. More with the NOWHERE payroll unfortunately. So I don’t know that she’s going to be a good resource. I’m kind of assuming that a lot of this… and what you’re doing.. has to be a you thing though?”
I mean. They’re trials. It seems heavily implied. Still. I’ll help as much as I can.
“I actually have a question for you. That. Lightning at the end. Did that read to you like… she was calling that? Or like someone was voicing flashy disapproval?”
Freddy: Fawcett City was my life. The circumstances on why I would leave the city probably would have been different, but I would have eventually ventured beyond the city limits to see different parts of the nation, but now everything had changed. My world had become so much larger. Larger than I had ever dreamed that it could be. For someone that had aspirations of probably hitting the majors all of that seemed so distant now. It felt like another life and it was a little scary, because it was incredibly intimidating, but I managed not to let it overwhelm me.
“That she is. I mean you can’t help but notice the outfit, but I suspect that’s the purpose. Associate the hero with the outfit. They’ll see it before they’ll clearly make you out, but seeing the outfit knowing that its headed your way means something. It brings people hope that someone is coming for them, to help them. Sometimes you just have to stand out.” You need to.
“Still learning about it myself, but I have a good resource I can turn to when needed.” That I didn’t need to worry about.
“Oh?” A question for me? With a twist of my lips I hoped I would be able to provide an acceptable answer. “I…in the moment I thought it was a smiting. That someone was pissed, but in hindsight. I don’t know. It’s…a storm had been approaching the area it seemed all very out of place and now that I have had some chance to think about and think about it could have been the former.” I admit.
“Think about it. If someone had been cross with Isis I don’t think it would have taken so long to smite. I think it would have happened in rather short order. The problem with that is if that’s the case and she did call the lightning I have a very big problem because that means another Lord of Magic has been compromised.” I didn’t get the feeling that she was hunting the Lords of Magic just any god that she could use to help her achieve her goal.
I didn’t answer her question about it having to be me. I don’t know if that was the case. I could believe that, but it was more along the lines of, I had chosen to prove that it could be me by completing the trials.
That aside I considered the nature of the question. “Why do you ask? Did you feel something? Sense something? Familiar?”
Cassie: “Huh. I guess I wasn’t really looking at it that way.”
The considering way I tilt my head and purse my lips says that I’m putting some thought into his opinion on the matter. And maybe he’s actually right. I just originally assumed it was something bright, shiny, and tight that Conner’d had them whip up for me in order to make me maximum degrees of uncomfortable, just because he likes to push my buttons and get me out of the comfort zone. Sometimes just to be a jerk, but occasionally it’s actually for my own good even I don’t see it at the time. Did he actually have that much forethought this time? I know he meant for me to be a symbol, but the outfit as well?
The storm had been there brewing when I got to town, but at the time I hadn’t thought of it anymore than I did any other bit of crummy weather that was going to crop up and ruin someone’s picnic. Or stargazing. Whatever. There wasn’t anything for me to connect it to, yet and I just hadn’t paid it any mind. Tim probably would have. He’s better at this than I am.
“I did. Something familiar. And it actually made me kind of angry because…”
My hands shift along the edge as I purse my lips once again, fingertips drumming absently as I think through what I’d felt since I’ve had a rash of distractions up until right now and hadn’t really put that much energy into puzzling it out. What had it been? I’d felt that familiar feeling, but it hadn’t just been about the lightning had it? It had come before and I’d taken it to mean perhaps I’d met this Isis before that moment. Maybe that wasn’t it at all.
“Because either someone else is using Zeus’ power. Or if there was smiting going on, was it him making himself known…and why then? Why not anytime in the last…”
There’s another pause and my cheeks color just a little because I’m babbling a little, and getting a hair heated about it, without any real background information and for once? It might actually be pertinent to what’s going on right now.
“Sorry. Issues. He’s. Well. He’s my Dad.”
Freddy: I didn’t know the history of the costume, but it was the assumption that I made. That and the fact that if someone was up to something nefarious they would probably think twice about doing so when they saw her coming. Nothing wrong with a glass half full approach to life.
Which is what I was attempting to do right this moment when thinking about what happen moments before Cassie pulled me out of the basement and into the sewers. The crocodile man was far more afraid of Isis than Cassie. Terrified even. She possessed the strength of Hercules which is considerable. It could have used against him, but the power of Zeus his lightning is something terrible to behold.
“Made you angry?” That was an odd reaction, but then as she explained it became clear. “He..wow.” That was completely unexpected. I don’t know serendipitous? That was the only way I could explain it at the moment.
“That definitely puts things into perspective.” So many questions flooded my mind, but I didn’t instead I kept them to myself trying to put together why Cassie would be angry.
“When I touched her I sensed something and that something is what she used to toss me like a Raggedy Andy doll. She possessed strength that I’m familiar with. Hercules’s strength. It’s why I immediately thought that Zeus had come to smite. She acquired his power somehow and to Zeus had appeared to put an end to it or slow her down. I don’t know. Perhaps and maybe it’s the optimist in me. If that is what happened perhaps he was there because of you.” It’s possible. To protect her because Isis may have eventually sensed the power in Cassie.
“Right now I’m just spit balling. I need to speak with someone who might have some insight into what’s happened.” She could be gone she might not.
“That said if she is still alive or someone else is doing she is we both could be targets. I am able to use the power of Solomon and Mercury. You are the daughter of Zeus. I’m not sure how she acquired the power but whatever the means. She is a goddess of magic.” And healing. Anything is possible.
“Still in that area I have more questions than answers.”
Cassie: “It’s…not really the most logical or sane emotion. I don’t know. Just at the time all I could think is he was opting to step in then, when he more or less ignored me the last seventeen years.”
Spreading my hands wide as I shrug my shoulders again. This should be right up my alley, but at the same time I feel totally out of my depth. I just don’t know enough. I haven’t had time or opportunity to learn, and I don’t know how to even reach out to something like that and find out. Maybe all I have to do is ask, or maybe there’s a whole lot more ritual to it than that. And then…would I even want to? I’d been perfectly, and completely happy not knowing who my Father was. Not having him be a factor or a thought. Then he ended up being the cause of everything changing. Unasked for. Unwanted… and yet…?
“Or worse, that someone else is slinging his power around. Maybe the storm was because he was keeping an eye on her. Or maybe she already had that power and was getting ready to use it for whatever she was trying to do. I wish I knew… sorry. I’m kind of thinking out loud myself here.”
Offering Freddy a chagrined smile across the table.
“Well. If you need my help, I’ll give you my number. That seems like a …really mundane way to get a hold of me all things considered… I’ll work on it. But it takes me fifteen minutes to get here. Probably could do it faster if it was an emergency. I should be okay in Metropolis. I’ve got more than a little backup there.”
Freddy: “It’s family. If there is anything in the world that produces the least sane and most illogical of emotions its family. It’s pretty par for the course. Family always pushes us to the extreme at times.”
Not that I had that problem, but when I was younger I used to get angry, angry that I was left alone. I was angry at my parents. Sure, they had no control over it, but it couldn’t be helped. Family. Logic didn’t always factor.
“It’s possible and that’s what makes this so perplexing. There are so many what if scenarios. I mean think about it. Isis was in the body of an old frail woman. She had Hercules’s strength, but how did she get in that body and who placed Osiris in that pendant she was searching for.” None of it made any sense.
Returning Cassie’s smile, I nodded in agreement.
“Something’s rotten in the various pantheons.” We needed definitive answers and the only way that was going to happen was through investigation.
“I’ll take any help that I can get. I mean this helping each other out has to stop somewhere and it’s best if I keep you in the loop especially if someone’s nicked Zeus’s power. I’ll give you mine and if there’s anything you need I’ll provide as much support I can.”
Cassie: “Whoosh. Tell me about it…”
Because, boy, don’t I know it? Two years ago I wouldn’t have understood that concept. But two years ago it was just me and Mom and generally speaking we’ve always gotten along like two peas in a pod. There were the occasional parent/child spats but it never really went beyond that. Certainly not the point of making me feel quite so crazy. Unfortunately, she seems to be trying to make up for all of that lately and I’m not even sure if it’s her and not just me.
“I don’t know how likely I am to get any sort of response but… I’ll see what I can do there. And I’ll let you know. Maybe there’s some chance of finding out whose pendant it was in the first place? There has to be some sort of record. It’s just a matter of getting a hold of it.”
I’d ask Tim, but I don’t know how …sophisticated the record keeping is in Fawcett or if he’d even be able to access it. Well. It can’t hurt to ask. I’m not sure if the same is true about asking my other parent what on Earth is going on. But again, this is at least a reason to try that isn’t revolving around me or my life.
“Thanks Freddy, I appreciate that.”
Freddy: I don’t know how much information I would find out, but I could try and see what I could find out around the city. See if I could get in contact with one of the hostages. There’s another avenue of questioning I could pursue, but that involved me locating one of the assailants. He’s probably long gone, but then again with his gang being taken into custody he might not have anywhere to go, but that I would have to consider carefully given the fact that you know he could be looking to snack on someone.
“All we can do is try.” Better to try than do nothing. “Just have to keep it the hope saddled with realistic expectations. See what we can find out.” Can’t ask for more than that. Ask the questions see if they get answers if not move on and keep trying until they do get answers.
“You’re welcome. Now how about we get the best burgers in the Midwest before you have to take off? I guarantee you they definitely don’t make them like this in Metropolis.” Can’t come to Fawcett City and not have a burger that’s a crime.
Cassie: “Well if that isn’t the most pragmatic thing I’ve ever heard someone with superpowers say, I don’t know what is.”
Because having powers seems to tip your perception of a lot of things, or at least set you up for a scale far beyond what most people can expect to experience. Or maybe even want to. But I like it, and I find myself smiling again. Effort. Hope. Realistic expectations. That’d make a heck of a bumper sticker.
“That’s the best idea I’ve heard all day. And fries. And a milkshake…”
What? I’m a growing demi-goddess that hasn’t eaten since lunchtime and after the day and night’s events? That feels like a lifetime ago. Then I need to fly myself back to Metropolis. Which might be a slower trip than necessary in order to figure out what on Earth I’m going to say to Conner.
by Michele | Sep 20, 2017 | Chronicles
ST: Located in the central mid-west of the United States of America, Fawcett City is known more for it’s down home country style than it’s criminal element. It is the place where it’s corn-fed farmers go to peddle their wares and buy a few of their own. Akin more to Andy Griffith’s Mayberry than Batman’s Gotham, there’s rarely a day that goes by without the local barber weaving some tale of suspense to the kids on the corner. Nor a chance for those same kids to miss Granny Smith’s fresh apple pies. Baked right there in Granny’s Kitchen. It, like much of the Town, has stood the test of time. This is where the ‘core values’ of America were born, raised and have yet to die.
Crime? Feh. Young men fall over themselves to walk an old lady across the street. Doors are held for women of all types. Men tip their hats to one another when passing in the streets. Race? Color? Creed? The people here wear blinders to that sort of thing. Preferring to live their simple lives, in a simple way. Coming in to town is a trip. An adventure. Something to be looked forward too. Not something that is a chore. Nothing politicized. The solitary blight upon the city? Once upon a time there was a notion to modernize the pore downtrodden yokels of Fawcett City. Walden thought to put his latest Wal-Mart up. To this day it remains a standing lot of emptiness. A sign that this is a people not to be disturbed, to be put upon, by the ways of the world beyond their simple day.
So then. It should come as no small surprise, that such a place would call to such people as Cassie Sandsmark or Freddie Freeman. Yet, through a miracle of fate or happenstance. This is where our intrepid heroes have found themselves. One brought here by the drawing of a strange lure perhaps. Unknowing, truly, why he was even at such a strange place in the middle of the States. Another sent here directly by ominous watching friend who happens to style himself more oracle than bird these days.
So then what are the chances of each of them being in that town. That exact moment. When that hayseed town experiences something most peculiar. It starts with nothing so convoluted as a swirling storm. Rolling in like a texas twister. The sky darkens in moments, perhaps in spite of weather men’s most assured predictions to the contrary. Amidst the sky-gazing denizens, rushing about their business. Each scurrying for a shop, a restaurant, a bank, whatever they’ve come to town for without their umbrellas, comes a single thing more shocking than the surprise storm of the century.
Lightning crackles the sky. Yet, it is no thunder strike that sends alert sirens in to the air. That’s the sound of the explosion at the Fawcett City Bank.
Cassie: I’ve been a lot of places in my seventeen years, in a lot of different countries, on nearly every continent, civilized cities, and forgotten ruins. I think I can pretty safely say that I’ve never, ever been to Fawcett City. Not even on the Fabulous Summer College Scouting Road Trip because lets face it, the place isn’t exactly known for what I’m looking for in higher education and it’s absolutely everything that Conner Luthor’s not going to want to be around. No experiences to experience or I guess more correctly none he hasn’t already had psi-jacked into his head thanks to the clowns that were responsible for his ‘formative years.’ I have a lot of things I might like to say to them at some point, but I guess he also wouldn’t be the same Conner I’ve got now without them. That could be a good or bad thing but either way, he’s not the point right now.
He’s not with me. As a matter of fact, I’ve snuck off without him quite on purpose and it didn’t exactly require Tim’s advice for me to see why that might be the best way to go about this. He’d organized the diversion and I hadn’t asked, but I have to assume that it’s worked. I made it all the way here without a speeding blur overtaking me brimming with curiosity about what the hell I thought I was doing. I actually feel a little guilty about the whole thing, to be honest, especially since I haven’t brought my phone with me either. You don’t need super-vision to use a ‘find my iPhone’ function.
Not guilty enough to stop or turn back though. In fact, I’m feeling pretty damn determined today, thanks in no small part to the way life’s been going lately. Not bad. Just. Not quite what I want, either. So. Here we are. Fawcett City. I’m glad I wore jeans and a teeshirt or I might really stick out. More than a new face is always going to stick out. The krakoom of an explosion makes me pause in my rather aimless ambling down the walk, though. That sound means trouble, and I don’t need my little bird chirping in my ear to tell me that’s probably where I need to go. So I put tennis shoes into high gear, still on the ground at least for the moment, and aim for the sound.
Freddy: Exactly why had Freddy come? He was here to visit his grandfather. Fawcetty City was a second home to him. A place he could come to escape the madness of the world and the journey that he had been set upon. His world had been turned upside down some time ago, but it was finally beginning to right itself. Less topsy-turvy and more pear shape.
Whether or not one knew which was easier to handle Freddy decided that it was pear shape. Topsy-turv was terrible time for him. It was the dark period where down was up and left was right. Nothing made sense as he stood in the hallway remembering the words of the doctor as he was told that his grandfather was no longer with them. He had passed on to a better place.
What better place was there Fawcett City. That is what his grandfather would say more often than not, but at the time, at that point in his life Fawcett City had lost its shine. It dimmed a bit through no fault of its own. All that was left in his life had been taken away.
Bitter and angry. Those were words that had never entered is mind. He was the typical All-American kid, star player on the baseball team. Things were supposed to get better. This wasn’t supposed to happen, but that’s life. It knocks you down not with a push but with a punch to the gut and then it’s up to you to get up and keep going or wallow there in the dirt as everyone walks on by.
Never for a million years did he think that he would be where he was. Yet, he made a promise, to his grandfather and to himself. He needed a moment to steady himself. He was so close the trials. He had been so consumed with them, but as he was reaching the end he knew that he needed to talk to his grandfather. He needed to focus himself. He also needed to talk to the only person he knew that would keep his secret which truly gave a morbid spin to the, Two can keep a secret if one of them are dead.” adage.
Still, that’s exactly what he had done. He been speaking with his grandfather for almost an hour. He needed to catch up he needed something that was a steady in his life. Talking to his grandfather was probably the one constant that had not changed it just took him a while that’s all.
He was still going over what he shared with his grandfather while he headed down the main thoroughfare in the city. It’s not that Fawcett City was small, but it wasn’t huge. Depending on where you were headed you could usually get there by foot and if need be by bus. He hadn’t gone to the house instead he decided to stay in a hotel which is where he was on his way too when the storm system began to develop.
True twisters did seem to come together quickly, but there was nothing in the forecast about it. That was rather odd, but what bothered him more was the sound of an explosion that came from the direction of the bank. Explosion. Fawcett City? Before he knew it he was taking off as quickly as he could to see what happened. He already felt his heart pounding in his chest. Adrenalin. Still explosion things like that happen in Fawcett City.
It was like Riverdale. Obviously Freddy had not watched TV in the last year.
ST: It is a stark contrast. The way in which Heroes such as Cassie and Freddie rush towards danger. While those of a far more average ilk rush away from it. There is never a more pronounced sense of just that as now. When the average every day citizen of Fawcett City would look to keep themselves and those they love safe. Not to say that they’re cowards! There is, even if in small amounts, Heroism in the way that Father’s rush their sons in to the truck. Or how mothers scurry their daughters in to the relative safety of the General Store. But there is a very noticeable lack of people, rushing toward the bank other than Cassie, Freddy and the piercing siren of FCPD.
As the Heroes approach the site of the explosion the sight before them is nothing too shocking at first. Fawcett City’s bank is smoldering. Smoke swirls out of the shattered windows. A cordon of police have begun to blockade the building. A light rain keeps the embers of fire from lighting neighboring buildings ablaze, but the fire crew is on standby none the less. A particularly barrel chested man, who wears a slightly fancier uniform and carries a megaphone, is even then barking orders to the others.
‘Everyone back behind the lines.’
‘Stay calm. We’re dealing with the situation.’
‘Get the wounded in to the General Store, we’ll set up an infirmary until the ambulance get here.’
His commanding presence seems to bring calm to those in the area. As if this is a man who has ‘seen it all,’ so he doesn’t crack under pressure. But while the average Fawcett City citizen might take a good deal of hope from his display? The trained eye can tell that even the Chief is rattled. He’s not sure what they’re dealing with here. This is Fawcett City, stuff like this just doesn’t happen here.
The relative calm is soon broken, when the otherwise shattered front door opens to allow a single disheveled older woman to exit. Her hands are bound behind her. A single tether of rope, like a leash, allows her no more than a few feet of space out the door before she is stopped. Despite obviously having been in there, where the explosion happened, the woman remains remarkably calm.
“They say they’re not going to hurt us. They’re only here for the money. If we let them leave, they won’t hurt-… they won’t eat… anyone else.”
And that, my friends. Is the exact moment when the look on the Police Chief’s face says he has never dealt with anything like this.
Cassie: There’s a pretty big difference in the reactions of the people to what I’m used to. No, it’s not totally different from the way it goes in Metropolis. Anytime there’s some sort of disaster, or crime in progress, you can generally count on people to do exactly what I’m seeing the citizens here doing. Getting to safety, getting out of the way. Seeing to their family or to self-interest. Maybe I notice it more now that I’m involved, but lately? In Metropolis it seems like there’s more people moving towards the scene of whatever is happening. At first I thought it might be to help, and sometimes it is in fact that. First responders that can and will step in to help. But more and more, now that ‘Superman’ and ‘Wonder Woman’ have been stepping in? They gather to gawk as well.
I don’t know Fawcett City. I mean. I was provided with a map, because the TImBirdy is nothing if not excruciatingly thorough, but I don’t exactly need it. There’s only so many places to go, and the sound had been guidance enough. It means that at some point along the trip there? I catch sight of another blonde head moving towards the noise. He stands out because like me? We’re trout moving upstream. But it’s also a face I’ve seen a picture of, and the whole reason that I’m here. As I arrive at the bank itself, and the smoke, I take in what’s going on. Robbery? Accident? The latter might seem more likely since the whole thing’s a bit dramatic for a place this size but… even Metropolis’ police force who are a lot more used to dealing with weird don’t really know what to do with it.
This guy sure doesn’t. And when the door opens, I shade my eyes from the rain to squint inwards. She’s ruffled but… too calm. I’ve got super powers and I would probably be freaking out a bit more than she is. Especially when she finishes the message with the correction of whomever’s in there not eating anyone. Eating? Well. That’s never good. Edging my way back a bit from my viewing spot, I start to circle around. They can probably only cover so much area, and I make a point to take my path past Freddy. To bump shoulders with him and mutter a ‘Sorry, excuse me’ as I go to find another way in.
If I can’t find another one already available? Well. It’s probably even easier to find an angle without as many eyes and to make one. Whether that’s yanked open door, or a dislodged window. Last resort would be a Cassie sized hole in the wall, but I’d prefer stealth over loud People Eating Triggering Ruckus.
Freddy: As he reached the bank he saw the perimeter being established. Emergency services had already arrived. When little happens in a town they were pretty Johnny on the spot. Police, firemen and the EMTs were already doing what they were trained to do. They were handling it.
The chief was there with his megaphone keeping the crowd clam. He projected the air of calm that everyone needed at the moment as Freddy took everything in from a slight distance. He didn’t want to rush head on only to find himself detained by the first responders. He needed to get a handle on what was happening around him, but he also needed to help.
Everything seemed by the book at least with how the emergency services were handling everything. Still the storm the explosion it all seemed to come together out of nowhere. Freddy gave it a bit more thought, but he was broken from that thought when the old woman came out of the bank with a tether of some kind.
Moving a little closer Freddy wanted to hear what she said and in the beginning it sounded like something out of a cop show or movie right up until it went all Walking Dead. Eat them? Nothing good could come of that. Nothing at all.
This couldn’t be a coincidence could it? Eating people? The same time he came to visit his grandfather’s grave? Things like this didn’t happen in Fawcett City. He didn’t know if something like that didn’t happen anywhere. Either way he doubted that they would be ordering up pizzas given the fact that they snacked on or devoured a hostage.
Freddy told himself to keep calm and focus. The last thing anyone could afford was for him to get too hyper or to panic. What was it that he had been told?
Charging in never a good idea. Instead he had to go for an alternate route. The blonde stepped back and ducked down the alley as he began to make his way to the back of the bank. How was he going to get in? Who he had to think of something right?
Of course he couldn’t do this as Freddy he needed an assist. As much as of an assist as he was going to get. When he was far enough away from the crowds he used what he had to help him.
“Shazam!” He called out and just like that it was still Freddy Freeman running, but he was moving far faster than he was before. He had two trials down. Wisdom and Speed. That he had on his side. Wisdom had to be the first. Gods suffered no fools so to speak. It was like unlocking the trials. Pass it and then you showed potential fail it then they would wait for another.
Speed proved useful, because it allowed him to do more than to move swiftly, but it did give him an idea, but he couldn’t remember if the bank had a sky light or an access point from the roof, but he could try to enter from the back. Back entrance then roof. That’s what he was working with for the moment. Hopefully he would make Solomon and Mercury proud. Sailor Mercury jokes aside. Though he couldn’t help it when he met the god himself. It just popped in his head.
ST: The bank is large, for Fawcett City. Being also the only bank in the City, because somehow the place has managed to avoid all of the incorporated points of interest that every other major destination has. Come to think of it, did anyone see an ATM machine around anywhere? And is that guy over there, using an actual telephone booth to call in the news story as it unfolds? Needless to say finding a ‘back door’ in to the Bank isn’t terribly difficult. Finding one that isn’t, at this point, at least marginally being monitored by the local constables? That’s a far tougher problem. While the Fawcett City PD might be a bunch of rubes when it comes to things like crooks who ‘Eat people’? They’re not new to their jobs and they seemingly do them fairly well.
What they can’t do, is cover the windows above their heads. No need to pull one out even. The explosion took care of that for the most part. Might not even need to fly, Cassie. Since there’s a fire escape leading right up to one. Just got to get past a couple of Deputies, who are watching it for potential escape efforts.
Of course. One moving at such high speeds isn’t going to have the trouble that Cassie has, in being unseen. Though it’s probably a good thing Solomon was on his side. As that would certainly tip off Freddy not to open that door on the roof. Not once he catches the sight of a small zip-line on the interior. Another Bomb. Rigged to blow in the even that the Police sent a team in that way. Leaving Freddy, much like Cassie, with only a couple real obvious hopes for entrance. That fire escape or the windows.
In the mean time the scene up front is not getting any better. The captive is giving off a list of demands. Not all of which are exactly out of the ordinary, but some….
‘They say, they want a Van. They want you to move the line back a thousand feet. No snipers on the roof. If they see even one they’ll eat… er.. kill a Hostage. Park the van up front. They’re taking two hostages with them. They’ll release those when they’re out of the City.’
Once inside the Bank? Well the scenery is quite different from the docile tones of the rest of Mayberry. With only three floors above ground, they all show signs of damage from the explosion. The top-most floor has the least, but it’s still obviously disturbed. Whether by those who caused all this or the effort to evacuate after the initial explosion. The second floor is more obvious in it’s damage. With the central floor collapsed, walls separating offices have caved in. Desks and debris little everywhere. Here there are signs of life though. In the form of near-horror story amounts of gore. Blood from injuries… or perhaps from people being eaten… is visible at nearly every turn. All signs point to the people on the second floor, those not caught in the explosion, being rounded up. Taken downstairs.
Visible through the enormous hole in the second floor is the lobby. Where debris causes a lot of hurtles in making out exactly what is visible. Still it’s not impossible to make out the Hostages. They’ve all been rounded up in the Bank’s main lobby. There too the floor has collapsed downwards, in to a basement. The Hostages show all the signs of visible duress. They’ve been through an explosion. Now they’re being held hostage. Some have seen their friends, co-workers, actually eaten by….
You actually have to see it to believe it. There’s four of them visible. Each standing at least seven feet in height. Their elongated snouts, long slooping tails. The clown mask disguises do —nothing— to conseal the fact that these men. These Crocodile Men. With their tommy guns and their mafia-style suits. Are terrorizing these people. At least one more is out of sight, most likely holding the tether of the Hostage that’s being used as a mouth piece. With yet more beneath, in the basement level where they’re no doubt raiding the vault.
Cassie: Getting past the deputies? Not really that hard, I don’t think. They’re watching for people coming out, not stopping other people from going in. Because really. Who in their right mind goes into a partially blown up building, with a hostage talking about demands of criminals that are apparently willing to eat you. Heroes and crazy people that’s who. Is this cannibals? Or something else? I actually hope it’s the ‘something else’ option because somehow that’s less creepy. Overall, it’s a mental picture I’m trying to dwell a whole lot less on.
While I’m not as fast as some other metas out there, I’m still fast. Getting faster, too. My powers may have triggered when I turned sixteen, but they clearly hadn’t shown up full force all at once. Probably a really good thing for me and everyone around me. So I bypass the fire escape, or at least most of it, by starting a little further down the alley. Running start that isn’t strictly necessary for me to scrabble up a nearby wall and then launch myself over, tucking my head to go in through the blown out remains of a window more for less impact noise than any real need of preserving myself. Acutely aware of the rustle of momentum that makes hair blow the way it shouldn’t. Most people probably wouldn’t know what that means. Most people don’t have superspeedy boyfriends that delight in using said powers. Someone faster than me just went past, and boy. I’m hoping it’s my new potential friend here.
The gore? The blood? That takes me from that little pre-action stage of antsy and determined, to angry and determined, and that’s a whole different side of Action Cassie. First though, is searching briefly and visually for anyone who hasn’t already been found by…
What the actual fuuuuuuu.… Yeah. Well. That’s a thing. Apparently. Gun wielding reptiles. Anyone close to me that can be ushered to safety? All I can really do for the moment is try to beckon them to a mostly safe corner of the place until I can come back. Sending them out the fire escape might get them shot. Down gets them eaten. And if there’s no one to immediately save? Then I guess there’s someTHING to fight. I’ll start up here on the second floor. Picking out a target away from the others if I can manage it to introduce to an over the head blow with some superspeed momentum behind it.
Freddy:Upon seeing that the back was being covered by the police Freddy backed himself away and quickly got out of sight moving as swiftly as the speed he had been endowed with allowed him. He also used it to give him the edge he needed to get to the roof. Whether it was a leap or flight he wouldn’t tell. He didn’t land hard, touching down light as a feather. Scanning the area which did have an access route, but nothing he wanted to tamper with. He saw the zipline. He seemed to be moving faster than normal even here as there was a chance that the police could be watching the roof for signs of movement. That’s the last thing he wanted. With that in mind he continued move quickly trying be as much of a blur as he could.
That might what he might need to do to keep people from seeing or recognizing him. Freddy never pushed himself to see how fast he could go, but right now he was about to try and see while he decided that he would enter via a different route. Windows here he comes. He slipped off the edge disappearing to land gently on the fire escape. It was right at this point that he thought he might need a mask of some kind, but that was neither here or there at the moment as he slipped through the window of the third floor.
Once inside Freddy took a moment. He couldn’t let the adrenalin get the better of him. He paused briefly to take in the surroundings. No real damage, structural or otherwise. He moved to the stairs pausing as he heard voices below him more like people nervous and upset and probably hurt obviously. He waited until the voices were fair enough away before he made his way down the stairs so he could get a read on the second floor which was none too good.
A bomb. Someone set off a bomb. Seriously wasn’t that a bit of overkill there? Why a bomb? He moved down the stairs quickly making sure not to disturb anything as the huge gaping hole that was once part of the floor gave him the line of sight he needed. He paused to take in what he was looking at while trying to keep out of sight.
Given what he had been told and shown gun toting reptiles weren’t too out of order, but it didn’t make sense. They had guns. Also, why the clown masks? It’s not like there’s a lot of croc men walking around. He didn’t even want to get into the fact that they were eating people. You had to remove the mask for that.
Still he waited, but he saw that he wasn’t alone. He could try to get her attention, but with the hole the crocpeople down below might see. Think Freddy. There was a possibility that there could be another bomb. That’s always a possibility. Not to mention that they had hostages. They made for easy targets. Not like Freddy was super-durable. Not there yet.
What he wouldn’t give for a distraction.
ST: There’s not a lot left of the second floor by the time our heroes arrive. Those too injured to be scuttled downstairs were among those whom got… well.. eaten. Those who weren’t eaten or hustled downstairs? Are more or less scared completely shitless. Putting her at risk of discovery, more so than of any real aide. In fact it’s at the point when she’s trying to cajole the first person she’s found, when one of the would-be captors comes looming ’round a corner. Snout up, extended, tracking like a predator in the wild.
Someone hasn’t watched Crocodile Hunters. The precision needed to strike a crocodile and knock them out is one that takes years to learn. Oh, Cassie has the raw strength in spades. Certainly enough she makes a resounding thud upon the skull of the suit-wearing, tommy gun toting, mobster of a Crocodile. But instead of the resounding victory that she thought perhaps to engender? Well. Her surprised captive goes from shocked, to hurt, to angry all in the span of her single punch. There’s good news at least. At least he didn’t reflexively squeeze the trigger and alert the others. On the flip-side, there’s a little bad news. Call being bitch-slapped by a Crocodile Man’s tail.
Which apparently packs a pretty good punch. Not a Superman level punch, but the sort of punch that leaves Cassie more offended than injured. Because. Frankly. She just got bitch-slapped by a tommygun toting crocodile man. The real threat comes only heart-beats later, when those long, strong, jaws open to bite her.
Hey, Freddy wanted a distraction? Well he gets one in spades then. Because those wide opening jaws looking to take a bite out of Cassie? Sets off the young woman she’d been trying to rescue. Who needs a gun to go off when you’ve got the Kim Basinger-type of wail of a scared young woman. ‘He’s going to eat you!‘ It’s more screech than scream. And well. So much for the element of surprise now, Cassie Sandsmark. Now it’s a lot more about the NOM NOM of Crocodile Men.
‘Great. Sylvester’s eating another one! Aunty Minerva’s gonna be pissed.’
Cassie : Someone doesn’t watch reality television, no. Or much television at all, really. Someone spent enough time in areas with regular reptiles to know to be wary of where they might be lurking, what they do to you when they strike and where to actually aim for if you’ve got the peace of mind to do so once you’ve gotten yourself chomped. Of course, I’m not exactly sure here how many of those characteristics and tactics I ought to count on being in play just now. Because these are … I don’t even know what these are. We’re sticking with Crocomaggia for the time being. My punch is less effective than I might actually like it to be.
Not a position I’m used to being in anymore, actually. And if that hadn’t put me a little off balance along with the whole walking talking Reptar thing? Then I might have better anticipated getting tail slapped. My chain of reactions isn’t all that different from what his had been. Shocked. Irritated. More angry than I had been already. Flinching slightly over the screeching of the hostage, I don’t have the time to shush her. I probably shouldn’t bother anyway. If they think he’s just eating another helpless person then it seems, from the blood and the talk, that they’re probably not going to bother interrupting.
Auntie Minerva? Weird as all this is I’m not going to call that a coincidence. It’s just a detail that’s less important at the moment than the jaws and teeth coming at me. So I lunge inwards, their height difference from mine giving me room under the jaws to throw my arms around in the best choke hold I can muster. If all else fails? It gets my hands a whole lot closer to where I can gouge at one of the very few weak parts on this kind of critter in the ‘real’ world. The eyes. It’s also a whole lot harder to get bitten or tail slapped from this vantage. One hopes, at least.
Freddy:Eyes are the vulnerable points. It could cause more problems than solve to get in the middle of the commotion and it could cause more problems, but at the moment it seemed that they had their distraction, but he was aiming for something that would allow him to get the other hostages out free and clear. There were a few ways that they could go about this, but at the moment it seemed that they had their hands full on the second floor here.
Screaming woman. Another who seemed to be able to take a hit and give them all the same. Things were getting dicey there needed to be a way they to round up the crocodile men without causing more damage. There was the hole in the floor, the first floor. That’s when Freddy moved into action. Don’t fail him now Mercury. He moved as fast as he could pushing himself. Fast like lightning? They were going to put that to the test.
“Go for his eyes.” He told the blonde girl..young woman. No time to be PC! He burst into action moving as quickly as he could to pull the gun from the Sylvester is? Hoping that Cassie’s attack would cause him not to grip the gun tighter. He might not be able to snatch. He needed the gun out of the way, because if she did go for the eyes that might cause him to react with a spray of bullets.
Also, who uses Tommy Guns? What movie did they walk out of? Still he had to see if the speed would let him move quick enough not only to snatch the gun and allow the young woman to get a few blows in he hoped to get the screaming woman out of the line of fire and out on the fire escape and then they could decide what to do about the other crocs.
ST: The creature that Cassie has engaged is not all that different than the creatures Cassie has a bit of experience with. Though she was never the one actually putting the skills to use of fighting off a crocodile. There’s certainly small differences. Like the longer bipedal legs that carry these creatures around. Leaving short, stubby arms, which carry the signature weapon of choice. Which is either by design or luck, still not going off. Even when Cassie lunges in close, ducking inside like a prized boxer to get under the natural defense of the larger creature seeking to bite her. A choke hold isn’t all that difficult to lock in to place either.
It’s really what happens -after- that, which is important. First is that Cassie realizes why the gun hasn’t gone off. The way it shatters in to a thousand little plastic pieces after Sylvester cracks her on the skull with it? Speaks to it being nothing more than a prop or a toy. That’s what Freddy confirms moments later when he takes that gun away from the creature.
Then there’s the density of the throat she seeks to choke out. Oh, she’ll win that fight. But before she does? She and Sylvester are going for a ride. Because in order to clamp down her godly strengthened arms, she’s got to be close. Too close to stop his tail from curling around her as well. And then… well you probably guessed it.
Gator Roll.
Well. Freddy wanted a distraction. Right? Nothing more distracting than two fully grown people, one of which is a seven foot tall crocodile man, wrastling on the floor. Rolling around. Crashing through desks, debris… she’s heeding the advice of Solomon though. They eyes happen to be a very prime choice. One that makes someone new howl in pain. Sylvester himself. So much for the others thinking this was a harmless snack. Apparently Sylverster picked a snack that fights back.
Between the gouging of the eyes, which forces Sylvester to defend his eyes with those short little stubby arms. And the fact that he’s unable to keep rolling. It leads to Cassie’s original plan working a lot better. Slowly choking the Crocodile Man down. All the while Freddy follows through getting the one captive out the fire escape window. Causing a commotion outside when the Police officers take notice of the terrified woman. In turn. This changes everything.
‘The jig is up boys. They’re on to us. Time for plan B. Kill the Hostages.’
Cassie: There’s a grunt from up under the GatorMan’s jaws that could be an affirmative. It could also be something a lot ruder than that, but the truth is I’m kind of occupied and don’t want to untuck my head long enough to answer clearly. A head that’s a whole heck of a lot harder than the plastic toy that breaks on it instead of the other way around. It’s something I’ve experienced before, though the last time it was cruel torturous teenage girls and not …these things. Of course, in that case? I had to pretend it hurt and I also couldn’t throttle them in return. This time I don’t have to be effected at all, and my fingers can rake and claw.
And. Then we’re rolling. This part I at least expected but after getting tail pimp slapped it’s a whole lot less startling, and a little rolling and wrestling I can manage. I don’t have enough of a peripheral view to really even get dizzy from the tumbling or the smashing. It’s not the cat fight that someone might have fantatsized about between me and my high school nemesii but then… we’re all girls at St. Mary’s. At least. Far as anyone knows. This I can do all day. The only really dismaying thing, as the thrashing slows and I clench my arms harder, is the call I can hear from downstairs. The racket outside. We’ve got to get those people out and now. Before anyone else gets eaten.
The pause that I take before extricating myself from Sylvester, and from the latest pile of debris that we’d rolled into, is to call out to Freddy. As well as to reach under the neckline of my teeshirt and press a fingerprint to the ‘bauble’ I wear there. Activating not only my custom designed and technologically crafted ‘costume,’ but the facial alteration as well.
“Keep getting them out!”
Now’s the time to be a whole lot less sneaky. That ship’s definitely sailed anyway so there’s really zero subtlety in the way I descend to the first floor, and a whole lot more dropping my weight, backing the falling up with flying, so that I thunk into the floor crouched and ready to move. If Conner were here? I’d definitely not be doing this. He’d probably claim it’s his pose, the Superman Landing but… he’s not and while I’d never say it to his face he’s right. It’s definitely impressive. And I need to get all the attention that I can right now. All attention on the sudden descent of Wonder Woman is not on chomping hostages.
Now that I know I don’t have to be concerned about the guns, and what they might do to other people?
“Which one of you amphibians is next?”
I know they’re not amphibians. In fact, my brainy brain is cringing over even uttering those words.
Freddy:The gun cracking and shattering was unexpected, but it explained a lot. As did the clown masks to a point. It was unexpected, but it drew together a few things in his mind. When he got his hands on the gun he looked it over dropping it so he could get the woman out. There were the other hostages, out. Was he that fast? Was there another bomb?
The bomb was a distraction? Perhaps it was the blood and guts that caused them to eat the hostages. Much like blood in the water for a shark they couldn’t resist. They can’t kill them with the guns so eating them was always the fall back plan. Still how many were there? He didn’t now.
Getting the woman out was a gamble. He didn’t suspect that the police would make a big to do about. It could have been a quiet affair. However, it was more like the gator roll which may have happened regardless.
If he had the strength he might have used Sylvester in hammer toss towards his brothers? Cousins? Other Crocthugs? Cassie was already making an entrance which could work to his advantage as he moved as quickly as he could making his way down to the floor deciding to remain grounded but using the speed to begin moving the hostages out of the area going for the closest exit whether it be backdoor, window or possible whole. If Cassie kept the attention on her then maybe they wouldn’t notice the hostages being moved out of danger.
Sadly this meant that Cassie was crocbait, but it also meant that she was currently the star of the show. Worst show ever, but still.
ST: “Amphibians! Who are you calling Amphibians!?”
Apparently one of the group is smart enough to know the difference. That also happens to be the one holding the ‘leash’ for the Hostage that had been outside. Playing the part of mouth piece for the group. What’s more impressive than Wonder Woman’s landing? Is that it actually doesn’t strike fear in to the hearts of Men. Not even Crocodile Men. They’re not even phased by her arrival. In a way it’s a little insulting, because they actually seem more concerned about the Barney Fife squad outside than the honest to goodness super-heroine that just landed in their midst.
Or perhaps they’re just a little more concerned about something else. Something other than Superheroes or Cops. That it keeps them on point. Pushes them forward. In any case, Cassie’s landing has one of the desired results. The remaining four Crocs aren’t making a move on the Hostages. Instead they’re forming a kill circle around her. While their ‘Boss’ heads for the basement, his singular hostage in tow. Leaving Mr. Freeman all the time in the world (or at least as much as Cassie could buy him) to extradite the Hostages at a super-fast pace.
How long he’d have to make that effort? Well that entirely depends on how long Cassie can square off against four full-sized Crocodile Men.
“Is he dead?”
“I think he pulled his barmy eye out!”
“Shouldna oughta done that miss.”
“Yaaah. Now weze gotta eat youse.”
Cassie: “That doesn’t seem like a very fair trade-off.”
I’m not about to let them eat me, of course. I don’t even want to risk letting one bite me, because there’s a downside to being smart enough to put two and two together on things like this. It means that I’ve taken what it felt like to get tail whipped by the first I ran into, and I’ve started to calculate the force that a regular crocodile’s bite would muster and multiply it by…whatever these things are. I feel like maybe my good buddy Red Robin should have prepped me for clown mask wearing, man-crocs with toy Tommy Guns but lets face it. I wouldn’t have believed him. I have a feeling that if I get home and decide to tell Conner about it? He won’t either. But being able to wing it in the ‘field’ is a big part of this job. I’m not always going to have a dossier of facts and tidbits, and I’m not always going to be in a place like this on purpose. Sometimes it’s just going to happen.
The important thing is as long as I’m distracting them? They’re not eating civilians, or interfering with Freddie getting them out. There’s just the one being led to the basement that I’ve got more pressing concerns about. Eyeballing the circling Crocs, I’m waiting for them to make a move, for even one of them to move in towards me, then I can drop my shoulder like I”m falling to the floor, I just never quite hit it so much as take off from that vantage. Aiming to take my opponent out at his very low knees and carry on through. There’s got to be a desk or a downed bit of architecture I can use for a baseball bat. Unless they all move at once, then it’s just straight up and out of the way. At least until what goes up comes down again right on top of them.
Freddie: Freddy moves as quickly as his feet will carry him. He moves through the lobby making sure that he can get his hand on every hostage that was in there while remaining alert. He said nothing as he went about this. There was one hostage that wasn’t gathered by the others. The hostage that was sent out to speak for the crocs was missing. He wanted to snip the line do whatever, but she was gone.
He was worried. Why was he pulling her away? Freddy had to prioritize. The others came first and if he was fast enough he would follow the other down into the pit. He didn’t like it, but he would take the moment to push himself even faster if that was possible to grab what he thought could be helpful from the walls. He grabbed the fire extinguishers. This was Fawcett City. Sure, they probably had a sprinkler system, but they probably had extinguishers. Not one of those dinky extinguishers either. Time stopped here why would they start thinking about getting little ones. Besides in times like this you use what you could and it wasn’t like he could lift a vault and drop it on anyone…yet, that would take too much time. Use what you got and those are the things that caught his eye.
“Catch!” He called out tossing one of the extinguishers to Cassie while he used one he still had to try and take one of the crocs on his way towards the stairs. Moving as fast as he was he wasn’t going to try to punch him He didn’t want to know what might happen but he would swing and hit as he moved as fast as he could, hoping that he would leave Wonder Woman (ok so he watched some TV) with one less Croc to worry about.
Of course, this was all depending on if he didn’t get tripped up and could be a be as helpful as he could be. Save hostages, take a croc and try to intercept another before whatever plan B was initiated. Sure he could do that maybe.
ST: What Cassie finds out soon enough is that this is one of those rare situations where the ‘Bad Guys’ aren’t actually as dumb as they look. Or rather, that they’re not quite as unschooled as they look. It might not even be that they’re smart, but it should be readily apparent that these guys have hunted in a ‘Pack’ of sorts before. Cassie is waiting on them, but they’re not attacking. Not yet. They circle. During which, Freddy is surely all but ignored. But when they circle, it’s more like organized chaos than just chaos. A trained eye might even take note of the way they clue in to one another. With the main hunter among them giving non-verbal cues. A snuffle, a jerk of the head, a little twitching of the tail. One by one the Crocodile Men fall in to place.
When it happens? It’s sudden. It’s no singular attack either. More like a layering of attacks that come all at once. One goes in, low and teeth first. While another flicks it’s tail in to the air high to deny her leaping out of the way. Those two attacks happen at once, but as soon as Cassie moves (tipping her hand), two more join the fray. Each one picking a different angle. These guys are trained and clearly of a predatory variety of villain. They don’t hold back, suggesting that they don’t have any compulsion against murder in the most bloody forms. By the time all Six have attacked, Cassie is going to be all but dogpiled by snapping jaws, teeth, claws and tails.
But there is definitively good news in all of this for Cassie. Freddy was very helpful. His tossed fire extenguisher is snatched out of the air by a set of jaws that rip is asunder. Spraying high-density, fire extinguishing and oxygen eliminating foam all over the lot of them. By which means that I hope Cassie can hold her breathe. Y’know. Longer than your average Crocodile.
Meanwhile, Freddy’s only real hurdle in all of this? Happens to be that ‘snatching’ one of the Crocodile Men, even at high speeds, is a little like grabbing a brick wall at a few hundred miles an hour. Sure, you might take the Croc with you when you go. But boy are you going to feel that in the morning, with the whole lack of super-strength to compensate. But, it’ll work. Even disorient the Crocodile Man enough to not instantly surge in to attacking.
For the time being neither Cassie, nor Freddy are really able to get a free trip down in to the basement to follow the last remaining hostage. Speaking of! With Freddy having saved most of them, the Cops outside no longer have any reason not to intrude upon the bank itself. As if being in a bank with a tremendous amount of structural damage wasn’t bad enough? The lights go out and the interior of the bank is bathed in spot-lights. You know the type that blind perps right before a tactical team breaches…
Cassie: I’m not used to fighting like this. I’m not ashamed to say it. I don’t have any reason to have learned to do so, because most of my training so far has come from sparring against my boyfriend, and that’s a one on one sort of situation. He’s much faster than me, so sometimes it can feel like more than one. But it’s not like there’s a contingent of practice dummies up in Canada where we go to throw punches at one another, not that can come back at me in any sort of tactical way. But it’s not that hard to figure out what’s going on here. Especially not if you’ve seen pack animals at any point in your life. That’s just not behavior you normally attribute to a crocodile.
I’d thank God (a God) that I’m as sturdy as I am, except we’re not really on speaking terms right now. If I wasn’t, I wouldn’t be here but…just the same. The only advantage possibly to being dogpiled is that it makes it that much harder for them to get me instead of one of their own. Where I don’t have to worry about who I’m kneeing, punching, or clawing at. It’s mostly a lot of kicking. Trying to get some room, gouging if it feels like I’ve got hold of anything soft. The help from the other blonde sails my way but I have no chance to grab it before it’s chomped, and then the world goes white and thick. Fortunately I can hold my breath a very long time, but there’s still a sense of panic that kicks in if you’re not prepared. I haven’t had my powers long enough for them to become entirely natural to me.
Unfortunately? I bet I can’t hold it as long as a Crocodile can. They’re designed for that kind of thing, and that means that my kicking and wriggling my way free of the pile on takes on that much more of a sense of urgency. No longer just fighting to be a distraction, but digging a bit deeper because I don’t especially want to die today.
Freddy: The explosion from those crocman jaws. That was unexpected perhaps at another time it might be comical. He didn’t wince, no time for wincing. When a crocodile, saltwater crocodile bite they slam their jaws shut with 3700 pounds per square inch or 16,460 newtons. So, they were more than capable of doing just that. He was just trying to give Cassie something to use a bludgeon the crocs with.
When hit the croc. He felt it. He knew he felt it. Thank God for adenalin maybe. He took a moment to use his extinguisher while the croc was disoriented. He could spray a little in its eyes blind it. It can’t be fun can it? Just get it out of the mix. He kept going to try and evade become croc chow. He had to deal with that, but there was the fact that two things happened as he made his round again to put some distance between him and disoriented croc.
His fellow blonde in arms was being crocpiled. “Wiggle free!” He called out. They were covered in extinguisher foam. Maybe it was you know slippery. Like that foam party he went to in New York. He didn’t add that part, because no one needed to know about that. However they were all wiggling about he might be able to work her way free.
Second thing. Lights went out. Crap. He knew what that meant. Power was cut. They were ready to rush in and do whatever and he still didn’t know what that other croc up to. Plan B. Possibly bomb! His mind went there. There was a hole in the floor. Easy access right? But into what? Possible getting dinged on the way down, but he didn’t want to abandon the other especially if the cops were about to come in like gangbusters.
“Coming in hot!” was what he got in as he used the speed to launch the second extinguisher as hard as he could. He was going to be out of it tomorrow and the next. She was underneath she was protected, but whoever was on top?
This was a total Hail Mary, Jesus and Joseph on Freddy’s part as he continued to road runner his way through this. He couldn’t get to close, because he saw what happened with the first extinguisher. He didn’t want to get snapped in half. Also please let his am be true. Croc not blonde. Croc not blonde.
ST: When you’re surrounded by five different people and they’re all trying to kill you? It’s easy to hit one of the bad guys. Finding something soft though? Is an effort in futility, when you’ve got very little time to actually make your strikes. If only you were the one blessed by the God of Speed, Cassie. Alas, wrong baby daddy. All you’ve got is immense power, strength and ….
CHOMP!
“…ow!…”
That crunchy sound brings, if only momentarily, everything to a halt. Crocodile Men looking for some sense of satisfaction. Cassie looking for a missing limb, where her arm hands out of a Crocodile Man’s mouth. None of them finding what they want. Because apparently her arm is more dense than Crocodile Man teeth. Not so dense as to not -already- be bruising from the force of the attack, but enough so that one of the Men is stumbling back and away holding his jaw. Cracked teeth and more than a little blood covers Cassie’s arm. Whether Luck or Favor from the Gods, it’s not her own. Yet.
You might think that was enough to actually put a spark of fear in to the hearts of Crocodile Men. Though, you’d be wrong. They don’t exactly see this as a failure on their part. It’s not the broken teeth, jaw or pain in their comrade that gets in to their minds. It’s the fact that the force of one bite bruised the Heroine almost immediately. So that means enough bites just might make it through! It’s all but a feeding frenzy then. Of them taking, soaking Cassie’s punches, her kids. Wrestling with her. Because each time she has her focus on one, even two of them, there’s -three- more to bite her somewhere. Over and over.
Correction. Two more. Since Freddy’s aim is definitely true. Call it the ‘Luck’ of Solomon this time. But there happens to be one stationary Croc in the midst of all of this. The one with the broken Jaw. He takes the vaulted extinguisher right to the side of the face, sending him sprawling away. His other comrade is thrashing about, raking at his eyes from Freddy’s quick thinking too. Leaving Cassie with a mere four Crocodile Men and one large opening chance to ‘escape.’ If that was her goal.
This is the end of our good news Champions. Because this, is also, when the first of the smoke bombs comes careening through the front windows in to the bank. As if the Cop’s thought, ‘Let’s add some fun tear gas to the mix of fire repellent, explosions and crocodiles.’
Cassie: “….huh.”
It’s a thought, more than a spoken word or syllable. Maybe a grunt of pain because it did actually hurt, more than the tail smack in the face had for sure, but a wiggle of my fingers shows that it’s clearly still attached, and I’m fairly sure that all that blood? Is not mine. I’m not going to bank on that happening every time, if I had faith in that scenario it’d make this a whole lot easier because I’m betting I could find all sorts of tender parts down past the jaws and into those giant maws of theirs. The whole thing would probably be fairly comical if it weren’t me right in the middle of it, and the rest of them didn’t seem to think it was an excellent time to redouble their biting efforts instead of being a little more wary about the whole thing.
The blinding lights were an issue, though not as much of an issue as they might have been if I needed to aim my attacks. The bounces of the grenades coming in? That’s another story. Part of me is actually very concerned for the armed men outside, more than I am for myself really, but I’d have to hope they just won’t get close enough to get bitten. This also isn’t over, so while I’m ‘escaping’ it’s not to retreat so much as to move onto a smaller fight. Wiping at my face with the bloodied arm, if no other reason than it’s had most of the retardant chomped off it with crocodile slobber, I rocket upwards again through the hole into the second floor, but that’s only to get a better angle to twist and shoot back down again. This time angling for the entrance to the basement.
I’d cart Freddy with me but honestly he could probably get there way before me.
Freddy:Thankfully it landed. He didn’t know if it was luck or all the years of baseball perhaps a little of both. However, it was the first time that he actually had to launch an extinguisher like that. Bright lights meant razzle dazzle. They meant to daze and confuse. Lights out then emergency lights on then the the sounds of grenades coming in releasing tear gas. If this was all for him he would have done a funneling technique of some kind, but this was for the crocs and they could have it.
He had no idea how they would react it to it, but it was best to disengage now, and trust that the cops got the 411 from the hostages and didn’t think that they were simply hysterical on wacky weed talking about crocodile men.
“Right behind you.” He called out as he careened around heading towards the basement stairs. Whatever was waiting down there for them they would have to deal with it, because it was about to get ugly on the first floor.
Just keep going beat the gas and down the stairs. Hopefully, the Wonder Woman would be able to give him a heads up if they were heading in to trouble you know beyond the obvious trouble that they knew was waiting down there for them.
ST: Cassie’s escape in to the air casts all eyes upwards in time to see the smoke grenades coming in. In turn that keeps them from restoring their focus upon her, so there’s no immediate pursuit or efforts to stop that escape. However, there’s a bit of stroke to the bad luck for the first time then. As Freddy, Cassie -and- the Crocodile Men all start at the hole at the same time. Now, this might otherwise be a humorous little clusterfuck, but in this instance both of our heroes make use of the one true edge they have upon the Crocs. Speed.
Behind them a grotesque glut of Crocs all hit the blown out hole all at once. Four of them. Leaving a slightly humorous sight of the four crashing in to the same point, then finding themselves mostly caught there by their own mutual girth. As humorous as that might be, moments later the Police storm the building behind them. And frankly, they’re rather lucky only to have one functional, though blooded and jaw-broken, Crocodile Man to deal with.
Beneath the surface of the Bank, it is almost exactly what you might imagine. The first basement is mostly security, but beneath that is the vault. Which is where the explosion has actually come from. If they stop to ponder that, they might wonder exactly why the explosion comes from inside the Vault. If the Crocodile Men were here to break in, to simply steal something, then wouldn’t they have been trying to break in to the vault? Curious, though nothing that either of the intrepid Heroes can hope to follow up on. Not when they finally catch up to the ‘Leader’ and his lone Hostage.
Except. That’s kind of when things take yet another sideways turn. Because it’s the ‘Hostage’ who’s rifling through safety deposit boxes. While the ‘Leader’ of the Crocodile Men keeps watch. Translating in to the final Crocodile Man seeing the Heroes coming. If anything else about anything in Fawcett City made a lick of sense, then it would probably be funny to see the Crocodile lifting the massive, unhinged vault door. Not to throw it or fight with it. But to pull it back in to place, in an effort to once more block the vault off.
Cassie: A couple things become immediately clear. That they’re not about to just let us run down here, which says that they really were a distraction upstairs as much as keeping everyone else outside out, with the flesh and bone shield of hostages. With the hostages gone, and the police coming in, they follow us down. Because either we’re the bigger threat? Except they never seemed particularly threatened by me. Irritated maybe, but not threatened. Or…
The ‘or’ solidifies as the real reasoning. The shape of the place says that this is where the bomb came from, and that means someone had to plant it here. Someone also would have hadto see these clowns coming in. Unless they didn’t come in off the street. My assumption is sewer. They are crocodiles after all, and there’s bound to be an access point. Maybe that’s what they blew up in the first place, or maybe it was the vault. Maybe both, really, because as I arrive I can see that it is, in fact, where the explosion originated.
It takes about half a second to look at the no longer tied hostage, who is also not eaten despite what went on upstairs for little or no reason, to the other crocodile, and then to narrow my eyes and move.
“Stop her.”
Throwing myself forward, I don’t go directly for the crocodile man. Not at first anyway. I go for the door in an attempt to yank it out of his grip. Perfect world? I can chuck it myself and very temporarily block the entrance to the basement, or at least bludgeon the hell out of the bottlenecked bad guys (since c’mon, clearly they can lift the thing). Worst case I can maybe keep him from getting it in place long enough for Freddy to grab the woman.
Freddy:As Freddy’s eyes took in the entire scene he started to try and formulate a potential hypothesis mind you all of this was happening while his feet moved across the ground making use of the superspeed he currently had his disposal as Freddy’s mind was going a mile a second at this point. Obviously from the look of things she was an inside man someone that could be used by the crocodile men to deliver what was possibly her message and be the innocent party if anyone ever caught up with her or herpes she never turned up because they wanted to use her a snack. If she wasn’t the only inside man so to speak.
Freddy recalled the message she relayed. ”… They’re taking two hostages with them. They’ll release those when they’re out of the City.” They could be taking her and someone else. That someone else could be in on or just to make it look good if something went bad and they thought the woman died or was still being held…probably the later.
Then there was the Aunty Minvera. Freddy assumed that she was waiting somewhere perhaps, but perhaps she was right here all along making sure everything went according to plan. Then there was the fact that the blast wasn’t end to the vault, but appeared to be within.
Blow the vault from within. Perhaps from a bomb that had been planted in something that the woman possibly placed in a safe deposit box. The vault was probably difficult to break into so why break in which would take time potential and require particular sets of equipment when you could blow it out from within while placing something in a box perhaps?
Too many Mystery Woman movies with gramps when he was alive, but regardless that’s what his brain fired off as he moved attempting to intercept the woman and rather than have her do something if he was lucky he moved swiftly to keep her off balance which could result in upchuck or her blacking out.
He was coming to save what he thought was a hostage, but she wasn’t a hostage. Innocent people were hurt. She was in on it. Freddy might be a little perturbed. Just a smidge.
ST: Cassie is good. She’s had a bad night, to be sure, but she’s good. Trained in how to use her powers by someone that knows a little too well. She’s quick, strong, but then you add in her brains. Don’t say this to her boyfriend, but it’s that combination which makes her actually dangerous. Maybe the Most Dangerous of the folks she’s set forth to bring together. All too quickly she’s getting the right of it. Seeing things for what they are. But then, she’d had an inkling at the very moment she saw the woman that first time didn’t she?
Getting to the broad vault’s door isn’t the problem. Over-powering the Crocodile Man to take it from him? Not the problem. What she does with it? Isn’t even the problem. The problem is when Freddy Freemen touches the woman. The Hostage. The petite little creature who had stood outside doting their demands. It’s at the very moment that he touches her, that Freddy realizes just how right he was. How right Cassandra was. Freddy learns a lesson that Solomon is even now whispering in his ear, Your speed isn’t always a weapon, sometimes it can be a weakness. Don’t act faster than you think. Take stock of the area. Use your speed to never get outflanked, not merely to race to the heart of a problem.
Because as his hand lays upon the woman, seeking to disrupt her. Seeking to disorient her. Seeking to do what has worked every other time to this point. This time? It goes horribly, terribly wrong. As the woman. Frail as she may seem. Doesn’t move. Doesn’t budge. Doesn’t so much as flinch when Freddy touches her. In fact, it’s Freddy who will find himself unable to move the woman. Like she’s rooted to the ground.
That? Is when Cassie problem knows shit is about to get real, because the Crocodile Man? Squeaks, before surrendering the vault door in an effort to escape in to the sewers. Like. Making with such haste, his little Clown Mask hits the ground before his squeak even clears the air.
Now. You might wonder what could scare a Crocodile Man so much? What could resist the speed of Mercury? Shazam? No, no. Not spoken like a command. Nor a trigger word. This sounds more like a Question. ‘Are you Shazam?’ Except that the answer is immaterial because Freddy is then introduced to the Strength of Hercules. When he is thrownback at Cassie with the force a kryptonian’s wet dream.
Cassie: You know what’s never going to be a good thing? When they run. I may not have the most practical experience, but I’ve seen enough movies and I have enough common sense to know that when you’re outnumbered by someone, or something, and they turn tail and bolt? It means something worse is coming, or in this case already there. Like little children skedaddling to the other end of the house when Mom or Dad’s found something they know they won’t like. It might be one on one, between me and the Crocodile Man right now, but that could change at any moment. I know it’s not me they’re worried about.
I sail backwards a bit in the air, because I was prepared to tug the door and I no longer need to. Pulling against nothing sets me back, before I turn the momentum into swinging that door into the other four before they join the fray in order to escape, or maybe to take the opportunity to get a little more bitey all over again. Either way, they’re not my problem any longer clearly. Not right now. What is? Is Freddy flying at me. Him hitting me? Isn’t going to do a hell of a lot to me, but me hitting him is going to be a little worse than splatting into a wall. So I catch him, doing my best to move with the force and cushion him a bit.
“Shazam? Is there more than one of you?”
Freddy: Freddy had it all worked out in his mind, but that’s when it all went sideways and upside down. One moment he’s trying to pull at her to do what needs to be done, but then she’s still there. Planted like a redwood. Then the all-important question. His eyes widening. He already knows the answer to everything before the question is fully formed in his mind.
“Oh shit!” He was hurled towards Wonder Woman with as much strength that Superman possesses. No if he had to think about it. Hercules. Strength, but if she had strength what else. He had Speed and wisdom, but she had strength. She could have any the others. When he was caught by Wonder Woman he offered a smile.
“Rival it seems or perhaps not.” He answered while he got down to the ground. This is… It was the first thing that he considered before he was set on his feet.
“Yes. I’m Shazam” He thought about launching himself at her, but at the moment he decided to err on caution, curiosity and a good deal of wisdom which as served him well for the moment.
“Keep one eye on the croc,” He told Cassie as Freddy listened to the voice that was quietly whispering in the back of his mind.
“Who are you?” This couldn’t be? Could it? Strength. She couldn’t be? She could be a rival. However, there was another possibility. “Hercules?” Not as in the strength of Hercules as in was he in there somewhere? Freddy mind wanted to wrap itself around that one, but he had to remain focused.
She didn’t speak the word to call upon the power there was no flash or anything. Freddy couldn’t afford to be confused. What he required right now was confirmation rival or Lord of Magic and if it was the latter what the hell was he doing breaking into a vault? All he knew was that the old woman was connected to the powers of Shazam of Captain Marvel, but how?
ST: Keep an eye on the Croc, really losea a lot of meaning when the ‘Leader’ of them is plunging through the hole that was punched by the original blast. Down in to the sewers, just as Cassie had surmised. Then there’s the others. Whom she threw the vault door at, but they’re currently dealing with the vault door itself. Which caused more of a physical hurdle than anything. Behind them? If one was to listen real hard, are the sounds of a near-militarily efficient tactical group moving in. The skirmish above is a short one, but that only means they move on to neutralizing the other Crocodile Men from behind. As they work to dislodge the door. Maybe they would have moved a bit more hastily, if they’d only know what was going on below.
You see, the Wisdom is Solomon is indeed correct. All is not as it appears. This petite, frail, woman, hadn’t actually called upon Shazam to empower. It had questioned Freddy. Before she then forced him to unhand her. No sooner had Freddy been discarded than the woman went back to it’s search. Pilfering through each of the little boxes, slowly. Time consuming, but it would seem the woman thinks herself to have all the time in the world in spite of what goes on all around her.
Perhaps this is just another part of the Trial then? His questions fall upon deaf ears. Or perhaps it is less that the woman is deaf and more than he’s said nothing of merit. Nothing worthy of a response. It would seem that she is quite consumed with her search.
What is far more important to Freddy, is not what the woman asks for. It is what his own inner voices begin to whisper. That she is familiar. That there is something about her that it recognizes. Her features are chiseled, her frame is slight. She seems elderly, but that in itself only makes her seem different. When looked at through the eyes of Solomon, she might seem younger. Far more beautiful. Egyptian, not sun battered. Ancient, not elderly. Much as Cassie had observed right from the start, this woman stands out as a misnomer. She appears to be elder, slight and was at one point a ‘Hostage.’ Yet from the beginning she seemed far too ‘in control.’ Then there’s the final clue. Which Freddy had remembered without Solomon’s help. They’d said two hostages. Not one.
“Ahh. Here it is,” having apparently just found what she was looking for. “Osiris! I’ve found you.”
Cassie: That Croc? He’s gone. And I am not about to chase him into the sewers where I’d be at a definite disadvantage. Fighting them on dry land had proved to be enough of a challenge for me. We haven’t exactly tested whether or not I can be drowned, and I don’t particularly want to find out today. Especially not in a sewer.
“A rival? Huh.”
I hadn’t had to fight anyone for my powers, but then there weren’t any trials, I was more or less ‘born’ this way. Something or someone just kept me from knowing it was all waiting until the ‘right’ moment. Once I’ve let him down, I hang back by the vault door almost absently leaning into the obstacle with one hand while blue eyes watch the woman askance, and Freddy from my peripheral vision. I don’t entirely know what’s going on. I had enough background intel to make me uncertain though. One assumes that if there’s a trial, that means a test and what happens if I interfere more with that? Or if I’m the one that does it. Does that matter? Or will that stop him from doing what he needs to do?
“Do I punch? Or not punch? Trying to take my cues from you now. I assume that her finding a God of the Dead is never going to be great for anyone concerned though…”
Not the. A. But I also have zero doubt they’re just as real. Look at me and where I came from.
Freddy: Freddy wasn’t sure what she might do, but the strength she possessed he was no match for and this was not something that would be settled through blows. He considered the possibilities as the woman seemed to forget him as soon as he appeared. The crocodile men. There had been a fleeting thought about them. Children of Sobek?
He looked upon the woman Solomon revealing to him things that he should have already known, but still the strength. She was a part of the power. He could feel it. It was one of those like recognizes like, but when she claimed her prize the realizations spilled upon his features.
“Isis.” He said the name loud enough for her to hear to draw her attention from her prize. Less he was completely off about this she has seemingly retrieved her husband. In Fawcett City? Daughter of Geb and Nut. Wife of Osiris. Mother of Horus.
“Not punch. I think she’s probably capable of going toe to toe with you. Actually I know she is. She possess the strength of Hercules.” Was it stolen to achieve this goal? Freddy didn’t run he walked over towards the woman. If he was right she found her husband.
Isis had done much to be reuniting with her husband, but this felt all wrong something was amiss to a degree ok several. “You’ve found him, but what of all the damage you’ve done. The crocs?” He wasn’t on top of her but close enough for him to notice and if she was going to lash out he was going to evade. He considered snatching up what she had in her hand, but if he could talk he would talk. The police were on their way a tactical team no doubt.
“You meant to escape with him. To release him from whatever prison he was placed in.” She knew who he was. Do they have to be enemies?
ST: Wisdom of Solomon indeed. It materializes in Freddy’s mind with such clarity. He is so very, very right. This woman, seemingly frail enough to break in a light breeze, is imbued with the power of Hercules. How that has come to pass is not immediately clear, but Solomon has put him upon the right path. There’s no denying the reaction Freddy gets from his line of questioning. She hasn’t already struck at him again, so she is either at ease with his presence or considers him a gnat to be swatted at leisure, as opposed to a threat to be worried about.
Once close enough, Freddy can see the pendant. A red jewel, encrusted in gold. Woven in to the shape of a Death Mask, for the God of same name. There is no mistaking it, actually. Especially not if you’ve half the knowledge of such things as Solomon or Cassandra Sandsmark. The elderly woman cradles it, bringing it closer to her breast.
Freddy’s question brings the first actual response to his presence, since she threw him like a paper airplane. “The Power of the Gods can be used for more than Championing. I need them. To bring him back. To bring me back.”
Not your normal sort of villainous monologue, actually. Though as the woman says this to Freddy, she also begins to turn. To finally take more stock of him. That is no doubt when Cassie, even faster than Solomon, gets a little tingle along her spine. There’s something more. Something Familiar about this woman, that she hadn’t felt before. Something a little closer to home than she’s ever felt before. Call it women’s intuition, call it a hunch, but Cassie can very much feel a presence that she is far more familiar with than she even knows.
“You. Have their powers. Yes. Come boy. Take my hand. Say his name. Call forth the Lightning.”
In this small chamber. A small vault in some city in the middle of no where. A place where nothing special ever happens. Stands the Speed of Mercury, the Wisdom of Solomon, in Freddy. The Strength of Hercules, in the creature Freddy has named Isis. If by chance then, she has one more of those powers, then what does Cassie’s presence here represent? Why have they all been called here, today, amidst the thunderstorm outside?
Cassie: “Hercules, huh? I’ve heard of him.”
He’s apparently my half-brother and all. I maintain my place, and my eagle eyed watch on the pair of them. I’m waiting for an excuse to do something else besides watch the door, but maybe I don’t need to do more than that. Gives me a little time to think over exactly what I’m seeing here, and what they’re saying. He’s calling her Isis. Is she really? And if she is, and I’m assuming he means she has the literal strength of Hercules, not just strength like Hercules… given that the figure in question had heritage not really any different than mine does that mean someday someone will have the Flight of Cassie?
…can’t say it’s really got the same ring to it. They’d probably insist on my full name for regality. The entire thing is pretty damn silly though, even in my own head, and so doesn’t take much thought or attention. Which leaves me squinting at the pair of them. What she actually has. Blue eyes widen, and then narrow all over again.
“Is that what I think it is? Why is it here of all places?”
None of this makes sense. But then, when you think about it, in traditional terms almost zero in my life does anyway. Then you add in crocomaggia, people invoking powers that weren’t necessarily theirs by birthright. Gods. Monsters. In the middle of Fawcett City. I can’t decide if I should ignore what he says and strike or not. But there’s something tickling at me, like I know her, but I have no reason to know her. Unless, maybe I’ve met her before and didn’t know it. Or maybe that’s just some sort of higher recognition. Divine calling to divine.
Freddy: Freddy was ordinarily the helpful sort, but something about this felt off. He hadn’t written her off as a rival, but this was completely unexpected. He took a few steps away from her quick steps denying her his hand. She could grip it and break every bone in his body until she got what she wanted.
“I don’t think it’s a call I should make. How about you do it yourself. Intermediaries are so impersonal.” He said still taking quick steps back probably faster than he needed, but enough to put some space between them until he was near Cassie once again.
“Gods aren’t imprisoned for no reason.” Unless there was a bit of business going on with the Egyptian Pantheon, but that was neither here or there. “What have you done with Hercules?” He asked. He would not freely give her the power. It doesn’t feel right. She powered her way into this place.
Isis brought her husband back from the dead once, but now she wished to do it again. Freddy was getting a bad, bad feeling about this. If she had Hercules’s power who else’s did she possess.
All he got was bad vibes from all of this. She’s made requests and requests from gods usually mean demands. “What I have was entrusted to me. Not only to use to protect, but protect.” Freddy took a moment. Either through magic or death power can be taken. “Where is Hercules?” Why was the question so important? Freddy was adamant about it. He wanted an answer, because it would give him the insight he needed. The answer would prevent him from jumping to conclusions. He needed to hear it to let himself judge to use Wisdom that had empowered with to make the right decision. He wanted to believe that this could be settled without things getting anywhere than they were, but even without Solomon he had to look at the facts.
She had Hercules strength. She also ran with crocodile men who would probably serve Sobek first before they would serve her. Innocent people had been harmed. She sought this to retrieve Osiris and now there was a gathering storm. She knew who Freddy was almost like she was checking him off a shopping list. Freddy’s mind could run with this, but he wouldn’t allow himself too. He also realized that he was putting himself in between her and Cassie despite the fact that she possessed more power than he did, but something or someone told him that it’s the right thing to do.
Love makes people do extraordinary things. Extraordinarily good and Extraordinarily bad.
ST: The answer to Freddy’s question comes a little more quickly than even his evasion skills. A veritable crack-a-thoom of thunder, to go with the lightning that neither of them can see at this point. Yet, somehow lightning flashes none-the-less. In a heartbeat there is a shaking, tremor, that precedes the sudden understanding of just what destroyed the vault. Exactly what had caused the destruction of several levels of the bank.
Isis explodes. Crackling with lightning that sweeps across entire vault floor, racing for Freddy and Cassie. Now they know why the Crocodile Man, the leader, had ran away. Just as Solomon had given Freddy certain glimmers of Sobek and the Crocodiles of the Nile. It now bestows upon Freddy a certain inescapable knowledge. Run, fool. It’s Zeus.
Except that there’s no longer a route -up-, Cassie blocked that with the Vault door. There is only one way out of here and the Crocodile Man showed it too them.
Cassie: I’m a little surprised at his back pedaling, to be completely honest. I assume there’s something going on that he understands and I don’t entirely, but there must have been some queue that the woman had given that made him think cooperating wasn’t a great idea. It turns out to be fortunate that he had, though. It means that he’s close enough to me that I don’t have to go terribly far to grab him by the back of his shirt and yank him up off of the floor. Ideally he’s not going to resist, but if he does? I’m still not leaving him to get electrocuted, it’ll just be a bit more of a forceful move on my part.
“I think that’s our cue.”
The hairs on my arms and the back of my neck feel like they’re all standing up and at attention and I don’t actually think it’s because of the electricity. That is what I was feeling, and I don’t need anymore questions for the light bulb to click on in my head. It makes me…angry actually, in a way that surprises me a little bit, but I focus that energy on something else. Namely getting us out of here. Up would be an option if I were by myself, going through the ceiling would be easy. I’m carting Freddy though, and that means going the way the Crocodile Man had. Great.
“Arms in, head down, knees up.”
Not that he has to, I’m rocketing through the opening just the same. Into the sewers, and then hunting the first way up I can find.
Freddy: Freddy had wanted to hear it from the woman’s mouth. He wanted to know what she had done and how far it went. Unfortunately he wasn’t given the chance. The storm that had been gathering and swept into town had struck again and it was in that moment a few more things clicked beyond the fact that he was getting ready to get out of dodge.
It appears he wasn’t the only one that was aware of Isis’s activities. This didn’t bode well not at all. Wonder Woman was free to pull him out of the basement and into the sewers of Fawcett City. Probably the last place he wanted to be. The whispers came through loud and clear. “Zeus.” It was a whisper. That right there was old school smiting.
Confusion spread across his features as they traveled away from the lightning strike that sought to harm anyone its path luckily they were already gone. He needed answers, because he needed to know what this meant for him and for all of the divine.
“She stole Hercules power. She meant to take the power that resides within me. “ She could have had others. “Zeus intervened…” Indiscriminately. Was it over? Couldn’t be. The trials were challenging enough and now they had become complicated, because he didn’t think this was the end of it.
ST: When the ‘dust’ clears the Cops will have six very feisty Crocodile Men in their custody. Although they’ve got no clue what to do with them. The Police Chief won’t allow the normal people of the City to know that. He’ll continue to demonstrate unwavering courage and spirit in the face of this entire fiasco, even as he struggles to find a way to explain what has happened or deal with the after-math.
Our Heroes escape. Though they do so without knowing what happened with Isis for certain. Was she smote as Freddy seems to believe? Was she channeling Zeus’ power, like Cassie a little jealously thought? What happened with the Mask of Osiris? The only thing we know for certain, is that those answers and more will come to us in the next issue. Until then all signs point to Fawcett City.
