With This Ring (Young Justice SI) (Thread Fourteen)

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
17:38 GMT

"You ever feel like joining the Justice League yourself?"

Philippus shakes her head, her eyes taking in every detail of the landscape below us. Hippolyta has opened up the reliquary and Philippus is back in her 'training Diana' equipment: Hermes' spare sandals on her feet allowing her to fly and boosting her speed, and the misnamed 'gauntlets' of Atlas around her forearms to boost her strength and endurance. Unfortunately for information-gathering purposes, Diana and Donna still have their respective lassos.

"It would be wrong to get in the way of the princesses. They do not need old women like me competing with them for glory."

That's a very Amazon response, though I mean that in the sense that it's a response that made sense before the Exile. Much like asari, the young women fought and the mature women raised daughters and practised professions. Unless their core territory was threatened or they became officers. Amazons don't have a new tradition which takes into account the lack of enemies or their agelessness. There's no need to prove your courage in your physical prime if your physical prime lasts three thousand years. And there's no urgent rush to have children once you've done that if you're blessed by a goddess who hasn't realised that normal women run out of ovum eventually.

That's probably something we're going to need to work on before the current generation come of age. After this mess is over.

"I don't think she'd see it like that."

"Perhaps."

She looks up, not at me but at the twelve pegasus riders accompanying us. Two of them are Heraklya, while the other ten are 'normal'. All have orichalcum equipment. Unless the Aztecs have flying monsters this should be more than enough force for reconnaissance.

"What will their Earth Goddess do with the people she ate?"

"Souls."

Her eyes flick my way. "Shades have no need for hearts."

"I'm not sure those are literally hearts. You have to remember that we're not in the material world any longer. It's thrown me off a few times, too."

"What does taking the heart of a soul do to it?"

"Okay, you know that motivation actually comes from your brain but we poetically refer to passion as coming from the heart?"

"No heart, no passion."

"Or maybe they still have it and… Tlazolteotl, or whoever it is, is using it to change them as they see fit. The sheeda we met had his personality intact, so I doubt it's having the heart removed by itself… Or maybe it just affects sheeda differently? I don't know."

"But they still have their minds." She frowns. "Then why do none of them talk to us? They make no war cries. They do not organise themselves with words or use formations."

"Again, guessing, but there is a limit to how many ways a goddess can split her attention. If she's remote controlling-. There was a wizard I briefly fought on Earth called Papa Midnite. One of his things was to remove part of a person's soul to turn them into a near-mindless servant. They lost the capacity for independent thought. Couldn't even speak. Just follow instructions as best as their damaged minds could understand them. You could stab one and it would just stand there, bleeding to death, until it lost the strength to stand. When we defeated him we were able to restore the surviving ones…"

I don't know what happened to them afterwards. Given the spiritual damage that inflicted on them, I doubt they would have survived any degree of Anti-Life exposure.

I shake my head. "The point is, there are all sorts of things you can clip off a person to turn them into pawns. Remember what shades were like before Lord Hades had his revelation?"

She nods. "I do."

"To be clear, Lord Hades is a god I admire and respect because he does a very good job at running an afterlife. Not all religions are as fortunate as we are."

"He does now."

"Anyway. Going back to my original point, it's a big world and if you feel like doing some heroing, I'm sure we can find somewhere for you that doesn't detract from Wonder Woman."

"I will keep that in mind."

Okay, so the topography of this place doesn't match Central America, but the trees I've seen match those that are native to Central America. Which makes sense. There are mountains in the distance, though I'm.. not sure if they're affected by the one hundred metre limit. Is Tlazolteotl trapping her rivals as well? I think-.

"I smell smoke. And water."

Philippus makes eye contact with Cernunnos. "Where?"

He points to… Forward and right. I have no idea whether or not this place uses normal directions, and I've got no idea how to work them out if it does. "That way."

Ring, scan?

Compliance.

"My ring thinks there's a river. Beyond that, don't know."

But that makes sense too. Aztecs hunted, so naturally their afterlife has the associated ideas built into it. They didn't use power rings, so I've got to copy their methods if I want to get anywhere. I could…

I glance at the construct coffin I'm carrying along behind me.

I could assimilate her, then pull the new construct lantern into my ring to gain its memories. And yes, that's an even more horrible violation of her soul than has already taken place, but Anti-Life. And the horrible violations that are already happening to her fellow Aztecs, with or without the Anti-Life.

Perhaps if I use the purple healing ray for longer? I might be able to reconfigure-.

"Paul."

"Captain?"

"Scout ahead. I want to know what Cernunnos has found."

"Covertly or overtly?"

She frowns at me, then looks over at the flying horses-.

I generate a booster construct. "Just checking."

The booster ignites, sending me shooting over the forest and… Yes, there's the river, just peeking through the canopy. Drop through the leaves into the channel and accelerate faster, because just because there's no reason for the Aztecs to have anti-air weapons doesn't mean that they don't.

I blink, and a… Boat? Flashes past. It was stationary, wedged against the bank and a fallen tree trunk. It looked like it was in reasonable condition, but the light construction suggested… A fishing vessel? This may be a river but it's not exactly the Amazon. It doesn't seem like boat fishing would be the way to go for food collection. Puzzling.

Up ahead the terrain rises, the river cutting a valley into the harder rock on side. I can distantly hear the sound of crashing water from a waterfall. Not much in the way of other sound coming from that direction-.

And then I'm at the plunge pool, braking hard as I see actual man made structures. Rock buildings that put me equally in mind of the surviving Aztec structures and those of Themyscira, things built by people with primitive tools and methods but unlimited time and patience. The roofs are thatched, and the walls are brightly coloured with either different types of stone or some kind of paint.

I don't see any actual people.

But I do see an Anti-Life broadcaster.

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
17:43 GMT

It's sitting on a small stone pyramid. I can't see any blood on the stones, but it might just have been washed off. No external power source, no obvious guards.

Scan.

No threats detected.

Yeah.

I create a second layer of construct armour around myself.

"Orange Lantern to Superboy. There's an Anti-Life broadcaster. Keep everyone back."

"Okay, but it's gunna take you about five seconds to destroy it."

"I want to check the setup first. I'll contact you when I'm done."

"Makes sense. Superboy out."

Design appears… Standard. I drift upwards, trying to get a full view of it. Because if I understand New God technology, there's got to be something linking it to the local thaumosphere… Or, just, normal-sphere here… Anyway, we should be cut off from Mannheim, so it would have to be…

Sonics.

Heart beat detected.

And there we are. There's a heart beat in there. Because hearts are how we power things around here, apparently.

What to do?

I mean, I'm still towing the zombie woman. Maybe I can try sticking this heart in her? Or at least get a look at what their hearts are supposed to look like here? I bring the sarcophagus closer and remove enough of it to get a look at her face. Nothing-.

And now it occurs to me that bringing her this close to a broadcaster wasn't the most intelligent thing to do. Send that-. House, grab spare stones from that house, put her inside and brick up the windows and doorway.

Right.

I send out a wave of orange light, trying to feel by weak kinetic impacts if there's anything invisible or otherwise dodging detection. Nothing. Repeat with tiny grains of dust. Nothing.

Okay, but why would anyone put a transmitter where there aren't any people? Because there used to be people, or because there will be people in the future and you want to be ready. This is clearly an inhabited area, but there aren't any people. Why would an area in an afterlife with homes have no one there. Reincarnation? They could be working… But there's only so far it's practical to ride on a llama. Aztecs didn't commute. If they were working then I should be able to hear something.

I look at the waterfall, and then fly up.

Yeah, more buildings at the top, but it's more of the same. Still no people. There… Yeah, that's an exercise yard. Simple shields and clubs are stacked, and there's a roughly marked area for the pugilists. Aztecs considered reincarnation to be something earned, rather than asked for or automatic. Maybe they were levelling up?

Whatever it was, they're not doing it here now. So not working. And-.

Wait, what's that?

I saw something shiny in that… Barn? Long house? I fly inside-.

Ah. That clears that up.

There's no blood, because why would the dead bleed? If they bled, the gods could take their nourishment from them and then just have them reincarnate. But there is skin, and discarded flesh, and damaged obsidian blades. And I think that's… Ectoplasm?

But no hearts. And no Aztecs.

There used to be people here, wherever 'here' is. And now there aren't. The broadcaster was probably used to control them, which means that the heart was probably installed first.

If I knew more about Aztec culture, I could probably learn a lot from this place. But as I don't, I just fly back down the waterfall to the plunge pool area. This place responds well to hearts?

Then we give it hearts.

BABUM. BABUM. BABUM.

I form a construct-.

Something blurs past my vision, my outer construct armour evaporating and the inner sporting-

Fly up fly away!

-claw-slashes? Replace it and-.

It's gone again.

Alright, replace immediately, evasive flight pattern, detail optic scan of my environment. If they're pushing off a surface using super speed then there'll be a depression where their feet impact the stone, or an explosion if they're pushing off sand. Non-perfect optic camouflage will cause slight ripples if viewed from variable angles. And add metal plating to-.

My outer armour fails and this time pressure continues and my inner construct parts in front of my helmet! For a moment I see fur and feathers before I counter, flash fabricated x-ionised knives stabbing and provoking it into disengaging. And it's gone, gone from my sight, gone from scan, no obvious sign of its passage.

Okay, try something else. Leave the knives, add wire to the construct in case the attacker is using construct disruptors specifically and fill the air with locally-sourced dust. An extra fraction of a second's warning from the particulates moving-.

Thereparry!

Two knives are on target, one hitting nothing but feathers, sending the cut ends spiralling towards the river below. The other hits the torso, causing the-. Figure to abandon their swoop and pull to the side, missing me-

I get more details. Humanoid with wings. More than one set. Talons on the hands and feet. Don't get a good look at the face.

-as I form a cold gun and take a shot-.

It doesn't work, and the figure disappears again, accelerating out of my dust cloud.

It's not as big as Tlaltecuhtli, but I don't know if all Aztec gods maintain avatars that big. Gaea walks around in a body the size of an unusually but not impossibly large woman. So I could be fighting a god. I'd assume that I was fighting some sort of supernatural creature but I don't know enough about Aztec myth to identify it. Emperor Itzcoatl destroying their early written records didn't help, and relying on Spanish monks for information regarding the supernatural wouldn't be a good idea anyway.

Grab the falling feathers. Can I at least analyse those?

Yes.

Eagle feathers. Some sort of eagle monster? No special counter for eagles-.

Disruption again, switch to knock-out gas and pump it out. Move the knives-.

"Kuh."

The shape flies away as I stare dumbly at the spear embedded in my right lung.

And then the pain hits!

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
17:46 GMT

"Uh!"

And it's a shitty Aztec spear with a head made of obsidian and resin rather than metal! This is why Cortés wiped out your civilisation!

Dodge!

This time the spear skims my power armour, scratching a line across my side. Pain's ebbing a little but for some reason I can't regenerate myself or disintegrate it. Knives, move the knives faster, keep up the defensive pattern. The spears don't redirect themselves once thrown, so dodging is a better option than when whoever this is was just swooping at me with their claws.

"Un-hu-hu."

Can I manually kill the nerve endings? Yes? Okay, kill ninety percent, I still need some idea of what's happening. Manually close the blood vessels. Crumbler construct on my own armour at the impact site… Can I pull it out? Because I can oxygenate my blood by ring but I don't like the way I can taste my own blood in my mouth right now.

It's not coming out.

Why isn't it coming out? Because obsidian isn't supposed to come out. It's supposed to splinter in wounds and make them bleed and get infected. So I-.

Frantically viff because that's another spear! I twist and it skims my faceplate rather than gouging my eyes out!

Disintegrate my own numb flesh-. And there, it's free and finally out and… And parts still aren't healing because there are tiny bits of obsidian still in the wound, but it's still progress. Feel the bits I can't alter and use construct tweezers.

My tweezers snap a small piece, fragmenting the obsidian still further.

Alright, construct vacuum cleaner, I can replace lung tissue but I need the obsidian out! I-.

There.

I spin the spear and all available knives at the space with a slight disruption in the dust, and get to see the bird/cat thing frantically try to dodge away! Can't be precise, so I just stab-. Got the main right wing! Try flying now! Got the left leg with his own stupid spear! Got a bunch of minor wounds with the knives! I-!

He's actually bleeding. Not a heartless zombie, and that snaps me out of deciding to kill him immediately because if this is a stupid misunderstanding then that-. That would be a bad thing. Grab with a construct fist, shove him up against a wall and pin him there. Rip off his spear quiver and set it aside. He's strong but it looks like his strike-power mostly comes from his feet talons and finger claws. And those aren't gloves or boots, some sort of giant eagle talons have replaced his feet and claws have replaced his nails.

Ah. The vacuum has finished sucking out my obsidian-enriched lung matter and now I can finish regenerating myself.

Okay.

"Orange Lantern to Superboy. Just got attacked by a.. jaguar/eagle man. I'm fine now and will attempt to interrogate."

"Is the Anti-Life broadcaster still working?"

"Yes. I think I should try and find out if anyone's watching before potentially alerting anyone."

"It's your call. I haven't seen anything up here."

"Call you back when I've got something. Out."

The man in my construct-grip has… He's trying to go invisible, and parts of him are, but I can still see most of him and my construct can grip him just fine. The mask… It's an elaborate Aztec headdress with added mask component. The.. mask itself is an odd mix of jaguar and eagle: eagle upper and beak, with jaguar whiskers and teeth. Is it..? No, thank goodness, it's not attached to his face. Take it off…

It wasn't attached because his face isn't much different. His eyes are eagle eyes and there's a clear line where his lower jaw has been torn off and replaced with that of a jaguar. As a result I'm having trouble understanding his expression and I'm not sure he could talk if he wanted to.

His chest features a chest wound… But the chest has been closed up and… There's a heart beat. No, two heart beats. Strange. I'm increasingly getting the feeling that someone tried and succeeded in turning this man into a super zombie. Basic pattern recognition suggests that it will be a jaguar heart and an eagle heart, but… If I remove them both that might cause him to devolve to heartless status, and he was intelligent enough to use both tools and tactics.

I send my helmet into subspace and look him in the eyes to see if there's any sign of recognition. There…

I can't tell.

"Can you understand me?"

"Khkhkhkhkh!"

Something like the hissing growl of a big cat. Not promising, though I suppose I could fabricate some catnip.

Or I could crack open his chest and add in a newly-fabricated human heart. Or I could use the heart from the Anti-Life broadcaster-

No.

-or I could use mine. I mean, the orange light can push blood around my body perfectly well and that enlightened Red Lantern version of me didn't seem to miss theirs. But this is a magic place and I don't want to take the risk of losing something permanently by giving it up.

Lowest risk solution is a new heart, so let's try that. If it doesn't work I can always cut it out and try something else.

"I'm going to open up your chest and implant a replacement human heart. I'll try and numb the pain, but I'm not sure if my techniques…"

Wait. Did the Aztecs have access to coca leaves? I know that some tribes use it as a pain killer, and if injections don't work… And he doesn't appear to be responding to spoken words…

"Okay, I don't think you can double-die, so I'm just going to try to numb the pain as best I can, then I'm going to try replacing your human heart. Sorry in advance."

I pull the spear out of his leg and close the wound as best I can. Connect the blade to a chirurgeon engine, brace the subject, then inject them with painkillers and coca while they're staring at the blade.

Cutting open someone's chest to give them a heart. This is just about the most un-Aztec thing possible.

The blade goes down, and it looks like neither jaguar nor eagle have made him more resilient. Right, cut down the middle, use a probe… Eagle heart is at the top and jaguar heart is at the bottom. There's nothing in the location where a normal human heart should be.

Can I analyse his genetics? No. Clearly this is a dead Aztec. So… Use genetic records, clone a best-match for an Aztec heart, prepare cloned blood to pump in and… Imbue this heart with the desire to beat and enough orange light to make it happen, to become a man once more.

Then wince quietly as I crack a couple of ribs and enlarge the hole and… Put the heart in his chest, hook up the blood supply-. The heart is already beating, good. Now remove my knives and clamp them to my armour, reposition the ribs and knit them back together. Drop the spear off to the side and seal up the chest.

And then sit back, reducing the hand-construct restraining him until it's something that he could probably break if he put his mind to it.

"So tell me, are you a man again, or still a beast?"

Eagle eyes lock onto me, and he lunges through my restraints!

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
17:49 GMT

A claw goes through my chirurgical construct, shattering it and causing the spear to drop.

Construct mace.

He flap/dives, grabbing the spear and bring it to bear on me just as my mace comes around and shatters the head, knocking the haft down.

"Are you a man?"

He tries to vanish from sight, but with a heart pumping orange light in his chest I can still see him.

"Or a-" I sidestep his charge, mace knocking the closest claw away from my face as I let him continue past me. "-beast? Because if the answer-"

He bends slightly, and I think he's… Yes, he's shaking, and I can see the orange colour percolate through his body more thoroughly. And…

"-is 'no', things are going to get unpleasant."

Orange filaments flash out, drawing runes for concealment and mana-eating on the rocks around us for me to tie into my soul. Okay, if that doesn't-

"M-an."

-work, then…

"Say again?"

"Man." He shimmers back into full visibility, looking me in the eyes. "I am a man, not a beast. Who are you?"

"Orange Lantern. And there are a great many things I need to ask you, but let's stick to the most urgent for now. What do you know about the broadcaster?"

I point, because I'm fairly sure that the Aztecs didn't have a word for 'broadcaster'. He follows the direction with a quick flick of his eyes.

"I am not a BEAST!"

He lunges for his scabbard, grabs a new spear and hurls it in a single smooth motion. The spear flies true, striking the main armoured shaft of the broadcaster and failing to penetrate.

"Is that what it's telling you?"

"Yes! That I am a toy, a tool for the evil god that made it! That I have no other function!"

"What is your name, man?"

"My-." He winces, then raises his right claw to his mouth-. He's bitten his lips, then cut them with his claw as he tries to feel it. "My name is Qualpopoca."

"There's a heart beating inside it-."

"Of course there is."

"Is it yours?"

"No. They took my heart as an offering to Tlazolteotl."

"Then who does it belong to?"

"An old man. Thin, with pale skin like yours. I thought that they were honouring him; he was smiling as they opened his chest. None of us had such courage." He shakes his head. "But instead they just took his body like the rest, while they made me… This."

Someone overwhelmed by the Anti-Life? A city master, perhaps? Not like I can show him a picture of every old man in the world and ask which it was. But if he's still alive, I should try and take the heart with me.

"Why did they leave you here?"

"To slay anyone who interfered with it. I am glad that you stopped me, but if your magic only shields my mind for a little while… I don't have the courage to reincarnate, but I would rather cease existing than continue as an attack-beast."

"Alright, but I'm trying to make it permanent. I'm not destroying you completely unless I know your mind can't be brought back. The results could help your entire afterlife."

But given that I appear to have cut him off from the control system which uses his original heart…

I generate a construct crumbler ram, inscribe it with runes of energy absorption and nullification and hunger and connect it to my tattoos.

And then I slam it into the broadcaster, just under where I can hear the heartbeat. I'm used to these things being supernaturally tough, fortified by the souls all of the Anti-Life sufferers within the city and by Mannheim himself.

This time it goes right through.

I'm so surprised that for a moment I hesitate, then I dive forward and tear into the failed structure, ripping through the material containing the heart and pulling it free and ugh.

Mannheim Is.

Yeah, I can feel that. Whoever this was, they were Anti-Lifed hard. But at least it's not broadcasting any more. Let's.. see. I can't reach the suppression chain I have stored in subspace, but I could create something similar using my tattoos to drain the energy. The runic system isn't really designed for this, but it's the best I can do on short notice and without a magic user on hand. I forge a chain, inscribe the runes and forge a connection before clamping it around the heart. That makes it quieten down, but I can just about still hear it.

"Feeling any better?"

"It is no longer screaming in my mind, but that does not mean that I don't hear its echoes in my soul. I know that I am less than a man, and was even before they treated my form as a-" He looks at his right hand. "-rag-quilt."

"What makes you say that?"

"Do you know where you are?"

"The Aztec afterlife."

"Aztec. That is what the Spanish called us. We are the Mexica. And this is just one part of the afterlife." He looks around. "Mictlampa. A place of respite for defeated warriors. It's supposed to be a temporary reprieve before we resume our journey to rebirth."

"And you didn't do that?"

"By the time that was an option our empire had already been destroyed. I could not face being reborn as a servant to the people that defeated us. Forgetting our ways, and forgetting our gods."

Forgetting the gods that commanded you to ritually murder people. But I'll be nice.

"Empires rise and fall. Your people weren't always empire-rulers. My people used to rule the largest empire the Earth has ever seen, and all we have now is a few islands."

"Were you the one that made it fall?"

"Ah, no." I frown. "That happened in my grandparents' and great grandparents' generations. And I doubt that you could have been responsible for the Spanish."

"No. But it was my attack on one of their outposts that caused the war which saw our defeat."

I shake my head. "I think that was the way they were going anyway. Ritually killing people for a god was considered to be a very bad thing in Europe, and the last people who did it were destroyed for it. You might have triggered the war, but it was already inevitable."

His posture suggests that he's not convinced.

"But if you want to quiet the voice in your head telling you that is true, why not help me stop what is happening to what's left of your people." I break open the house I bricked up to contain the heartless woman and pull her still-recumbent body out. "If I understand your thought-."

"Yes. I will."

"Glad to hear it. Superboy, the broadcaster is destroyed. Come on down."

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:00 GMT

It's easier, here. I spotted that the first time Granddad brought me here, but it's getting more and more obvious. Miss Martian wasn't too happy about talking to the fire fomorians but we need to know exactly who's gone missing or we're just fumbling around in the dark, aren't we?

Wasn't expecting them to try setting me on fire right away, but it's elemental stuff. Don't use it all that much as a superhero because setting people on fire causes serious injuries and because the fire service usually get to fires quicker than I can. But right now three fomorians are trying to burn me to death and it's not working at all.

Actually…

Yeah, there we go. And now I can store up that fire for later.

I look through the fire towards Miss Martian, to try and-. Okay, I'm going to need to get her some flowers or something. I should have warned her-.

"Why won't you burn!"

I look up at the flaming giant with my face just like Granddad showed me for dealing with idiots. "'cause I'm a wizard. I don't fear your fire. I'm here because I want to help." I give them a moment, because I want them to have that in their heads for the next bit. "Did someone disappear? You're not the only ones."

It's a bit hard to tell when they're in walking bonfire mode, but I think they're all looking at the one who was talking for a decision. He ignores them and keeps looking at me. And I keep staring back at him. Am I too young for this to work? Does he think I'm an apprentice someone sent because they couldn't be bothered to come themselves?

Well then he can put up with it, can't he?

He takes a step back, then starts becoming less bonfire and more person. And he's old. His hair and beard are mostly white with just a little bit of red, and his beard covers most of his cheeks so there isn't much of his weathered skin visible. His eyes turn back last, and I can still see just a little bit of fire in the middle of his pupils.

"You're a Cornwall."

"I'm the current living Cornwall. And this…" Miss Martian isn't getting any closer, but she is out from behind that rock now. "This is Miss Martian."

"Hello!"

"Who else has been taken?"

"Just about every fomorian clan has lost someone. And that's just the ones where they live together. I don't know where all the hermits live so I can't check up on them. Who did you lose, and when did they get taken?"

"Brian. He's a child, he doesn't know enough to defend himself yet. He's been gone less than a day. We're searching for him ourselves."

That explains why they went for me. I'm the odd thing out. Interrogating me would have been more intelligent, but they just had a little boy kidnapped. So, be a hero and try reassuring them. "As far as we know, they're taking everyone alive. Where did you last see him?"

The old fomorian looks over to… A woman. Looks like she's been crying, and hasn't been sleeping. Maybe his mother?

"He was near by. I was tending the charcoal oven just over there." She points. "I turned my back turned for just a moment, and then he was gone and I couldn't find him!"

The old man nods. "She started shouting and we came running. I guess that's what you heard as well."

Actually it was Miss Martian hearing their panicking minds, but close enough. I just nod.

"Miss Martian, can you hear anything?"

She flies closer and her eyes start shining white. They go back to normal as she shakes her head. "No. I can't hear Brian or anyone who could have taken him."

Fuck! I hate missing person cases when it's kids! Alright, think. If she can't hear him then he could be dead-. But with his family searching they'd have found the body by now. Or he's gotten out of range super fast.

"Are you his mother?" The woman nods. "Alright. I need one of your hairs."

The old man scowls. "Wizard-."

I take a small knife off my belt, prick my right thumb so some blood ends up on the blade, and then I offer it to him. "Give it back when we're done, yeah?"

He blinks in surprise, then takes it and nods to the woman, who pulls a hair out of her head and hands it to me. I wrap it around my right forefinger and.. reach out for attachments. A hair's not the strongest link, but it's not bad and he's probably got a couple of her hairs on him-.

Yeah, got it.

I start running, feeling where his feet went. He was… Just running around, playing in the woods without going far enough away from the group to get worried. There are dangerous animals in Otherworld, but most of them know not to pick fights with fomorians.

**Robert?**

Right, I'm in a daze when I do this. Mind probably feels weird to her.

**I'm fine, M'gann.**

More trees, more nearly bare earth. I wouldn't say I'm going deeper but I'm definitely going away. Doing this spell tells me where he went, gives me impressions of what he was thinking but it doesn't tell me-

I stop where the trail ends.

-why.

A small clearing. Some plants on the ground, taking in light for as long as they can until the trees around it grow over the top or one germinates in the middle-. The trail ends. It doesn't go into the air. That leaves teleportation.

"You haven't-"

I can't feel a teleportation spell, so that leaves-.

"-found-."

I bring my arms together in front of me and then push them out to the sides, the earth in front of me splitting open in sympathy.

Yeah. They covered it over but they didn't actually collapse the hole in the earth completely.

"Magic gate. Not like the gnomes or elves use." I clench my right fist so the earthen slope reforms into steps and start walking down, M'gann floating down after me. "Don't know where it goes, but I can feel the trail right up to-."

To the blood on the little altar next to it.

"To the gate."

A stone archway, and the carvings look… Aztec? I don't really know South American history. I don't want to get confused between different groups. I glance back at the old man, who has led the family in following us down.

"Can I have that knife back?"

He silently nods and holds it out to me.

"Thanks."

I tap the bloody tip against the altar, trying to see-.

The blood vanishes, and the gate opens. Simple enough. Not all that secure, mind, but maybe it's guarded at the other end. Soon see-.

"We're coming."

"No." I shake my head. "We-."

"He's our blood."

"Miss Martian and me can hide in plain sight. Can you?" He doesn't immediately respond. "And I know that Brian went through there. I don't know that the person who took him did, or that they didn't come back. They could still be around here, so I need you to keep this end safe. If we need you, we can-" I burn up the hair around my finger before sheathing the knife. "-come back and get you. Okay?"

He keeps looking at me, then grudgingly nods.

"Thank you. Miss Martian?" She nods, floating just in front of the gate, and then goes invisible. I pull shadows and air around me as I do the same. "Go."

I run through the port-.

SHITSHITSHIT!

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:00 GMT

"Okay. Turn left."

I can feel Match twist slightly, and then the oversized robot toy thing we're hiding inside turns too. Spoofing its transponder so that their control system didn't pick up on it wasn't easy, defeating it without completely wrecking it and then hollowing it out so we could hide inside it and still get the messages from its control centre was even harder. There's no way that it would pass a detailed inspection, and I really wouldn't want Match to fight wearing it while I was still inside.

But we're inside the castle now. Whatever it's actually called.

Batman doesn't have great records on this place, or whatever these robot drones are called. Back in the sixties there was a British man who fought crime using remote controlled robot… Toys. His name was either Eric Dolmann or Jonas Luthor -no relation- and he didn't ever use a code name that couldn't also be an actual name. He used Jonas when he ran the electronics repair shop he used as a cover and 'Doll Man' for a guy who fights crime using robot dolls sounds like it's not a real name, but there's not enough info in the database to know for sure. He hasn't been seen for over a decade anyway, but these look like they use an updated version of the same concept: giant science fiction combat robots.

My arm computer lights up as the central computer sends another query message to what it thinks is just another simple drone in its system. My computer's emulator sends the only response that could explain why we're where we are: serious damage detected, returning to workshop.

If I was the one programming the system, damage like that would make a robot shut down and then make a separate robot fly over, pick the damaged robot up and then fly it to be repaired. Maybe with the castle covered in wards that sort of system can't be made to work, or there are only so many doorways and they don't want to remodel.

"Okay, two robots ahead."

"Right."

The system has the approaching robots send the I.F.F. signal, which the robots on guard mode check with their own internal records. Good job I spotted that before trying this, or we'd never have gotten past the guards at the front gate.

"Hey, where do you think all the people are?"

"I don't know yet." The system that controlled this robot doll wasn't designed to ask questions like that. The drones aren't supposed to be all that mentally sophisticated; anything like that just gets referred to the central computer. That's gotta be some kind of A.I. but I don't know if it's actually got a personality. "If they were just using this as an operating base… I mean, we didn't used to have a lot of people in the Mountain.."

"I guess."

There's a short signal from the left guard robot, pulses decreasing in duration-.

"Okay, stop in two… One… Stop."

Match stops, and the left robot turns his 'face' towards us to do a full scan. It doesn't transmit it to us, because there's no point. What would a simple robot do with that information other than decide whether to return or not? But my computer picks up the message it sends back to the main computer.

I don't want to try hacking it without as much information as I can get, because government centres like this can use custom operating systems and sometimes even custom programming languages. And I don't know how smart the A.I. is or what kinds of things get its attention.

And I really don't want to get Mannheim's attention again.

I don't-.

Breathe in, breathe out. Remember what you're here for, and that this is gunna be over. I don't exactly think that I'm going to be laughing about this in a few years, but I know for sure that Mannheim isn't either.

"…bin?"

Huh. Ah, okay, the robot-. I missed the first dismissal transmission, but it looks like it accepted that as being a result of the damage. The second transmission was at a higher power level. Send the acknowledgement.

And the doors open.

"Okay, start walking again."

The doors look wooden, but Paul's magic-detecting amulet has been glowing constantly since we got here so it could be anything. The door mechanism-. It's like a giant hug-me toy attached to the ceiling upside down, with its arms threaded through a wheel mechanism just above the doors. If it was a person it would basically be having its arm bones pulverised whenever it opened or closed the doors, which fits the Anti-Life but doesn't match the records for Luthor/Dolmann. He used to pretend that his automatons were real people.

Now I think about it, that reminds me of the Ventriloquist.

"Hey there, Mister Centurior."

There's a woman over at a work bench. She's slumped and wearing messy overalls and has the look of someone who's been too badly Anti-Lifed to really take care of themselves properly. Her hands are constantly moving over a control panel, and there's a bank of.. dozens of monitors on the wall in front of her. I spot the feed from the two outside, and… That one is our feed.

There isn't an A.I.. She's handling it all.

"You've been in a fight."

She's not watching us, she's watching the screen-. The top down view of the workshop screen. The door-opening robot has cameras mounted in its eyes.

"I wonder who with? No, wait. I don't wonder things any more."

She presses a series of buttons, and we get another move command.

"Into the machine you go."

A corner of the room lights up, and there's a-. Boxy mechanical face with chomping teeth. It has large mechanical arms, a nose and eyes and for some reason it's painted a bright cheerful green color. The teeth open up to show a conveyor belt inside and the faint glow of a furnace further in.

I take a EMP batarang out of my utility belt, hold it in front of Match's face until he checks what it is and nods in acknowledgement, then hit the activator and drop it down the right leg. A few seconds pass, and then there's a fizz and a bright flash. A couple of seconds more and Match makes a show of trying to move that leg and not being able to while I prepare the knock-out gas.

"This is why they all left me behind, isn't it? I can't make anything work right. Armstrong, throw it in."

For a moment nothing moves. Then there's a squeaking noise from the ceiling as the door opening robot pulls its arms free from the wheel mechanism-

"Break out on three. I'll knock her out, you get the creepy long-armed robot."

-and then grabs onto rungs underneath it to kinda pull itself down. Looks like it's attached to the ceiling somehow, like an upside down jack-in-the-box.

"Right."

"One."

A second pair of arms drop down from its shoulders and grab the next set of rungs.

"Two."

A third set of arms drop down from its back and grab the rungs on the floor and that is a seriously creepy robot face. And I can see that the woman is the one controlling it. Does she just talk to it because she's crazy?

Guess we'll find out in a moment.

"Three."

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:05 GMT

I snatch my left hand back and cut the connection as the recumbent woman's chest cavity starts trying to drink down the orange light I'm trying to use to infuse her heart with purpose. It wasn't doing that before. Someone knows what I'm doing and is taking countermeasures.

I shake my head at Philippus. "That's me out of ideas, I'm afraid. A heart didn't work, the healing ray didn't work and any orange light I try using just gets absorbed."

Philippus frowns at Qualpopoca. "If we use the rites of your people, a few drops of blood is all that it takes?"

He nods. "Yes. We offer the hearts of sacrifices to the gods to sustain them, but it was also customary for every warrior to offer a few drops of their own blood as well."

The woman I took from Themyscira hasn't recovered, but Qualpopoca obviously knows more about Aztec Mexica magic than I do.

"Would she be restored when we defeat Tlazolteotl?"

"I do not know. Perhaps. Perhaps not. Perhaps her soul will be so damaged that it will simply fall apart without Tlazolteotl's magic."

"Do you know why Tlaltecuhtli was eating the heartless?"

"She was not eating them. She was taking them into the earth to be purified."

"Does that work? I thought that there was a whole process you had to go through to be reincarnated."

"If you want to be reborn as yourself, yes. I believe that Tlaltecuhtli seeks to preserve as much of their essence as she can, in their damaged state. Or perhaps she believes that removing Tlazolteotl's magic is sufficient. The dead are hard to completely kill." He sighs. "I cannot say for certain. I was a warrior, not a priest."

Philippus nods. "It would be better to make her whole. She may have useful information. I will-."

"No, Captain." One of the Heraklya -a woman named Annis- steps forward. "It would be better to use mine. If there is a trap within her, I am better able to resist."

Philippus glances at me for confirmation. "Demi-gods have an inherent resistance to being changed by external magic. I'm not sure that it would be enough to actually matter in this context, but she'd be more resilient that you would."

Qualpopoca stares at Annis. "Demi-goddess?"

"Zeus, deposed King of Olympus, is my grandfather."

She doesn't look at me when she says 'deposed', but I feel the look she doesn't give. Darn, he's still out on Earth somewhere, isn't he? He shouldn't be too great a security risk, but I… I didn't want him dead. Or driven mad.

"The gods of my people do not breed with mortals. If the Orange Lantern says that it will work, I have nothing to add."

Philippus waits a moment, then nods. Annis draws her sword, runs the edge against the meat of her thumb, and then drips a few drops of blood onto the woman's open heart. Then she wipes the residual blood off the blade, and the scab off her already-healed thumb. And in the meantime her blood drops just sort of sit on the exposed heart, doing nothing.

Qualpopoca shrugs. "Perhaps more blood is needed."

"More blood isn't always the answer. Sometimes it's better to-."

The heart fibrillates.

I reach in with my right hand and grasp it, forcing it to beat in a proper rhythm.

"Oh."

"What?"

Annis leans a little closer. "I'm three thousand years old and I'm seeing something for the first time."

I glance at Philippus. "I had, 'a man handling a heart delicately'. How about you?"

"'A man pumping… A woman.'"

I mock-frown as the woman's heart starts to beat properly on its own. "Captain, crude."

Philippus shrugs. "Amazon comedy is often bawdy. As well you know. Particularly where men's activities are concerned."

Annis frowns. "I was being serious. A wound like this has meant death for my entire life. And this blood magic… Would it work on the living?"

"That is not how we used it." Qualpopoca sounds uncertain. He's had hundreds of years and he hasn't tried studying magic? Or is it just that people in Mictlampa aren't considered suitable for that sort of knowledge? "You would need to ask a priest. It was never used on me when I was alive."

I take my hand out of her chest, pushing the flaps of flesh on either side closed. "Superboy?"

Kon looks a good deal more unsettled by open heart chirurgery than the rest of us, but he points the purple healing ray and knits the woman's chest back together. And once that's done, I fabricate her a t-shirt.

Philippus returns her attention to Qualpopoca. "What vulnerabilities does Tlazolteotl have?"

"She is a goddess. By the standards of mortals, she has none."

Kon shakes his head. "We're a bit more powerful than a normal mortal."

"And she is still a goddess. She can strike you down with disease before you can raise a hand to her." He thinks for a moment. "Perhaps… We fed our gods with the hearts of the living. But… The Mexica are no more. The gods have not been fed for a long time. If may be that they are weaker than they once were. At least where other realms are concerned."

"Like Olympus?"

"What is that?"

"The realm of the gods of Greece."

He nods. "Yes. Without blood, without hearts, they would be crippled if they tried to attack it."

"Okay, that's-."

"G-hhhhhhhhhhhr!"

The recumbent woman awakens, sitting up and gulping down air, right hand grasping for her chest. Feeling cloth, she shoved her hand under her t-shirt to check her wound.

Kon manoeuvres himself in front of her. "It's okay. You're okay. We got you a new heart-."

"Tlazolteotl! She made a pact with an evil priest, and they-! They are sacrificing the dead-."

"Legions of heartless dead enslaved to her will. We know. We're fought them and you were one of them. What else is she doing?"

"I saw little, but there were other hearts in her city! The living, the dead, strange creatures… Some of the hearts were giant, and I could feel the power radiating from them. And it has been some time since I have seen another god."

"Qualpopoca? Any other gods knocking around?"

"Yes, but… I admit, I have not seen any of them recently."

"Great. We'll need to scout this ourselves, then. Where does she live?"

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:06 GMT

GIANTROBOTS!

I bend light around me, because confusing peoples' minds doesn't work against most robots, and I leap into the air, praying like hell they don't have some kind of air density detector because two of them were LOOKING RIGHT AT ME when I came through and I can see little hatches opening.

Darts-. Shit, no, fucking javelins get fired out, and the… Pyramid? Stepped South American pyramid gets covered in them, some getting deflected and bouncing along the ground and others embedding themselves in the stone bricks. M'gann-.

She's invisible-. 'least, I really hope she is, which means that neither of us can see the other and some of my spells interfere with telepathy.

Ah… Okay, hands in front of my chest, bind the air between them to seek my target and the air around me not to transmit sound outwards.

"Miss Martian, I'm uninjured and.. directly above the portal. About twenty metres."

I look down at the.. stone gateway, build into a small stone building on the top of the pyramid. Next to it there's an.. altar-.

Is that blood?

Aztecs. Yeah, they-. Focus.

"The robots probably can't detect telepathy, so link us up. Over."

I release the binding and the air vibrates. It's weird: this spell can't tell me where she is, but the vibrations will only find her.

The big robots are still looking at the top of the pyramid, so I guess they don't have any sort of magic detection build-in. Which isn't all that un.. usual…

Wait. I remember… Yeah, Paul was explaining why Atlantis wasn't thrilled about Black Adam knowing Queen… Ganymede? And it stuck in my mind because he said that one of his old friends was an Aztec with power armour powered by the blood of murdered children. He.. made a construct of what he thought it looked like. Those robots look a lot like that construct, only much bigger. What was his name… Zumak? No, that's not it, but I don't remember-.

**What are they?**

**Do you remember Paul talking about Black Adam's old friends?**

**Ah, like Rama Khan? And The Anointed One?**

**Yeah. Do you remember what the Aztec one was called?**

The giant robots keep their javelin launchers ready, but they don't fire again. But a.. squad? Yeah, a squad of power armour-sized robots… Or power armour, I guess, they march up the pyramid. Big power armour. Those things are about three metres tall and at least two wide. The metal they're made of look like… Bronze? Or gold? I thought that Aztecs used obsidian.

**There was an Aztec? I thought they were from further back in time than that.**

The smaller suits reach the top and start poking around, trying to see if there's anything there.

**Yeah. Zumak?**

**Let me just try-.**

M'gann goes quiet. That happens when she shapeshifts her brain, and if she's trying to do something to make it easier to remember-.

**Tezumak!**

**Yeah, that was it!**

**Didn't he die thousands of years ago? I think I remember Paul saying he died in a volcanic eruption.**

**I don't remember, but I don't think it matters. Other people had his technology.** Unless… **Okay, I need to cast a spell to find out where we are. They might be able to detect it, so… Get ready to run and hide.**

**Right.**

Sympathetic bonds are easiest, but there's a bunch of ways to just… Pick up magic resonances. Otherworld is where dead Celts -and Cornwalls- go. So are we somewhere real now, or are we in someone else's afterlife? So look for resonances of death and living, something that would pick up people who aren't alive but are still doing things. Doesn't really pick up anything in Otherworld because everyone except past Cornwalls has left, but if this is…

Yeah, I'm getting something. Dead… But it doesn't feel like it did when I used it on great-granddad. I don't know what it means.

**Okay, I… Think we're in the Aztec afterlife.**

**Is that bad?**

**They used to do ritual human sacrifice.**

**Okay, but they can't sacrifice dead people, right?**

**Not… Not in the same kind of way. There is energy in souls, obviously, it's just a lot harder to use if they're not in a body.** I take a closer look at the suits of power armour on top of the pyramid. **Tezumak wore one of those. Or.. one like it.**

**Oh no! Do you think they're kidnapping people to sacrifice them?!**

…

**Probably. I don't-.**

**We need to find him! Brian!**

**M'gann-. M'gann, don't-!**

**If you can hear me-!**

**Yes, little one. I hear you.**

I hear a stamp-. All the power armour suits on the pyramid are standing to attention, staring-. Staring up at me, and where I assume M'gann is.

**More hearts ready for harvesting.**

Clink.

The power armour suits unfurl metal wings-.

Form air, to M'gann. "Shut down telepathy and flee." Release. And then start flying and trying to remember everything Paul showed me about warding. Come on, LexCorp was printing the designs on paper, I should be able to-.

The power armour suits flap and the suits go flying into the air fast! Two shoot past me close enough for me to feel the pressure wave. I don't strengthen the spell, and I just let myself get pushed by it because when they're that close if they've got any magic detection system at all they'd pick up on it. Drop down, give them a worse angle for their dart-launchers, and… Ward against metal, that'll have to-.

One metal head jerks to stare down at me, a rain of darts plinking off the stone a moment- ooof- later! Fuck! Move! Down the pyramid, through that giant robot's legs and over-.

God damn it, there's a whole city here! The trees were just-!

Put the ward back up, and then-. It wasn't down, just weakened a little bit. Fix it, and then-. Yeah, that's a basic scry ward. Not as good as the one on Paul's skin, but it should work. Into the trees.

Where's the power armour?

Darts shoot through the tree branches just over my head! Ah, ah-. No, wait, they're shooting the whole tree line. They've lost me. Okay. Stay near the ground until they stop shooting, then try and get hold of M'gann-.

Five power armour suits suddenly turn… Left of the gate, and then fly that way as fast as they can. I bet they're going after M'gann, but there's a fat lot I can do about it. No, I think-. I think I should wait until the others move away, then scout around. Brian and hopefully the others are still around here, and I need to get them out.

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:08 GMT

"There's no off-switch!"

"And it's surprisingly flame-. Ah! Flame resistant!"

The woman laying on the floor under the control console was a pretty good programmer. She'd only been down about thirty seconds before the robot soldiers went autonomous. And it was only ten seconds after that that the two on guard duty outside-

I jump back and twist to throw an EMP batarang as a laser beam flashes through the air! I hit-. I miss the laser gun and hit the heavily insulated armour, the electrical discharge doing nothing at all to the robot.

-charged inside.

"Try freezing it!"

Match has got, like, three arms wrapped around him. They were bouncing him off the floor, but they gave up when it didn't work and now they're just trying to choke him out. Doesn't look like it's all that strong but it's super-flexible and kryptonian physical strength is way greater than their flying strength.

I back flip towards the creepy green incinerator as the other guard robot aims its laser at where I was, slashing through the air and melting the stone on the far side. I'm actually kinda impressed.

Smoke bomb. Actually-

I land and roll as the ceiling robot trying to hug Match to death fires a spare arm at me.

-let's make that two. I think they're using optic identification but they might have infrared vision. It's not that hard to make a camera that sees a little further into the red.

"Kinda hard to do if I can't-"

Okay, if EMP isn't going to work, I could try gel crystal. Have to get it right before they fire. The two robots are spreading out-

"-ugh-"

-and I guess a dead cat arrow might actually be useful as a distraction right now. Have to tell Roy when we get back.

"-concentrate!"

"Flashbang!"

The flashbang flies into the face of the ceiling robot and explodes, light and sound hopefully overwhelming its sensors. Match has ducked his head and closed his eyes, which-. Well, he'll still be deafened, but he can still see.

He grabs the arm around his neck with both hands, brings it up to his eyes and exhales, and a layer of frost forms on the metal as it super cools. Superman didn't used to be able to do that, but thanks to Angelika all the full kryptonians on Earth can kinda force the air in their lungs to stop vibrating and then breathe it out, absorbing all of the heat from the surrounding area as it starts vibrating again. I can feel the chill from-.

Whoops.

The sudden change in air pressure in the room blows a hole in my smoke clouds and I just push off the floor without thinking about it. The lasers flash underneath me as I hit the ceiling face-first and I'm reminded again that being a metahuman is actually pretty great because without the Danner formula? I'd have broken my nose at best.

"Y-ah!"

I hit the ground and dive out of the line of fire of the robots, getting just enough time to see Match shatter the metal of the arm and free himself before I throw another smoke grenade, roll and dive in the opposite direction. The hug-in-the-box-bot throws its remaining arms at the ground and pulls its bulk down right on top of Match, who breathes freezing air at it again as it descends. It should still be blinded, so how is it-? Vibrations, maybe?

Hit the ground, roll and throw smoke and keep going, preparing a liquid crystal batarang-. Now!

Two lasers point where I would have been if I'd repeated the dodge I used last time, and my batarang hits the closest before it can fire. There's a flash of red as the focusing crystal takes the brunt of the energy from the laser beam and has a meltdown, wrecking the laser.

Okay, that works.

I scurry past the woman, who's still unconscious. After I had to drug myself last time, Doctor Mist and Blue Lantern came up with a better way to get someone who'd been Anti-Lifed back on their feet. Liquid hope, with a nebuliser. It's really obvious in an Anti-Life zone when we use it, but I think we're already kinda obvious.

Stick it over her mouth, hit the switch and jump as the robot without a gun tries charging me down. Twist and push off the ceiling and slap an anti-armor charge on its back, dodge because it can rotate one-eighty at the waist and then dodge again because the explosion threw it at me.

Dead?

If it was designed like a human body then I just took out its neck above the shoulders, so that should be it as far as signals from the head go, but there's a small chance that its brain is in its chest or it uses short-range radio transmitters instead of wires. I didn't pick anything up before, but I'll know if it does it now.

I scramble and stick another charge on its back just in-.

Its arms reverse and grab me!

My computer pings a 'transmission detected' message as I shove my hands at its chest and try and stop it bear hugging me! Can't shout to get help from Match because the other robot will aim at the sound! Okay, think it through. Shift to the left-. Yes, it's just grabbing anything it can get hold of. It can't see to change its grip. So if I… Push… And get my knee between the chassis and my chest… I can push… Get a little space, grab another charge and stick it on the arm just below the shoulder and blow it!

BOOM!

The left arm loses all its strength, fingers still gripping but with no link to the upper arm its got no leverage. I slide out that way, its right arm clanking against its chest and then feeling around to try and find me.

That's kinda sad.

Then the other robot shoots it, and the laser burns right through the metal. Doesn't stop it trying to find me, it just makes it look more pathetic.

Two.

Three.

Four.

Five.

The laser flashes out again. Five second recharge time run.

I pound across the stone floor, through the smoke and into the open where the robot is backing up. Guess it heard me. Not going to make it. Three. Draw crystal gel batarang and throw-.

The laser explodes, knocking the robot sideways and I'm sliding under it and reversing direction to slap charges on its upper and lower spine and jumping clear.

"Match, you-" The charges go off and the robot collapses. "-okay in-"

The weird pile of springs and arms shimmers slightly with frost, then shatters into super cooled metal fragments!

"-there?"

Match brushes off the metal and then shivers, rubbing his arms together for warmth.

"Yeah. Know who she is yet?"

"Not yet. I'm gunna take a look at the computer while we wait for her to wake-"

Something big slams into the door. It holds, but the other robots are only gunna keep coming.

"-up."

Match nods. "I'll hold the door."

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
11:08 GMT -7

I spot John Constantine as he leaves a poker game, cheerfully waving to the now light-walletted FBI agents he just fleeced. They seem irritated, but in a 'what did we think would happen when we agreed to play cards with a wizard' sort of way, rather than a 'let's slash his tires' sort of way.

John's usually pretty good at judging that sort of thing.

And then he spots me, and just shrugs-. Wait. Oh, he's good. He tenses up slightly, but the change in his actual physique is so small that I didn't notice it until I gave him a scan.

Just the man I need.

"Mister Constantine. Augmenting your salary with the tears of rubes?"

"Why?" He fishes out a cigarette and sticks it in his mouth. "Want a game?"

"No, never liked poker. Listen, I'd like your help with a demon problem."

He sucks in air through his teeth, then pointedly exhales. Then he fishes his lighter out of his coat pocket, removes the cigarette from his-

"Look, if you're trying to push the price up you should know that I'd rather just pay what you want rather than-"

-mouth and then lights the end before returning it to his mouth and pocketing the lighter.

"-go through the rigmarole."

"Don't… Don't you have other people you can talk to about things like this?"

"You have a certain amount of field experience that lends itself to finessing problems rather than brute forcing them. My issue right now is that while the actual demands on my time are perfectly manageable, the potential demands on my time are immense. I could escalate the confrontation… Pretty much all the way, but I don't want to."

"Because… You're known for being subtle, yeah..?"

"Mister Constantine. I make you nervous. I accept that. That's why I avoid you as much as possible despite Sunset working here. But-."

"That's not it. Reason I jerked Alec around so much is because… You need to be able to smack someone down, even if you don't want to. It's like… Mutually assured destruction. A threat you don't want to unleash, but you want everyone to know you could."

"I am familiar with the idea, yes." I frown. "Wait, have you been using my name like that?"

"No. But people know that we know each other."

"I mean, I don't mind. I'm a shareholder in this school, so implying something that's true doesn't offend me, but if I'm acting as your guarantor then I'm not paying you for this job."

He exhales sharply through his teeth, half-turning away. "So what is it?"

"What do you know about Triskele?"

"About as much as anyone. Don't think she'd make a deal with you."

"Ah yes, what was it? One innocent soul every five years? And she gets to puppet you in the meantime? Whether she'd make that sort of deal with me or not is irrelevant; I wouldn't make it with her, and even if I was willing the Source has first claim. Issue is… You know about my children?"

"Heard a few things."

"Given that you killed their father, I think it would behoove-" He gurn-winces. "-you to pay a little more attention."

"Didn't think you knew about that."

"Yes, it's almost like I employ a legion of literal mind-readers or something. I'm not criticising you for doing it; he was a murderer and his children would almost certainly have been worse under his guidance. Did you ever find out who the mother was?"

"No. We figured that his brood would be vampires. New ones. Wouldn't be strong enough to cross running water."

"Good effort, but I found your ritual site. Try again, but without the lying."

"Fuck, fine. We knew him and the succubus were up to something on the island. Didn't know what it was, didn't see the kids. We just stuck a general purpose binding and got out, because if they'd have found us they'd have killed us."

A deceiver unmasked is still a deceiver, but I'd like to get him into the habit of lying to me just a little less. It certainly helps that one of his colleagues on that job sided with the Masons and got a full mental trawl before being put in permanent detainment.

"You know that I adopted the youngest. The eldest were eaten by the youngest. The very oldest was called Caroline, and a few hours ago we summoned a succubus of that name. Don't know for certain it was her-."

"Could be. Usually takes longer to turn souls into demons, but if she was mostly demon anyway…"

"She didn't recognise her brother, and claimed not to recognise the version of events I relayed to her. Obvious question: can demons tell direct lies to their summoners?"

"Yeah. For some stuff. A deal's a deal, so if you want them to tell you something honestly you got to make it part of the deal. Outside of that they can tell you whatever they want. Or just keep stumm."

"Can they be compelled to honesty?"

"Yeah. Get their full true name, get the right bindings on them, put them in so much pain that they'll swear on their true name that they're telling the truth… Other than that, it's like anyone else."

"How much do you know about the process of turning mortal souls into demons?"

"Did it, once. Bit of demon blood, a few of my worst parts, one of the better parts and the soul of an inveterate sinner. Mix it all up… And you've got a demon. More or less."

"The normal process."

"No. Got the impression it's not a lot of fun, but that's it."

"Given your profession and likely ultimate destination, don't-" He shivers. "-you think it might be worth putting a little more research time into it?"

He turns back to look me directly in the eyes. "Where are you going with this?"

"I imagine that the souls of the older children went to Triskele, she threw a wobbler when she found out that one of her girls got close to breaking away and altered the minds of her children during their transformation. If so, what I want to do is get them their memories back, ideally without having to launch an invasion of Hell myself."

"… Right. Pretty sure their boss could take you."

"Didn't you once send him back to Hell by tricking him into drinking holy water?"

"… Yeah. That caused a bunch more problems."

"I'll buy two super soakers. Any idea if that's actually something Triskele would do?"

"If it's messed up, she'd do it."

"Any idea what she'd want to undo it?"

"More stuff. Doubt it'd be anything you'd want to give."

"Can you find out without too much risk?"

"Maybe. Easiest way would be to just ask her. Pretty sure the boss lady could summon her and keep her in the circle."

"It may come to that. I'd appreciate it if you could try with subtler means first."

"Getting volunteered, am I?"

"I understand that your brother in law has gotten a bit stuck with a crisis of faith." I take a transmission node out of subspace. "Hide this under his chair. It will allow him to draw on a little of my spiritual power. He'll kick himself up the arse and become an actual person again."

"He wasn't my favourite person before he nearly got my niece killed."

"A word of prophecy, then. In his current state he's ridiculously easy to manipulate by any of your enemies. If you don't take action…"

"Yeah. Fine." He takes it from me and gives it a once-over. "Give me a few days to try some stuff."

"Thank you, Mister Constantine."

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:09 GMT

**Brian!**

Hm?

**Yes, little one. I hear you.**

Oh dear. That was M'gann, and from the faint glow coming from my amulet an Anti-Life-aligned goddess heard her broadcast and butted in.

**More hearts ready for harvesting.**

**M'gann, can you hear me?**

**Paul?! Where are you?**

**Mictlampa. No idea where I am relative to your position. How-?**

**Tezumak! A bunch of his suits of armour have a magic portal to Otherwold! And whoever made them, they're behind the kidnappings!**

**Rightoh.** Philippus frowns at me as she spots that I'm not focusing on what Qualpopoca is saying. "Talking to Miss Martian in my head."

Qualpopoca just stares, but Philippus nods and Kon-.

**How'd you get here?**

**There's a portal in Otherworld. It links to ah-.**

**M'gann?**

**I'm okay, the Aztec robots chasing me just nearly hit me.**

"Qualpopoca, which way to Tlazolteotl 's home?"

"As I said, I do not know. The.. gods do not make a habit of confiding in me. I was suggesting-."

"Alright." I turn to the recently restored woman. "Ma'am? Do you know where your heart was removed?"

**How big are they?**

**About twenty feet tall. And bulky, like Paul's heavy armour, but with a head. And they fly with magic wings rather than gravity manipulation.**

That's an interesting approach. I can sort of see how it would work-.

"Cihuateteo. South west of here."

Philippus nods. "We do not know your territory and cannot see the stars. Which way is west?"

She points, and suddenly navigation is a good deal more simple. "We were carried to your island in the body of Tlaltecuhtli, and that turned the journey of years into no time at all."

Qualpopoca nods. "The journey to earn reincarnation takes four years and passing through nine different realms, each of which has their own perils. Even journeying to Cihuateteo would take at least a year on foot…" He shrugs. "I do not know what arrangements the gods have made for people who can fly."

"Let's hope not-."

Kon jerks his head around. "What's the obstacle closest to Cihuateteo?"

"Iztepetl." / "Iztepetl."

Qualpopoca frowns. "Those who wish to travel there must brave the mountain covered with razor sharp shards of obsidian. I do not know what will happen to people who try to fly over it."

"I don't think we'll be able to." **M'gann, we're north east of you. Head for a mountain covered in obsidian shards. Be careful, it's only possible to fly upwards a hundred metres or so. Superboy and I are coming to you now.**

**Okay! I'm on my way.**

The Amazons have already mounted their steeds, Annis pulling the woman up behind her. And now I'm reminded of an unsettling number of unsubtle Amazon 'romance' stories. Well, she's hundreds of years old and survived having her heart cut out. I'm sure she can manage.

I fly upwards to just under the limit, waiting with Kon while the winged horses get themselves in order. The equine form is not known for being aerodynamic.

Kon is staring off into the south west.

"Can you see anything?"

"Mist. I can see further in a vacuum, but I guess there's way more moisture in the air here than normal."

"No. I think the gods set things up to prevent people seeing too far."

"Why?"

Power trip.

"Because the journey is supposed to be a trial. If you can see the destination, you start relaxing."

The pegasus riders reach our level, and Philippus nods as I make eye contact. I reform my booster-.

"Prince Kon-El, go with him."

Kon nods and smiles as we accelerate away from the flock, jungle shooting by beneath us.

**M'gann, we're on our way. How many suits are after you?**

**There's five of them. I don't think they know exactly where I am, but they're moving in the same direction as me. And they've got dart launchers.**

I nod. I remember Tezumak's dart launchers downing the Flash due to the combination of speed and spread: while he could normally vibrate through or effortlessly move around them, Tezumak was able to create a spread where there wasn't room to dodge and… Something stopped him vibrating through them? I don't remember it clearly and Adom didn't know the details of how his armour worked.

**Dart launchers?**

**They can fire a dozen or so at once and they fire really fast. I tried phasing through them and.. it didn't completely work.**

**Are you hurt?**

**Don't worry, it's just a scratch. I'm fine.**

**Was it poisoned?**

**Ah, I don't think so? Not with anything that poisons martians, anyway.**

**Don't assume that. We're in a magic realm, so it may be more the idea of poison than chemistry.**

**Okay, so what should I do?**

**Keep flying and do not engage unless essential for your exfiltration. I'll check you over when we meet up.**

**Right. I'm coming up to the mountain now.**

**We're a little further away. E.T.A.… Two minutes.**

**I'm losing altitude!**

**Magic. Go with it. Are the power armour suits going down as well?**

**Yes.**

**Switch to a faster ground form. Preferably something from South or Central America, then head up the mountain. We'll see you shortly.**

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:13 GMT

Faster ground form?

Oh, this is stupid! When I could only do a few Earth shapes I could just pick the one closest to what I wanted. Now I can do just about every animal in America-.

I'll try horse.

My frontal vision's not so good, but I can gallop and stay invisible and it doesn't look like the Aztec power armor can hear all that well. Wait, I remember a documentary I watched with Conner. Central America used to just have llamas, which are like short fluffy horses with bad tempers. I never actually studied them well enough to turn into one.

Four galloping legs go!

I should remember to send a thank you note to Mister J'arkus, because there's no way I'd be able to run this easily without his kuru pendant. Despite his… History, he's a really good researcher. I hope when martians start leaving Mars he can get a posting and hasn't been blacklisted.

There aren't as many plants as I get closer to the mountain, trees being replaced by small bushes struggling to survive in the thin soil. Still more greenery than Mars-. M'arzz, and Mister J'arkus's memory print says that the loose stones could be a problem for hooves. But it's still mostly soil so-.

OW!

Something pinched me on the pad of my hoof! I'm-. Bleeding. Not much. Was that just bad luck?

I look up the mountain, and then I give myself better eyes because while wild horses have okay long range vision I can't see a lot of color like this-.

The mountain's a lot blacker than I thought it would be. When Paul said 'obsidian shards' I thought he just meant… Piles of obsidian, or-.

There!

I do a little four-legged jump over a patch where the soil got thin and the black volcanic glass was poking though. And ow.

Why hasn't my foot healed yet? I can just shapeshift-.

**Paul, I can't fix my wound!**

**What wound?**

**Just a little one on my foot-.**

**Avoid getting wounded again. This is a high magic environment.**

There's a bush just up ahead, but I can't see what's on the far side. I turn right, galloping around it along the bare rock and soil.

**Some things that are meant to inflict wounds will just inflict them, whether they would normally be able to wound you or not. I had a devil of a time getting a spear out of my chest.**

**Understood.**

Um. Mole? Worm? It's still too flat for a mountain goat-.

In my right eye I can see the power armour suits running up the lower slope of the mountain, wings folded up in their backs.

Left right now.

Okay, there's a sort-of path leading up there, and there's also black crystals sticking out through the rock. Those ones aren't all that hard to avoid, but there's got to be more just under the ground. But if the power armor can't go any faster-.

CRUMPFF!

I scrabble to stop! A suit of power armor just hit the path right in front of me! It pulls itself out of the mountainside and then I freeze because it's looking down at the ground. It's trying to see where I'm standing, I know it. I-.

Wait.

Its armor is all scratched up where it hit. A couple of the pieces of obsidian went right into the armor.

Okay, that's great, but it's blocking the path. There's an almost vertical wall, and a… Awkward slope.

The power armor opens most of its dart guns. Some of them don't open but goat powers activate!

I jump as a horse, and the power armor turns to exactly where I land and fires right as I turn into a goat! Twist and dodge and shove with telekinesis because those are too close! Up the rock and I don't know what a sheer wall looks like to a goat but it still looks like a sheer wall to me!

I'll just use my telekinesis towaaagh!

I'll respect what the Aztec gods want me to do and just use telekinesis to feel the rock. Okay. That feels like something a goat could stand on. I think. And that one after it.

And jump!

Waagh!

Jump again! Jump again!

I get my front legs over the lip of the next ledge and frantically scrabble for any sort of support from my back legs. Telekinesis is letting me stick my hooves on the rock but goat legs aren't designed to pull in this direction! Shapeshift claws! Pullpullpull!

Ah-haaah-haaah.

I'm up.

I take a moment to look down the mountainside at the power armour suits making their way up.

Did they notice that?

…

CRASH!

AH! One smashes into the ledge right in front of me, scrabbling for grip even as it opens its dart launchers! Jump off the wall as it fires, jump off its head as it grabs the rock and pulls itself up a little further, jump into the wall above its head and jump off that into a small cleft and balance.

And gasp for breath and darts plink off the rock around me!

Idon'tlikebeingagoat! Idon'tlikebeingagoat!

Ow! That shot chipped through the rock and sent slivers of obsidian flying out!

Magically… Deadly obsidian.

I jump back a pace, getting as far out of their line of sight as I can… If that's even how they're detecting me. Then shapeshift myself an extra hand and grab a stone, a regular one. There's an obsidian spire, but I don't really have a good enough grip to hit it. Will this place let telekinesis work? Uh-huh, floating the rock, and slam it into the glass! And again, and again… Okay, that should be enough if I add in what the darts are smashing. I drop the rock and pick.. up.. the glass.

A golden hand grabs onto the edge of my crevasse.

And as the power armour pulls its head over the edge I fire a magical telekinetic obsidian sandblaster right in its face!

Its face is scoured off, the metal pitted and cut and the power armour collapses backwards, falling first onto the ledge and then down the slope.

Okay, good. Time to hoof it.

I look upwards, trying to judge a path that's got less obsidian sticking out, because from here on up it gets a lot more common. I suppose standing on the flat surfaces should be okay, but if they get hit by a dart…

Okay, got it. Goat-jump time.

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:16 GMT

I don't like arbitrary rules.

Can't fly? Okay. There should still be a way to travel around that doesn't block things in case someone who doesn't want to take the trials wants to travel, but fine. Constructs not working on lumps of glass? Irritating, but perfectly 'fair', as this journey is supposed to be a trial for Aztec souls and they're denied anything that would make it not a test.

BUT THIS IS BULLSHIT!

Kon swings his tetsubo through an outcrop of obsidian as I use my Aztec-compliant wood and hide shield to block the shards which fly at us. And now the floor is littered with shards just big enough to threaten us but too small to efficiently move out of the way without cutting ourselves. AND I can see the other obsidian growths in this part of the-

"This isn't working."

-mountain expanding, paths which were nearly visible before now increasingly overgrown.

"Yes-! Yes, you're right. Ring, sonic-."

"No, that's not it, either." He gives me a hard look. "M'gann's over there and you're trying to think your way through a trial of the gods."

"Yes? I want to get there quickl-."

"Then you're not doing the trial. This whole thing isn't gunna let you think your way around it: that's not how these things work."

I glance up at the almost entirely black slope.

"The Aztecs need smarter gods. So we just run through it?"

"Yeah."

"This is going to suck. I can't neutralise my own pain and I won't be able to regenerate without setting them off."

"Yeah. I won't either."

"I-. I think… Up there?"

I point to something resembling a route that probably won't flay us too badly. We do actually need to cross the mountain and I imagine that constructing a hang glider at the summit -which the Aztec totally could have done- will result in a negative response as well.

Kon nods.

"I'll take the lead until I get light-headed from blood loss."

"You've gotta brave them, that doesn't mean that you've gotta get cut up by them."

"Aztec gods like blood."

I start, obsidian shards on the ground cutting into the metal armour of my boots. Not cutting through yet because my weight is spread widely enough to prevent it, but the sole is taking damage and that will change. I speed up, twisting this way and that to try and keep my arms and torso as much out of the way of the outcrops.

It doesn't work. A narrow crevasse we have to path through slashes holes in my back and front as I turn aside, and I feel pain as a misplaced hand results in a spine going through my gauntlet into my palm. I don't jerk it back because I'm much better at dealing with pain than I used to be. When I've got a purpose I'm working towards at least. And we need to get to ow.

Right through the side of my helmet. Because only shitty Aztec cloth armour is allowed to do anything. Yep, that's bleeding.

Up the-. And just like that the difficulty has been toned down. There's an actual path now, spiky as it is. I wonder if I could talk Zeus into taking over this place-?

M'gann needs help, focus and make an effort.

I pump my legs, feeling the effort in my calves as I do my best to run up the side of a mountain. And I feel.. the slight dampness as the thin cuts on the soles of my feet start to bleed in a way that I'm sure makes the Aztec gods delighted.

"You alright, Kon?"

"Helios's blessing is still working. So's the Danner formula." He accelerates past me, grabbing a crystal to pull himself up a steep surface. I see it cut into his hand, and then his wound closes up a moment later. "So I can-."

"Carry me."

He pulls himself over the lip, then turns and offers me his now completely healed hand to pull me up. "I don't think they'll let that work."

Okay, hand there, grip Kon's hand with my other hand, feet there-. And I'm up, and we're off again.

I can see the blood he's leaving where his feet are getting cut too frequently for him to heal it. Looking back-. And my blood too, from the looks of things. I could top up my blood supply, but quite aside from the gods' system considering that 'cheating' it would risk reinflating veins and arteries that are closed due to the lower pressure to prevent me bleeding further. That's why-.

"Kon, did I ever tell you why survival rates for wounded British soldiers during Falklands War were better than the rates for US soldiers during Vietnam?"

"No? Better hospitals?"

Okay, this bit is relatively straight, not too steep, bit of a scramble in a few places but I'm seeing more rock. Guess the mountain accepts that we're playing its game.

"No. Worse. US soldiers got evacuated by helicopter or boat as soon as possible. British soldiers got left on the freezing moor for hours because the country with the longest naval tradition in the world fucked up a naval invasion. Problem was that the US medical corps insisted on pumping blood into wounded soldiers to keep their blood pressure normal. Prevented internal clotting because the clots couldn't hold against the heightened blood pressure. They bled to death inside their skin. But lying on freezing ground on Goose Green slowed the British soldiers metabolism, and the lack of blood transfusions let them clot just fine."

"Okay?"

Shit, a completely sheer surface where the only handholds are obsidian. I… Ditch my armour, which was basically just hanging on at this point.

"Just thinking about it. Because of..."

I hold up my steadily bleeding arms. He nods.

"Well, there's no medical attention, but it's not cold enough to slow your metabolism."

We each nod and start ascending.

"Yay."

Hand on the.. flat part, the corners will cut a little bit, but the main 'blade' will remove fingers. Push and foot and.. next hand hold. And-. Glance upwards, and Kon's already half way to the top, and I-.

Crapcrapcrap!

Right hand slips on my own blood, and there's a nice pile of obsidian below me waiting for me if I fall off.

Breathe. Take a moment. Grab onto the actual rock. And start up again.

"You okay?"

"Good enough. Don't slow down for me. I'm okay but M'gann-."

Oof! What-?

Goat-?

GIANT ROBOT!

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:21 GMT

Kon ducks as the gosh that's big lands next to him, the force of its landing shaking the mountainside! I brace as best I can with a goat in my face which isn't much unless I want to lose fingers, then my eyes widen and I press myself into the rock face as it fails to control its momentum and falls over me-.

It grabs at me with its right hand and I use a construct lasso and pulley to wrench its right arm away as it falls, spinning it around and then letting it go once it's out of range. One second passes and then I hear a thud and crash as it slams down onto the obsidian outcrop below.

"Beeeh!"

Goat and I can't see the robot because it's standing on my shoulders and mostly covering my face. Winch for the goat-.

It jumps off me, lands on a near-vertical surface, and then jumps up again to reach the top.

And then it turns back into M'gann. "Hey guys!"

I look down, thankful that I've long since overcome my vertigo, and see… Yes, that's more or less Tezumak's armour. The obsidian punched through the chest in three places and I can see blood leaking out from the wounds. But it still tries to get up.

"Hey, M'gann. What is it?"

I stab a construct piton into the cliff, attach a construct rope to it and to a construct harness around my chest, and lean back. A couple of jumps and I'm standing next to the armour. No… Obvious response from the mountain.

"Aztec power armour. I think. They haven't said anything."

I cautiously step around its flailing right arm, wincing as new shards are driven into my feet. I'm sort of… Floating above the pain at the moment but if this keep up it won't be all that long before my joking request to Kon becomes a serious one.

"You said there were five of them?"

Left hand on its forehead, x-ionised knife through its throat-.

Blood sprays out, covering me-!

"Ugh."

After a few seconds it.. dies off, reduced to a impressive but low-pressure flow from the wound. A human artery.. could bleed like that, but this blood doesn't look all that highly oxygenated. And there wasn't any noise from the interruption of the wind pipe. And the armour is still moving weakly when any normal human would flail frenziedly for a few seconds and then lose consciousness once the blood pressure in their brain dropped.

So I keep slicing.

"Paul, what are you doing?"

"Need to know what these things are. Miss Martian, is there a mind in here?"

"I.. can't feel one, but that could just be because they've got-"

I cut all the way through the neck, causing the head-. The helmet to fall off and the flow of blood from the neck hole to increase. There's no flesh inside. There's the neck armour, a.. metal 'spine' and a whole lot of blood.

"No one inside."

Analysis of the blood… It's a mixture from many different individuals. I can't… There are anomalous properties that suggest that there's an element of magic here, but a power ring can't characterise it better than that.

"I'd guess that they're using blood from people they've either abducted or Anti-Lifed to animate them. But…"

There's still a little… Movement in the blood. A small surge and then a stop. Another small surge, more of a ripple at this point as most of the blood in the interior has leaked out onto the mountainside.

I send filaments reaching inside the chest cavity-.

That's a heart. It's wired into some sort of frame, and… Okay, it's there.

I climb up on the armour-. I slip, the blood coming from my feet making them slide out underneath me and making me slam face first into the power armour's side.

Ah-ow.

"You okay?"

What do you think, Kon? "Miss Martian, I don't suppose-"

I check my footing better this time before hauling myself up.

"-you've got any healing potions, do you?"

"Sorry, no. Cornwall Boy does, though. Did."

I nod as I take position over where the heart is. This armour panel looks like it can be removed, but I've got no idea where the switch is. If it's even a physical thing, or wasn't sealed shut once its purpose was fulfilled.

Kon's head jerks up. "They're coming."

M'gann just looks determined. "We can beat them. The obsidian goes right through their armour."

"I'm pretty sure that Kon's fists will, too." I crouch down and start slicing around the edge of the panel. "Shout if you need me."

Construct shield.

And… The panel comes off, and there's an interior armour mechanism, but this one… Yes, the latch is there and there, twist and pull…

That's a human heart. Wait… No. Not a human heart. It's roughly the right size, but the shape isn't quite right. And it's still beating in its metal… Cage. Some sort of blood magic. The power armour has finally gone still. Curious that it doesn't have the same Anti-Life aura as the other one, but I don't know enough about Apokoliptian technology or blood magic to draw firm conclusions. Just in case this is linked to someone or belongs to someone, I take a couple of pints of blood out from the armour's interior. Then I tear out the heart and the housing along with it, fabricate a carry case for it and put it inside before covering it with the blood. Then I-.

There's another crash as another suit of power armour lands on the top of the rise. Kon and M'gann have already gotten out of the way, Kon darting back in a moment later to punch it in the leg. That knocks it to one knee, then it raises its hands-. Are those claws? Yes, yes they are. And it lashes out with them and forces Kon back.

I can't get up the cliff face while that's going on. There isn't another convenient way up here… I can go around, but that will take at least ten minutes. Or more, because my feet are a mess and it's all obsidian fragments. Standing here…

Hm.

I point my right hand at where the heart used to be and generate a heart-shaped construct before linking it to my tattoos. Grab the head piece and… Clone my own blood. Seal the neck, pour my blood inside it with a little of the actual blood that's leaking from just about all of my body at this point, then reattach the head.

"Ugh."

The power armour's eyes glow orange.

"Up you get. And carry me."

Its left arm grabs hold of me, while its right supports its torso as it struggles to rise. I use a construct to snap off the obsidian which ran it through, snorting to myself as I see the obsidian around us grow a little in response. That gives it the space it needs in order to get back on its feet, still holding me to its chest.

"Get us up there."

It follows my pointing finger, crouches slightly, and then leaps.

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:25 GMT

Which put me in the exact line of sight of one of the power armour suits holding back from the brawl with Kon and M'gann. I jump off the arm holding me and duck down behind my armour's bulk as the flechettes plink off its chest. They can't penetrate fully whole-.

My armour shudders as a flechette hits the rent torn in the chest by the obsidian spike, punching through my repair construct and causing blood to leak for a moment before I patch it.

But they couldn't penetrate the metal with their flechettes.

Two are hanging back. One has its head and upper body wrecked, and is leaking blood. Not a lot. But the armour is clearly losing integrity. The other is down a right arm, and is using its left to support itself against the rock. Damaged legs? The two that have closed the distance with Kon and M'gann are fighting carefully, firing individual flechettes and planting their feet on the shrinking patches of normal rock before taking a swing. My team mates are more agile, using the power armours' bulk to shield themselves.

These are the only pursuers. If we destroy them, then it doesn't exactly matter how angry the mountain gets, because we can take our time. Assuming that Robert has the sense to keep his head down until we can reach him.

Robert who -and I think this as a friend- has a significant chip on his shoulder about not getting better training and more fieldwork up until I got involved, and certainly isn't just going to wait without an excellent reason-. I can't provoke the mountain.

I push the desire to leap at the second fire support armour into my armour, and grip on tightly as we're airborne again. And a desire to punch-.

The armour we're aiming at spots us coming in and tries to move, but its right leg can't react properly, trembling as it tries to support the acceleration. It still manages to back up a pace which means that we miss the arm we were aiming for, but we land almost chest-to-chest-.

I dart up and forwards and slash its neck with my knife, ducking back-. Ducking back to avoid most of the blood spray.

Shield us.

As our target loses a lot of its strength, my armour picks it up under the arms and turns, using it as a barrier against the armour with the damaged head as it decides to prioritise us. Flechettes… Some hit the armour but a lot go wide-. It can't aim properly. It keeps firing as it.. stumbles forward. Nothing wrong with its legs that I can see, so it's the senses again. It brings its right arm around in an awkward slap which is still strong enough to knock our shield out of my armour's hands, but it's now off-balance-.

Grab its head and crush.

My armour responds at once-. Oh, it felt that, and it tries to twist itself back into position to hit us or at least force the hands gripping its head off. Unfortunately for it, that just puts extra torsion stress on the damaged part of its-

And there's the blood fountain.

-body, causing the damaged metal to give way completely. The armour weakly slaps my armour twice more, causing no damage, before finally slumping to the ground.

I turn to see how Kon and M'gann-. Ah, good show. One of the armour suits they were fighting appears to have been introduced face-first into an obsidian spike. The other, M'gann telekinetically anchored its limbs for Kon to strike the joints. They're both down.

"Good work. Miss Martian, could you fish out their hearts?"

"Ah…" She looks decidedly disquieted. "Why?"

"Aztec magic. We might be able to use it to restore its owner to life… Or if it's the heart of a dead person, restore their minds."

"The heart of a dead..?"

Kon nods. "This is the Aztec afterlife. We think Tlazolteotl is doing something to their souls to control them. A bunch of them were attacking Themyscira with their chests cut open."

"Themyscira?"

I direct my armour to crouch down so that I can get at the heart of the robot it decapitated.

"Yeah, the Greek gods brought it here, but now we can't contact them."

Oh. Ah, I feel a little dizzy. I think I'm…

"Hate to be a nag.. guys, but please focus. I'm not doing so well."

M'gann looks at me in concern as Kon rips a heart compartment open. "I didn't see you get hit?"

"I know that between my armour and ring we usually count me as a 'tough' member of the team, but with magic attacks that bypass my constructs… I'm a lot squishier than both of you."

"But you can… Heal yourself? Right?"

"Not without setting the mountain off. And magic obsidian-" She nods. "-stops me healing the injury without replacing the whole area. None of this will matter in the long term, but right now I'm well below one hundred percent effective. So if we can finish-"

I cut through and pull out another heart, which I shove in a blood-filled tub.

"-up here and get over the mountain, I'll be a good deal happier."

Kon holds up the heart he obtained, and I repeat the containment process. And then…

Augh.

Kon looks at me as M'gann opens up the interior of the next armour suit. "How about you just focus on storing them and let us pull them out?"

I nod gratefully. "Thanks. Up."

My armour straightens up. Okay, let's see. One Anti-Life infected heart. Three regular hearts. And…

M'gann finds the switches and actually takes the heart out as the designer intended.

Four regular hearts. Hundreds of zombies. Ugh, I don't know it matching them up to the original owner matters, or if they just represent a particular capacity. There's probably some way to do it with magic. And… Robert might be able to cast that spell. Shouldn't be too-.

"Here you go." M'gann smiles awkwardly as she holds the still-beating heart in her telekinetic grip. "One heart, two careful owners."

"Ah, thank you."

Another box, another heart in a box. I strap them over the shoulders of the armour I'm riding. I briefly consider trying to repair it using parts from the other ones, but I don't know how to take them apart the easy way and making this even more of a kludge job isn't going to help.

"Right. I don't intend to bring this thing into an actual fight, so don't worry about picking a route that damages it. Superboy's regeneration is still working because.. it's magical, probably. Miss Martian, what's the best way across?"

"Ah, well, the route I used is only good for goats, but I can find you a way." She shifts back into goat form. **Follow me!**

She heads up the gentle part of the slope, leaping from rock patch to rock patch with the ease of a seasoned mountain goat. Kon heads after her with a little less élan, and I bring up the rear.

Robert, please be in one piece.

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:29 GMT

At least I'm in one piece.

The power armour suits that didn't go after M'gann are on patrol, but it doesn't look like they've got any trace of me. I.. think I've got what Paul's tattoos look like copied right. The big power armour suits standing on guard duty in the main… Town? City? Base? I don't really know what this place is. All looks Aztec to me. They've gone back into standby, and no one has gone anywhere near the portal. Haven't seen any actual people, but I don't know if that's normal or not. Pretty normal for Otherworld, and the Aztec religion didn't go extinct all that much more recently.

But someone built this armour, and I'm not going to find out who by hanging around outside here. This… Ziggurat is the biggest building in the place, and the best guarded, so this is probably where I can find answers. Can't risk trying to talk to M'gann, not with someone listening in like that. And I can't risk waiting in case something happens to Brian.

But how do I get in? There are doors, but there are more big power armour suits next to it and they're closed and probably sealed anyway. Taking that fight is a non-starter. Running past them? Same sort of problem. But the walls aren't guarded in the same way. The ziggurat is made of stone blocks, or something like that. My magic lets me move stone around, so in theory I can walk through it and into the ziggurat. Except the wall is obviously going to be warded with sensors to warn them if someone tries this.

So as far as magic is concerned, I need to not be here. And the stones I move need to not be moved. The stones themselves need to think that they're in exactly the same place. Because if this is stone, that power armour will smash right through it to get to me faster than I can put the spell back up. Plus whatever they've got on the inside.

Don't fuck it up.

Kay, so the first thing is the natural state of the rock. I need to know that so that I can fake it convincingly. And I can't just probe it because that's a ward even I can cast. So I've got to create the idea of a rock that isn't there, switch the two around in the ward scheme without anyone noticing-. No, run them through the same attachments pretending to be one, then take the actual block out.

That… That should work, actually. I mean, it's pointless if there's a wizard actually watching me, but if that's what's happening then it's all pointless anyway. As long as they need the alarm signal…

Try it. Form the earth magic into the spirit of a block but not the form of one because I'm not sure I could hide that. Volcanic rock's easy enough, just got to take into account the fact that this is more of a spiritual world than normal earth so that's going to be a bit more pronounced… Yeah, that should do it.

And the merge has to be instant, no fiddling around and no feeling the spells out. Tune my fake block to not send signals and…

Quick check the giant suits of armour…

Merge.

Woo.

That's a lot of spells. I think… I think that they're doing what Paul did to the mountain: running a whole lot of spells through the outer surface, rather than just setting it to detect things or be stronger. I dunno what this all is, but my fake block looks like it's copying it alright. 'kay. That's the warn-.

Yeah, like that.

The warning spell, that triggered, but it isn't a complicated thing. Least, this bit of the spell isn't. Looks like it's just a low level alert. Which makes sense. That bit looks like the 'brick broken, send help' alert. And some of this stuff… Some of this I can't even tell what it does. But it doesn't look like its triggered from this block. Reset the warning spell, remove the actual brick from the network… Good. And cast Pass Through Rock.

I push into the rock wall of the ziggurat just as easy as I did in practice. The rock sends the alert, but since it's disconnected from the system it doesn't go anywhere. I'll have to reset it… No, that's not how it works. It constantly triggers while something's interfering with it, but once the interference is gone it stops transmitting.

That makes it a bit easier.

Okay, the stone doesn't go all the way through, and the next layer… Same thing. Create etheric stone, duplicate and look at the duplicate.

This one doesn't have the interference alert. Makes.. sort of sense. I guess they aren't worried about people messing about with it from the inside. Looks like the other spells get more complicated, but I can't even guess what they're supposed to do from here.

Keep walking, then drop the spell replacing the first stone once I'm out of it. And cross my fingers… Ah, not seeing an alert. Looks like it worked.

Press on.

And now it-. It's just rubble. Gravel. No spells on any of it, not that I can see. I'll have to remember this, because if I can just run along the inside without setting anything off that's a good way to get around.

And then it's another stone layer, same as before. And another, more like the outside. Normally I'd be getting tired by now, but with this place being more magical I guess I'm just…

I'm just charging off of the realm of a real powerful wizard. Or something bigger. Shit, I didn't think-. I mean, wizards on Earth can track me draining stuff but it's a lot harder. But if they haven't sent anything to where the drain's coming from… Maybe it's not that noticeable? Or maybe it wasn't M'gann's telepathy that let them pick up on us. Okay, just.. have to stop draining ambient power, easy enough. Didn't used to do it at all.

And… No more bricks. I'm inside. Nearly. Just have to stick my head out and then stop casting my earth spells. Deep breath.

And step.

Huh. No light. I guess the armour suits don't need lights. So there probably aren't any other people around here. Stealth spells are still going, and I can't hear any alarms.

So I'm in a pitch-black… Corridor? Room? So now what?

Can I hear anything?

Ah? No, not-. Yeah. It's quiet. Like a… Pumping noise. Did Aztecs have pumps? Or has someone imported something from Earth. Doesn't sound like a person walking, and I don't… I don't know enough about Aztec magic creatures to know what else it could be.

I need to see, but I don't want to mess things up by summoning light and showing everyone where I am. So… Heat vision. That's not impossible to detect, but since I'm mostly casting it on myself and just getting the ability to see things a bit differently it shouldn't have much chance of alerting anyone.

Quick check it won't interfere with my stealth spells… Yeah, should be fine.

Slight burning in my eyes… And… Okay. The walls are… Generating a little warmth. With dots along them generating more. Dots… Well, more like the size of my fist. Looks like I'm in a corridor about…

I take a step forwards to make sure that they're not embedded in the wall.

No, it's about two metres across and… Quite a lot longer. Can't tell if there are any turn-offs from here, but I'll see them when I get to them. The noise is… It's coming from a lot of places, and I think… I think there's a louder pumping noise coming from somewhere else. The quiet pumping is coming from all around, so I guess it's in the walls.

Weird that they've got heat sources lined up on the walls but nothing making light. Are there Aztec monsters that have infrared vision? If there are, there aren't any nearby. I walk over to the closest one and touch the wall next to-.

Damp, warm and slightly sticky. And it looks like the heat source is vibrating? Some sort of lightless fire? I reach out to touch it. Wouldn't be the strangest thing-.

Feels a bit rubbery. And it's moving, I think it's pumping-. Yeah, it's pumping, and it's sort of heart-.

Shaped.

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:38 GMT

"Okay, that's it: I'm ripping my own feet off."

Kon jerks his head around from peering at what is supposed to be the Aztec afterlife for women who die in childbirth.

"You sure that's a good idea?"

"The obsidian is embedded too deeply for normal tweezers. I can't grab it properly with construct tweezers. My wounds have sort of scabbed over but they won't heal because I've got shards of magic death glass in them."

Kon lifts up his own right foot, revealing a mildly scabbed but basically healthy sole. "Maybe you shoulda tried being nicer to the gods?"

…

Apollo you fuck.

"I'm sure that Lord Apollo has a better sense of priorities than to deny healing to someone trying to save the world."

Kon doesn't look convinced.

I don't feel convinced.

I-. Wait.

"No, no. If Tlazolteotl has done something to take over this region, she might pick up on it. I-."

"What about-" M'gann swoops down. "-if I open up the armour and you get inside?"

"Possible. Tezumak obviously took his on and off. I should be able to rip the internal bracing out."

Kon frowns. "Doesn't it need a heart?"

"I can use the orange light, it's fine. That's basically what I'm doing at the moment. I won't be fighting at full effectiveness, but at least I'll be able to walk." I turn to M'gann. "See anything?"

"Big suits and little suits. It doesn't look like they're chasing anyone."

Kon nods. "Think we could sneak in?"

She looks dubious. "Can you turn invisible?"

"Can you adopt an irregular shape that could extend around him and keep him invisible?"

She thinks for a moment. "Yes. It wouldn't be a lot of fun, though. I'm not Plastic Man. I need to keep my internal organs in one piece."

Kon looks a little blank. "Okay, so..?"

"I'll.. need to swallow you."

"Oh. Ah…"

Kon looks at me. I look at the armour.

"So will I be in your stomach..?"

I extend a construct into the armour and start sucking the blood into a storage flask. Then I open latches and carefully remove components.

"No, I can make a rumen. That's like a special pouch in my throat. It's perfectly safe."

It's interesting how obvious it is that the parts needed to allow the armour to operate on its own are additions to the original design. Whatever Tlazolteotl's skills, thaumic engineering isn't amongst them. I.. recognise some parts of the runic control system, but only the obvious parts. There's a lot of complexity here I'm… I'm going to try and find someone to go over at some point.

"Do I..? Should I take my clothes off..?"

M'gann blushes.

Skeleton removed, I can get in. I can see where the gap for the wearer is. Tezumak was a big man, but the armour is far larger. Okay, clamber in, stick some gold-coloured metal to the interior where the holes are so that they're not immediately obvious, and… Yes, it's even obvious where the blood reservoirs are supposed to go. Add replacements, because I don't know what they actually looked like, and fill them with blood from my flask. Strap myself in and then connect the arcane systems to my etheric heart, the heartbeat of avarice.

BaBUM.

The armour comes… Not 'alive', not literally. But the blood lets it feign being alive for the purpose of control. That makes sense: there's no way a civilisation that old would have understood an electronic control system like what my power armours use.

"Alright, I'm ready to go. Have you come to terms yet?"

It projects my voice, which is useful.

"Uh, yeah." Kon lays on the ground on his chest and raises his legs. "Let's just… Do this."

M'gann… Assumes the form of a large…

I'm just going to look away and spare Kon the embarrassment. And hum, because that sound-.

"Okay. Ah. He's… Inside."

"Okay. Make yourself invisible and I'll head in."

"What if they attack you?"

"I know where the heart latch is, and I can drain their power. But if they didn't send reinforcements then I imagine that they're semi-autonomous. The regular robots probably won't recognise that I'm out of the ordinary."

M'gann's skin shimmers and then she vanishes, and Kon along with her. Quick check…

"Yes, this armour's visual systems can't detect you. Stick around until we're somewhere safe, communication to a minimum."

"Understood."

I walk through the forest edge and into the clear area around the outer wall. I can feel how to operate the wings, but I don't really want to fiddle around with systems like that and the visible damage this armour has taken means that not flying shouldn't look all that odd to any observers. The armour units on the walls don't react, and neither do the larger ones standing on the outside. I march towards the main doors, and they open without any special action from me. Okay… That is where the portal to Otherworld is, so if I march around for a moment then Robert-.

BaBUM.

What?

The Anti-Lifed heart is beating a frenzied rhythm in its compartment on my back. Why? There's nothing around-.

Justifiers start marching out of the portal, Apokoliptian weapons at the ready. A moment passed, and then Mannheim himself follows them. He doesn't waste time looking around at the scenery. Instead, he strides forwards, down the steps, the armour suits on guard duty there collapsing to the ground in his wake.

What's..? Going on?

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:43 GMT

The armour suits don't get back up once he passes, either.

So… What, he's added some sort of counter-magic ability to everything else now? Or an ability to turn hearts off? If they actually retain any sort of awareness, that seems more plausible, but it's still-.

I carefully avert my gaze from him, looking only at the shoes of his escorts as I make sure that my empathic vision is as weak as possible because I still remember Mr. Nelson's warning about looking into peoples' souls. There's no way that he isn't almost as aware of the souls of the people with him as he is of his own. This area isn't Anti-Lifed so he shouldn't have perfect awareness, but I still…

Yes. I walk over to the entrance to a nearby building and take up position as if I was guarding it.

No chatter from the Anti-Life party. Because there's nothing the guards know that he doesn't and there's nothing that he wants that they need to be told to do. What an unpleasant way to-

BaBUM.

-live.

Is he aware of that? Has he been coming here for a while, or..? And I looked at him, which he would have felt, but… This place is Aztec in style, not Apokoliptian or modern American. The broadcaster was clearly his work but all the rest has been Aztec magic. So I'd guess that Tlazolteotl is working with him rather than being enslaved to him.

Why?

Don't know.

From the direction their feet are moving in, I'd guess that none of them are coming towards me. Can't risk looking at them directly, so… Ring, passive sonic imaging.

Compliance.

And… Yes. Just by listening to the echoes I can more or less follow-.

One of the large suits reaches across the top of the pyramid with the portal on it and picks up the fallen suits before walking off in a different direction. Hm. I could send M'gann and Kon after Mannheim while I follow the big suit, but we don't have any reliable covert way to get back in contact or find each other. We could both follow Mannheim but that would be kind of obvious. We could try killing him, but since he's here on 'friendly' terms with Tlazolteotl I'm not hopeful. Or we could try following the big armour and see where that takes us.

That sounds like the better option.

I step away from my post, and the sounds I'm getting suggest that the rearguard are watching me but taking no action. That's fine. Down the middle of the street, like a robot following the line to its destination. Is that how they walk? Don't know. But the alternative is activating the wings and none of the others seem to be doing that.

Tracking the big armour is easy: it's taller than almost all of the buildings. And the power assistance in this armour means that it's not a strain for me. Blood pressure… Okay. I.. could supply my brain by ring and leave the rest of my body to just try its best, but if Mannheim's around with… Poorly defined abilities, I think that the risk would be unwise.

No people around, but the stone seems to be in good condition and the greenery is in good condition. The armour suits don't appear to be doing it, so I imagine that it's just how this place is. I didn't have any preconceived ideas about what a haven for women who died in childbirth should be like, but I suppose 'just another Aztec city' is pretty reasonable. They wouldn't want to be reminded of how they died for eternity, and they'd have been living here for longer than they were alive. Certainly for longer than they'd been trying to give birth. And the aim was to give them a place to recover mentally before seeking reincarnation so the gods couldn't make it too nice.

The big armour suit looks like it's heading towards a huge building at… Roughly the centre of the city. It has the traditional stepped pyramid design but the individual steps are huge; big enough that the large armour would be forced to climb them rather than walk up them.

I pick up the pace a little, trying to be only just behind the large armour before it enters the building. No one looks, no one cries out and none of the suits I can see act any differently. I can't get readings from Mannheim's party from here, but if I really want to find them later I doubt that it will be hard.

Mannheim doesn't back away from fights. Not any more.

The large suit that I'm following stops just in front of a large door in the huge ziggurat. It's stone, and painted in surprisingly bright colours. I know that people in medieval Europe had access to bright pigments and dyes earlier in history than is sometimes assumed, but it's still a little surprising to see bold colours like that in an Aztec city. I suppose that even if it is an anachronism for the time these cities date from that doesn't mean that their afterlife wouldn't have it.

The big suit puts the smaller ones down and pushes-. Ah. The doors are stone, and on some sort of turntable. They swivel as the suit pushes, revealing the interior.

I can hear the sounds of a forge almost immediately. So this is where they're being made?

The big suit picks up the smaller ones and walks inside. It doesn't close the door immediately, so I accelerate to a jog and get inside. Then back…

To…

Walking normally.

So this is where they're keeping the heartless. And the prisoners.

BaBUM.

The prisoners are strapped to… The arrangement reminds me of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Bound wrist and ankle, gagged and attached to gurneys, they're pushed around the room by heartless… They're dressed as… Priests. In one part of the room they're… Being ritually bled, the priests officiating showing absolutely no emotion as they discharge their office. They're using knives and pots rather than modern medical equipment, but the blood is staying liquid rather than clotting anyway.

BaBUM.

In another part of the room more heartless hammer metal, pausing every so often for blood to be poured onto the plate. Magical transmutation? I can't… Immediately call to mind a transformation that would require human blood, but perhaps it's a conduit for some other spell instead. They're using only primitive tools, and their supply of metal doesn't seem all that large.

BaBUM.

The finished parts are carried up to the top of a dais where a single man is working on the internal frames. Parts are attached either by his hand or at his direction, blood is added and… I think he's performing a ritual anointing. His chest is cut open, but there's a visible heart in his chest-

BaBUM.

-and it's the source of the Anti-Life feeling that… It's not filling the room, but it's a constant background drone. The man himself is… Muscular. Huge, actually, six and a half feet tall and extremely muscular. I didn't think that sort of musculature existed back in those days, but it looks like I'm wrong. Close-cropped hair. Clearly of a South American ethnic group. There's an open suit of armour behind where he's working, metal stained by old blood.

And a… When he briefly turns in my direction I see a metal plate attached to his face over his mouth.

Adom didn't have any pictures, the statues had long since eroded to nothing and I felt stupid asking him to draw them, but… He fits the description for Tezumak.

I don't think anyone deserves to be Anti-Lifed, and the whole human sacrifice thing does get a little muddled in a place with an afterlife that rewards being sacrificed and allows reincarnation. But I don't like the fact that I'm about to help the least moral member of the League of Ancients, including the queen who reintroduced slavery to Atlantis.

Affecting the pose of automation, I walk what appears to be the correct route to the dais, evading the large armour suit as it heads outside after dropping off its load for repairs.

Time to start acting openly.

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:49 GMT

Objectives:

1. Liberate and evacuate the prisoners.
2. Revitalise the heartless.
3. Destroy the power armour.
4. Prevent Mannheim and Tlazolteotl becoming aware of it.

Evacuating the prisoners is going to be hard. Not only are there a lot of power armours around with flechette launchers that would easily kill people with baseline human toughness, but the only portal I know which I could use to evacuate them is in the open at the top of a pyramid. The Amazon force following us is going to have to take their suddenly ground-bound flying horses over a mountain of obsidian so I'm not counting on getting reinforcements from them quickly. And there's a limit to how much M'gann can ingest.

Can Tezumak turn the other suits off?

Probably not. Assume that I rip his current heart out of his chest and replace it with one of the ones I took from the power armour we fought, and that brings him to his senses -which isn't guaranteed- then I'll have access to someone who can tell me everything I could want to know about the suits that have already gunned everyone down.

How about… Sneaking hearts into peoples' chests?

I don't think anyone here can detect that, but the change in their behaviour would be pretty obvious. As would the fact that their wounds were closing up. That's also the option most likely to tip Tlazolteotl off.

Can I engage and destroy all of the armour suits?

Hide behind the big armour, bleed the others out one at a time… It's doable, but it would almost certainly take long enough to draw attention from outside. And they might just decide to shoot the prisoners out of spite. Or be told to.

But if the armour collapses when exposed to Mannheim…

I follow what looks like a reasonable path towards Tezumak, following more or less the route the large armour took. It's… Waiting for instructions? Or just-.

It turns and starts walking towards me. Nothing strange about that, it's a straight line between Tezumak and the door out. And-.

It was close to Tezumak and that's clearly an Anti-Life infused heart in his chest. I don't know how to make Anti-Life broadcasters… I mean, I know their physical structure, but the arcane component is… Not something I'd want to rely on being able to replicate in a controlled way.

There wasn't any power armour in Mictlampa. So how could I broadcast..?

…

There must be a better option.

If I take control of the big armour-. No, same problem. Bystanders would die. I could fly everyone outside-. No, there are suits of power armour outside. Grab Tezumak out and interrogate him? No, that just-.

It's nearly reached me. It's going to walk over me.

My armour goes dead as I cut myself off from the honden. As much as I can, anyway. Because this could cause some nasty blowback. And then…

I imagine a universe where everyone trudges through their daily tasks in lockstep with the will of another.

BaBUM.

I push from my mind the possibility of living any other way.

BaBUM. BaBUM. BaBUM.

The giant suit of power armour shudders and shakes-

I accept it as my place.

-and drops to its knees and then collapses towards-.

Chuck the heart away and-. And I can think-. Fire up the armour and wings!

The armoured giant falls, clipping my feet as I try flying out of the way and sending me into a vertical spin! Dizzily I see M'gann vomit up Kon as they both charge over to where the prisoners are bound, M'gann's telekinesis already throwing heartless priests out of the way with bone-breaking force. The power armour suits are collapsing just as the giant one did-. No. Some have retained at least some of their power, just about remaining upright as they try and bring their flechette launchers to bear on any target.

There's a clank as Tezumak gets inside his armour-.

"Kon! Get him out!"

Kon doesn't look around, he just leaps at Tezumak, reaching his dais an instant later and shoving both hands into the rapidly closing armour. He heaves against the shutting mechanism-

"Ah!"

-which sprouts small blades which cut into his fingers, making him bleed.

I-.

I am glad that you know your place. Come to me.

Shit.

I get control of my movement, grabbing hold of a walkway and setting my wings to neutral. I look around-.

"Gimme a hand!"

Tezumak has gotten control of his arms and has used his right to grab hold of Kon's head. It's an awkward angle and he can't bring his full strength to bear, but Kon's hands are both occupied keeping his armour from sealing.

I push off, activating my wings and rocketing towards Tezumak's dais. I land with a thunk, then dash up to-.

Tezumak opens his flechette launchers, trying to pull Kon into the arc of fire-.

I fire a beam of orange light through the opening in his armour, construct hand forming around his heart! Grab and pull!

BaBUM.

It's out, and Kon shudders as he's exposed to the concentrated Anti-Life. Fortunately Tezumak loses focus as well, his eyes going from hard to somewhat vacant. I toss the tainted heart aside and grab one of the hearts from the suits we fought. Construct hydraulic ram, shove it in the gap and push. New heart in, link it up and replace some of the blood that was spilling out.

Would he have blood as a spirit? Or was that added for the magic? Don't know.

"Okay, done!" I step back from Tezumak and look around. M'gann's beaten up the heartless but some of the suits are showing signs of life. "Get the other armour suits!"

"But-." He looks at the hands that are holding Tezumak's armour open.

"I replaced his heart. No more Anti-Life infection. Go!"

He nods and leaps, landing on a suit that had managed to rise to its knees and slamming it back to the stone floor.

"Tezumak." He blinks and I see slight more focus in his expression. "Adom says-."

The armour slams closed and readies itself for combat!

 

[Mr Zoat]

6 882 938.M41

"I do not share your frustration." Fio'Vre Lar'shi Gru'oya makes a gesture to indicate that while she doesn't exactly disagree, she doesn't share my perspective. "I found it quite instructive."

"Yes, but you do agree, right? This doesn't make any sense."

"Aliens frequently do things that make little sense to me. As you have observed, by definition, different species think differently. There is more than one correct solution for the equation of sophoncy."

I throw up my right hand in frustration. "So why do you think this ship is a study in different ways of achieving the same outcome?"

She thinks it over for a moment. Gru was given this job due to the way she doesn't get flustered by alien technology, which the Lar'shi fio'ar'tol correctly deduced was going to be to most significant consideration to being assigned to studying the ring. I once asked how they determined that, and apparently they used to use a complex battery psychological test… But found that they got almost the exact same results far quicker by showing the students an Imperial servitor and watching how they reacted.

I was pleased to find out that it wasn't because of her name. On the other hand, as far as I'm concerned any rational person should find a servitor weird.

"The possibility which I think is most likely is that it was intended as a test bed for new technology. Putting them in a functional ship would allow them to be tested under load, and give better information than a laboratory test."

"The idea being that they would select the best and install it on future generations."

"Yes."

"Then where are they?"

She considers that for a moment as well. "Warp travel is not something that can be precisely controlled by any known species in this galaxy. While it is usual for ships lost in the warp to coagulate together in a vortex to form a space hulk, it is possible that a ship might find a current which caused it to exit the warp on its own."

"Where's the damage from warp exposure?"

"They had shielding devices. They were the source of our understanding of the technology."

"No crew, Gru. Something killed them. If it was daemons, then the shields failed. Or weren't perfect. There should be some damage."

"Warp dives have a far lower-."

"We know their fuel capacity, and we've scouted literally every system in range of a warp dive based system. That can't have been how they did it."

She watches me, waiting for me to calm down a little.

I bow my head. "Sorry."

She nods slowly. "We know the fuel capacity for the systems we can understand. Your ring had given us full access to some of the databases we could not decipher, but not to all of them. There are still systems we do not understand. You have told us that the ves'ron use drives which nullify inertia in normal space. Perhaps it is something like that, but not effective enough to entirely replace warp technology."

"One of the two would be faster. We know how far that could be for warp diving. Sure, they could have another system, but then why have the warp dive system?"

"The be'gel would make such a system."

"The orks would cobble the systems from captured ships together rather than regularise their ship-building. They wouldn't build it like that from scratch."

She regards me calmly. "Then what do you suspect?"

"Two possibilities. One, despite assurances from the T'au kor'ar'tol, we haven't been given access to everything. They're hiding the bodies, or… Okay, this isn't a fresh wreck or anything, I wasn't expecting it to be pristine, but parts have been removed and not included. Something that would make this make sense." I sigh. "The second is that they're pulling a Krikket and the ship's a fake."

"It was a real ship. We walked inside it."

"I don't mean that it's not a real ship. I mean that it wasn't a fortuitous wreck. Someone put it there for the early tau to find. And… Since they didn't know exactly what your species would be good at, they included a little of everything."

"Why would any species do that?"

"Necrons messed around with ancient humans to create pariahs. They can't cope with warp energy, so they wanted another species around who could dampen the connection between warp space and real space."

"That claim is based on the existence of pariah units amongst the ves'ron. The Tau Empire has not encountered them for some time. It has been suggested that they were only ever used by a single dynasty."

"Or there are a lot more dynasties waking up at the moment and they haven't all had enough time to pick up enough pariahs to form units. If they were even aware of the possibility. The point is, that very long term plans that might pay off are something that happens."

"Very well. Let us assume that one of the situations you suggest is correct. How would you determine the difference?"

"Ah… Test everything that could be a drive in the field. And everything that might generate power. Except for warp phenomena I can scan and replicate just about anything. Then we'd know what the greatest range could be. Then check all worlds within that area for signs of habitation. If anything matches, then we've got an origin point."

"And what would the significance of that be?"

"We might find other examples of their technology. After four thousand years I doubt that anyone there will remember it… If their civilisation is still a going concern. But they might at least give us some way to decode the remaining databases."

"And the only thing that would require your direct involvement would be the creation of the device copies." I nod, and she's been working with me for long enough to understand the gesture. "What else?"

"Hunt down the T'au kor'ar'tol's secure databases, including nudging peoples' minds to persuade them that I need access. And… At this point, probably the T'au aun'ar'tol's databases as well. That would get any records that I don't have access to. I'd need to do that myself, but it would be relatively safe and wouldn't require anyone but me."

"A-ttacking the aun'ar'tol is something of an extreme measure, regardless of other considerations."

"I know how tau get about the aun. If I was planning it, I wouldn't have told you about it. But… You weren't there, but the Admiral had a physical reaction to me showing her the image of Krona. If this ship is somehow one of his projects, keeping that from me is an astronomically stupid thing to do."

Her eyes narrow has they unfocus, Gru clearly going through a calming meditative exercise after my not-heresy.

"Perhaps we should return to a more productive avenue. How would you access the remaining databases?"

"If it even is a database. It scans a lot like some Eldar psychomorphic materials, so I'd… Try getting hold of a psyker. One with skills relating to transferring information. And probably spotting booby traps."

"None of the other databases have active defences."

"Warp-based technology needs to have active defences due to the warp. The daemons will worm their way through any undefended hole eventually, even if it's just to attack the minds of nearby sophonts."

"Do you have access to such people?"

"There are human astropaths I could call on. None cleared for access to this site. The genestealer hybrids are psykers and.. since they're under my authority I could bring one or two here, except that I am not a moron. Not trying to use Gremlin because even if he can get enough waaaagh energy, it would probably just wreck the database. That leaves-."

6 883 938.M41

The Dark Eldar wych prisoners smile near-mindlessly at me, eyes glowing orange. It turns out that that once you take out the sadism and hunger, there really isn't all that much left.

"How may we serve, master?"

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:52 GMT

HologramprojectorshowimageofAdom'swedding.

Tezumak raises his right fist and then stops. His helmet hides where he's looking but I'm really hoping that it's the hologram. It shows Adom, Adrianna, Rama Khan, Frederick Cantrell, Sharon Parker, Amon and me posing in our costumes. Guess I'm taking the place of… Whaler?

"I'm sorry that he couldn't come himself-"

He lowers his arm and turns his head towards me. Right, he can't talk.

"-but I'm sure that he'd wish you well. My ring can translate any sort of communication, so if you project intent towards me I should be able to understand you despite your mouth plate."

"My friends are dead. The Mighty One was murdered. Rama Khan would have returned to the wheel by now."

"He did some sort of spell that cut Jarhanpur off from the world. It only nominated him an heir recently. Khufu and Chay-Ara reincarnated and Adrianna's the new Isis."

"You freed my mind. I will accept this for now. I have work to do."

"True. Can we work together? For now?"

"My strength is nothing to the strength of the gods. Is yours?"

"I'm hoping that we can finesse a solution. If we move the hearts from the armour to the priests..?"

"That will restore their minds, but Tlazolteotl knows them."

"And I don't suppose that you can take control of the armour suits, can you?"

"I can convert them to our use. But not quickly, and they will need people inside them."

"Okay, that's all of them." Kon walks back over to use, giving Tezumak a mildly concerned look before returning his full attention to me. "I guess we need the hearts?"

"I'm afraid so. M'gann! How are the prisoners?"

She's hugging a boy with hair made of fire. He's bleeding from several places, and.. some of his blood is catching fire? Doesn't seem to be hurting him.

"They're pretty beat up, but they'll live. Is anyone coming?"

Quick scan…

"No. Hopefully, Tlazolteotl and Mannheim are focusing on each… Other."

Mannheim, who heard when I used the Anti-Life and specifically called for me.

"I've… Got an idea. Tezumak, can you make it so that your armour looks like the automata armour to magic?"

"No."

Darn.

"Can you implant the hearts without me?"

"These are the souls of the dead. Making them whole requires a simple ritual. Bring the hearts here."

I nod at Kon and he nods back, heading over to the closest suit to rip it open. I drop off my regular hearts and pick up the second Anti-Life heart.

Kon glances up as he rips off a metal plate. "I could just burn those."

"I've… Got a plan. It's not a good plan-."

"You're gunna.. use them to get close to Mannheim."

"I'm going to pretend to be Anti-Lifed to try and get a better idea of what the point of any of this is." I look up at Tezumak. "Unless you can fill us in?"

"Blood and hearts from strongly magical creatures makes for stronger armour."

I take another look at the prisoners. M'gann's broken most of the chains off the frames binding them and is helping them down. Their wounds… She's taking whatever cloth she can find for bandages-.

I begin fabricating actual bandages in a pile next to her. She glances up and flashes me a quick smile before returning to work. The young fomorian that she and Robert were looking for is sitting off to the side… He's not in a good condition, but he's not getting worse and will probably be able to recover once we return him to his family. The others… Not sure what all of them are, but none of them look like an elf.

"The heart you gave me is not human."

"Oh. Is that a problem?"

"I don't know. It is not something that I have tested. I do not even know what it is from."

"I'm afraid that we're just going to be doing good-enough fixes until the situation is dealt with. Is there anyone here called Nuala!? Your brother sent us!"

…

No, it doesn't look like it.

"Is there any clever way out?"

"Walk the path of rebirth."

"For the living."

"The gods can send someone back to the realm of the living."

"Good. We freed Tlaltecuhtli earlier, so she can handle that."

M'gann floats a struggling heartless priest over to Tezumak, who motions for Kon to bring him a heart. He awkwardly does so, blood pumping over his hands and Tezumak takes it and presses it into the priest's chest.

"Stay here and hold this location until you can retreat to Itztépetl. I'll flee for the portal once I've done reconnaissance and found Cornwall Boy and we can meet up back on Earth."

I feel something as Tezumak holds his hands over the wound, and the priest stops fighting. Or at least stops fighting so coherently. It doesn't look like the process is particularly pleasant.

"I will accompany you."

"You've got work to do here."

Kon brings him another heart for the next priest, and Tezumak lays the first spasming priest aside as he performs his office again.

"If our gods are dead, if our way of life is finally to end, I would prefer to see it with my own eyes and then face oblivion rather than be reborn."

"Adom will be disappointed to learn that you have become a coward."

"This new world has nothing of my people in it."

"Or his, and he lives in it. It's quite a lot different to the one I was born in, actually."

Kon shakes his head. "You need backup. If we're evacuating with-" He glances at the exsanguination victims. "-these people, we're going to be busy."

I nod. He's right, but… "Alright, Tezumak. Try and work quickly."

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
18:59 GMT

There's a… Pull, when I hold the heart in a particular direction.

Ugh.

"Why do you do that?"

We're heading towards the biggest pyramid, collapsed power armour all around us. They don't seem to be recovering. Which is… Good?

"It's what I want. I am the me-shaped place in the universe. I have determined to make changes to the way the universe operates and the Anti-Life winning makes them impossible to achieve. You?"

"No. Why do you use that corrupt thing?"

"Because as far as I can tell that's the best way to achieve the result I want. Refusing to use it would be cowardly squeamishness. My comfort is not as important as getting the right result."

"I see why the Mighty One likes you. That is his attitude." He looks at a large suit of power armour slumped against the wall of the great pyramid. "This perversion of the divine disgusts me."

"I met Qualpopoca earlier. He told me that he didn't get reincarnated because he couldn't stand the idea of being reborn into Spanish Mexico. But you've had far longer, and you're still you."

"It takes more than the failures of one man to bring down a civilisation. If he had endured rebirth he could have learned to respect himself."

"So..?"

"My people were from long before the Mexica, the people you call Aztecs. Our traditions were different. I found existence in this form preferable to returning to life as a man, and I dwelt in a place of honour. In sight of the… Gods."

We approach the main entrance, and the two slumped titans that had been standing guard outside it. The door is open wide enough for a normal sized person to walk through. Tezumak takes the left side and I take the right. We push, and the door opens wide enough easily.

No one comes to greet us.

"Have you been in here before?"

"Yes. Many times." He reaches out to one of the supporting pillars with his right hand and runs his hand down it before withdrawing it and examining… "There should not be blood here."

"Blood seems to be your culture's thing."

"Blood, hearts, sacrifice. These things bind the gods to the world, strengthening them and us. There is no reason for it to be on the walls."

Things are going as he directs them.

BaBUM.

"This way. And there is, or it wouldn't be there. What is it?"

We start down the larger corridor, blackened heart beating in my raised left hand.

"Blood is a conduit for magic. Tlazolteotl could be casting some spell that required this pyramid to be bound to the living world."

"Like..?"

"If I knew her mind, then she would not have captured and enslaved me."

Fair-. Enough…

"The wall is lined with beating hearts."

Tezumak stops walking, gently reaching out with his right hand to touch one with his fingertips.

"I don't know this spell. It feels a little like the one which animated my armour, but…Not. This many hearts, this much vitality…"

"Is this pyramid a giant suit of armour?"

"That is ridiculous. A suit that big would serve no useful purpose." He withdraws his hand and starts walking again.

I keep pace with him. "The gods of Greece brought their last point of contact with the Earth here. A giant suit could enable a goddess to storm it."

"And do what?"

"Add their hearts to her collection, empowering her further so she can get more and more and eventually become supreme goddess of Earth."

"This may be for channelling power, but she would have no need for a suit."

"Could she move herself to Earth? At full power, rather than an avatar?"

"That is possible-. No. That would require the hearts of many living people. Thousands. Tens of thousands. Perhaps more. Most of these were taken from our dead. They would not serve that purpose."

"The magic creatures and people?"

"Compared to the hearts of gods? Their power is trivial."

BaBUM. BaBUM.

I hesitate slightly as I hear the second beat. Or was.. that an echo?

BaBUM. BaBUM.

And it's getting faster.

To Hell with it. If all the suits are dead then I'm not going to worry about pretending. Construct claws take my Anti-Lifed heart and grab the one that Tezumak is holding and crush them as I accelerate to a jog.

"No more pretending, then."

"I can't see how we win, here. We just need to find out what he's doing and then break contact."

He sticks out his arm, obliterating the hearts attached to the walls as he runs. I use my x-ionised knives to do the same on my side of the corridor as the door to the inner sanctum approaches. Two human guards stand outside, but when they see us they just… Step aside and pull the door open.

Titanic… Bodies lay on biers along each side, each with their chests cut open and… Apokoliptian.. cables and devices implanted into their chests, connecting to machinery attached to the walls above their heads which in turn connect to a device at the end of the room. From their clothing I recognise a handful of Aztec gods, and-.

Tlazolteotl is at the end of the room, facing away from us.

…final absolution.

She-. Jams a spike connected to three Apokoliptian cables into her own chest and then collapses, her position mirrored by a giant heart in some sort of cage. Near the top of the Apokoliptian machine there are smaller figures strapped to sacrificial slabs, and from the blood covering their chests I think most of them are dead already.

Mannheim walks over to the last, a slightly built girl-. Nuala, with a small obsidian knife in his hand.

"And you, for your connection between realms. But do not fear, for you will not miss my ascension. These machines and this place will trap your soul as surely as those bonds trap your body, and you will serve me in spirit as you do in flesh."

He places his left hand on her neck, then hesitates, looking towards us.

And once he has eye contact he begins cutting.

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
19:03 GMT

Fire everything.

I'm not.. exactly thinking as I let the impulse flow through me. Instinct, from the soul. The first energy pulse splashes against something shielding his face before I'm really conscious that I've-

"AAAAAAGHGAHAGHAGHAH!"

-done anything. Tezumak is running forwards towards the distant platform at full sprint as my follow-up cold beam and ultraviolet laser also do nothing to Mannheim. My railgun forms a moment later-

Blood is pumping out of Nuala's chest as Mannheim patiently cuts down the centre. The guards aren't bothering to respond.

-and I fire an x-ionised round immediately followed by a crumbler round. Nothing. I'm not sure that I'm even hitting him.

That's not how New Gods work.

Sure, the tough ones barely react when they're hit by conventional weapons, but it does hit. They do feel it, even if it doesn't really hurt. I'm not hitting him. He's just wearing a suit, and any one of those shots-.

Tezumak's about halfway to the target when I turn my guns on the cables plugged into the gods. I doubt this will work, but it's the next logical step while I try to come up with something that will. Yes, the energy I'm expending just vanishes before reaching the target.

No point maintaining a strategy that can't work.

I drop my gun constructs in favour of a cable and shove it into the chest of the closest recumbent god.

Drain.

Nothing.

Assimilate.

Nothing.

I can't even feel the thing I'm plugged into. Ring, confirm-.

No contact made.

Okay. What else what else..? My clone. It's plugged into the system and sucked up some of my orange light. That should mean that I can affect it without other direct contact.

Alternate possibility: kill Nuala and retreat. I can't see any other elves and-. He just said that he would bind her soul anyway. But she's not plugged into the machine yet, which means… Would her soul be stuck here and force him to hunt it down? Or would it go to wherever elf souls go?

Tezumak gets close enough and leaps. He-. He's not aiming for Mannheim.

I hear a quiet snap as he breaks one of Nuala's ribs to get it out of the way.

He slams into the cage containing Tlaltecuhtli's heart, flechettes shooting out at everything. The ones on target for Mannheim just vanish like all of my attacks did, but the corpses get torn apart by the supersonic darts and Nuala-.

Mannheim moves to interpose himself, glaring at Tezumak.

"What is the real reason why you were not reborn?"

I'd guess that he remembered the looks even his closest comrades gave him when he murdered children to fuel his armour and realised that his whole culture was completely fucked up.

I take another shot at Mannheim with an energy pulse to see if anything's changed. It hasn't.

"Earth."

Earth? Tlaltecuhtli's responsibility. He isn't connected to her heart in the way that he is all of the others. Which means…

Construct crumblers carve a chunk of stone out of the floor and a construct gravity impeller hurls it across the room at-

Crack!

-supersonic speed.

Emerge.

The rock projectile punches through Mannheim's jacket before being stopped by his chest. He doesn't seem unduly bothered. I don't even get the glare he's giving Tezumak. And he doesn't stop-

Snap.

-carving Nuala up.

I blink as I get a second perspective, one of my alien construct lanterns emerging inside my cloned corpse. A cable runs into my/its heart and it yanks it out as I aim at Tlaltecuhtli's heart cage with my rock impeller.

Crack! Crack! Crack!

It takes three direct hits to the same point on the cage, but I've managed to break part of the machine. Doesn't seem to have shut it down, but it's not doing as well as it was. Lights shimmer all over the structure… And there isn't an Aztec God of Technology for him to just wave it away.

And you? Get Nuala if you see an opening.

"…a stranger in your own homeland as you did in Kahndaq, or amongst any of the peoples you visited."

Crack!

Mannheim sticks his hand in the way of my shot on Nuala, but he's forced to stop cutting. But… He can fire omega effect beams. We're not inconveniencing him. Or, we are, but only a little. So little that it's not worth actually working at it for him.

Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack!

I fire at his eyes, Nuala and the cage again, this time aiming for the base rather than the bars. Tezumak… Doesn't fire.

"This is what I offer you. A place. A function. An end to all your-"

My possessed clone corpse lunges at him from behind, reaching for his knife.

"-suffering."

He doesn't look around as he grabs it around the head and squeezes, crushing its skull.

Any non-fatal injury…

Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack!

Chunks of rock smash through her bindings and the flesh beneath them. She'll bleed to death unless we can get out soon, but-.

"Ah." Mannheim turns towards me, eyes glowing. "So be-."

The machinery winks out as Robert appears on top of… One of the gods. He rips the tubes out of his chest, the space around him rippling. "Always wondered how much power I could take, y'know? What the limit was." He reaches out towards Mannheim and the smaller corpses on the biers decay to dust. A death god, then. "Looks like it's a lot."

"So be it." His eyes-.

Tezumak hits him in the side, driving him back-. About an inch. His gauntlet drops to Nuala's heavily damaged body and hurls it down the-. I leap into the air, construct wings keeping me aloft as I field her battered torso. Still… Alive.

"Time to-."

Mannheim grabs hold of Tezumak's shoulder with his ring hand, wrenches him down and then hits him with the omega beams. His armour is outlined in red for a moment, then vanishes.

"Time to go!"

I grab Robert with a construct and chuck him at the exit, then fly for it myself!

"Run!"

 

[Mr Zoat]

6 884 938.M41

That.. was.. not.. fun.

I wave at my room's scanner, not quite focusing, hear the beep of acknowledgement and the shhh of the door sliding open.

The only part of this whole place that sounds like Star Trek…

And then I walk inside. The décor is… Pretty nice, actually. Tsua'm has really gotten the hang of human-friendly decoration and furnishing. Including a bed that takes into account that humans need a lot more sleep than-.

"P'ol, I was-" Tsua'm gets up from her chair with a tau not-smile on her face, deactivating her holodisplay as she does so. "-concerned that I may have to search for you."

Her robes settle-. And suddenly I'm imagining very clearly what she would look like without them-.

She stops approaching as my environmental shield flares.

Control. Control.

"Was your work so unpleasant? Was the archive trapped?"

"No, no it-. I've just been dealing with wyches all day."

She nods. "I know that you find their slave-like state repugnant, but there was no better option. You have seen what they did."

"It's not that. They…" I look at the ceiling-. She remembered the ceiling rose. She would have had to explain what that was to the Earth caste builders, and… "You know how they dress?"

"They do not wear much armour, to display their bodies as part of their art."

"Part of my conditioning has been to discourage them from showing off through fighting. But that doesn't stop them wanting to show off. And because of.. how the orange light works, they mostly want to show off to me."

She blinks. "And did that distract them from their work?"

"No, that was… We confirmed that it is a psychic storage device, but none of them have the skills necessary to decode it. I've.. got them working on it."

"Is that why you are frustrated? Or-. Ah."

This time she makes a point of giving me a human-style smile.

"Were they dancing for you? Posing for you?" I look away, nodding. Those women and man are pretty-. No, superhumanly lithe, and appear to habitually turn everything they do into a display of their.. physical.. 'skills'. "Enticing you?"

"I'm not sure. I'm not sure that there's a distinction in their minds."

Tsua'm looks slightly amused. "It is still a little strange to me how you can find other species 'visually stimulating'. Did you copulate with them?"

"No!"

"That would seem to have been the sensible choice, but since you are here…" She looks around, rolling up her right sleeve.

"Ah, what are you doing?"

She returns her attention to me. "I assumed that you are here because they should be focusing on their work and you expect me to satiate your sexual hunger?"

Ah… "That-. 'Expect' is not the way I'd.. put it, Tsua'm."

We stare each other in the eyes for a moment, then her nasal cleft narrows thoughtfully. She steps aside and indicates the settee. "Sit with me."

Decidedly disconcerted, I walk over to my accustomed place on the soft furniture and sit down. Tsua'm sits next to me a moment later, letting her sleeve fall back. She's sitting.. diagonally, her posterior in the corner of the settee while her knees are touching mine and her lower legs spread out to the side.

The best way to 'cure' a man's arousal: have a serious talk about your relationship.

"You have made it clear that you… You love me." I nod cautiously. "And that in your culture monogamy was the expected way to behave."

"Yes."

"And you know that tau society does not work like that."

"Yes. The Eugenics Board assigns reproductive partners."

She nods. "If I were not working with you, I would probably have been assigned my second partner by now. My first child would be beginning the first stages of their formal education."

"Have I..?"

I… Look down.

Have I really fucked up your life and you're just going along with it? How do I-?

She reaches over and takes my left hand in her right. "We do not just exchange semen samples for in vitro fertilisation. I would have sex with whoever I was assigned to. Several times."

"Ah. Okay?"

"And that would be all. We would spend a little time together socially while… Recovering, but it is unlikely that we would see each other again once I was pregnant. He might not even meet his child, except by coincidence."

"That…" I frown. "But… That wasn't how tau society used to work? Don't you have the same… Biological drives that humans do? I mean, mostly?"

"Relations outside of reproductive partnerships assigned by the Eugenics Board do occur, and a small number of children are born to matches that were not arranged, though that…" She looks away for a moment. "Reflects poorly on those involved. Especially when it produces… When the child is half-caste."

Which is no joke. Tau of different castes can breed together, but the health impacts on the children range from severe lifelong arthritis for Earth/Water half-castes to 'they-won't-see-the-end-of-the-first-week' for Air/Fire half-castes. And that's before you get into the psychological problems. Since this is the Tau Empire and not the Imperium, the Empire generally tries to find a role for the ones that make it to adulthood, but the structure of tau society doesn't really leave one.

She lightly squeezes my hand. "The point that I wish to make is that tau… Find satisfaction in… Order. When you tell me that you want me to do something that you have the authority to tell me to do, it is not an imposition. It is not… Treating me as a means. It is showing me how best to do something that I want to do."

"Alright, but you seemed to be-. I mean, I.. got the impression-. You are… Enjoying…"

"The…" She looks away, her cleft twitching. "Spasmodic.. completion.. is.. not unpleasant. But I feel… Mental pleasure, when I am able to fully discharge my responsibilities. I know perfectly well that tau and humans are-" She uses her left hand to pat her mammary-free upper chest. "-differently shaped. I understand that there are attributes that I do not possess which arose your erotic passions. That is not offensive to me."

I… Nod. "O-kay, I think-."

"Excepting that you will not consider modifying me so that I could fulfil them. You know that modern tau castes are engineered to better fulfil their roles. I can see the advantage in being able to feed young children while leaving our mouths unoccupied. Regurgitation does not taste pleasant, even when it serves a useful purpose."

"I.. could do something cosmetic, but genetic changes..." I shake my head. "I don't know enough. That's not a trait that tau have ever had." Hm. "Two children?"

"One or two."

I hold up my right hand, a representation of a genetic strand appearing above it.

She looks at it curiously. "Whose DNA is that?"

"It's the closest I've got to me as a Water caste tau. I hadn't thought about how much I'd thrown your life off course, and now you raise the issue… I do want to help you fulfil your role."

"I see." She nods. "Should we visit the obstetrics ward?"

"No." My crotch briefly glows as I lean closer and exhale on her nasal slit. She shifts in her seat, slit switching and mouth slightly open as she gets a better taste of my scent. "Tau semen isn't toxic to humans. I'll perform the procedure myself. Manually."

"Very well. Would-?"

I reach over, grabbing her around the waist and then lifting her over my shoulder as I stand and walk towards the bed.

 

[Mr Zoat]

Do Or Die Time

17th February 2013
19:05 GMT

"Running!"

The Anti-Lifed soldiers guarding the door step into our path, guns raised. Robert clenches his fists, and the stones of the walls reach out and grab them. Chirurgical limbs sprout from my armour and start… Shit, ah, reattaching Nuala's… Everything, and sealing the severed parts of her limbs to prevent complete exsanguination.

"What's happening?!"

"Do you have a healing potion?"

I construct-grab one of the stone-bound guards and throw him behind us, intercepting the omega beam that Mannheim fired at our backs. A momentary glow and he's gone.

"I.. got, like, one?"

I send out a construct hand. "Give it here."

He pulls it out of his belt and passes it to me. I poor a few drops into Nuala's chest cavity before sewing her skin closed, then pump the rest down her throat. Not much else I can do for her.

"What's happening?"

"Mannheim appeared to be trying to give himself the power of the Aztec gods, using their hearts and a lot of Apokoliptian-"

And we're outside. No army of suits converges on us, so I turn in the direction of the city's exit closest to Itztépetl-.

I scoop up a handful of stone slabs, shove them in a new gravity impeller construct and then fire them at the portal to Otherworld.

Crack! Crack! Crack!

The building on the top of the pyramid crumbles, which I hope will take the portal out of commission.

"-machinery. We haven't stopped him, but if we're lucky he's going to be occupied with this for a while."

"Is a healing potion gunna grow her arms and legs back?"

"A healing ray can, given time."

"Thought it only closed wounds up if you lost a limb."

"Oh, yeah, I'd have to create a scaffold and basically flay the end of the limb repeatedly healing it a little better each time, but it's perfectly possible."

"Maybe the elves have got something better?"

"Elves are arseholes. Even if they do, I doubt they'd use it on her."

"Right. How's M'gann?"

"A few wounds. Nothing that we can't heal when we get back to Earth."

But so much for making contact with Melinoë. If Olympus is off limits then I doubt that there's a…

Elven path, possibly? I can ask once she's stabilised. Because once Mannheim's dealt with… It's like that bit in Transmetropolitan where they regenerate a frozen head. As Spider Jerusalem observes, the cryopreservation company thought they could promise whatever they felt like because surely someone in the future could actually do it. I fully expect to have to spend a lot of time putting the Earth back together after this, but the point is that I have the power to do that.

So long as Mannheim doesn't eat the whole thaumosphere or something.

"How much damage did it feel like we did to his machine?"

"Not much. Damn it, we didn't even know he was doing this. We tripped over it!"

"If you look everywhere hard enough, you're bound to 'trip over' something eventually."

No point asking 'how long will it take to repair', because there's no way he's going to know. Some time, which means that the best time to attack the Anti-Life network is right now, or at least as soon as possible. And I don't have a yellow ring bearer.

I-.

"Did you get exposed to the Anti-Life? Any injuries?"

"No-. Other than.. being around Mannheim. No injuries. I don't think they knew I was there. Did the.. goddess helping him… Do that to herself?"

"Gods are vulnerable to the Anti-Life. If you think about it, they'd have to be. Maybe she thought it was a way to gain some sort of relevancy, maybe… I don't know, absolution is one of her domains. Maybe she was motivated to sin more so there'd be something to absolve."

"That's crazy."

"I said I don't know. I'm speculating."

Out of the city and into the jungle. Mountain is that way, and we should meet up with the refugees before we get there. If there are any suits still working, I'm confident that we can destroy them as long as they reach us before we get in range of the mountain's cheat-zone. The only issue would be if Mannheim was able to take control and change the rules.

So I hope his system is at least that damaged.

What happens next?

Tlazolteotl spoke about this to Bastet, probably trying to persuade her to make herself vulnerable to Mannheim's influence. That would risk removing Adom's powers and making Kahndaq vulnerable to the Anti-Life. I'll need to warn him and her. Other pantheons… Well, the Olympians clearly know what's going on. The Roman pantheon? I can probably get a message to Vulcan, but I've got no idea if he can warn the rest of them. And I doubt that Odin would fall for anything that Mannheim could do. And that's about all the pantheons that I know anything about.

"Otherworld. Are there any gods who might do something stupid with Mannheim?"

"No. It's all pretty quiet. They're not really ambitious. Well… Some of them are-. Were, but they've already moved on. Ah. You can… Does this, like, stop that thing you said would get rid of the Anti-Life?"

"It shouldn't. As I've said, it isn't something I've been able to test in advance. I don't know if Mannheim being away from the material world creates a problem or not. And it doesn't matter because he wouldn't be doing this if it didn't help him, so we're going to have to carry it out as soon as possible."

"You need someone for fear, though."

"Batman will do. He was actually going to be my first choice. He'll just need to get back in his old headspace for a little while. Shouldn't need to keep it up for long."

"Ah." He exhales as we continue to run. "Great, okay! Always thought he was pretty scary. So why did we… Do all this? If we didn't need her?"

"Melinoë would have been better. Less coaching needed. I'm a pretty powerful Orange Lantern, and with Batman changing how he operates… I didn't want to take the risk, but now we've got to. Unless you know anyone better?"

"No." He shakes his head.

"Then that's the plan. Hope you like obsidian."

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
19:21 GMT

I land the construct platform carrying those we've rescued on the Themysciran beach. Tlaltecuhtli has wandered inland a little way, presumably in search of more heartless Aztecs to introduce to the wheel. Kon's explaining things to Queen Hippolyta while Philippus organises escorts for the people we've rescued.

A… Significant proportion of whom are male. And yet no one is complaining about it.

Ow.

I see a familiar face hovering at the periphery of the crowd, preparing to handle any casualties. And I swallow my pride and float my way over to her.

"So…"

Sadeh regards me with as little expression as she can manage. I earned her regard by replacing the missing body parts of Themyscira's long-term wounded. And then I helped my god dump her god in a pigsty.

"I'm not going to pretend that I actually feel guilt over what I did, but since I'm still bleeding I'd like some idea of what Lord Apollo wants to make up for it."

She shrugs. "How would I know?"

"You're.. a.. priestess?"

She shakes her head. "Direct communication with the gods is unusual. Even after three thousand years, all I can really do is feel his ire radiating from you."

"Oh. Ah. Okay. Could you please ask for me?"

"I can entreat him in my prayers." She frowns. "Why are you still bleeding?"

"Magic obsidian stab wounds. I-."

My magic armour starts to vibrate. Ring, what-?

Something is… Pulling me in the direction of the mainland. No. Pulling the armour. Okay, open, twist around-. Pull myself out and fly up over it and withdraw my constructs-.

It's like a hurricane force wind is pushing on my armour and-.

"Paul!"

M'gann shouts as-. Shit. I wrap construct chains around Qualpopoca as he flails in the air, held down by M'gann's telekinesis. Anchor him to the ground, make sure it's solid. Whatever force is acting on him is still pushing, so I add a little-.

Ow ow ow.

A little cushion between his flesh and the chains. Looking down at my legs I see small flecks of blood appear as… As the obsidian fragments pull themselves free from inside my body. It's painful, but once they're out my normal ring-assisted regeneration kicks in and the pain abates.

Okay, what's making-?

Everyone who went over Itztépetl is losing whatever obsidian fragments caught on their clothing or in their flesh. The Aztec priests are looking extremely concerned and more than a couple are holding their hands over their hearts-.

"Do you feel it in your hearts!?"

The armour's gone, flying though the air in the direction of the mainland. Qualpopoca is wincing in pain as the… Force pushes him harder.

A few of the priests who have their wits about them shake their heads.

Alright, so what links the-? Aztec magic. The armour is Aztec magic, Aztec magic turned Qualpopoca into a beastman and the obsidian mountain is made of Aztec magic. The hearts are either taken from sacrificed magical creatures or are parts of human souls. Nothing inherently Aztec about them.

"Cornwall?"

He looks even more uncomfortable. "Something really f-. Bad is happening."

"Can you narrow it down?"

"Raw magic… I don't… It feels like a spell's being… Broken down into raw magic… But… Bigger."

"Mannheim… Ingesting the gods?"

He shakes his head helplessly. "I dunno. I've never felt anything like this before."

"Uh-!"

Qualpopoca is… He's not bleeding, but that looks painful.

"Can you do anything to stop it?"

He shakes his head. "I wouldn't even know where to begin."

"Qualpopoca, I'm afraid that you're just going to have to endure it."

He grits his teeth. "Y-es. I understand."

"Good man. Your majesty!"

Queen Hippolyta walks towards me, glancing at Qualpopoca with clear concern. "What is happening?"

"Something's pulling all Aztec magic that way. Is the gateway to Erebos open?"

"No. The door is barred and will not open."

"And we can't get to Olympus. Are there any other routes off Themyscira?"

She shakes her head. "No."

"Okay. You're a demigoddess, right?" She nods. "Is there anything you can do to… Bless Qualpopoca here?"

She looks a little pained. "I have not wanted to take advantage of that part of my heritage." She sees the way I stare at her in response and sighs. "Why would you want me to do that?"

"I'm hoping we can turn the spells holding him together from Aztec magic to Greek magic, so he'll stop getting pulled."

"Anything I could do would be as likely to kill him as aid him."

"Ah." I nod. I mean, if she's had three thousand years and not experimented at all, then… It's probably for the best. "Cornwall, is there any sign that it's-."

"…way off."

I look around as Cernunnos carries Nuala towards us. She's… Not in immediate danger of dying, and he was able to save her right leg in its entirety, but… She's looking understandably ropey.

"You have a way off?"

"Fairy ring. There's a… Fairy ring."

"Excellent, thank you. We-."

Qualpopoca slumps as the force pulling on him cuts out.

I leave the chains in place, just in case. "Superboy, would you mind flying up and taking a look?"

He nods and shoots up into the sky, staring in the direction of the land. Then he drops back down.

"It's gone."

"What is?"

"The land."

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
19:26 GMT

In the role play game 'Exalted', the land of Creation is split into five elemental poles. In the middle you have the pole of earth, which makes things stable, and to the west you have the pole of water. Near west has a sea with a lot of islands in it as earth and water combine, then as you go further west the islands peter out until it's just sea. Keep going further and things stop making sense as sky and sea sort of merge together.

I wasn't really able to picture what that looked like until now.

Concerned, I turn to Cernunnos to see if he's got any idea what just happened.

"So?"

"It's gone."

I wait a moment to see if there's anything else. It doesn't look like he's doing anything, but as I understand it god-type magic is a lot more a part of them than what mortal magicians use.

After a moment he stops staring at the blue nothing and meets my eyes.

"Bast's realm was decaying as the magic within lost contact with Earth. With that restored, it began recovering itself. But even when it was decayed it existed. It is not easy to erase things completely. Normally there would be a wasteland… Relics of their faith here and there… Whispers on the wind."

"And the Aztecs have left nothing at all."

He nods, looking increasingly uncomfortable. "A page torn from the soul of the world."

"What would that do to Earth?"

"Any spells or magic artefacts tied to the Aztec mythos would stop working entirely. There might be some disruption to other related mythos objects. Will that be a problem?"

"It shouldn't. Not much left from those magic traditions, and most people who learn magic in South America now learn plant magic from Euanthe and Doctor Isley. And I think the world could do with less magic related to human sacrifice. Anything else?"

"I don't know. If it was destroyed then there would be a magic surge, but if Mannheim somehow absorbed it…" He shakes his head. "I need to return to Otherworld as soon as possible. If he is working on something like this in my homeland, the effect will be worse."

"Because Kon-Sten-Tyn bound England and Otherworld in perpetuity."

"Yes. So make sure that it does not happen."

"I'll do my best." I glance down to where everyone who is returning to Earth are gathering to use the fairy circle. "Shall we?"

He nods and then swoops, landing next to Nuala and saying something to her. I follow him down but aim for Queen Hippolyta, who is conversing with Captain Philippus.

"…the gods moved us here."

Philippus shrugs. "It seems clear to me that we were the ones who were supposed to stop Mannheim."

"Without a way to-." She notices me. "What news?"

"Mannheim appears to have somehow internalised the entirety of the Aztec mythos. That or destroyed it. Problem?"

"We were discussing what aid we could send you. I had thought that the gods wanted us to prevent the heartless from entering the sacred ground of Olympus. If their land is truly gone, then we can send all that we have to aid you. But if there is some other purpose then we would risk weakening our ability to serve it."

Huh. Gods can't just turn up on Earth at full power due to their sheer arcane power not… Fitting. Presumably they could create some sort of… Barrier effect using the same sort of magic, forcing someone to enter their realm at low power. So… The heartless storm Themyscira, which… Anchors..? The low power end? But if the heartless killed the Amazons off then that would gradually push the spell back?

Logical, but speculative.

And there isn't any way for anyone to assault them from the Aztec afterlife any longer, but there… Is a back way into Themyscira, and if Mannheim sends people through it then the whole things starts up again. And… It sounds harsh, but there isn't anyone on Themyscira that we actually need. Amazons don't leave Themyscira often enough for me to bother including them in my plans.

"We really can't risk anything happening to the Hellenic mythos. I don't know what Mannheim's plan is, but I think it would be best to stay on guard here. My plan… We should be able to carry out my attack in a couple of days at most."

Queen Hippolyta nods, while Captain Philippus looks mildly put out. "Do you agree that the gods wanted us to defeat Mannheim?"

"I don't know. I wouldn't presume to speak for them. Maybe? I'm not sure how you'd have beaten Tlaltecuhtli without me, but you could probably have bypassed her and found Qualpopoca. Found out what Mannheim was doing. Maybe rescued a few people." I sigh. "This is the thing about isolationism: you get used to not engaging with people outside of the island on anything except your terms. You have the highest percentage of superhumans of any nation on the-. On the surface. There are… Lots of things you could do, but…"

I shrug.

"Amazon culture has started to change, and that's great. But the instincts of three thousand years don't change in a couple of years, and the world doesn't pause while that happens. And I'd love to discuss this in more detail, but I need to go. Excuse me."

Hippolyta nods thoughtfully, and I skip to the head of the queue where Cernunnos is watching Nuala carefully. I really don't think that she's going to try anything at this stage, but… Maybe he's just concerned?

"Orange Lantern. Nuala will open a portal for you to Castle Baaleskein. After you are through, she will close the portal and open one to Otherworld. I will take her and Brian through and look after her until her brother appears to take her."

"Thank-." I turn to Nuala. "Thank you. Once this is over I'll-. Actually, if you stay with Cernunnos for a couple of days I should be able to fix your remaining injuries."

She freezes up for an instant, then looks at me nervously. "I can't repay you."

"I don't do things for payment. I do them because the universe is the wrong shape and I've made it my life's mission to fix it."

"No, I-. My magic. I must pay my debts."

"Okay, agree to show a couple of friends of mine how to use elf circles and that will be plenty." She hesitates for a moment, then nods nervously. "Thank you." I look to my colleagues. "Everyone ready? We need to pick up Robin and Match before I.. start calling people in."

Kon nods. "I wonder what they found."

M'gann smiles faintly. "Maybe they found the missing British superheroes and we'll have a whole lot more help?"

Robert shakes his head. "Doubt they'd leave Britain even if that was what happened to them." His body shimmers as he activates his enhancements spells. "Okay, ready."

Nuala waves her hands, and there's a faint gust of air from the area around the fair thing. Air pressure equalising, probably.

I generate construct armour and a construct tower shield and stride through.

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
19:30 GMT

A smoother transition than I got going to Columbia. I step forwards, and my surroundings blur. Another step, and they shift further and further towards a new-. My destination. I don't know how much I'm in one place or the other or somewhere else, but from the looks of things there's some sort of fight-.

"Lantern, watch-"

A sheeda warrior swings a spear at my head and I-. Subspace is back! Parry with an x-ionised sword. The spear is sliced through, runes on the spear shimmering as it sprays some sort of sludge on my construct armour and sword. Ah, high strength magic acid, no problem there.

"-out!"

I turn up my empathic vision as I start moving forwards, more to get out of my teammates' way than because I've got a destination in mind. Robin called out, and-

A flashbang goes off somewhere to my left.

-Sheeda soldiers are rather fond of invisibility there.

Construct chains wrap around the former spearman and drain-. Nothing? I settle for tearing the helmet off his head and stunning him.

Robert appears from the fairy ring behind me.

"Sheeda!"

"Right!" He shoots up into the air, which is a pretty sensible move-.

A large sheeda beetle with an energy cannon on its back smashes through a hedgerow, the beam striking my construct shield and… Doing some damage, but not doing it fast enough to kill me before my crumbler railgun round hit the beetle's howdah and the gun just falls off. The crew leap off after it, but those things explode pretty violently when their capacitors or their battery get hit and I'd like to avoid that. Since it doesn't seem to have a barrier I opt for shooting the barrel and… Yes, the gun's wrecked.

The sheeda I'm holding, his chest appears to be intact. I can feel his pulse in his neck.

"Sheeda of Summer's End! Drop your weapons and be spared! I am not in the moo-!"

The beetle rider grabs the gun operator and draws his knife-.

"Mood!"

Construct grab both of them, disarm them and stun them both. The beetle looks at me for a moment, then scurries away from me. I load a solid round into my railgun and shoot it in the head, turning its brain to mush and killing it.

Then I take a closer look at the sheeda. They're wearing… Modern human clothes. Not something I'd expect to see in a prison, but not their invasion gear. With empathic vision I can see a few more, but they mostly look recumbent-.

KA-KOOMPF!

All look recumbent as Robert's lightning bolt electrocutes the last couple. M'gann comes through the ring a moment later, looks around and then winces.

"Miss Martian." She looks around and I toss her a healing ray. "Two over there. Electrical burns."

"Right." She nods and then flies over to them.

Robin emerges from the underbrush, looking around cautiously. "Did we get all of them?"

"All of them close by. You alright?"

"Eh, a few bruises."

I nod. "Why are there sheeda here?"

"Don't know. The castle's records showed they were sending them out to a bunch of places to try opening portals, but you said that all the standing stones got sabotaged and the locations weren't anywhere near the Atlantean portals."

"The elves have their own system."

He nods at once. "And sheeda have enough elf blood in them to make it work."

"Apparently." I pull my prisoners closer and examine them, looking for any trace of the Anti-Life. Looks like… General exposure, but nothing everyone on Earth doesn't have. "Not seeing enough Anti-Life to control them."

"Have you read their interrogation reports?"

"No, not these ones. I read a few of the American interrogations, but there didn't seem to be anything useful. Why?"

"I took a look through. They think we destroyed their civilisation."

I nod. "Effectively, we did. If we try really hard and prevent them from ever coming into existence we might destroy it twice."

Or at least prevent it from coming into being here while it continues to exist in a separate timeline.

"Most of them said that since they didn't have anything to live for, they'd do anything they could to hurt us."

Hm. "Could just be big talk, might indicate willing participation."

"But then what? Does Mannheim plan on invading… What's the name of the place where the elves come from?"

"The Fair Lands is the name I've heard for it. And quite possibly. We just visited the Aztec afterlife. It doesn't exist any more. Mannheim… Absorbed it after cutting out the hearts of their gods."

Richard nods slowly. "Afterlives weren't being affected. But he can just go around and spread it to all of them."

"Probably not the Silver City. But yes. So we're accelerating my schedule."

"Are we following up on this at all?"

Kon and Mitchell appear, dragging two recumbent sheeda each. Robert drops down from the air and M'gann flies over with the rest of the sheeda in tow. Hm. Are we attacking Washington right away? No. I need to talk to Batman and get him a little used to using a yellow ring. That's at least a couple of hours. Then there's the issue of actually getting the rest together.

"Did you get a full list of portal sites?"

He shrugs. "We got all the ones in the castle. They're spread out across Europe. We'd have to check other prisons to see if other places are doing the same."

"Send a message to Mister Atom. See if the Justice League can spare any resources to cover the ones you can't reach. I need to speak to Batman about our final attack as soon as possible."

"What do you actually think he's doing?"

"I thought that he was making war on the gods, but if he's activating elf gates… Maybe he's building some sort of magic construct to attack the material world from the thaumosphere? I don't know. I could probably guess better if we saw him activate a gate, but I… Think we should probably try and stop all of them anyway."

He turns to M'gann. "Miss Martian, can you call the bioship?"

She nods. "Already done."

"I'll drop you off at the closest location before going to talk to Batman. Where is it?"

Richard smirks. "Where else? Glastonbury."

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
19:36 GMT

"…weird robots and a woman called Penny Dolmann who was controlling them." Match's eyes flicker as he sends a heat beam into the sword of a sheeda warrior taking a swing at Richard. "I dunno what else used to be there, but that's all that's there right now."

I nod as I patch up the unconscious sheeda who was volunteered for ritual sacrifice duty. "Where did you put her?"

"Their dungeon. I figure, Doctor Mist could take a look at the castle, and maybe find a way to fix her. If they can't do that for a couple of days, she could probably wake up and get one of the robots to let her out."

"Reasonable."

"You don't..? Think we should have killed her, do you?"

With the fight mostly over I turn my attention away from my environment and towards him. "While there is an obvious advantage in killing enemy assets and a disadvantage to taking prisoners, I'm… I don't think she's critical to Mannheim's work so just.. leaving her isn't a big problem. And if this works like I think it will then she'll be back to normal in a few days. Other than… Maybe.. fabricate a time-delayed lock for the dungeon I'd have done the same thing."

He nods, smiling with relief.

"The fact that I'm okay with killing people doesn't mean that I enjoy it or that I think it's the only solution."

"Oh, I-." He looks a little guilty. "I didn't.. mean…"

"I'm not unaware that I'm unusual in that regard."

"No, I-." He exhales. "I don't wanna kill anyone either. But I don't want anyone to die because I didn't kill… Someone I should have killed. Y'know?"

"I feel the same way. But there's no way to know for certain either way, and you… Sometimes you just have to best-guess it. I think you guessed right."

"What about the sheeda?"

Mmn.

I brought the sheeda from the last site with us, bound arm and leg with chains that they won't be able to break. None of them are Highborn, so their potential for trickiness is limited to what devices they've brought with them, regular sheeda being only mildly superhuman. Which means that a normal prison can probably hold them, if it's staffed. But prisons not being taken over by the Justice League aren't… Working, at the moment. Some are staffed, some aren't, some have had break-outs and some have had everyone in them kill themselves. Aside from Belle Reve and Blackgate Mannheim hasn't really targetted prisons, and with Blackgate he was just going there for Karon. So we could drop them off in a prison for a couple of days under the same terms as Ms. Dolmann, it would just be a matter of finding one. But they're a threat to the inmates and staff if the conditions deteriorate.

Best… Alternative, is for me to give their brains an orange light prod. Make them want to be a bit more pro-social. A couple of different versions of me mentioned doing something like that in… Less sophisticated civilisations, and they got a version that… Wasn't completely monstrous. I've got better control than them, so I could probably do one that would decay naturally over a few weeks…

"I'll deal with them." I turn away slightly. "Robin, are you done?!"

Richard is using his arm computer to take images of the sacrificial altar that the sheeda had set up, which goes a little way towards explaining why that sheeda nearly cut the other's throat at the last gate: trying to rush a sacrifice when they realised that they wouldn't be able to do a full ritual.

"Yeah. Mister Atom says 'thanks for the warning, but everybody's busy'."

I nod. "Understandable, without a smoking gun. Cornwall?"

"Yeah, sheeda blood could jam it open. And I don't know exactly what bit he was planning to cut, but this whole thing looks a bit Aztec-y to me."

"Do your-" The bioship descends from the night sky, slowing as it reaches the ground. M'gann flies up to its canopy and gives it a hug. "-best."

I hold up my hands, orange strands attaching them to the heads of every sheeda in our vicinity. And add an… Aura, which feeds into their existing desire systems. They want their own civilisation back? Okay, redirect those desires from the historical reality of that civilisation and onto… Ah, resource efficiency? Advanced biotechnology? Useful things that their civilisation had and that we have to a lesser extent. Make them want to add the better parts of themselves to us.

It doesn't take, exactly, but it's stuck on the outer parts of their mind. Okay, now turn up the power a little so it'll take precedence…

Not perfect, but if we haven't gotten rid of the Anti-Life by the time it wears off then we're probably not going to.

I float up into the air. "Robin, you're in charge."

"Good luck with Batman."

"Thank you."

I look up into the sky and set course for my new ship before accelerating. That little chat with Mitchell is… Making me reconsider. It's not like Batman will have just forgotten how he used to think, right? It hasn't been that long. Or-.

Power Ring. Harrolds owes me and has experience using the yellow light. With Alexander Luthor here…

Ring, contact Alexander Luthor.

Compliance.

"Orange Lantern. What can I do for you?"

"I need to contact Power Ring Joseph Harrolds. Can you set that up?"

"Absolutely not. I can't risk the Anti-Life spreading to my Earth. The conversion would be almost immediate and there's almost nothing to stop it spreading."

"What if there was a way to remove the Anti-Life permanently?"

"If, Orange Lantern. I'm happy that you have a technique in mind and wish you all fortune, but unless it's certain then I'm not going to risk another world, another universe. Is it?"

"It-. No. But honestly, the people who have already gone through are a bigger risk factor."

"I cannot undo what has already happened, but I can prevent it from getting worse. To be clear, I have already created and activated devices to prevent further travel from my Earth to this one, and they work in both directions."

Before I could even think it…

"Mister Luthor? For future reference? It's fine to say things like that to me, because I might well have done it, but with just about everyone else we're working with, they wouldn't, and they'd probably be annoyed about the implication." … "Me, Mister Atom and Batman."

"Thank you for your honesty. End-."

And he's gone.

"Orange Lantern to Batman."

I look down as the planet spreads out beneath me, troubles…

No. Still troubled. I can see patches where there should be lights but aren't, places where the noise of civilisation is hushed in a decidedly… Wrong way. And there's the constant pall of black over every emotion.

I… Really want to stop this.

"Batman. Go ahead."

"I need a word in person, preferably off Earth. Where's a good place for you?"

 

[Mr Zoat]

17th February 2013
19:46 GMT

I watch as Mr. Atom coordinates the efforts of the Justice League worldwide. He's not plugged into the Watchtower's computer because he's specifically designed not to be able to perform direct interfaces, so he copes by using his highly precise sonic emitters to communicate with the computer with sound of a complexity the human ear can't distinguish and at pitches we can't hear. If the shield around his work area was to drop it would just sound like loud white noise to me, though Superman said that he rather likes it.

"Batman's arrival estimated thirty seconds plus minus ten seconds. You have three percent of my attention. This is still vastly more of my attention than you require so do not slow down. In fact, speed up to fifteen percent faster than you usually speak for peak efficiency."

I speed up my thought processes by sixteen percent.

"That might make it more difficult for Batman."

"I have learned that efficiency is not the only rational value metric. However, it is a highly important one and Batman could become a more effective individual by replacing no more than five percent of his brain with an augmentative computer."

"I didn't think that you designed those."

"You uploaded the design for Talon's augmentative onto the Justice League's database. I improved upon-"

"Recognised, Batman, zero two."

"-it."

Batman… Batman is wearing a blue cowl and cape. It's a dark blue, but…

"Orange Lantern. What do you wish to discuss?"

"Have you read Robin's report yet? Or mine?"

"Yes, and Doctor Mist is making it a priority to find out what he's doing. But Mister Atom was correct, there are simply too many elven portals listed for us to spare the resources to cover all of them."

I nod. "I agree. That's why I want to go ahead with my Anti-Life removal plan immediately."

"Explain."

"Combining the seven colours of the emotional spectrum can produce pure life force. The same thing that granted Doctor Mist immortality. My plan is to generate it and feed it into the Anti-Life broadcast network."

"Do you have all seven colours?"

"Sort of. Orion of New Genesis has a red ring and the hate and anger required to use it. There's me, and I've got the best control of the orange light of any Orange Lantern. Lord Malvolio has volunteered to act as our green, and to my knowledge he's the most powerful green ring user ever. Alan's got blue, Dame Carol has violet and I… I think that the Medusa Mask can sub in for indigo."

He nods. "Now I understand how you reacted to my change of approach."

"Yes." I take the yellow ring and lantern out of subspace. "I considered… I don't know, trying to make you angry so you'd… Try cowing me into obedience. Or…" I sigh. "You were my first choice. Alexander Luthor refuses to let me ask Joseph Harrolds, who would probably have been able to do it better. I… Don't have anyone else. No one I would trust with it, with the knowledge of what power rings can do."

"You don't think that I can do what you need me to do."

"It's not just about whether you can do it or not. If the rest of us cover you, I'm sure you could probably get a weak yellow glimmer and fire it, but that's not enough. The rest of us are people who really grok our colours."

"My whole approach was based around using fear as a tool to fight crime, manipulating the people I fought and intimidating the criminal underworld into hiding themselves. Is that what I need to be a Yellow Lantern?"

"It's a viable approach. There's a big game hunter who lives for the fear he feels when he hunts prey that could kill him easily. There's a man whose species I killed who turned the fear he feels for the future into a weapon. There are serial killers who live for the fear their victims feel in their last moment. Yellow isn't a colour that lends itself to nobility."

"Which species did you kill?"

"Citadelians." I shrug. "I sent in the report a while ago. I'm sure you read it. In theory, there's nothing stopping him cloning himself to recreate them; that's how they started in the first place. I don't know if he will or not. People ruled by their fears aren't likely to be rational."

"I see. May I?"

He raises his right hand slightly in the direction of the ring.

"I hope you will. That's the whole point."

"I believe you have a tradition of asking Lanterns to call their ring to themselves."

"Ye-ah."

"I find your lack of faith…" He points his index finger at the ring. "Disturbing."

The ring wobbles a little bit.

"That reference was disturbing. Sir, I'm afraid that the only way I can see this working is if you… Temporarily regain your former mindset."

His eyes narrow behind his cowl. "I.. thought I did."

"You wouldn't have made a film reference if that was true. Sir, have you ever used a power ring before?"

"I briefly used a green ring." He closes his eyes and bows his head. "I need to feel fear?"

"You need to command fear. And be able to feel fear; Jordan literally can't use it."

"Have you used it?"

I nod. "Not very well, but yes. Strategic fear is only something I use incidentally; I don't have a good feel for it."

He moves his hand slightly.

"It's harder than I thought it would be to get back into that headspace."

"Sir, we need someone who can use that ring. Do you have any ideas-" He steps closer to the ring and picks it up between his right forefinger and thumb, examining it. "-who else might be able to get something out of it?"

"None who meet all the criteria."

"Would you like my help?"

"No." He turns around and heads towards the exit. "If I.. have to do this, I'd rather do it on my own."

I nod as the doors slide closed behind him.

"Probability of success is low. I recommend lobotomising Jonathan Crane and using him."

"That wouldn't work. The lobotomy would prevent him from 'commanding' fear."

"Then I recommend ensorcellment to bind him to agreement."

"That might work, but Batman is still the best option." I sigh. "What elf sites still need to be checked?"