Chapter Forty-Six: The Darkness Inside.
Bees filled the air and obstructed the vision of Clark, Diana, and Helena all around. They knew aggravating them would mean being stung. Clark and Diana suspected the bees would not be strong enough to take them down, but would they run the risk? Plus, Helena was standing right beside them, very squishy, and very human.
Clark launched a blast of heat vision to send the bees packing. The angry buzzing of the bees continued around his head. He took a deep breath and used his super breath to knocked them off course.
Diana withdrew the blade from behind her back and swiped it at one of the bees. The blade sliced into a bee and caused sparks to fly everywhere. She took a step back and one of the bees came close to stinging her with a dive bomb attack. Helena flicked a small disc-like device in the air and released a cloud of dust which took the bee down.
"Keep me covered."
Neither of them really had any choice to be perfectly honest. Clark swung his fist back and punched one of the incoming bees, knocking it down to the ground. One of the bees went towards his skin. Clark avoided the Kryptonite stinger from coming into him. He caught the bee between his finger and crushed the little body into the chest.
Diana deflected the incoming bees. She remembered the Kryptonite and realized these bees might affect Clark if they somehow penetrated their skin.
"Get the cool air vent open," Diana said. "I have an idea."
Clark clapped the air and the bees swarmed around at the sound of the supersonic vibrations happening from elsewhere. The continued swarm made Clark deduce there wouldn't be much longer before the bees started to attack from their position, sooner rather than later. He was going to have to time this next attack perfectly, otherwise, it was going to be messed up.
'Well, here goes nothing.'
One of the bees scrapped a bit of his skin and true to form, Clark felt a tiny bit woozy. He pulled open the cold air vent and bombarded the area with cold air. Both himself and Diana weren't affected by the cold air. The bees, on the other hand, their agitation increased.
"It's working!" Diana cheered.
Clark watched the angrily buzzing bees and their attempts to get at them. He took a second to pull back and noticed some of the bees were starting to light up and emit small amounts of beat. They moved into one angry swarm, the ones which didn't get killed by the first volley of cold air bombarding them.
"Unfortunately, not enough."
The bees came closer to attacking Clark. He braced for the attack and they came an inch away from diving into him. They pulled out before they came to him, not just once, not just twice, but three times in a row. Something was blocking them from attacking. The bees swarmed around and looked very confused.
Unless Clark missed his guess, and it was very likely he did, those bees had been tapped into by something. Helena's plan, whatever it was had worked. The very last minute passed and the bees started to short-circuit.
Clark could have breathed a sigh of relief and pumped his hand into the air with a cheer. Diana looked at him with a raised eyebrow, and a teasing smile spreading over her face.
"What, wouldn't you be pleased if something that was built to hurt you was taken out of the equation?"
The two of them locked eyes with each other and both smiled and nodded. The truth was, Diana would be more than pleased. The two of them arched their eyes down and saw Helena making her way up. She held a transmitter in hand, locked onto the frequency of the bees.
"Your quick thinking worked nice, thanks," Clark said.
Helena raised a hand and make sure Clark had her full and undivided attention. The young man turned towards Helena and wondered what she had in store for them. The three of them walked down the hallway and turned around the corner, frowning with a very obvious expression of discontent racked in their hives.
"Don't thank me yet. We still have a lot to do and not much time to do it. HIVE knows we're here, which means they're going to pull out something dangerous to stop in our tracks."
Clark smiled, she always thought about the good things in life, okay, not really. But, she really did think of the worst, even though Clark was prone to positivity because otherwise, it would lead to madness.
"Wow, she's a right little ray of sunshine, isn't she?" Chloe asked.
"She is, what she is," Clark responded. "I'm not going to go against her, she's pretty good at what she does."
"Yes, she is," Tess responded.
She remembered meeting Helena for the first time in the not so distant future. The Wayne family had their levels of obsession, and Tess wasn't going to get in the way of them.
Diana arched her head back and turned back towards Helena. "So, where do you think we're going to have to go next?"
A long pause followed before Helena looked down to the tunnel to the right. She extended a hand almost to the left and then turned to the right, up the stairs.
Hopefully, they would be lead past a bee-free path.
The HIVE Queen waited at the end of the hallway. Her frown grew in an even more prominent way. The little attack to deter their intruders did not prevent them from breaking into the complex and causing all kinds of havoc. The HIVE Queen's clutching of her fingers together increased, and she drew back a deep breath. She looked inches away from losing her mind.
Lex turned his attention from the HIVE Queen, all the way back to the orb. The orb fascinated him, as it would fascinate everyone. An echo rose up over the back of Lex' head when he tried to make the orb work for himself.
'I'm beginning to think if someone opens it, they'll have power beyond the wildest imaginations of human beings,' Lex thought. 'Even though my wildest imaginings are far stronger than the wildest imaginings of many other people. I just got to…..keep it cool, and I'll have everything I wanted.'
The body language of the HIVE Queen interested Lex. For a brief second, she resembled someone who had it together, but there were parts of her which were unsure. Lex dealt with these type of people before, both men and women. They projected all of the confidence in the world on the outside. Internally though, it was a different story, and their very obvious frustrations hit a very obvious very pitch.
'I just got to ride this one out, and I'll have her, right where I wanted her.'
The HIVE Queen activated a button and tried to scan the complex.
"Let me guess, one of them disabled the security," Lex said. "I'm going to guess it was Tess, or Chloe or Helena Wayne...maybe it was that one hacker that's hacking around Thea Queen. Or maybe it was the legendary Oracle. She's been known to ruin some of the best-laid plans of mice and men."
The HIVE Queen's knuckles clenched and they grew very white. Her heart skipped a couple of very obvious beats when trying to determine the next move.
"Let's be honest, you don't have it under control, do you?"
The HIVE Queen's eyes flashed and she looked at Lex. Again, Lex knew she would not attack. The façade of control resulted in her wanting to keep up with what she was doing. Lex watched her body language, for the tell-tale signs of a woman who was about to break down.
The woman who the HIVE Queen once was, threatened to break through underneath her surface, which resulted in Lex flashing a very devious smile. All he had to do was wait her out, and HIVE would be his.
'Patience, it's a top word in the Luthor dictionary.'
"They have arrived here," The HIVE Queen responded.
Lex decided to dig that knife a little more inside of the gaping wound which was starting to fester.
"You shouldn't have any problems trying to keep them out, should you? You are the high and mighty HIVE. One of the most powerful organizations the world has ever seen. I doubt you can keep a few do-gooders from ruining your plans."
The bald businessman paid careful attention to the body cues of the HIVE Queen. Her frustration reached a brand new fever pitch. Lex drummed his fingers down across the desk.
'Just wait for it, and keep waiting for it. Your time will come soon. You just have to be a patient man.'
Lex returned his attention to the mystical orb lying underneath his line of sight. He realized only he could open it, which meant things were going to be interesting. Lex returned to the secrets of Clark Kent, which he tried to uncover with increasing difficulty.
It had been dogging him for almost six years, and they moved around full circle.
'We're destined to do this together, Clark. We could have been great friends, but we're just from different worlds. It's nothing personal, I'm just going to have to stop you and prevent you from taking control of my planet.'
Lex shifted the item underneath his line of sight and broke into a wide smile in response. The nice item underneath him showed him the power which could be used if he opened the orb.
'Show me the power, show me what you can give me,' Lex thought to himself.
One of the guards made their way around the corner and walked up to the HIVE Queen. Lex paid very special attention to the conversation.
"They've already breached the security on the bottom floor," one of the guards responded. "They're on your way, what do you want to do?"
Lex thought this little meeting would be very interesting, as it would show him what the HIVE Queen would be very much about. He shifted over, taking a look at some experimentation which caught his eye.
'Hello, what do we have here?'
The HIVE Queen's standing up tall and looking at her drone made Lex realize she was about to make a move. It was going to be very exciting for her to make it, or maybe not. Still, he had to wait and more importantly, he would have had to watch.
"The Trinity is on their way?" Queen Bee responded. "Let them be on their way….prepare the drones. If they want to try to stop me, then HIVE will take them down."
Lex appreciated the confidence even though in a matter of minutes, HIVE would soon be under brand new management. He waited for the HIVE Queen to leave
'Now, it's time to get to work.'
Clark walked down the hallway and tried to see what he could run into. The HIVE main lab had to be one level up, and with it, there had to be Lex. Lex, Clark really didn't know what state of mind his former friend would be in. Did he come willingly along with the rest of HIVE or was there some other reason why he was down here? Regardless, Clark took half of a step back and looked around.
"Watch yourself," Helena said.
The reason why Helena told Clark to watch himself grew very apparent in a hurry. The doors opened up and several HIVE drones made their way down the hallway into the room. They wielded some of the most dangerous armor in the world that anyone could ever see.
"I'll go for them," Clark said.
"No," Diana responded. "You run down the hallway, we'll take care of the drones."
One of the drones fired at Diana. Diana crouched down and deflected one of the bullets with her wristband. A loud clank echoed when she moved.
Clark realized it had been up to him to try and stop HIVE, for better or for worse. The young man shifted back a fraction of an inch and waited for something to happen, anything to happen.
'Okay, I got this way.'
One of the HIVE drones rushed down the hallway. Clark blocked his arm, taking the man down to the ground. The warning snap of the man's wrist Another one of the drones charged forward and almost came an inch away from taking Clark out. Clark blocked the wrist and nailed him with an uppercut punch to the side of the head. The drone dropped down to the ground.
Clark noticed a reflection of the battle out of the corner of his eye. Helena dropped down and caught one of the drones with an uppercut to the chest which doubled him over. Multiple punches rocked him with a series of jabs which stuns him. The man slammed down to the ground with Helena bringing the hardest force she could potentially muster down onto the back of the goon's head.
She looked a few inches down the hallway. Clark made his way down the hallway. An energy field bombarded against Clark's chest and propelled him down to the ground. The young man rolled over onto his hands and knees and took a deep breath. He tried one more time to break through the energy field.
The energy field flickered around him. Clark had to pull back and used his head, as opposed to really using his head. Clark dove in front of the field and almost slammed himself through the field. The ricochet effect of the field came close to knocking Clark back onto the ground.
There was nothing for him to get bounced back from now. Clark used his x-Ray vision to find a weak spot in the growing instability. He saw it happening, every few minutes, there was a flash of light. He would need to exploit the flash of light.
One of them tried to nail Clark in the back. Clark turned around and blocked the drone before he hoisted him up and brought him back down onto the ground. Clark stepped back and waited for the goon to rise up to a standing position, the wind having been knocked out of him.
Now, Clark returned back to trying to destabilize the force field which would be leading him up. Much to his surprise, something happened which raised some questions, and answered very few of them. The light erupted around him and then left the path opened for him.
"I'm going to say it," Chloe said. "Do you think it's a trap?"
Clark listened in for some kind of attack. The buzzing came up from his particular position.
"I'm pretty sure it's a trap," Clark responded.
He would have to turn the trap around on them some way. Clark had his path up of the stairs. The walls opened up and launched a stun laser towards Clark. The young man took half of a step back and avoided one of the blasts which came very close to ripping him apart.
'Okay, that was too close of a call!' Clark mentally yelled.
The blasts of the energy shot towards Clark and came very close to taking him down. He took in a deep breath and blocked the energy wave from trapping him. The cell came very close to closing around Clark.
"Just to let you know, we're going to shut down the power," Helena said. "That should buy you a little bit more time to get around."
Clark pushed the energy wave back and disabled it with one quick disconnecting. HIVE had a lot of interesting traps in this location, but Clark was able to see them before they would become a problem, at least he hoped he would be able to see them before they became a real problem.
"Thanks."
"You should quit thanking me until we're completely out of the woods," Helena said.
Clark responded with a chuckle. He was pretty sure he would be laughing when they were out of the woods. He looked to have one more floor based off of the map of technology which Indy had brought up. They had been changed, for the most part.
"I'll try and remember not to."
A single-minded objective for Clark to reach Lex hit him. There was nothing else which mattered right now other than Clark Kent reaching Lex Luthor.
'Lex, I'm ready. I hope you are.'
'I'm ready.'
Lex once again studied the orb for another minute. The item locked into his hands started to react to something coming around the corner. He knew Clark was coming, and he really wished he could be better prepared for Clark's incoming arrival.
Another item caught Lex's interest on the shelf. He noticed a combination of DNA. Lex decided to take a closer look at it, now with the HIVE Queen distracted with dealing with the problems, it allowed Lex to take a closer look at what they were cooking up. And what they were cooking up made her look very interested to be perfectly honest.
The cells inside of the box looked like they were about ready to break free, and come out. The darkest parts of Lex's mind longed to take a closer looking, to see what he had to deal with. His excitement increased when looked at the box. The box flashed a second later and increased Lex's studying on it. Another second passed with Lex running his eyes over the edge of the box.
He had to have the powers, all of the powers. Those Doomsday powers, he would have had to have them, along with the meteor powers. They mixed them together in one delicious cocktail which called to Lex. No, it didn't just call to Lex, it practically screamed to him.
'You must take me, Lex. You must give me the power!'
Lex looked at the HIVE Queen who stood on the outside. He looked towards the outside. On the one hand, these powers tantalized him. On the other hand, Lex didn't know the consequences. He wrestled in his mind to see what could be done.
'You need to experiment to accomplish,' Lex responded.
The bald businessman's eyes locked eyes onto the case one more time. A tendril tried to flash through the other end of the box and called out to Lex. The bald businessman leaned down and touched the side of the case, frowning when was about ready to be released.
Lex took the plunge and slammed the wrench into the edge of the case. The sound of glass smashing open echoed throughout everything.
The HIVE Queen rushed inside. Her eyes widened, and she stepped back.
"What have you done?" The HIVE Queen asked. "What have you done?"
Lex's mouth curled into a very obvious smile when he approached the HIVE Queen. The liquid wrapped around his hand and glowed with obvious power. He could feel the energy rise up inside of him , and make him stronger than ever before.
"I've given myself power, the ultimate power!" Lex howled at the top of his lungs.
The HIVE Queen pulled out a gun and pointed it towards Lex. Lex raised his hand and stopped the HIVE Queen in her tracks.
"You know, every Queen is going to bow down before her King sooner or later."
The HIVE Queen made a very obvious struggle to try and break free from the submissive maneuver by Lex. She had beet down to her knees in front of it.
"Yes, HIVE Queen, bow down before HIVE's new king!"
"You don't understand what you're getting yourself into!" The HIVE Queen yelled.
Lex laughed and looked very dismissive at the HIVE Queen when she dropped down to her knees. Lex would be lying if he didn't say she looked good brought down to her knees, brought down to a more proper role in front of her.
"You can't stop me!" The HIVE Queen yelled at the top of her lungs.
Lex motioned his hand down and forced the HIVE Queen to ascend to her knees even further. She was practically on the ground and worshipping whatever ground Lex walked over. The Queen didn't look too happy about being forced to the ground.
"The piece of Brainiac inside me has been unleashed, increasing my mental capacities, along with the Doomsday DNA and the other meteor mutant DNA."
Lex picked up a table over his head without any warning and dangled it right about the Queen's head. The HIVE Queen looked up with absolute contempt when the table shattered underneath Lex's hands.
"You see what I can do to anyone who stops me?"
He raised a hand and several cells clicked open. They all unlocked with each other and brought meteor mutants awake from their position.
'Right about time.'
Lex looked up into the sky and saw Clark Kent dropping down to the ground.
"See, they respect my new power!"
The young man lifted a hand and forced the meteor mutants to drop to their knees before him. Clark couldn't believe it, they had no choice other than to comply.
"And now, it's my birthright," Lex said. "My old friend, and my new enemy, to take down the most dangerous threat the world has ever seen."
It was Lex's birthright. He tried to fight through the darkness, but he enjoyed the power. A Luthor always fought through greatness, and his accomplishments would only increase.
"And now, you're going down, Kal-El."
His given name had been shown. Clark braced himself for an attack, for better or for worse.
Chapter Forty-Seven: Calling All Heroes Part One.
Chloe frowned and had been keeping an eye on the mission control after Clark had gone in. The entire situation had gone dead on the other end of the line, which really wasn't a surprising thing. All Chloe could do was tap her finger on the edge.
'I suppose I shouldn't jump to conclusion unless he doesn't get in touch with me sooner,' Chloe thought. 'I'll wait for five more minutes before I start panicking.'
The door opened and Lana walked up behind Chloe. She stopped short of reaching Chloe and looked on with one of the most obvious frowns possible.
"How are you doing?" Chloe asked.
"I'm not sure," Lana said. "I'm just having one of those bad feelings. It's kind of hard to explain."
Chloe frowned in response. Oh boy, did she had that feeling every single day when they dealt with some of the things she did. Come to think of it, she was feeling a little dazed, and not only a little dazed, but very confused. Chloe's thought swam in her mind when she tried to hold her head up above the table. Her breathing increased when she wiped a brow of sweat across her face.
"I imagine," Chloe said. "Clark just went into the HIVE complex. He's after Lex."
Lana's obvious sign broke through the tension. 'It's always Lex, isn't it?"
That statement really summed up the last six or so years of their life. Well, maybe not generally just Lex, but a Luthor of some sort. It was always someone with the last name Luthor.
"Indeed," Chloe said. "Clark, are you there? Clark, can you hear me? Helena, Diana, come in, I need to see if any of you are alive out there."
A buzzing sound came through the communication headset. Chloe decided to switch and try someone else, hoping they would have better luck in getting through.
"Tess?"
"Let me guess, you lost contact with Clark and the others," Tess said. "I was talking to Helena until about a minute ago, and then she just disappeared, and I can't track her down. I've…called in a few favors to see what's going on, but it's going to take them a while to get into position."
"Especially if HIVE is mobilization all of their resources?" Chloe asked.
"Yes," Tess said. "Just be prepared, there's something happening. I don't know what it is, but there's something happening."
No sooner did Tess say these words, Chloe's entire world began to spin. It was almost like she had been dragged inside of a tunnel of some sort. A whisper of "comply" echoed through Chloe's head.
Lana watched when Chloe grabbed onto the desk. The dark-haired girl took a step closer towards Chloe.
"Chloe?" Lana asked. "Chloe, you're starting to scare me."
Chloe slumped over onto the desk. Lana screamed in response, not that it was heard by Chloe. Lana picked up the headset which Tess dropped on the desk and put it on. She activated it.
"Tess, Chloe just collapsed, I don't know why, but she did," Lana responded. "I don't know…."
Chloe rose up to her feet and made her way to the door. Lana wasn't sure what was happening, but she was pretty sure she shouldn't let Chloe leave. Lana grabbed Chloe around the waist and restrained her. The two girls engaged in a titanic struggle with each other. Chloe squirmed, twisted, and tried to break out of the grip of Lana. Lana pushed Chloe against the wall and pinned her back. Chloe screamed in agony when trying to be pushed out.
"No, I have to…..join them….join the HIVE!" Chloe yelled.
"Chloe, Chloe, CHLOE!" Lana yelled. "Listen to me, whatever is happening, you have to fight it. You're strong, fight!"
Chloe's eyes flickered back and forth. Lana grabbed Chloe harder by the arm. She tried to drag Chloe back to life, tried to drag her back into the real world. It was a constant back and forth struggle, where Chloe was being dragged underneath.
"Just think about Clark," Lana said.
Chloe's pained mumble of Clark came through, and Lana, finally, at least she hoped, managed to push her way through Chloe's stubborn mind and managed to get her to listen to reason, or at least what passed as reason. Chloe started to shake with madness, the shivers going down her spine when she spoke.
"Yes, Chloe, Clark, remember, he's still in there, he's still fighting."
Chloe's brain tried to resist the very persuasive thoughts going into it. Someone was trying to command her to do something, anything. Chloe's fingers began to twitch. It was much harder for her to hold her head up and concentrate than it was before.
By some miracle, Chloe broke out of her thoughts, and all it took was a little help from Lana. She dropped to her knee,s breathing. The control had been broken.
Lana breathed, hoping Chloe was out of the woods. She managed one word.
"Lex!"
Chloe collapsed, and no sooner than she did, Lois broke through the door.
"I just heard it over the radio, there's been a mass escape at Belle Reve!"
Lois stopped at the door, caught sight of Chloe on her hands and knees on the floor, stopped, and screamed for the heavens. The look of her cousin in this particular state caused Lois a fantastic amount of alarm, and for very good reason.
"Yes, it's beautiful, and at the same time, terrifying. I can feel all of your troubled minds, as one."
An energy field surrounded Lex, which kept Clark at arm's length with him. He could bring his legions of new followers around to crush Clark, but why do something so impersonal. No, after, all he and Clark had been through over the years, he deserved a more personal touch for his decimation.
"At first, I didn't fully appreciate the benefits of the human mind, until I have now. But when a mind has been sufficiently strengthened, it is capable of being anything. The mind is capable of doing anything, and a man with a strong mind is capable of being anything. What use is having a strong body, what use is having all of the powers of the world, if you're a man who squanders them? If you're a man who doesn't have great power."
Clark rushed towards Lex and the energy shield folded underneath Clark's punches. Every single time he tried to punch the energy shield, it just repelled energy at him. Lex turned around and his mind clicked. He sent blue fire at Clark. The fire would both burn and freeze Clark at the same time.
A strange scientific paradox which only could be capable by HIVE's weird Frankenstein mining of several meteor freak powers. Clark dodged the blue flames. The flames licked against the wall.
Lex moved at super speed, and Clark just had to move a tiny bit quicker to avoid the attack. He popped up behind Lex and aimed a series of punches at him. Lex's hands turned to stone and he blocked up to avoid the attack. Clark shifted his hands where they vibrated at super speed and caused Lex to scream when the force of the hands going into the side cracked his skin.
"Oh, clever, I didn't think you were stupid. You had to be somewhat intelligent….to get the better of me over the years."
Clark didn't know whether or not to take it as a backhanded compliment or not, but regardless he just kept coming through. He would keep fighting until he could not stand.
Lex would have summoned more creatures into the room, but his ego demanded he battled Clark one on one. The two locked knuckles in the middle of the room. Lex acquired a surprising amount of super strength which pushed Clark over onto his knees.
The super strength wasn't anything when you didn't have the leverage. Clark pushed Lex over and flipped him on the ground. He went behind his former friend, and grabbed him around the head, before stabbing him in the side of the neck with a series of jabs. The jabs caught him on the side of the neck.
The feeling of numbness came down Lex's body. Fortunately for him, one of the meteor mutants had a healing factor. He turned around, eyes glowing in power.
"Lex, you need help."
"I can feel that beast," Lex said. "Doomsday, I have the strength of Doomsday and the intelligence of Brainiac."
Clark thought it was not a good combination, but he had another thought.
'The more Lex becomes Doomsday, the more he's going to lose his mind. The human mind can't handle that monster. I'm just going to have to last the distance, and hope it doesn't take too long to take him down.'
Lex rushed towards Clark, and the two of them battled each other. They were about ready to throw down against each other one more time when suddenly a loud crack echoed from underneath him.
Helena jumped up from the floor. She saw the crowd of the meteor infected surrounding them and quickly hurled ice pellets into the air. The pellets broke up and froze her enemies, but not for long.
Diana dropped down.
"Dispose of these two interlopers!" Lex yelled.
The meteor mutant charged Diana. She blocked the punch, wrapped the man's muscular arm around his back and kicked him down to the ground. The next meteor mutant charged her, this time with knives retracting from all ten of his fingers. The knives stabbed at the Amazon Princess who avoided all them of them with the precision of a warrior princess.
Diana moved in and used her blade to trick the nails of her attacker. The attacker groaned before he dropped down to the ground. Diana nailed her attack with one more brutal uppercut punch.
"I've got bigger plans right now," Lex yelled.
He used a telekinetic blast to fling Clark into the air. Clark landed on the table.
"You three, hold the line, and protect your king," Lex said. "The rest of you, come with me. We still have much to get done."
Clark rose to his feet, and almost collapsed onto the ground from the injuries which were sustained in this particular battle. He looked up just in time to see the members of HIVE about ready to leave the room, along with Lex.
He locked eyes with the HIVE Queen who mouthed "help me!"
Those words fell unfortunately deaf ears. The HIVE Queen was gone, and Helena, Diana, and Clark were up to their neck in HIVE's new experimental batch of meteor mutants.
Chloe sat perfectly still underneath the brain scanning machine in the fortress. Lara watched her brain wave patterns, which grew absolutely erratic, and there were no surprises as to why they were turning around in such a matter. Lex had entered her mind and started to take control of it.
The communication to Clark had finally been opened back up.
"Lex is taking control of all of the meteor mutants," Clark said. "Chloe….is she….."
"She managed to avoid his compulsion, just barely," Lara said. "I'm seeing if I can strengthen her mind, but there's only so much I can do."
Lara worried about an army of her son's greatest hits descending on the world, with Lex stirring them up into some kind of revolution.
"It feels like someone just pounded my head like it was bongo drums," Chloe grumbled.
"Yes, that's what mind control normally feels like, sweetie," Lara muttered. "Let me just try and figure out how to get inside of your mind, and make sure he hasn't left any triggers."
Lex would have been the kind of person to turn Chloe against Clark and force him into some kind of sadistic choice. He underestimated the loyalty Chloe had to Clark.
Lara spent a lot of time studying the human mind, and it was no different than the Kryptonian mind, especially in how it perceived the world around it with a certain bias which turned certain events around towards its favor. Lex thought Clark betrayed him. It might not have had little to no basis in reality, but that's what Lex thought. And he was going to do his best to rectify that matter.
'Lex Luthor is a problem, and it might be time we end the problem once and for all.'
Lara knew if Astra went after Lex, and if he did have possession of Kandor, there wouldn't be enough of Lex to bury. She did have a certain obligation to Clark, but if anything, her obligation to restore Kandor back to life was stronger than ever before.
"Your brain scans are coming up normal," Lara said. "Your healing abilities has rendered you immune to mind control."
"Oh, it's kind of like when you have the Chicken Pox once, you can never have it again," Chloe said with a weak smile. "That's good to know."
Chloe almost collapsed into a fit of tiredness. She still could feel the banging in her head.
Lara was glad Chloe could not be controlled by Lex again. And it was a good thing Lana was there to keep Chloe from jumping off of the ledge. Not that Chloe didn't have a strong mind. Lara experienced that first hand for several months. It was just, sometimes a little help from her friends.
One look at the AI she had yet to properly get running made Lara wish she could get help from one of hers.
A message from Tess indicated she wanted to see Lara straight away. She was currently at the location where they had the Parasite locked up.
Lara took the teleportation crystal to the location and dropped down on the ground. She came about the Parasite, who thrashed in agony, and smashed himself against the cell. He howled in agony when pounding away at the side of the cell.
"No, you don't understand! I need to find him. I need to find the Messiah! The end of the world is almost here! He will lead us to the promise land!"
The Parasite looked to be completely out of it. Tess watched his mental breakdown unfold. He had not been awake ever since being brought her. Needless to say, the Parasite made up for lost time, throwing fits and throwing himself into the cell repeatedly, and very hard. The sound of a man beating his head up against the cell could be a sickening one to behold.
"So, Lex reached out to him, even behind a shielded cell," Lara said. "I don't even have to tell you what would happen if he got his hands on the Parasite's powers."
"No, you don't," Tess said. "I'm well aware what would happen if that madman got his hands on Rudy Jones's powers. Hence, why it's not allowed to happen."
"LET ME FIND MY SAVIOR! LET ME FIND MY MESSIAH!"
Tess rolled her eyes.
"Well, it's obvious Lex has gotten drunk with power," Tess said. "I doubt Jones is thinking these thoughts on his own."
"How do you figure?" Lara asked.
"Well, the man identifies as an atheist for one thing," Tess said. "So, he wouldn't normally put much stock into the thought of a Messiah."
Tess stared at the screen and a thought came to her mind.
"He would be good in shutting him down, Chloe and him both," Tess responded. "How is Chloe doing?"
"She's mentally wrecked but immune from the mind control," Lara said. "Are you suggesting we use Chloe as bait to lure out Lex?"
"No, nothing of the sort," Tess said. "But she is the only option where we can bring Lex out into the open."
"And we need to hurry," Indy popped in. "Because I feel the presence of the other one."
The piece of Brainiac inside of Lex was active once more, at least that's what Tess thought.
"Do you think you can track Lex through it?" Tess asked her.
"I can attempt to do so!"
Diana enjoyed a good fight about as much as the next person. The figure fighting her had hands made of concrete and a head which was hard for even one of an Amazon to punch through.
One of the mutants had a glowing green head which bombarded his attackers which a small amount of radiation. Helena found herself glad she fortified the old suit with radiation shielding because otherwise, she would have been screwed. Diana and Helena might not have been screwed, but she most certainly would have been screwed.
The window broke up, and the Green Arrow stood in the window. She fired an arrow which broke open and released a sticky foam which wrapped up the goons in one fell swoop. She flipped down onto the ground and waited for one of the attackers to rush her.
The attacker rose to the bait, and Thea dodged the attack, just in time to see Karen and Carol fly through the window.
"Figured you could use the backup," Carol said. "We would have got here sooner, but there was an energy field around the building which took a long time to break."
"Better late than never," Clark said.
He still had to get to Lex, who knew what he was doing. All Clark could figure out he was causing a lot of trouble. The goon on the ground sent electrified whips from his wrists at Clark. Clark avoided the whips from slicing into his skin and propelled back a couple of attacks from the goon. He nailed him with multiple punches which stunned the goon.
The ground underneath the goons shook. One of the goons turned around and saw a dark haired figure who raised her hand. A vibration rocked them and allowed Clark to take them out one at a time.
A tranquilizer dart caught one of the more persistent goons in the side of the neck. Alex turned around and realized the goon had not been dropped. She fired at the goon once again, but the goon rushed towards her with the persistence and speed like a cheetah.
The wind had been knocked out of Alex. The figure dodged out of the way of an arrow. And he also dodged Clark and Karen.
"Damn, he's fast," Clark said.
Diana managed to catch him with her lasso, but his hand vibrated through the lasso and knocked Diana back a couple of inches. The Amazon flipped over onto the ground.
Alex pushed a cart into the back of the man. He went intangible, moving out of the way at the last second.
"Great, just what we need, some kind of Frankenstein creation, channeling meteor mutant powers together!" Alex yelled. She popped her gun.
A figure went through the window at super speed and flew around the creature. She created a reverse cyclone and launched the creature up into the air. He bounced into the air several times and dropped down like a particular grotesque ping-pong ball.
He was too dizzied to think straight. Clark rushed towards the figure and grabbed him around the back, before taking him down with two thumbs to the group.
The younger Kara showed up, with her best display of a heroic pose. The room had been cleared. She had been surprised to see how much faster she was than her cousins, and quite pleased as well.
Alex looked up towards her, frowning her. "Kara, what are you doing here?"
"Helping," Kara said.
"Yes, I'm aware of that," Carol said.
Kara put her hands on her hips and sighed. She obviously wasn't going to get a lecture for saving the day, which her two sisters did on a daily basis, not to mention her cousins and her friends.
"Hey, you did good, kid," Daisy said.
Kara smiled, at least someone appreciated her. Alex gave Daisy a look as if ask Daisy not to encourage her.
"So, Tess is tracking Lex, but Astra is going after him," Lara said. "Because she knows Lex has Kandor."
Clark thought the situation has just become more frustrated by the moment. He hitched in a breath and prepared to do what he needed to do.
Through the minds of the HIVE Drones, Lex stumbled upon the jackpot to end all jackpots. Hoards and hoards of meteor rocks stockpiled.
"And here I thought Lionel was stocking up on the rocks," Lex said. "And they want to create a Kryptonite bomb which they can deploy."
The word Kryptonite came to mind because of Brainiac. It was oddly appropriate, because it was a meteorite, from Kryptonite. The bomb could level an entire country.
Lex had no interest in the destruction, but rather, he wanted people to unlock their full potential. With his resources, he could expand the scope of the bomb, and use the radiation to blanket the entire world.
Many would die, but many more would be gifted power. Earthlings would evolve into a new age. Lex would be the ruler of this new world. There would be no more conflicts because Lex would have them under his mind. Peace, peace under one mind.
Lex loved the sound of that one. He rubbed his hands together, positively giddy with anticipation when he waited to see what he could do next.
He set down the orb on the ground. It was his most prized possession. Lex motioned for the HIVE Queen to join him, and she stood at his side. A robotic look flashed through her eyes.
"You shouldn't do this," The HIVE Queen muttered.
Lex started the mechanism to power up the bomb and a blur shot through the window. He had been surprised, it was not Clark, it was his cousin, it was a new threat.
'It's General Astra, she was one of Krypton's greatest monsters,' Brainiac stated in his mind. 'She must be destroyed at all costs.'
Astra blew past the HIVE drones. She grabbed Lex's meteor mutant bodyguard by the throat and snapped his windpipe before dropping him down to the ground.
Lex went flying out of the window with a concussive force. He kept flying until landing onto the ground with a very solid thud.
Kandor laid within reach on the table. Astra didn't waste a second in scooping it up in the palm of her hand and looking down at it with triumph dancing in her eyes. Astra left out of the window.
Lex rose up from the ground, the wounds in his chest healing. He wasn't about ready to let such a valuable resource slip through his fingers, so he gave chase.
The windows of the facility broke open. Helena dropped down on end and Thea dropped down on the other end. They were about to attack, but the HIVE goons stood frozen. They were awaiting orders, orders which never would come.
The HIVE Queen kneeled on the ground. Blood spilled from her nose when she tried to break Lex's control.
"Disable the bomb!"
Helena took one look at the bomb. The fate of the world depended on her disabling the bomb. She hitched in her breath and had to go for it.
Chapter Forty-Eight: Calling All Heroes Part Two
Lex Luthor stepped outside, practically seething. He was so close to having Earth in the palm of his hands, years of work would not be flushed down the toilet. An army of heroes had cut his army in half. They didn't understand what had to do.
The young man turned his head around for a few seconds and made his way. The woman who shoved him out of the window, and snatched the orb, the key to everything disappeared. She was heading North, and Lex heard the thoughts of Brainiac in the back of his mind.
'She's heading to Jor-El's Fortress, is an outpost used by his son,' Brainiac informed him.
Lex thanked him and the powers made him move at the speed of light. He zipped across several state lines in a blink of an eye and crossed the border into Canada before heading into the North. A second passed with a hand being raised and smacking Lex in the face. Lex flipped over and landed back to Earth.
A blunt force jumped down from the sky and caught Lex down across the back of the head. The man rolled over onto his hands and knees and looked up. He saw Clark standing before him, dressed in a blue top with a red "S" symbol and a pair of tight dark blue pants. A cape fluttered in the air. He looked towards Lex.
"I see you're wearing your family symbol," Lex said. "I'm going to rip it off of you in a token of victory."
Lex rushed towards Clark in a blink of an eye. The two men locked knuckles. Lex summoned the power within him and retracted the metal knives from his fingers. He tried to stab them in Clark, only the knives shattered against his chest. Clark caught the man's hand in a wristlock and twisted him around. A loud crack followed.
Both landed down in a field. Lex's hands shot forward, stretching to wrap around Clark's chest. The hands turned into sharp blades a moment. Clark had to admire Lex's intelligence in chaining the power together. Clark nailed him with an uppercut to the chest while his hands were not protecting it.
The two rolled over onto the field. Clark flung over into the air like a rubber band and swung over to the fence. The two of them ran into each other at the speed of light. Clark and Lex fought with each other. The two of them struggled with each other. Clark pulled him up to a standing position.
"Your persistence is almost amusing," Lex said. "Just like your fate is inevitable."
The two of them broke together. Lex turned into solid stone and Clark nailed him with a punch to the chest. Another punch rocked him in the chest. Clark staggered back. Lex put his hand on the ground and caused the ground to rumble.
He channeled fire through the ground and knocked Clark a few seconds back. Clark flipped over onto his back and landed down onto the ground with a solid impact. Lex pulled back and nailed Clark with a repeated series of punches to the chest.
"You really are still the same you've always been," Clark said. "All this time , you've want to prove you're worthy of the name Luthor."
Lex wrapped his hands around Clark's neck and pushed him down onto the ground, planting his knees down onto the ground. Clark pushed almost above Lex's hands and flipped him into the ground.
"I'm better than him," Lex said. "Do you hear me? I'm better than anyone who has, or ever would have the name Luthor. Do you hear me?"
Glowing green spikes retracted out of Lex's back. He rushed towards Clark with a thunderous roar and nailed him with multiple punches which kept rocking him. Back, forth, and center kept stunning Clark. Clark's knees buckled over.
The menace of Doomsday flushed through Lex's eyes.
Clark swept Lex's legs out from underneath him, jumped behind him, and jabbed away at the back of Lex's neck. The nerve spot dropped Lex to his knees. Clark reared back and caught Lex with another jab to the chest before an armor piece protected Lex's chest.
"We are going to keep doing this until the end of time," Lex growled. "You're going to keep getting in my way, and I will never try and stop you. I will never try and stop you from destroying my perfect world."
A blast of orange energy launched Clark into the air. Clark flipped head over heels and smashed into the ground. The wind knocked out of him, and Clark rolled over.
"Absolute power corrupts absolutely," Lex said. "You think you've been sent here to be our messiah. NO ONE ASKED FOR YOU, KAL-EL!"
Lex brought down another boom onto the top of Clark's head and folded him up onto the ground. The Last Son of Krypton performed a valiant struggle to his feet. The top of his uniform held into place despite every nerve ending inside of his body singing, absolutely screaming due to the fire he was feeling.
"You're not one hundred percent good, nothing is."
Clark looked at Lex with one bleary eye. "Nothing includes you. So, what gives you the right to pass judgment on anything?"
The bald billionaire's eye flared up in absolute rage. Clark saw it, Lex tapped into those Doomsday abilities, and they were making him far more dangerous. They were making him far more hostile, and very much more feral. All Clark needed to do to hold on a little bit longer.
And hope the others were close to disarming Lex's bomb on the other end.
"Clark, three hundred kilometers North," Chloe whispered urgently in his ear piece.
"Understand."
Thea crouched down against the wall, the beads of sweat rolling down her face. HIVE drones surrounded her from all ends and Thea almost wished they would move. Karen, Diana, and Carol dropped down onto the ground on all sides.
Karen stopped and looked at the HIVE drones. The blonde waved a hand and listened. She could hear a heartbeat, a very faint one.
"He drew, the HIVE mind away," The HIVE Queen managed. "They are awaiting orders, but since he is preoccupied with his own rage, they won't attack. You need…..you need….you need."
The HIVE Queen's breathing intensified when she tried to tell the guests what they needed.
"The bomb, I'm working on it," Helena said.
"Do you think you can do it?" Karen asked.
Helena Wayne wiped a brow of sweat away from her face and picked ahead at the bomb.
"I've disarmed bombs in far less time than this," Helena said. "But I don't think I've ever disarmed a bomb far more complicated than this one."
Carol took a step forward. Most people would give Helena Wayne all of the space in the world. She wished the other two DEO members were there, but they were busy directing traffic at the facility down south.
"Maybe I can help you."
"Maybe she can help," Karen agreed.
Helena took a second to reconcile her thoughts and moved over to allow Carol to bend down. Diana, Karen, and Thea all stood into place to watch their backs. Not their backs really needed much watching, but when disarming an alien explosive device, you really were going to need all of the help you could get. Helena crouched down on the ground as did Carol.
"Well, I think we're going to have to dismember these tubes first because they're feeding the energy into the bomb," Carol said. "It might still make a really big boom."
"Disable the orange tube first, it will buy you some…time," The HIVE Queen responded.
Helena hesitated for just one second. She couldn't sure Lex wasn't feeding her information. Carol frowned.
"Actually, I was going to suggest the same thing. It does make a whole lot of sense to remove the orange tube first, before going to all of the other tubes. Then, I think the blue one, and then disengage the central circuit board."
Karen eyed the timer, they had about ninety seconds to go before the bomb was going.
Helena knew this had far more reaching consequences than the Scarecrow's latest attempt to gas all of Gotham City. She pushed her hand into the middle of the tube, thankfully the gloves of her costume would protect her.
The orange tube came out and Helena changed a glance at the timer. The timer slowed down to a crawl, although it was blinking.
"She's correct, it's blue next, and the backup power will cycle to that one," HIVE Queen managed. The further Lex got away, the more she was able to gain control of her own mine. "Red, green, and yellow are dummy tubes."
Helena knew she was right and it took both her and Carol as a tandem effort. She was glad the others were here to watch her back because this process would have been one which would give her far more problems if she didn't have some people to watch her back.
Time ticked up, and Thea held her arrow on one of the larger HIVE drones. She knew it didn't move, but still, it was very intimidating to stand here in front of it. He resembled a pretty grotesque and a pretty disturbing looking mannequin.
Now the blue tube clicked out of the circuit breaker. They only had one more thing left to do and they would be mostly home free. The central power grid and Helena reached into her belt.
"I think this requires a firm touch and not a sophisticated one."
Carol reached in. She had to disable a bomb almost like this on the same fleet which gave her powers. A few sparks flew out of the bomb, and she dropped it onto the ground. Everyone could finally feel free to breathe, at least they hoped.
"Okay, let's disengage the Kryptonite tanks and separate them," Helena said. "Then we'll work on disposal when Lex is good and done."
Luring a man who was obsessed with him was no trouble at all. Clark flew backward and Lex moved towards him. His skin had solidified into stone with glowing green bone spikes. The bone spikes ripped from his skin, almost like they had been lit upon with fire and bombarded towards Clark. Clark dodged the bone spikes before they ripped into his body.
"I will destroy you, Kal-El!"
"Destruction?" Clark asked. "Not the sophisticated scheme I expected from one of the world's foremost thinkers. Then again, Doomsday is in the driver's seat."
Lex could no longer hear Brainiac, the feral thoughts creeping into his mind drowned out that particular computer. He didn't really care though.
He saw a box which contained another minion, the Parasite. He would be perfect to both capture Clark and to drain that other Kryptonian.
"Master, please, free me!" the Parasite yelled.
"Those animals have caged you?" Lex asked. "You should fear not my faithful servant, for I will set you free!"
Lex rushed towards the cage containing Doomsday. The light around the monster flickered and caused Lex to stop, dropping onto the ground in confusion. He thought he had the creature, and hell, he thought there was a meteor mutant in his grasp.
'You fool,' Brainiac's faint echo thought.
'No, I thought one was here, I thought there was a meteor mutant here.'
Lex turned around and saw Chloe Sullivan standing there. One of Clark's oldest friends, and also a perfect hostage, and he rushed towards her.
He stopped short and sensed something else. Clark disappeared, but Lex sensed power, great power, power which he needed to have. The power to bring anything to his knees, but Chloe's weak, frail frame would not be able to sustain the power to it.
But, was she so weak and frail.
"Well, Chloe, you're full of surprises," Lex said.
"I'm glad to have bamboozled the great Lex Luthor," Chloe said.
Lex tried to snatch Chloe, only to receive a shot to the face and a large net made out of electrified wire wrapped around him. The net sliced into his skin and made him scream in response, agonizing and yelling at the top of the lungs.
Alex and Daisy stepped in.
'Good thing we had a few upgrades put in after the encounter with Doomsday,' Alex thought. 'Good, be mad, it's just going to make you more careless.'
Daisy raised her hand the second Doomslex broke free and rushed towards her. She unearthed the ground and flipped the man over like a particular grotesque car. Doomsday rolled over onto his hands and knees. Daisy raised her hand and slammed it into Lex one more time.
Lex ripped a post out of the ground and tried to run it through Daisy. Clark moved in front of him to block the fence post, and hoist Lex off of the ground. Lex flew head over heels and crashed down onto the ground.
A jab to the side of Lex's neck stunned him.
"My newest servant, listen to me," Lex said. "Why isn't it working?"
"Performance issues, Lex?" Chloe asked smugly. "Clark never has that problem."
Lex howled in agony and rushed towards Chloe. If he couldn't have her, he was obviously going to kill her. His single-minded, blind, unstoppable rage left him in position for Clark, and Clark to take him down to the ground. Lex flipped over to the ground and landed with a thud. Clark grabbed Lex's arm and pushed it back until the arm cracked.
Suddenly, the spikes retracted from Lex's back, and his skin turned normal. The power retreated within Lex and caused stress on his organs. He flared up and nothing throbbed even more than the back of his head.
Something ripped through the back of his head. It was a circuit board which contained Brainiac, or what has left him on Earth. Daisy raised her hand and nailed him with a shockwave which disrupted the circuits in the blast, and sent an EMP to destroy it.
Lex dropped to the ground, stunned and unable to believe it. It was so beautiful, it should have worked. It should have worked. He had the cusp of power. He pulled himself to the ground.
BANG, BANG!"
Tess fired two shots into the back of Lex's head and he slumped to the ground like a puppet with his strings cut.
"After he killed me in the last timeline, that felt good," Tess said.
The catatonic, but miraculously still alive Lex, laid in the middle of a room, hooked to millions of dollar's worth of medical equipment. Tess paced over and looked at the readings. She had to give it to Lex, she really did intend to kill him.
The medical equipment was to keep him from waking up, and not from dying. She studied enough of Lex's biology to realize there was a chance he could come back to life. And she wasn't taking any chances that any lingering traces of Doomsday DNA would come back to bite her in the ass.
She turned around and faced Clark who had been standing on the edge of the room. Clark was still uncomfortable about the entire killing thing, and Tess didn't relish the necessity of doing so either. There was a necessity as well.
"He's still alive?"
Tess couldn't understood if Clark was exasperated, relieved, or both. Shooting Lex right in front of Clark might make things awkward for a while, but Tess had to do, what she had to do and what she had to do was make sure her brother didn't live to haunt another day.
"You sound surprised, or are you upset?"
Clark took a second to look at the monitors showing brain activity. There was no brain activity. Lex did pride himself on intelligence and it was almost intelligent.
"The bullets didn't lobotomize him, Brainiac trying to inject himself out of his skull did that," Tess responded. "Speaking of which, you have the piece of Brainiac, secured at the Fortress, don't you?"
Clark responded with a nod.
"Indigo despises that piece of obsolete, outdated technology, and she's doing what she can to track down the other pieces of Brainiac," Tess said. "Don't tell her I told her this, but for such an obsolete, outdated piece of technology, Brainiac is doing a pretty good job at keeping ahead."
Clark smiled, he was confident Indigo would do the best at what she could.
"He's still not dead. Did you have second thoughts and save him?"
"Do you want me to lie to you and say I had an attack of conscience regarding him?"
The longest, most pregnant pause possible followed. Clark took a second to regard Tess and her words before he responded with a flat 'no'.
"I actually have some readings I want to look at in the Fortress later, "Tess said. "I know you're busy though, so I won't push the issue, with Kandor being back and everything….."
She trailed off suddenly. She wondered how the progress was going to the restoration of Kandor. They had been searching for it for months. Now the orb had been back at the Fortress, and now they would have it.
"Astra, Raya, and my mother are working on it," Clark said. "They mentioned something about trying to isolate only the most essential components of the orb."
Tess knew what they were talking about, and well they might have to expand the Fortress. Thankfully, the Arctic was large enough to be expanded.
The two of them stood in silence, just waiting for the other to break the silence. Clark chanced a glance to Lex who was still not moving.
"Do you think he'll find a way to wake up?"
Tess sighed and looked in on the scans. Brain activity was down. Vital activities were very minimal as well. She could pull the plug, but she couldn't until she was certain any trace of Doomsday's DNA had been scrubbed from Lex's body.
The last thing she needed was a feral monster they needed to deal with. They sent the real Doomsday off to a world where he could do no lasting damage.
"I'm going to take every step possible to ensure he doesn't," Tess responded. "You shouldn't worry, I know what I'm doing."
"I know, you know what you're doing," Clark answered in response. "It's just….well, you know….."
The redhead squeezed the hand of her lover, leaned in and kissed him on the lips in understanding.
"It does seem like, despite your best efforts, you're intertwined forever. I get this, and I understand this, you better believe it."
Now, it was up to Tess to prevent Lex from waking up from his eternal slumber, and maintain the slumber he had would remain eternal forever, and a day.
"So, what about HIVE?" Clark asked.
"I have the HIVE Queen," Tess said. "She was able to throw off of Lex's mind control. It wasn't as effect as Chloe did, but she managed to do it, somewhat. She could be a valuable mind to help us out, providing she learns her place. And learns she's now only a drone."
Clark got the implication Tess was planning to overtake HIVE, and amass its resources, but maybe it was just him.
Kandor had been the culmination of much hard work. Astra looked at the orb which had been set down on the lab table, where Raya and Lara helped her go over it. The three brilliant minds were trying to figure out how to extract the most valuable elements of it.
"Give Jor-El credit for once in his life," Astra said. "He was savvy enough to treat the orb with Blue Kryptonite, so when they had been cloned, they would be cloned without the ability to perform powers."
"Still," Raya said. "Even Jor-El knew it was highly possible for them to obtain their powers. They would need the blood of a Kryptonian who had spent time empowered underneath Earth's yellow sun."
"We have a few of those," Lara said.
Lara could not believe it was finally happening. They would need to prepare the new Kryptonians on Earth. The DNA sequences had been extracted one by one. Astra pushed a button whether to keep each DNA cluster. The flashing lights of the Fortress.
"We have the DNA isolated as necessary, and we will dispose of the DNA which we don't need for this process," Indigo said. "I have run a simulation, and I think the most probable result will be most favorable indeed."
"So, we're good to go?" Lara asked.
"To put it in simpler terms, yes, we're good to go," Indigo said.
"Good."
Astra pressed a couple of buttons and prepared the extraction process. All of the variables had been isolated, and she knew who she wanted to get out of the orb first. She had not been put into the orb, which was fine. One of her was enough.
A figure extracted from the orb which looked like a slightly younger version of Astra. She dropped to the ground. Astra smiled when she watched her fully formed progression on the ground.
"Welcome back, Alura."