Main Story Nineteen
Their two attached bodies hit as one a moderate distance away from the teleporter. Both grunting in pain, they separated and sought to recover their senses. Bruce dragged himself to the side and- without looking- found his mask with his left hand.
Groaning, he rolled over and looked at what was left of the teleporter unit. Several large tendrils of green vines had grown over, punching through the platform, the floor, and the ceiling. He knew from the layout of the plan that these vines would be spreading throughout all of the Watchtower, attacking anyone they found.
The room was alight in flames, casted into a light not dissimilar from the hue of the platform’s flares. These plants would be targeting Leaguers and energy sources alike, causing the maximum damage to the ship. Ivy had spent weeks culturing these fire-spewing plants, knowing that once they were out in space, they would have no way back to Earth. For her, utilizing plants like this was a major sacrifice for her, even if it meant taking out the Justice League.
Superman’s departure was fortunate, Cyborg leaving was immaterial, and both Aquaman and Flash were insignificant when compared to her power. Simply put, the major focus would be destroying the ship to make sure that the League would be sucked out into space and be killed that way.
Bruce put on his mask again, seeing the camera in several tiny pieces on the ground nearby. He suspected that the communication device in his left ear had been crunched by Diana’s greedy fingers as well. The room was getting real hot.
Wiped out, he tried to sit up, finding the not-as-impressive-as-Ivy body of Wonder Woman still down in front of him. Alive, but injured, evident by her pained expression as she clutched her head. He considered the heat to be an incidental factor in the sweat that covered her body.
She groaned, pulling herself up to her knees. “Bruce?” she called out, eyes closed.
“I’m here, Diana,” he returned. He struggled, but ultimately made it to his feet without falling over again. “We’re under attack.”
She grunted, tapping the floor with her boot. “I thought so.”
Bruce looked to the elevator. Though it was not destroyed at the top of the station, he knew that the elevator was inoperable with the massive vine down below having crushed the cables. Served it right; that thing moved way too slow.
Breathing with some difficulty due to the smoke, he leaned down and offered a hand to his fallen friend. Wonder Woman coughed, opening her eyes to find him offering aid. She accepted his hand with one of hers, allowing him to help her up. Once she was standing, she seemed to have no trouble remaining on her feet.
“What happened?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” he replied. He thought it would be the best strategy to pretend to be still on her side until he could slip away and get off of the ship quietly. “It looks like the teleporter brought something in.”
“Huh?” Diana asked dazedly. “How did the teleporter bring something in?”
“It’s been destroyed,” he said, turning to the stairwell on his left. The table that had once been in the center of the room was now blocking the exit, tipped over on its edge and all of its legs crumbled or detached. “Come on. Help me with this.”
Diana groaned, pressing her palm to her forehead as she walked over to the doorway. Bruce expected to see damage similar to this room further along the way to the hangar. The plan had called for him to drop six seeds in strategic locations throughout the Watchtower: one in each of the two teleporters, one in each of the two hangars, one in the elevator, and one in the crew quarters. Escape would be impossible by conventional means for every member that could not breath in space or required no breath.
Unfortunately, that included him, and with no way to contact Ivy back on Earth, he would need to figure something out before he arrived at the hangar. Something that allowed him a way out without hurting any of Ivy’s plants.
“On three,” he ordered as they arrived at the table blocking the door. He curled his fingers around the side. “One-”
Diana simply reached out with one hand and pushed it over, allowing it to fall on its face to the floor. It hit with a loud crash, a crack running up its center right through the symbol of the Justice League.
“Right,” he finished.
“Right,” she repeated curtly. “Are those plants?”
“Looks like it.”
“How did they get on the ship?”
“We’ll figure that out later,” Batman said. “Right now, just focus on getting rid of them.”
Another explosion rocked the ship, detonating beneath their feet and making them both stumble. That would be the first of the many engines being destroyed. Each engine destroyed would trigger a secondary blowback explosion that would destroy some walls.
“What’s the plan, Bruce?” she asked through gritted teeth.
“It sounds like there are more plants downstairs.” He extracted a Batarang from his belt and handed it to her. “Use that to cut through them.”
“Anything we should do aside from fighting?” Wonder Woman inquired, accepting the weapon casually.
“Try to find J’onn,” Bruce said. “He knows the ship better than anyone; he’ll know how to deal with these plants.”
“And what will you be doing?”
He turned back to the stairwell, pulling out a second batarang for himself. “I’m going to go fight.”
“Got it.” Though she was not as fast as Barry, she was still so unnaturally quick that he was unable to track her as she ran down the stairwell.
Bruce sighed in relief, replacing the batarang in its compartment. He considered going to the crew quarters first to find himself a new comlink, but he decided against it; the ship wouldn’t last much longer, and he needed to leave before it was completely destroyed.
----
Diana rushed down the staircase, finding the heat to be both growing and shrinking through different parts of the Watchtower.
She thought back to when Barry had fled to the other teleporter, trying to escape J’onn. Hopefully, she would find both of them there, but the other teleporter was at the opposite end of the ship.
So she ran, doing her best to tune out the noises. She had to tune out the screams of pain, tune out the explosions… the noises of arousal.
What had she been thinking just throwing herself at Bruce like that? That wasn’t her, nor was she that person who had creepily stared at him before the meeting had started. She was supposed to be a warrior, not a stalker. He was a warrior too, one with no time for her in that way. She had long ago decided to respect that.
She ran, running from him and the shame of her actions. She hoped that once this was over, she could find forgiveness from him.
As she came to the bottom of the stairwell, she halted, hearing a fanning noise from out in the teleportation room. Diana edged her way to the open passageway, seeing a great portion of the room occupied by either flames or a large green tendril. There, standing in the center of the room and quickly swinging his arms against a barrage of fire, she saw Flash defending a huddled Martian on his knees on the floor.
“J’onn!” she shouted, hoping he would hear her. He couldn’t be around flames for too long, or he would suffer in agony.
Luckily, he turned his head to look in her direction. He was still capable of functioning. In his expression, she saw a great pain trapping him on his knees. His powers would be nullified when surrounded by fire.
Assessing the situation, he saw that the large vine in the room was fighting with Flash’s arms, shooting flames directly at him while he stood guard between it and the Martian Manhunter. The flames were growing closer as his motions grew more frantic. J’onn raised his hand before him and turned to the side, curling up as the flames neary engulfed them.
A primal anger surged within her, compelling her to charge and do something. Raising the batarang, she charged for the vine’s flame-shooting head. Ducking under its thick body, she swiped up with one arm, cutting through the skin at the stem. The head detached and fell to the floor, its flames dying with it.
Panting, Barry rocked his shoulders to stretch them out. “Thanks.”
She nodded, then attended to the Martian’s side. “J’onn?” she asked, tenderly touching his shoulder and rolling him onto his back.
He went with her motions, staring blankly up at the ceiling. A feeble hand rested atop hers, unable to squeeze as his fingers failed him.
“Barry, put out the fires!” Diana screamed.
“Got it!” Barry became a red blur that rapidly expanded in a large vortex around her. As he continued running, the flames became more subdued, more smoke than heat being emitted. Within seconds, the fires were dulled and finally depleted.
As the final flame was extinguished, J’onn gasped, arching his back as he tried to deal with the pain. In spite of her soothing touch, he was not capable of ceasing his cries and groans.
“What now?” Flash asked.
“We need to get him to the medbay,” Diana grunted, heaving him up to his feet.
“There’s no time!” J’onn suddenly gasped. His voice was weak, raspy. “They’re all over the ship.”
“Then how do we get rid of them?”
He raised his head as best as he could, looking directly at Barry. “There’s a climate control panel in the Watchtower navigation room.” He sounded like he was barely holding back bile. “Victor knows how to use it.”
Diana grimaced. “Cyborg’s not on the ship.”
He looked at her, puzzled but still no less pained. “Not on the ship? Where is he?”
“Never mind that. Just tell us how to use it ourselves.”
He groaned, a swallow audibly sounding from his throat. “The panel will ask for identification. Just say my name and-”
Another explosion made them all stumble, J’onn collapsing to his knees. Diana reached out to pick him up again, finding his hand and lifting it over her shoulders. “J’onn,” she pressed.
“Use my name and my key card.” He pulled an access card from his left side, handing it to Flash. “Turn the temperature all the way down.”
“Not everyone on this ship can stand sub-zero temperatures,” Barry pointed out.
J’onn shook his head. “The plants should die before anyone else does. Once we have the all-clear, you’ll have to return the temperature to normal.”
“Alright,” he said. “What if there are plants in my way?”
Diana tossed the batarang to her free hand, holding it out for him. “Cut through them.”
Cocking his head, he reached out to take it. “Bruce is sharing his toys now?”
“No time, Barry!” she retorted.
“Right.” He gripped the batarang firmly. “See you on the other side.” He vanished, a faint breeze whooshing up through the stairwell.
“I’m taking you to the medbay,” Wonder Woman announced. She led him slowly away from the teleporter to the stairs.
“This attack,” J’onn said, trying to walk with her, “it is the doing of Poison Ivy.”
“But how?” she asked. “How did she get her plants on this ship?”
He shook his head. “She didn’t. Someone put them here for her.”
“What?” Who would do such a thing.
J’onn gripped her shoulder with all the strength he had left. “Perhaps Bruce did not defeat her.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means-”
Diana halted, noticing that the vine she had cut was now moving again. An anther along its side, opened up in their direction. Its inner portions began to grow brighter.
“J’onn!” she cried out, throwing him behind her and shielding him with her body.
The anther fired, attacking with the fires of the Underworld itself. Diana barely managed to raised her gauntlets in front of herself before the blast hit, but she could feel it burn her hands as she was flung high and back into the wall.
She hit hard, falling down on her front with little to lessen her momentum. Pounding the floor for being so careless, he sprang back to her feet and rushed the anther as it prepared for another strike. Grabbing it, she twisted it around itself and ripped the head off. Then, not allowing the vine to return for another attack, she grabbed the thick, plush plant with both hands and squished it until it was thinner than her fingers. As its flesh wheezed through its skin, Diana raised her fist and hammered the exposed portion.
The vine split in half, retreating back toward the teleporter and flailing from side to side as it entered its final death throes. Pressing the advantage, Diana rushed forward to the platform, kicked the metal, and pushed it until the grate from which the plant was sticking out of was closed.
A nearby explosion knocked her off of her feet. She landed less roughly this time, prepared for the blasts that seemed to be growing in frequency.
J’onn.
Panicked, Diana turned to find him motionless on the floor where she had dropped him. His clothes and skin were scorched, his eyes and mouth closed.
“J’onn!” she fell beside him, prodding him for signs of life. “J’onn, wake up. J’onn!”
----
Bruce ran down the corridor, staying just out of reach from the vine behind him. If the plants were capable of relaying a message to Ivy, she wasn’t telling him that she could sense him. They attacked him just the same as any other person on the Watchtower.
As it shot a fireball at him, he dropped to his knees and slid, letting the attack fly over his head and land on the floor right in front of his feet. In the same motion, he propelled himself back to his feet once the fire had missed him and resumed running down the corridor.
Bruce, are you off the ship yet? Ivy asked in his mind. Give me an answer.
He couldn’t, but once he reached the ship in the hangar, she would see him. He knew that she would still be in the Batcave, watching the destruction of the Watchtower from a live feed of a nearby security satellite.
To escape, he had to reach the hangar. Unfortunately, the hangar was likely to be overgrown with fire-spewing plants at this point. Still, he had to try.
He thought that right up until he reached the entrance to the hangar, finding not a single intact ship waiting for him. Every ship had been destroyed, leaving a lot of room for the plants to spread. Some of them noticed him, opening their heads to barrage him with flames.
Batman ducked, turning around and diving out of range. The vine chasing him, however, was still there, and had finally caught up to him.
He sighed. After all this time, after finally allowing her to take full control, she would still defeat him again. At the very least, before the end, he had helped her achieve victory over the Justice League.
And that was all that mattered.
Bruce closed his eyes as the vine’s anther opened up to fire again.
----
“Where is he?” Ivy demanded.
“I can’t tell,” Stephanie replied, sitting in the chair in front of the Batcomputer. “The satellites haven’t picked him up yet.”
She grumbled in reply, turning away from her and watching the screen. There were three open windows connected to the cameras, each showing a different angle of the Watchtower exterior. Through those three views, she could see that her plants had covered the entire length of the ship from top to bottom. They were in the process of expanding further, but if she so desired, she could order them to immediately constrict the base of the Watchtower and force it to implode. It would kill almost everyone onboard instantly, assuring her total and complete victory.
He’s probably already dead, a part of her whispered. He would have gotten out by now if he was still alive.
And yet, she held herself back. She could send a few of her babies up into space knowing that she could preserve their kind down on Earth. It was a brutal pragmatism, but despite all of her years fighting for a greener world, the simple truth was that these plants could be replaced. War required sacrifice, and she would not lose this war.
Batman could not be brought back.
So she waited, hoping, begging for him to come back to her.
“Mistress,” Stephanie said. “He would want this.”
“I don’t care.”
“Nothing came before his mission. If you don’t do it, they’ll come after you. Hurt you.”
“I’m not killing Bruce.”
“He might already be-”
“NO!” Ivy screamed. “He’s not dead! He’s Batman; he always survives. We just need to wait a little longer.”
“The ship doesn’t have much time left, Mistress,” Stephanie said quietly. “I’m sorry.”
She sniffed. She had the power to end all of it now. All she had to do was give the order, and the war would be over. Billions of pieces in space, hundreds of Justice Lague corpses, all at her command.
War requires sacrifice.
No.
She let her arms go limp, surrendering. She couldn’t do it; she loved him.
“I can’t do it,” Ivy whispered. She knew that any plant that suffered after this moment would blame her, but she couldn’t sacrifice Bruce.
She was still too human.
“Forgive me.”
A figure clad in red and blue flew by one of the cameras, racing toward the starboard hangar of the Watchtower.
----
Another explosion sounded out, but this one had a different effect than making the ground quake. This one only caused him to feel a slight propulsion forward.
Bruce opened his eyes as the force knocked him out of the way of the fire, throwing him underneath the vine. He grunted at the impact, attempting to pull himself all the way past it.
The anther reared back for another strike, but this time Bruce was able to roll to the side and dodge it. However, his roll put him right in the corner of the hall, trapping him.
Just as the vine opened its head at him, a loud whistling noise came from behind him. The vine turned blue, crystals of ice forming around its top and materializing all across its body. It stopped, fully encased in the frozen matter.
Bruce started, twisting to look through the doorway to see Superman floating in the air, his lips pulled tight as he blew the chilling air. He stopped once the entire vine was blue and cold. He blurred forward, smashing the ice with his fist and shattering both it and the plants into pieces. A glance into the hangar confirmed to him that Superman had ignored the plants in the hangar to come directly to him.
The Kryptonian turned to face him, a mad craze in his eyes. “Where is she?” he demanded.
“Who?” Bruce asked, pulling his arm back to his belt.
Superman groaned loudly, turning from him and becoming a blur again as he flew down the hallway.
“No, Clark!” he called. “Wait.”
----
“J’onn, get up!” Diana begged. She had managed to drag him up three flights of stairs to the medical deck, but he hadn’t shown any signs of waking up.
As she pleaded, she saw one of the plants ahead of her blocking the path, having grown in from the ceiling and the crew quarters on the deck above. The Watchtower would house hundreds of Leaguers on duty at once, stationed there. If the plants had made it through there already, she couldn’t imagine how many had already been hurt.
Keep moving, she thought, pulling him around the vine as best as she could without disturbing it. With all these plants, it was a miracle that the ship hadn’t been crushed already.
The medbay hadn’t been overrun yet, the plants finding their priorities elsewhere on the ship. Apparently, many others had come to the same conclusion, as she found dozens inside the medbay, many of them injured and being attended to by the healthy. Maxima, the primary physician with Fate still in catatonia, was busy with one of the others; whoever it was, his or her face was burned so badly that Diana had no idea who it could be.
Gods, protect us.
“Help!” she called. “J’onn’s injured!”
She got a couple of turned heads, but amidst all of the groans, cries, and screams of pain and terror, no one came to her aid. Diana found an empty gurney on her right close to the entrance. Thankfully, it was close enough that she didn’t need help to lift him up into it.
Maxima finally came over to J’onn’s side to help get all of his limbs on top of the gurney. “Was it the fire?” she asked.
“Yes,” Wonder Woman replied. “It happened only a few minutes ago.”
“Then there many still be time,” Maxima decided. She reached out to straighten his neck, placing both of her hands on his temples. “I’ll see if I can find him in there. Diana, I need you to defend the doors.”
As if on cue, another explosion occurred, seeming to come from outside the medbay. Turning around, she saw two giant vines poke their anthers into the room. There didn’t seem to be much concern anymore for the crew quarters above.
Sounds of alarm echoed throughout the medbay as everyone crouched down and prepared for the attack. Diana and Maxima each covered J’onn’s body with their own as the two anthers opened.
Suddenly, a sharp whistle seemed to come from the two plants’ bodies from outside the room. Their movements became sluggish as the green skin was slowly covered in a white-bluish crystal. Ice.
The fire in the anthers was extinguished as the light went dark. After a moment of rumbling, several Leaguers poked their heads up, confused.
Then, the ice and vines shattered, revealing a very manic Superman standing behind them, clearly incensed by this attack on the Watchtower.
He looked directly at her as she pulled herself off of the Martian. “Where is she?” he demanded.
“Who? Your cousin?”
“No! Siren! Where is she?” his eyes bespoke a raging fury.
Her lips parted in bewilderment. “Who are you talking about?”
Another explosion. Everyone but Superman fell to the floor, including J’onn, who fell from the gurney from which he had been set. Diana rushed to help him back into his bed.
“She’s not here,” Diana heard Superman whisper, likely to himself. “I have to find her.”
A whirlwind upset her efforts to help J’onn. Turning around, she found Superman gone.
----
A ship arrived in the hangar just as Bruce prepared to leave. It was a small, discreet fighter that looked like it was of Amazonian design.
It landed on top of the plants, quickly ejecting its pilot. Cyborg dodged by a few fireballs that were launched at him, using his sonic cannons to counterattack the vines. The plants recoiled, twisting around themselves to shy away from his beams.
As the plants were busy recovering from his strike, Cyborg took the opportunity to scurry over to Bruce’s location. Coming to a stop around the corner of the doorframe, Cyborg reloaded his arm cannon. “Who broke the damn teleporter?” he asked.
“Take a guess,” Batman replied, eyeing the Amazonian fighter that had just arrived. He’d flown one before, but he was far out of practice.
“I spent ten minutes trying to explain to them how to make it work,” he complained. “Then another five convincing them to let me take their ship.”
Bruce pulled out his grapnel gun, aiming it at the ceiling of the hangar. If he could just angle it right…
Victor grabbed his arm before he could pull the trigger. “Where are you going? We need to deal with the plants on the ship before we can leave.”
“I’m going to try to shoot at them from outside,” Bruce explained. The vines in the hangar resumed their occupation, growing over the fighter and covering it with its green.
“And take the whole damn station out with them?” Victor asked. “Not a chance. We need to get up to the climate control room and-”
Another explosion. They were growing more and more frequent.
“Shit! No time. Just help me get up there.” Cyborg charged down the hallway, keeping his arm raised in front of him to shoot if any plants got in the way.
Dammit. He didn’t have a choice but to play along now. Gritting his teeth, he ran after Cyborg.
----
Superman emerged from the Watchtower from the port hangar, putting some distance between himself and the giant space station so he could view it in its entirety.
She’s not here, he realized. Siren hadn’t been on the Watchtower when the attack had begun, but many others in the Justice League had been. In his short time on the nearly overgrown ship, he had passed at least a dozen corpses and had found many injured people.
None of that mattered to him, though. Only that Siren was okay.
Even though he could be reasonably certain that she was still back in the apartment where he’d left her, he needed to check on her, to make sure she was truly safe. Besides, the mere thought of her made his cock demand her touch now.
Superman hastily turned around and flew back down to Earth, abandoning the rest of the Justice League.
----
Ivy paced back and forth behind Stephanie’s chair. Superman had, for some reason or another, chosen to leave the Watchtower as it was under attack. She had hoped, just briefly, that he would have been able to rescue Bruce alone and fail to assist the rest of the League, but his departure left her little hope.
The only cards she had left to play was to either stop the attack or to destroy the ship, though she had absolutely no intention of doing the latter while Bruce was still on the ship. But, if Bruce had already died, then she would have exposed herself and failed to prevent them from coming after her for nothing. Plus, she had no idea how well she could shield herself without his expertise.
Ivy grunted, feeling her plants’ pain from the Watchtower. They all began to scream for aid, as they were all being killed in simultaneous fashion. Somehow, the League was fighting back against the surprise attack.
She closed her eyes, tears threatening to break past her eyelids. Forgive me.
----
The air suddenly became cold. Freezing cold. Like the cold Batman had once received from one of Mr. Freeze’s arctic assault weapons.
The change occurred in an instant, the air going from moderately warm from the distant flames to bone-chilling ice in the air. His next breath manifested as a white puff in front of him, remaining stable for only a moment before being swallowed into invisibility.
Cyborg coughed, though the Watchtower caretaker was much more resistant to the extreme conditions that he was. He raised his gauntlet, opening up a new comm channel to the entire ship.
“Attention!” he shouted, his voice echoing throughout the ship on various loudspeakers. “This is Cyborg. Whoever is in the climate control room, raise the temperature to negative eighteen degrees Celsius; the ship is too cold the way it is right now.”
Bruce would have nodded in agreement if he could move his neck. He was almost frozen in place entirely, if not for the buckling of his knees. Thankfully, the temperature became substantially warmer in the next minute, though the temperature was still well below freezing.
“You okay?” Victor asked him.
Letting out another breath, Batman nodded. “I’ll live.”
Acknowledging his pains, Cyborg returned his focus to the rest of the Watchtower. “The cold will not last long. Anyone who needs immediate heat or medical treatment, report to the medbay. All non-essential and off-duty personnel, report to the main cafeteria for an immediate briefing. The plants are all dying now.” Cyborg switched off his ship-wide voice amplification. “We won, Bruce. It’s over.”
“We did?”
“I’m filtering through cameras around the Watchtower right now; all the vines are cracking and breaking apart right now and the fires are all out. We held them off.” He extended as hand to help him back to his feet. “Come on. Let’s assess the damage.”
----
“I’m sorry, Diana. I can’t feel him.” Maxima retracted her hands from J’onn’s head. “I can’t help him any more than keeping him fed.”
Diana set her jaw. “What’s going to happen to him?”
Maxima shrugged. “He’s in a coma. Given his unique abilities, it’s possible that he could hear what we’re saying, but if he can, he can’t talk back to me.” She sighed. “I don’t know how long he’ll be like this.”
Wonder Woman swallowed bitterly, forcing down her pain. Her anger would suffice. “Where’s Bruce?”
----
Lex studied his screen, skeptically watching the vines sticking out from the top and bottom of the moderately damaged Watchtower. They were vividly turning gray and decaying as they suffered from both the unforgiving cold of space and the lack of breathable air. From a distance, it also appeared that many of the holes in the ship also showed icicles forming on plants.
“Apparently, the attack began less than a half-hour ago,” Mercy’s voice said from over the line. “I don’t know exactly how much damage was done, but I have no doubt that it was substantial.”
“How about casualties?” Lex asked. “Was Superman on that ship?”
“Unknown, Mr. Luthor.” He turned to a second screen on his desk to the right of the screen showing a live, satellite image of the space station. Mercy was looking back at him over the screen from that warehouse in Gotham. “At least two were pulled out into space and suffocated, though there may be more injured and dead on the ship.”
“And the two we know are dead?”
“No one too high up the food chain,” Mercy explained. “Stargirl and Katana. I doubt anyone too important was hurt, though we won’t know the full extent of the damage for at least a couple of days.”
Lex sat silent for a moment, contemplating. An attack on the Justice League was no laughing matter. Anyone crazy enough to do something like that would be a threat to all life on Earth. He would never admit it, but the so-called heroes on the Watchtower served at least one crucial role: the targets.
“It appears that this attack was carried out by either Poison Ivy or Swamp Thing, though I believe Poison Ivy would be the more likely assailant given Swamp Thing’s disregard for the space travel and Ivy’s control over the Batman.”
“No, this was definitely Poison Ivy’s work,” Lex replied. “Creating fire-breathing plants requires a scientific background, after all.”
“Mr. Luthor, this attack seems careless, if you ask me.” She turned from him and looked back at her live feed. “She launched a surprise attack when almost every member of the Justice League was on board to defend it. Why not wait for a time when the ship was nearly empty if she wanted to destroy it?”
“Because she was trying to kill the League, not destroy their home,” Lex answered. “And, apparently, she succeeded in causing major damage to the ship as well as killing a few of its members. This sort of damage could take some time to repair, during which the survivors will be preoccupied with her.”
Mercy’s face returned to his view. “All the same, this will almost certainly interfere with our testing of the planetary shield. I’m sorry, sir.”
Lex raised his eyebrow. “Sorry? Why, this is excellent news.”
She paused. “It is?”
“Yes, of course it is,” he confirmed. “Ivy’s attack presents us with an opportunity.”
“I don’t see how, Mr. Luthor,” Mercy said. “With the Watchtower in disrepair, we won’t be able to test the shield until the Martian is able to get it fixed. Not to mention the possibility that their targeting systems may be compromised.”
Lex turned off the screen showing the Watchtower, then waved a dismissive hand purposefully in front of the camera so she could see it. “The Watchtower’s laser isn’t the only testing tool we can use. Plus, the shielding device is only weeks from completion anyway, regardless of testing.”
She waited. “So…”
“A direct attack on the Watchtower is bound to grab the Justice League’s attention for quite some time,” Lex observed. “Time we could use to perfect our shield and break the prisoner. Add to that a couple of deaths and plenty of injuries, and they won’t stop until they make her pay.” Lex leaned in closer to the camera. “Add a little extra motivation, and all they’ll see is red.”
She nodded. “I think I understand, Mr. Luthor.”
“Release it. It’s time the world knew the truth.”
“We haven’t established all of the proper fronts and marks yet,” Mercy warned. “You might not be able to cash in on it.”
“This was never about a profit,” Lex assured. “Do it.”
“As you wish, Mr. Luthor.”
----
“Th-thank you,” Fire repeated breathlessly, severely vulnerable to the cold. “Thank you.”
“Just stay here,” he warned, his breath coming easy to him despite the cold. “I’ll come back once I make sure no one else needs help.”
She nodded, curling up and huddling for warmth. Fire wasn’t nearly as impressive to look at as Ivy, so Batman turned and walked back into the crew quarters. There was a giant hole in the floor matched by an even larger one in the ceiling right above it. Several smaller cavities appeared sporadically where vine offshoots had come back in to attack sleeping Leaguers and to shower them with flames.
There didn’t appear to be anyone else in the room; everyone had been evacuated to either the common cafeteria or to the medbay. These barracks could be used as an additional housing for the injured should it come to that, so Bruce had to work quickly.
He strode toward the far end of the room, finding his own bed. It was one hardly befitting a billionaire: a small, uncomfortable twin bed with no frame and only three feet tall. It better resembled a military cot than anything one might find in Wayne Manor, but he hardly used the Watchtower for sleeping purposes anyway. An empty, well-furnished bed was not something he needed.
The only purpose it served was for storage. Lifting up the shallow mattress, he uncovered the spare Batsuit hidden underneath, separated into all of its individual pieces. It was a recent model, though not perfectly up to date with all of the modifications that the suit he currently wore had.
Fortunately, he only required the cowl. Slipping off his mask by grabbing both ears with one hand, he knelt down and retrieved the spare cowl. He swapped the cowls in his hands and placed the undamaged piece over his head. Using his gauntlet, he synced the new cowl with the systems back at the Batcave.
A few moments later, his lenses turned white, allowing him to cycle through both detective vision and normal vision. He hoped that the camera in his head was active. “Ivy?” he checked.
Bruce! he heard in his head. Thank goodness you’re alright. Where are you?
“I’m still on the ship,” he replied, his breath making a short cloud in front of him. “I’m sorry the attack didn’t go as planned. With the teleporters destroyed, I can’t get back immediately. I’ll need to take a flight back to Gotham.”
“They’ll be coming after us soon,” Stephanie’s voice said over the comm link. “Everyone’s going to ask how Poison Ivy got her plants on the ship. Sooner is better, Bruce.”
She’s right. You can’t stay up there for too long, or they’ll start asking too many questions. Leave as soon as you can.
“I can’t leave before the briefing, or they’ll know for sure that I was involved.” Bruce shot a glance at the doorway, making sure that Fire wasn’t peeking in the room. “Once it’s over, I’ll grab the ship Cyborg came in on and leave. I’ll tell them I’m tracking a lead on you.”
“I don’t know if that’s a good idea, Bruce,” Stephanie said. “They’ll suspect you either way. You should just make a run for the hangar now.”
“Even if they think I had something to do with this, everyone’s still in shock,” he returned. “They won’t be able to stop me.”
Do what you think is best, Bruce. Just be quick about it.
“I will. I’ll see you soon.” He put down the mattress and stood up.
The emergency meeting would start soon, so he needed to get downstairs quickly. He stalked past the large hole in the floor over to the exit. Fire was no longer sitting outside of the door as he had asked of her, though he saw her walking down the stairwell.
Setting his jaw, he moved up alongside her, grasping her free wrist and raising his arm above his shoulders to assist her. “I thought I told you to stay put,” he berated.
“It’s too cold,” she gasped through chattering teeth. “I need to be m-moving.”
“Fine,” he grumbled. “They’ll turn the heat back on soon.”
Bruce assisted her down the two flights of stairs to the main cafeteria deck. Stepping out of the stairwell, he helped the not-as-good-as-Ivy woman leaning against him walk through a large group of men and not-as-good-as-Ivy women, who were all busy hushedly whispering about the attack in worried, voices. Many white puffs of air arose from the cluster of Leaguers.
The cafeteria was arranged in two decks with many television monitors around the room. Normally, they were tuned to news stations around the planet to keep the League alert to happenings and reports of activity. Now, however, they all displayed an emergency message alerting the League to the same instructions Cyborg had issued earlier.
Cyborg himself was directing everyone to the lower level of the cafeteria, taking them out of the stairwells and assuring them that the cold would cease shortly. When Victor saw him, he signaled for him to join him.
Bruce nodded, finding a table to seat Fire at and asking a nearby Ice to keep an eye on her. Unlike Fire, she seemed to be completely comfortable with the temperatures around them, making her perhaps one of the few who could be counted on to manage the conditions of the others. Leaving the two of them at the table, he walked through the other Leaguers, hearing more than a few vows of vengeance over the ones responsible for the attack.
He soon found himself next to both Cyborg and Diana, the latter of whom stood with a haunted look on her face. It made her look even lesser than Ivy. “Status report,” Bruce requested.
Cyborg eyed him. “I should be asking you that.”
“Just tell me the situation,” he retorted.
Cyborg shook his head. “We’ve got almost forty people in the medbay right now, with more on the way. How did the crew quarters look?”
“Bad,” Batman said. “I made sure everyone was safe, but the room was covered in scorch marks and holes. I can’t imagine the battle that must have gone on in there.”
“No kidding. Stargirl and Katana… they’re gone.”
He grimaced. “Killed in the fire?”
“Sucked out into space,” Victor reported grimly. “If there’s any upside, it’s that the rest of us didn’t meet the same fate as them. A bunch of our engines got destroyed, but not enough to knock us out of orbit.”
“What about repairs, then?” Bruce asked. “How long will it take you and J’onn to get the Watchtower back to full capacity?”
Victor didn’t answer, instead looking at Diana. She still had that same haunted look on her face.
Bruce understood the look. “How is he?” he asked.
Her haunted eyes flashed a sorrowful anger. “She’ll pay for this.”
Bruce steadied her, grabbing her shoulder firmly. “Is he dead?”
“Comatose,” she replied coldly. “Maxima doesn’t know when he’ll wake up.” She shook off his hand. “How did she get her plants on the ship?”
“I intend to find out,” he assured her. “I promise you that I will find her and make her pay.”
“You’re not going after her alone,” Diana seethed.
“She’s right, Bruce,” Cyborg affirmed. “Ivy declared war against all of us with this attack. We need to let everyone know the situation.” He checked his wrist. “Alright, gotta get ready for this. Bruce, call Barry and tell him to turn up the heat.” He turned and went to stand on top of one of the tables. Luckily, it withstood his metallic weight.
Batman looked at his gauntlet and patched himself into the Watchtower’s speaker system. “Barry, you can turn up the heat now.” He turned off his station-wide audio access without waiting for a reply.
“Everyone, look up at me!” Cyborg shouted. “I need your attention now!”
Within seconds, the well-trained Justice League were all focused on Victor. Seconds after that, the air temperature raised to a much more manageable condition, but due to the sudden change, the heat felt nearly unbearable on his exposed chin.
Cyborg’s sigh of relief produced no white puff of air. “Now, then. I know we’re all on edge, but we need to remain calm if we’re going to get through this.”
A normal crowd of people would turn to mob in a situation like this, demanding instant answers to all of their fears at this very instant. The Justice League was far too disciplined for that.
“Before we begin, I need to report to all of you that we have unfortunately lost two of our own today. Stargirl and Katana were both killed in action today.”
This announcement drew a few scattered sobs from the two-hundred or so Leaguers in the room, but most of them stood in respectful silence, remembering and honoring their sacrifices. The fact was that most of the people in the cafeteria had dealt with loss several times over.
“We won’t let them die for nothing,” Cyborg promised. “We will track down the people responsible for this attack and we will see them brought to justice.”
There were some nods from the listening crowd. No shouts. They were all doing exactly as they should, either too shocked or too orderly too begin screaming and cheering.
“Everyone should-” Victor cut off. “Hold on, I’m getting a lot of chatter from…”
Cyborg’s shoulders tensed, turning over his shoulder to look down at Bruce. In his single human eye, Bruce saw total and utter shock. Victor absentmindedly tapped a few buttons on his gauntlet, still staring at Bruce as his shock turned to contempt.
All of the television screens dropped their emergency message and switched to news feeds from GCN, Gotham City News. On each screen, a crystal-clear, high-definition video was playing of a large plant structure standing alone in Gotham Square, the Batmobile parked a short distance away. The video was of an aerial shot, showing a grassland full of flowers with a blurred patch of pixels in the center of the field, but Bruce thought he could see his own cowl as one of the specks in the video. The lower third panel showed a message that read of a breaking story.
BATMAN APPARENTLY HAS AFFAIR WITH POISON IVY, the bar read. POSSIBLY UNDER HER CONTROL.
Almost as one, Bruce felt the eyes of the room turn from the screens to him. Like with Cyborg’s initial reaction, Diana appeared absolutely livid. Betrayal was on every one of their minds, and even if they had not turned to a mob yet, they were definitely out for a pound of flesh.
And he was right on their dinner plate.
Get out of there! Ivy shouted.