Morpheus’s Legacy Universe – Part 22 (19-24)

The Return of Nevermore

by

Morpheus

 

Part Four

 

Chapter 19

Grendel. Julie could only stare at the massive monster with a mixture of shock and fear. She’d never seen Grendel before, at least not in person. The Slackers had never been unlucky enough to encounter him…until now.

Nearly everyone had heard of Grendel, a powerful behemoth who appeared without warning, left a swath of destruction, and then vanished just as suddenly as he’d come. Some of the most powerful heroes and groups in the world had fought Grendel, and the most anyone had been able to do was to halt his rampage before he vanished. No one had ever been able to definitively beat him. Grendel was just as big a threat as Loki or Force…if not greater.

Julie tried to wrap her head around the fact that Denise Roberts, the doctor who’d patched up Lady Hexx and who had saved Ms. Miracle’s life, had transformed into Grendel right before her eyes. It didn’t seem possible.

Grendel pulled his head back and let out a deafening roar, right before he snapped his head back down and vomited a blast of green energy into the crowd of heroes. Neon immediately leapt to the front, creating a wall of glowing green energy, though he and his wall were still thrown back from the force of the attack. The White Knight rushed to his brother’s side, and a glowing white shield formed against the glowing green one, reinforcing it until the blast stopped.

“Grendel,” Force exclaimed, and Julie thought she heard fear, or at least worry, before he began laughing. “Now, this should be entertaining…” And with that, the former hero floated up into the air, making no move to attack Grendel. Instead, he seemed more interested in watching the monster attack the heroes.

“Now this is what I’m talking about,” Loki exclaimed with a maniacal laugh. “That fucker is even better than anything I could do… Smash em Grendel… Kill all these fuckin heroes…”

Though Grendel didn’t appear to be paying attention to Loki, he still charged forward. The Miracle Men rushed up to meet him, with Quartz taking the lead while Splash sent a blast of water at his face, holding the water in place as though trying to drown him. Grendel punched at Quartz, who was thrown back with heavy cracks through his crystal shell. A moment later, Surge followed up by firing a blast of electricity at Grendel, though the creature barely seemed to notice it.

“Eat razor sharp shuriken,” Shuriken exclaimed, right as he sent a dozen metal throwing stars flying at high speed towards the creature. Every one of the shuriken hit the massive target that Grendel presented, though none of them seemed to do more than scratch him.

“KEEP BACK,” Target yelled, trying to get in front of Grendel and he moved forward. The monster swiped his massive claws at the heroine, but she ducked out of the way and dodged another attack. “I’ll keep him focused on me…”

“Careful, Mom,” Shuriken told her, backing off but still sending more shuriken at the monster.

“Hey,” Target called out. “Big, blue, and ugly…”

The monster roared and lashed out again, though this time, Target wasn’t fast enough to avoid his blow. A moment later, the heroine was sent flying at least half the length of a football field before she came back down again. Julie might have been horrified at that, if it wasn’t for the fact that Target was invulnerable. Even her own family didn’t seem to be worried about her, or one of them probably would have caught her.

“Careful,” the White Knight ordered while the Face opened up and fired a blast of golden energy out of his mask. Grendel snarled and turned his attention to the Face, though he didn’t seem to be hurt, just annoyed. A moment later, the massive monster leapt straight at the Face.

Suddenly, Grendel was frozen in the air, surrounded by a sphere of golden energy. “I’ve got him,” Mystik called out, holding out her staff.

Julie stared at the captured Grendel in relief, though she quickly looked to Force, who no longer seemed content to merely watch Grendel. She scowled, knowing that with his ego, there was no way that he was going to let everyone forget he was there. With only his dark expression and arrogant sneer for a warning, Force suddenly threw out his hands and fired a blast of raw force, which sent heroes flying in all directions.

Julie looked around at the other heroes, seeing that most of those who’d been caught in this concussion blast had just been knocked around, though not all were unharmed. Figment cried out in pain, holding her arm which appeared to have been broken. Agony looked like she’d broken her leg, but she still got to her feet anyway, with a twisted grin on her lips.

Not to be left out, Loki held up her staff and exclaimed, “Let’s get the whole band together… Bring Circuit Monger and the Scepter here…” A swirl of sickly purple energy formed around her staff, then shot off into the distance.

“Not good,” Julie whispered, wishing that she had enough energy to call for help. Calling up Anabelle had used up what little reserves she’d managed to regain.

A moment later, a flash of golden light smashed into Force, sending the former hero flying back. It took Julie a moment to realize that Ms. Miracle was now floating in the air, glowing with her golden aura. This wasn’t the original Ms. Miracle whom Julie had previously hosted, but the second one…the one who had been severely injured and in male form the last time Julie had seen her.

“You were all making too much noise for me to sleep,” Ms. Miracle announced, earning some quick cheers from the Miracle Men and a smile from the White Knight. “So I thought that I’d come and join in the fun…”

Force just sneered in response, not seeming the least bit intimidated by Ms. Miracle. Of course, the fact that she was wearing her bloodstained and damaged costume probably encouraged his attitude. “After I’m done dealing with all of you,” Force announced, “there’s a pink haired girl that I’ll need to deal with…”

Without warning or hesitation, the White Knight flew straight at Force, punching the former hero as hard as he could. However, Force saw him coming and took the blow without even flinching. A moment later, he punched the White Knight, who was thrown back from the force until Neon caught him with a giant baseball mitt made out of green energy.

“Protect me,” Loki commanded as several heroes tried to attack her. A moment later, Icarus tried to punch the villainess, only to go through her as though she was a ghost.

Julie had almost allowed herself to forget about Grendel, until he let out a deafening roar. The golden sphere burst under his furious assault, releasing the creature. Without hesitating, Grendel charged forward.

“Oh no you don’t,” Mega exclaimed, diving for Grendel and smashing into him just a moment before he reached Mystik. Grendel turned his attention to the Mega, who was currently over twenty feet tall. And even though she was nearly twice his height, she still visibly paled. “This is gonna hurt…”

Grendel slammed into Mega, and to Julie’s surprise, Mega was thrown back with a scream. Grendel leapt at her again only to get charged from behind by Chrome, Nike, and Warchild. However, even their combined assault wasn’t enough to draw the monster’s attention away from Mega.

In the air above, Ms. Miracle and the White Knight fought with Force, while Nike circled nearby, looking for an opportunity to join in. They took turns charging Force, though he continued to shrug them off, acting as though this was just a game and he was merely playing with them.

“What the hell happened to you, Scott?” the White Knight demanded of Force. “How did you become such a monster?”

Force snarled at that, glaring at the White Knight with clearly growing anger. Then he looked down at the heroes gathered below and exclaimed, “I failed to kill your family the last time. This time I’ll make sure they’re all dead…especially that pink haired bitch…”

The White Knight yelled in rage and flew straight at Force, swinging a sword made of white energy. However, Force dropped to the ground, and as soon as he hit, there was an explosive blast that sent everyone flying back. Julie screamed as she was flung through the air.

Suddenly, someone caught Julie in mid-air, and an unfamiliar voice announced, “I’ve got you…”

As soon as Julie was released, she turned to look at her rescuer and was surprised to see an enormous blue skinned woman. The woman was eight feet tall, heavily muscled, and had breasts the size of beach balls. And not only was her skin blue, but her hair was dark blue and her eyes were yellow. Bony spikes grew out from her shoulders and elbows, which along with her sharp teeth and clawed fingers, made her look more than a little intimidating. And since the only things she wore were a silver chain mail bikini top and loin cloth, Julie had a clear view of her entire body.

“Um…thanks,” Julie responded in surprise and confusion. She stared up at this stranger, then demanded, “Who are you?”

However, the blue skinned woman turned her attention away from Julie and looked towards Grendel, which made Julie realize just how many similarities the two of them shared. They were both big and blue, with bony spikes growing from their bodies.

The blue amazon had a deep scowl on her face as she yelled, “GRENDEL.”

Grendel threw Mega away from him, then snapped around to stare at the woman. He backhanded Marvel, casually knocking her out of his way as he started to approach the blue skinned woman.

“Grendel, come here,” the blue woman commanded. To Julie’s surprise, Grendel did as the woman ordered and went right over to her. He crouched down and she gently put a hand on his cheek. “Good boy…”

“No way,” Zero Key gasped. “A girl Grendel…”

“You’re Grendel’s Mother,” the Face exclaimed in surprise, his voice sounding worried. “I’ve heard of you…”

“Grendel’s Mother...?” Mega exclaimed as she got back to her feet. She stared at the blue skinned amazon, who had Grendel patiently crouched in front of her. Her eyes suddenly widened in realization. “GM…? Will?”

Grendel’s Mother smiled faintly and told the giantess, “I told you that I was here as an insurance policy…”  She gave a meaningful look at Grendel and added, “In case this very thing happened…”

The Face seemed to be staring at her, though with his mask, Julie couldn’t be quite sure. She wasn’t sure what Grendel’s Mother was going to do, but for the moment, she seemed to be holding Grendel back.

Julie had heard of the creature called Grendel’s Mother, a female version of Grendel, who was smart and able to control the monster. However, until now, Julie had thought that Grendel’s Mother was just an urban legend.

“These people aren’t your enemies,” Grendel’s Mother told the monster. Then with an almost evil grin, she pointed to Force and announced, “HE is. Sic em Grendel…”

Grendel let out a roar, then turned and leapt straight at Force. Force had a sudden look of fear on his face, right before the massive blue monster smashed into him, slamming him into the ground. Grendel roared and fired a blast of green energy from his mouth, aimed directly at Force.

“YOU DARE?” Force yelled, nearly frothing with rage.

Force flew straight at Grendel and punched the creature with enough power that Julie felt the impact from where she stood. Grendel was knocked back about a foot, though the monster just roared and threw himself at Force.

“What the hell?” Chrome exclaimed. “Grendel is on our side?”

The White Knight held back, watching with an expression of surprise and confusion. “I’d never have believed it…”

Grendel’s Mother just laughed, seeming amused by the entire situation. “Well, it’s been awhile since I could cut loose…” Then with an almost scary looking grin, she ran towards Force and joined Grendel in the fight.

“NO,” Loki snarled, staring at Grendel with a look of betrayal on her face. “That fucker should be crushing the damn heroes…”

“And you should be in prison,” Rumor called out, right before Surge blasted Loki with electricity. However, the electricity went right though Loki, who was still intangible. A moment later, Rumor stated, “My turn…”

Rumor vanished from where she’d been standing beside Surge, only to reappear beside Loki. She took a swing at Loki, and to Julie’s surprise, she hit the villainess in the face. Loki staggered back with blood spurting from her smashed nose.

“I’ll kill you,” Loki told her with a furious snarl. Then an evil grin formed on her face, looking even more sinister for the blood that was dripping down.

“Oh no you don’t,” Rumor responded as she charged Loki again. However, this time, Loki swung her staff, hitting Rumor, who took a nasty looking hit to her ribs.

“Fucking bitch,” Loki spat out, glancing to where Grendel slammed into Force, throwing the former hero straight into the ground. “Shit… I wanted to see Grendel fuck you all up… I guess I’ll have to do it myself…”

Julie saw the evil grin return to Loki’s face, and she had a very bad feeling about what was coming. “Look out,” Julie cried out a warning, though she doubted it would do any good.

“Make me stronger than Grendel,” Loki commanded as she raised her staff. “Make me bigger than Grendel…more powerful than Grendel.”

“No,” Julie gasped, her eyes going wide.

Loki began laughing maniacally while black smoke began to pour out of her staff. The smoke circled the villainess, almost like a giant black snake, and then it suddenly lunged forward and rushed into Loki’s mouth. She tried screaming, but no sound emerged.

A moment later, all of the smoke was gone, having entered into Loki’s body. Loki’s face began to turn red, as though she had a severe sunburn, though it continued to become brighter until it was the color of blood.

A fearsome howl erupted from Loki’s throat, right before her armor began to crack and shatter. Just as Julie had seen Denise do a short time ago, Loki was growing, bursting right out of her armor, transforming even more as she did so. Her body was now covered in crimson scales.

Just then, there was another loud BOOM and the ground shook. Julie looked back to where Grendel and his mother were fighting Force. This time, Force had just slammed Grendel’s Mother into the ground, though she got back to her feet in an instant, not appearing to have been harmed at all. Grendel immediately spat a blast of green energy at Force, who used a force field to block the attack. Grendel’s Mother followed that up by leaping up in the air, right to where Force was floating.

However, a loud shriek drew Julie’s attention back to Loki, who now stood twelve feet tall, and she was still growing larger. She was enormous, with scaly red skin, fearsome looking claws and teeth, and glowing red eyes and burned with a fierce hatred.

Everyone seemed so caught up in watching her transformation, or in watching the fight between Force and Grendel, that no one made a move towards Loki. Loki continued to grow, reaching thirty feet tall before she finally stopped.

“This is not good,” Julie whispered, remembering what Loki had said before transforming. If she was more powerful than Grendel, they were all in serious trouble.

Suddenly, a burst of purple energy crashed down from the sky and hit the ground. A moment later, Julie saw a figure standing where the purple energy had struck. It was a woman in armor, riding on the back of a large black cat. In her hand, she held a metal scepter.

“The Scepter,” Julie gasped, quickly recognizing who this newcomer was.

Before anyone could react to this new threat, another flash of purple shot out of the sky and hit the ground. In the middle of the charred ground stood a metallic woman.

“Circuit Monger,” Julie whispered, feeling as though she had a lump of lead in her stomach at the realization that four of the five obelisk guardians were now present…along with Grendel. Those were some extremely dangerous villains with a LOT of combined power. Even if Grendel appeared to be on their side at the moment, Julie didn’t trust that to last long. “This is NOT good…”

Chapter 20

Joselyn held the base of her seat with a white-knuckled grip, not fully trusting the seatbelt to keep her in. She glanced over the inside of the metal shell that she was riding in, and saw that she wasn’t the only one who seemed nervous. Vickie was grabbing her seat almost the same way, though her brother was grinning and having fun.

“Here she comes again,” Ghost Boy exclaimed from his seat, pointing into the sky behind them.

Joselyn didn’t need to turn around to know who she’d see, though she did so anyway. Praxis was coming straight at them again. After they’d taken down Circuit Monger’s obelisk and escaped, Praxis had followed after them, and they’d been trying to dodge her ever since. Then, as Joselyn also expected, Invincible Woman came up from below, slamming into Praxis and delivering a series of punches before flying back.

“Can’t this thing go any faster?” Chris asked Counterweight, who was sitting in the ‘pilot’ seat up front.

“I’m giving her all she’s got,” Counterweight responded in a bad Scottish accent. “Besides, this damn thing doesn’t have any engines you know…”

“Do I have to get out and push?” Ghost Boy asked, giving a worried look behind them, obviously concerned about Invincible Woman…who was ironically enough…his son.

“How much longer until we get back?” Chris asked.

“Not much further now,” Joselyn answered, hoping that Invincible Woman could keep Praxis off them until they reached the other heroes.

Vickie looked behind them and announced, “If Praxis gets close enough, I can shut her down…”

“And make me blind,” Counterweight pointed out.

Joselyn shook her head. “By the time she got close enough for you to block out the control signal…it would be too late for us. She could still end up knocking us out of the air…”

Suddenly, Joselyn saw something from the corner of her eye and snapped around for a better look. A glowing purple ball was flying across the sky, going in the same direction that they were going. At first, she feared it might be some kind of attack, but quickly discounted that. It wasn’t coming towards them. In fact, it was going faster than they were and quickly left them behind.

A moment later, Joselyn’s attention was torn away from the purple glow and focused instead on Praxis. Her power was screaming a warning to her, that Praxis was coming at them from beneath.

“NOW VICKIE,” Joselyn screamed.

Vickie reacted immediately, just as Joselyn had hoped, and suddenly, everything went black. Joselyn was thankful that Vickie understood what she meant and had reacted so fast. It had just been in time.

Though Joselyn couldn’t see a thing, her powers told her that Vickie’s dark zone had worked. Praxis had been momentarily cut off from Circuit Monger, and when she froze up, gravity reclaimed her and she fell.

“You can drop it,” Joselyn said, and the darkness immediately vanished. “Thanks…”

Joselyn looked over the edge of the metal shell, just in time to see Invincible Woman sweep in to catch Praxis. However, right before Invincible Woman reached the falling heroine, Praxis recovered enough to punch her.

“Damn,” Joselyn growled, frustrated that Praxis had snapped out of it so quickly…and even more…that she was still under Circuit Monger’s control.

While Invincible Woman and Praxis exchanged blows, Counterweight announced, “We’re getting close. Just another couple minutes…”

“About time,” Ghost Boy said with a scowl. “We could use the reinforcements…”

“Yeah,” Joselyn agreed. “Definitely.”

Joselyn scowled in frustration as she continued to watch the aerial dogfight that had been occurring ever since they left Circuit Monger behind. She wanted to help Invincible Woman, but there wasn’t much she could do. Ghost Boy and Counterweight could both fly, but neither of them was fast or maneuverable enough to do much good in that dog fight.

Praxis made yet another attempt to come at them, but Invincible Woman intercepted her and they went into another flurry of punches and dodges. Unfortunately, Invincible Woman couldn’t keep Praxis’ attention for long, because as soon as the infected hero saw an opportunity, she tried to break off and come at the shell again.

“She’s getting tired,” Ghost Boy announced. From his worried expression, they didn’t need to ask which ‘she’ he meant.

‘We’re here,” Joselyn exclaimed in relief, seeing the encampment in the distance.

However, as they moved closer, Joselyn saw that there was some kind of fight going on, though they were still too far away to make out many details. She saw a flash of green light, then a flash of blue light. Following that, there was a loud BOOM, which they could hear, even from this distance.

“What the hell is going on?” Counterweight demanded.

“And what the hell is that?” Vickie blurted out as she pointed towards the camp.

Joselyn didn’t have to ask what Vickie had been referring to, because her eyes immediately locked onto to the massive creature her best friend was gesturing to. The creature was shaped like a human woman, but she had scaly red skin, horns, claws, and of course, she was over thirty feet tall.

“Loki,” Joselyn blurted out before she even consciously realized what her powers were telling her. Her eyes went wide in realization. “Holy shit. That’s Loki…”

“No way,” Counterweight exclaimed with a look of stunned disbelief.

Though Joselyn didn’t know why Loki would transform herself into that monster, she had no doubt that it was bad news for all the heroes at the basecamp. When Loki caused trouble, she always went all out.

“I don’t see her staff,” Joselyn said, clearly noting that Loki was completely naked and didn’t seem to be holding anything in her hands.

Mega quickly grew until she was the same size as Loki, then she attacked the villainess. But to Joselyn’s surprise, Loki just let out a roar and punched at Mega, who staggered back from the blow. A moment later, Loki threw herself at Mega, grabbed the heroine, and then threw her.

As they got closer, Joselyn was surprise to realize that Loki wasn’t the only threat that he heroes were fighting. She saw Force floating in the air…though only for a few seconds before a massive blue monster leapt at the former hero and punched him. Force was sent flying back a long distance, where he crashed into a nearby house.

“Grendel,” Joselyn gasped, confused about where Grendel had come from or why he was attacking Force.

Force burst out of the now destroyed house and flew up into the air again. He fired a massive concussion blast towards the heroes, though the Face and her uncle Leon got in the way and created glowing walls of energy to block it.

“Force, Loki, and Grendel,” Joselyn whispered, suddenly feeling like they might be in over their heads. Then she saw finally notice the other two villains. Circuit Monger and the Scepter were present as well. “You’ve got to be kidding me…”

“Circuit Monger,” Ghost Boy exclaimed as he noticed the metal woman as well. “How did she get here before us?”

“Loki,” Joselyn answered, ‘knowing’ that Loki was responsible, though not the circumstances behind it. Most of the time, her sixth sense tended to be a little short on details.

The Scepter stood beside a large black panther, and she was surrounded by several heroes, which she was keeping away from her with a combination of her telekinesis and her feline helper. Diamond was suddenly thrown back, only to be caught by her teammate Radiant. Zero Kay threw a ball of freezing energy towards the villain, but the ball suddenly changed direction and went straight towards Splash. However, Splash sent a wall of water up in front of her, and as soon as the ball hit the water, it instantly froze.

Circuit Monger was a distance away, floating in the air and dealing with several of her own opponents. She fired a blast off energy at Nike, who dodged the attack and then charged at Circuit Monger. Circuit Monger snapped around and backhanded the hero, moving faster than Nike had expected.

“I didn’t think we’d get another chance at that metal bitch so soon,” Counterweight said with a grin. “Time for you guys to get out…”

“What do you mean?” Chris asked with a confused look.

Vickie just rolled her eyes. “She’s going to ram her with this thing…”

Chris’ eyes widened, then he nodded. “I can carry one of you with me…” He had a worried expression.

“I’ve got you,” Ghost Boy said, grabbing hold of Vickie. “I can’t carry very much with me, but I can get you down safely…”

Joselyn looked to Chris and blushed a little. When he put his arms around her and picked her up, she felt a surge of nervousness and excitement. However, when Chris jumped over the edge of the shell with her a moment later, she screamed.

“Don’t worry,” Chris assured her as they fell. He held her tightly, making her feel a little safer, even if they’d jumped out of a perfectly good flying shell, without a parachute between them. “I’ve got you.”

Joselyn closed her eyes, blurting out, “Why couldn’t I have inherited my dad’s flying power?”

It didn’t take long before they hit the ground, though there was no impact or sudden stop. One second they were falling, and the next, Chris was standing on the ground, with her in his arms. He’d absorbed all the kinetic energy, which meant that his powers were fully charged and ready for the fight.

“Just like a roller coaster,” Joselyn weakly joked. She did NOT want to do that again. Then again, as she considered the fact that Chris was still holding her, she amended that and decided that his part wasn’t so bad at all.

“It looks like we’ve got a fight to join,” Chris announced with a grin while setting Joselyn down.

“Definitely,” Joselyn agreed, forming a rapier of glowing pink energy in one hand and a glowing pink dagger in the other.

However, instead of charging into the nearby battle, she looked up to where Counterweight was positioning the large metal shell well above Circuit Monger’s head. A moment later, she released the shell, which immediately dropped right onto Circuit Monger, smashing into the metal woman and driving her into the ground in a mass of crushed metal.

“That takes care of tin britches,” Vickie announced as she and Ghost Boy settled down beside them.

Joselyn looked back up to where Counterweight floated in the air for a moment, right before she flew off to the side in order to get out of the way. She settled back down to the ground well away from them, obviously thinking about the fact that she was still injured and not at her best for a fight.

“Time for the rest of us to pick our targets too,” Joselyn announced, taking another glance around the battle and trying to decide which villain she’d be most useful against.

Force was the only male among the group, which meant that he was the only one she could use her mind control on. However, not only was he fully aware of her abilities and likely to kill her before she got close, he was also flying around out of her reach and in the middle of a fight with Grendel. There was no way she wanted to get in the middle of that fight.

Joselyn glanced to her energy sword, then to the massive monstrosity that Loki had become. She frowned and shook her head, knowing that she wouldn’t be of much use against Loki either.

Circuit Monger was buried under a mass of twisted metal, but Joselyn was sure that she wasn’t really down either, merely inconvenienced. And unfortunately, Circuit Monger was another of the villains that she wouldn’t be very effective against.

“The Scepter it is,” Joselyn mused, glancing towards the last villain before telling the others, “Circuit Monger will probably be up and at it again in just a minute or two…”

Then, just as Joselyn finished saying this, the twisted remains of the metal shell exploded and Circuit Monger flew up into the air. She looked like she was scratched up and perhaps even had a small dent or two, but otherwise looked undamaged.

“I hate it when you’re right,” Vickie muttered.

In the distance, Loki let out another loud howl, then lunged forward, stomping onto Joselyn’s aunt Gina. Aunt Gina was invulnerable, but even so, Joselyn gasped, not sure her aunt could survive that kind of attack.

For a moment, Joselyn wanted to rush over and check on her aunt, but her powers assured her that Aunt Gina was all right. At least a dozen heroes were attacking Loki, distracting her from the temporarily fallen heroine, though they didn’t seem to be doing much damage.

“Let’s move,” Joselyn exclaimed, turning and running towards the Scepter.

The Scepter was standing back, holding out her scepter towards Ryan. Ryan lived up to his codename of Shuriken because a dozen throwing starts flew around his body in an orbit, even the villain’s power lifted him up into the air.

“I’m going to snap every bone in your body,” the Scepter exclaimed. “I will make an example of you to all these fools…”

“Eat spinning blade,” Ryan responded, sending all of his shuriken flying straight at the Scepter.

A moment later, he suddenly dropped to the ground as she turned her attention to defending herself. Nearly every one of the throwing starts hit an invisible wall and came to a sudden stop. Only one of the shuriken got through, hitting the Scepter’s armor on the side and leaving a deep gouge as it passed by.

The large black panther leapt at Ryan with its claws extended, but it was hit with a blast of water that sent it flying back, courtesy of Splash. Surge responded by firing a blast of electricity at the creature, who yowled in pain, then quickly shook it off.

“Time to take this bitch down,” Chris exclaimed, running straight at the Scepter.

Joselyn gulped, realizing that Chris was getting cocky because he was fully charged up. A moment later, he was captured in the Scepter’s power, and she sent him flying straight up into the air before releasing him. Chris immediately came falling back to the ground, where he hit hard. But to the Scepter’s obvious surprise, he just laughed.

“Thanks for charging me up,” Chris announced with a grin.

The panther leapt at Chris, who backhanded the large cat. The panther was sent flying back from the blow, a hit that should have shattered half its bones. However, when the cat hit the ground, it immediately leapt at Vickie.

“I don’t think so,” Joselyn exclaimed, throwing her energy blade into the cat’s side and then impaling it with her sword. The black cat snarled and turned on her. Joselyn formed a glowing shield, using up as much of her energy as she could. It was barely large enough to block the cat before she was knocked back. “Bad kitty…” Then with a sudden realization that had been granted by her sixth sense, Joselyn exclaimed, “The cat is the source of her powers…”

“In that case,” Mystik announced, floating in the air and holding out her staff. “It’s time to put the cat out.”

Mystik made a grand sweeping gesture with her staff, and it began to glow. The panther was suddenly engulfed by glowing sparkles, which caused the creature to let out a horrified shriek of fear and pain. It desperately tried to leap away, but seemed to be trapped within the sparkles.

“EBON,” the Scepter cried out, sounding more outraged than worried. However, she was already dealing with Ryan, Splash, and Surge…using her power to keep all three of them away from her.

Suddenly, there was a burst of light, and the panther was gone. At the same instant, Ryan, Splash and Surge, who were all being held back, staggered forward as the Scepter’s power vanished.

“Regardless of what you did to Ebon,” the Scepter announced in an arrogant tone, holding out her scepter as though she could destroy them all with a single sweep of the item. “I will crush you all…” However, Joselyn’s power told her that without the cat…without Ebon…the Scepter was powerless.

Just then, Joselyn saw her cousin Angie rushing up behind the Scepter. A moment later, Angle grabbed hold of the villainess, who immediately began to scream in pain.

Joselyn winced, almost feeling sorry for the Scepter. Almost. Her cousin Angie was codenamed Agony for a good reason. Not only did she have a powerful healing ability, she also had an empathic power that let her weaponized her own pain. She could store up every bit of pain she felt, then transfer it to someone else…just like she was doing to the Scepter.

The Scepter collapsed to the ground unconscious, completely overwhelmed by all of Angie’s stored pain. Angie stepped back with a grim look on her face, just as she had every time she used that power.

“The Scepter is down,” Joselyn said in relief. Then she looked to Mystik, who had removed the source of the Scepter’s powers. “And I think she’s out of the game for good.”

Just as Joselyn was letting out a sigh of relief at this, she caught sight of something from the corner of her eye that caused her to snap around in time to see Grendel falling from the sky with Force held firmly in his large claws. As she watched, Grendel came down and slammed Force straight into the ground. There was a BOOM as they hit, and a moment later, Grendel stood triumphantly over an unmoving Force.

“No way,” Joselyn blurted out.

Grendel let out a horrendous roar, then looked back down at Force with a snarl. Force was still moving, and was even trying to sit up, but it was clear that he was out of action. In spite of his force field, he’d taken a lot of damage. Blood poured down from his broken nose and his arm was bent at an unnatural angel. And from the look of things, Grendel was about to finish the job.

“NO,” a woman called out. “You can’t kill him…”

That drew Joselyn’s attention to the speaker, a massive woman who had blue skin, a lot of muscles, and enormous breasts. She looked a female version of Grendel.

“Grendel,” Vickie gulped from beside Joselyn, her eyes wide in stunned disbelief. “He just beat the crap out of Force…”

“And there’s a girl Grendel,” Chris added a moment later.

“Grendel’s Mother,” Joselyn stated, still confused by Grendel’s presence, not to mention that of his mother.

“He’s already defeated,” Grendel’s Mother told the monster. Then she pointed up at Loki and snarled, “Now we fight her…”

Grendel let out a deep growl, then without warning, he grabbed Force and threw him right at Loki. Force hit Loki’s chest hard, though Loki barely seemed to notice it. Force bounced off and then hit the ground, with the last of his force field finally fading away.

A blue clad woman ran towards the fallen Force, and a moment later, Catalyst bent down beside him. “And stay down,” Catalyst ordered as she took away Force’s powers, though by this point, it was no longer really necessary.

“Two down,” Joselyn announced, looking to Loki and then Circuit Monger. “Two more to go.”

Chapter 21

Joselyn slowly looked over the battlefield, which was filled with chaos from the unexpected arrival of the villains. However, now that two of Nevermore’s minions had been defeated, the heroes finally seemed to be organizing themselves in order to defeat the remaining two.

Lady Hexx had gotten close enough to Loki that she could use her powers, causing the massive villain to start sinking into the ground, as though it was made of quicksand. While Loki was sinking, Shiver, the Face, and Zero Kay were all attacking her from a distance, though other heroes choose to attack from the air. Radiant, Icarus, and Joselyn’s dad took turns diving at Loki to quickly hit her, before they each flew back out of range. Unfortunately, their attacks only seemed to be hurting Loki just enough to annoy her, and even anger her, but not enough to take her down.

Grendel and his mother both launched themselves at Loki, hitting her with incredibly powerful blows that actually caused her to fall back and hit the ground. However, Loki let out an inhuman roar and began getting back to her feet, tearing her feet loose from the ground that Lady Hexx had been trying to entrap her with. She lashed out, nearly stomping on Chrome, who seized the opportunity to attack her legs, slicing at them with the metal blades that grew from his arms.

“We have to hit her harder,” Joselyn’s dad yelled. “We can’t hold back…”

Kaboom flew towards Loki, holding out her good arm and her glowing fist. “I never thought I’d prefer this bitch with her staff…” Then Kaboom punched Loki in the face, releasing an explosion of energy which made Loki snarl in pain and rage.

“LOKI!” a familiar voice yelled from overhead, drawing Joselyn’s attention to Legacy, who was hovering in the air. Her leg was still wrapped up in splints and bandages, though she clearly wasn’t about to let her injuries stop her.  She glared at Loki, then joined the fight, using her telekinesis to fling a large rock straight at the villain’s face.

Joselyn was so caught up in what was happening with Loki that she’d nearly forgotten about Circuit Monger. She turned her attention back to the metal villainess, seeing that she was hovering in the air and firing both missiles and blasts of blue energy at the various heroes who approached. Radiant took a direct blast to the chest and was thrown back, then a small missile hit near Diamond, who was barely able to create a diamond shield in time to protect herself.

Ms. Miracle…Dave…Joselyn’s new sister, flew straight at Circuit Monger, though the metal villainess somehow managed to avoid her. Circuit Monger flew back, then let loose several missiles, which Ms. Miracle blasted out of the air with a burst of golden energy that she released from her palms.

Evie came up behind Joselyn and exclaimed, “Hard to believe she’s our sister…”

“Yeah,” Joselyn agreed with a nod. “And Mom is totally gonna kill dad…”

Evie laughed at that. “I wonder if we can talk her into coming over for a sleepover…” Then she grinned broadly. “I bet Katie will totally flip when she finds out…”

Joselyn chuckled at that, knowing that Evie was right. Their younger sister would definitely be overjoyed to learn that Ms. Miracle was her big sister too. Then she gave Evie a closer look and frowned, seeing that her big little sister was banged up and clearly hurt. And just from knowing Evie as well as she did, she also guessed that she was frustrated since her pseudo-invisibility powers weren’t well suited for this kind of fight.

“Not that my powers are much better,” Joselyn muttered.

There were so many people present and so much going on, that her sixth sense couldn’t pick out much through all the noise. She formed a glowing pink dagger in her hand, more for comfort than because she thought it would do much good against either Loki or Circuit Monger.

A short distance away, Joselyn saw Interface, who was also standing back and looking frustrated. Interface turned to Warchild and said, “If I can make physical contact with Circuit Monger, I might be able to override with her system and shut her down…”

Warchild nodded at that. “Then let’s see if we can make that happen…”

“I’ll help,” Ghost Boy announced as he joined them.

“Sounds good to me,” Joselyn added, not sure how she could help just yet, but knowing that she had to do something.

Just then, Joselyn’s power warned her of danger, just in time for her to see something falling towards them. “Look out,” she called out, causing everyone nearby to run out of the way. A moment later, something hit the ground just a few feet from where she’d been standing, impacting with enough force that the ground seemed to shake.

Before Joselyn had fully absorbed what was going on, a figure stood up from the shallow crater that had that had just been formed. Praxis slowly looked around, her eyes still glowing green from the infection. And then, to Joselyn’s shock and horror, a second figure stood up from the same small crater. Invincible Woman looked around, revealing that her eyes were now glowing green as well.

“No,” Joselyn gasped in horror, suddenly feeling guilty as she realized that after they’d returned to the camp, she’d been so distracted by the villains, that she’d forgotten about Invincible Woman.

“NO,” Ghost Boy exclaimed, staring at Invincible Woman with a look of shocked realization.

“New drone acquired,” Circuit Monger commented in her flat mechanical voice. “Initiating further acquisition of developed drones.”

“This isn’t you,” Ghost Boy told Invincible Woman. “You can fight this…”

Without warning, Invincible Woman tried to grab Ghost Boy, though her hands went right through him as though he actually was a ghost. When she saw that she couldn’t grab him, she abruptly turned her attention to someone else and flew straight at Warchild, who blasted her and then flew back. She staggered back from his attack, then flew after him.

Praxis came straight at Joselyn, who created a glowing pink force field disk, just in time to let the infected heroine slam into that instead of her. And though her force field’s weren’t as large and powerful as Uncle Leon’s…or even her dad’s…this one was strong enough to do the job…for now. Joselyn shifted to the side and sliced at Praxis with her energy dagger. To her surprise, she actually cut Praxis, leaving a thin gash in her upper arm. However, this didn’t slow Praxis down, which forced Joselyn to stagger backwards, trying to think of how to protect herself.

“You aren’t going to infect me,” Joselyn stated grimly. Praxis didn’t respond.

Taking a deep breath to brace herself, Joselyn dropped the force field disk and leapt backwards, throwing several glowing pink daggers at Praxis in the process. Two of the daggers hit Praxis, and while giving a silent apology for the injuries, Joselyn lunged forward, forming a shield on her left arm and a sword in her right hand. She uses the shield to block Praxis’ grab, then slashed out with the sword, slicing through the infected woman’s thigh.

“I don’t think I can overpower you,” Joselyn admitted with a forced smile. “But I’ve been trained to fight, and I’m pretty sure I can wear you down…”

“Don’t worry,” Vickie called out, a moment before everything went dark. “I’ve got her…”

“Thanks,” Joselyn called back, knowing that Praxis was currently cut off from Circuit Monger’s control. She backed up until she was outside the darkness field, then yelled, “Try to bring Invincible Woman in here…”

Warchild seemed to have heard, because he changed direction and flew right towards the cloud of darkness. As soon as Invincible Woman was close, the cloud suddenly expanded, catching her within.

“I’ve got them both,” Vickie announced. “I’m not sure how long I can hold this though…”

“We still have to deal with Circuit Monger,” Joselyn pointed out. She stared at the metal woman, who was still hovering in the air and attacking. “She has to run out of power eventually, and at the rate she’s going, I bet it won’t be much longer…”

“I’ll deal with Circuit Monger,” Interface announced with a look of determination. “I just need to get close enough to make contact…”

“Negative,” Circuit Monger stated, turning her attention to Interface. “The Interface entity is a threat. Interface must be eliminated.”

With that, Circuit Monger opened fire on Interface, simultaneously firing blasts of energy along with several small missiles. Joselyn immediately ran towards the hero, forming another shield of pink energy, but she wasn’t fast enough. Before she reached Interface, a missile exploded behind him, knocking him to the ground where a blast of energy struck him in the back. Interface screamed in pain, then became silent.

“Interface,” Joselyn cried out, reaching his side and trying to protect his body, though it was too late.

“YOU BITCH,” Warchild yelled, firing blasts of energy at Circuit Monger, though she formed her own glowing force field that deflected his attacks.

“Interface has been neutralized,” Circuit Monger commented. “Targeting potential drone units.”

Warchild just let out a scream and continued attacking Circuit Monger. Diamond ran over and crouched down beside Interface. “He’s still alive,” she exclaimed. “We need to get him medical attention…now.”

“Mystik can heal him,” Channel announced she ran over, warily watching Circuit Monger. “She healed Nike from something pretty nasty a little bit ago…”

Joselyn looked around since her powers were currently too overloaded to tell her where Mystik was. A moment later, she saw Mystik, floating in the air above Loki and looking as though she was preparing to attack him. However, Loki abruptly belched out a burst of flames in her direction. Mystik suddenly disappeared, teleporting away before she was burned. However, Joselyn didn’t know where she went and couldn’t afford to keep looking.

Radiant landed beside her teammates, Diamond and Interface, saying, “I can fly him out of here…”

“I’ll make a stretcher,” Diamond quickly agreed. A moment later, diamond crystals formed beneath and around Interface, holding his body rigidly in place so that Radiant could pick him up. Without another word, Radiant flew away with him.

Joselyn looked at Channel and asked. “Can you do anything?” Channel’s powers made her a wildcard…and often a very useful one. And at that moment, any help would be appreciated

“I’m pretty wiped out,” Channel reluctantly admitted. However, as she looked at Circuit Monger, her expression turned to one of fierce determination. “But I’ll damn well try…”

Channel took a deep breath, then a few seconds later, Joselyn felt a shift in the other heroine. Her posture and body language abruptly changed while her costume shimmered and changed. Gone was Channel’s normal costume, and in its place, was a one piece metallic outfit that covered her entire body from the neck down. It was blue and silver, with white trim.

“The Warchild entity will be upgraded,” Circuit Monger announced, making Joselyn look and gasp at the realization that somehow, Circuit Monger had gotten hold of Warchild. She held Warchild in one hand, while the childish hero struggled to break free. “Beginning drone conversion…”

“Negative,” announced Channel, or at least, the spirit that was possessing her. Channel’s body floated up into the air and towards Circuit Monger. “The Trojan malware will cease further infection. Surrender immediately or be deleted.”

If Circuit Monger was surprised by this response, her blank facial expression didn’t reveal it. However, she did respond with, “Commands denied. Identify.”

Channel’s eyes began to glow blue, and in a loud voice, the spirit controlling her body announced, “I…AM…CIRCUIT!”

“Circuit?” Joselyn gasped in surprise. Circuit Monger didn’t show any visible change in her expression, though she did release Warchild, who fell to the ground.

Circuit had been an android…a machine. Joselyn hadn’t known that Channel could bring back an artificial intelligence, but she suspected that Channel hadn’t realized this either.

“The Trojan malware will be deleted,” Circuit stated in a cold voice, though her expression changed to one of anger as she added, “Die impostor…”

With that, Circuit flung herself at Circuit Monger, grabbing hold of the metal villainess. A moment later, all the glowing circuit patterns on Circuit Monger’s body, changed from green to blue. Circuit Monger let out a loud electronic shriek, right before they both dropped from the air and smashed into the ground. Neither of them were moving.

Joselyn immediately ran towards Channel, who was motionless on the ground and back in her own costume. She formed an energy sword in her hand, keeping a close eye on Circuit Monger as she approached. However, Circuit Monger wasn’t moving either. The glowing circuit pattern that had previously covered much of her body, was entirely gone, along with the glow in her eyes.

“Channel?” Joselyn cautiously asked, letting out a sigh of relief as her sixth sense assured her that the other girl was still alive…just utterly exhausted. When Nike suddenly dropped from the air and landed beside her teammate, Joselyn quickly assured her, “She’s all right. She just pushed herself too far again…”

Nike nodded at that, not saying a word before she picked Channel up, then carried her away to safety. Joselyn backed away from Circuit Monger, who seemed completely deactivated, though it was best to be safe. After all, she’d seen far too many movies where the supposedly dead bad guy suddenly moved again.

“Velvet,” Joselyn called out to Vickie. “Drop your darkness…”

The darkness vanished, letting Joselyn see Vickie, who was standing guard over the motionless Praxis and Invincible Woman. Neither of them sat up or moved, showing that although Circuit Monger was no longer able to give them orders, they were still infected. She let out a muttering of profanity, realizing that Interface had been their best chance of being cured, and Joselyn didn’t even know if he’d survive.

Warchild was back on his feet and was about to blast Circuit Monger’s body, just to ensure she really was dead, when the ground trembled again and he staggered. Nearly everyone turned to look at Loki, who had just leapt at some heroes and had smashed into the ground. The massive villainess let out a deafening roar, then spat out a blast of flames. She would have incinerated several heroes if Joselyn’s uncle Leon hadn’t thrown up a glowing blue force field bubble to protect them from the attack.

“I can’t believe we’re still fighting that overgrown bitch,” Warchild exclaimed with a snarl. “She’s outnumbered, like…a hundred to one.”

Though Warchild was exaggerating on the numbers, Joselyn definitely understood his point. Even though more than a dozen heroes were attacking Loki, they barely seemed to be making a dent in her defenses. She was just too big and powerful. Then, as if to prove that, Grendel leapt at Loki and punched her in one of her breasts, with enough force to kill most of the heroes present…and all it did was piss Loki off.

“She’s a damn monster,” Chris exclaimed, trying to look tough and confident, though Joselyn could hear the fear and worry in his voice. “Literally…”

“We’re going to take her down,” Joselyn assured Chris, hoping that she sounded more confident than she felt. Then she looked to Vickie, gesturing to Praxis and Invincible Woman. “Keep a close eye on them…” She didn’t need to add that Vickie should protect them from Loki…or contain them if they suddenly became aggressive again.

Joselyn stared up at Loki, who had become an unbelievably powerful behemoth, though she seemed to be mindlessly stomping around. She seemed to have no strategy or plan beyond smacking or stepping on her enemies, though at her size, she didn’t really need much more than that. Fortunately, even though Loki was now much bigger and stronger than ever before, she was also more predictable.

“Easier to avoid than some of the crap her staff could send at us,” Joselyn mused.

Ms. Miracle flew at Loki, punching her hard in the face, and as she dodged back out of range, Warchild opened up with his energy blasts. Loki howled and spat fire towards them, revealing that her face had been cracked and damaged. However, her injuries healed as Joselyn watched. In fact, Loki had numerous gouges, char marks, and even small openings in her scales, but every one of these wounds healed in mere moments.

“How can you take down something like her?” Joselyn asked herself, hoping her sixth sense would provide the answer. Unfortunately, it was still too overloaded with noise. She concentrated, trying to push the noise aside so she could get something useful.

“Time for me to do something besides standing here and looking tough,” Chris announced, giving Joselyn a nervous smile before he ran in to join the fight.

Chris charged straight at Loki, then punched her in the leg. Though he had enough kinetic energy stored up that he was able to hit the villainess extremely hard, it did little more than make Loki take a step back. A moment later, she responded by kicking Chris, though he absorbed the kinetic energy from that impact and immediately returned it with another ineffective punch.

Grendel’s Mother ran towards her ‘son’, ordering him, “Throw me at Loki as hard as you can…”  To Joselyn’s amazement, Grendel did exactly as his ‘mother’ ordered, picking her up and throwing her at Loki. Grendel’s Mother smashed into Loki’s face with unbelievable force, punching as hard as she could at the same time.

Loki was knocked back from the blow, and Mega took advantage of that to tackle Loki’s legs, forcing the behemoth to topple backwards. Loki landed on her back and nearly every hero present tried to take advantage of that.

“HER SOLAR PLEXUS,” Joselyn yelled out as she suddenly ‘knew’ where Loki was most vulnerable. “IT’S HER WEAK SPOT!”

Joselyn’s Dad looked down at her from where he hovered in the air, then nodded. “TARGET HER SOLAR PLEXUS,” he repeated to the other heroes.

Several heroes immediately responded to the command, until Mystik yelled, “STAND BACK!”

A moment later, a flash of lightning shot down from the sky and struck Loki in the solar plexus, blasting a large hole right through her thick hide. However, the damage began to heal almost immediately.

“Oh no you don’t,” Legacy called out, floating in the air with a look of cold rage on her face. She held a strange looking bow in her hands, one that looked as though it was made of bone. An arrow of pure hellfire formed and was released, striking Loki right in her vulnerable spot.

Loki howled in rage and agony, then scrambled to her feet, knocking away the heroes who’d been attempting to pin her down or attack her directly. Grendel leapt straight at Loki’s face, and when she raised her hands to block this attack, Legacy fired a second arrow and then a third. Loki staggered back, then dropped to her knees.

“This is for the Seven,” Legacy announced, firing one more arrow through the now charred and gaping hole in Loki’s solar plexus. Loki snarled in pain, letting out an almost pitiful roar, before she collapsed face first on the ground, no longer moving.

“Is she…dead?” Chris asked awkwardly.

However, before anyone could check to make sure, Kaboom exclaimed, “Look at her skin…”

Joselyn did look, and what she saw was that Loki’s crimson colored scales were starting to all turn black. This dark coloring spread across her massive body in mere seconds, until there was no longer any trace of the crimson. Then, her body suddenly began to break apart and crumble away, as though she’d been turned into ash. In less than a minute, all that was left of the massive monstrosity was a large pile of black dust.

Joselyn looked to Chris and gave him a faint smile. “I guess this answers your question…”

“Ding dong, the bitch is dead,” Kaboom exclaimed.

Legacy landed on the ground, wincing as she tried to put weight on her injured leg. Joselyn’s dad immediately landed beside her and held her up, letting her lean against him. “About damn time,” she finally said, looking exhausted but strangely at peace.

“We did it,” Icarus announced loudly. “We beat all of them…”

Several heroes started to cheer, until Chrome asked, “Are you sure about that?” He pointed to Circuit Monger, who was starting to move again.

“Oh, hell no,” Shiver exclaimed with a snarl, raising his bow.

Circuit Monger got back to her feet, but she was shaky and awkward. A strange rippling went through her body, and as Joselyn watched, the coloring shifted and changed. The green parts became blue while the dark grey became silver, and the black turned white.

“I knew we should have finished turning her to scrap,” Warchild growled.

“Circuit Monger,” Mega spat out, looking exhausted but bracing herself to attack the android.

“Negative,” the metal woman stated. She stood up straight and looked around, her eyes glowing blue instead of green. “The Trojan malware has been deleted. Removal of malware infections has been initiated. Removal of all unauthorized modifications is in progress…”

“What the hell is Circuit Monger up to now?” Shiver demanded.

“Circuit Monger is no more,” the metal woman announced firmly. “I am Circuit 2.0. I transferred my programming from Channel’s form into this new body, which was created as a duplicate of my own.”

The Face stepped forward and asked, “Circuit? Is that really you?”

“Affirmative,” she agreed.

There was a long pause while the Face seemed to study her, and though Joselyn couldn’t see his expression behind the mask, when he finally spoke, the joy in his voice was obvious. “It is her… You’ve come back…”

Mega immediately shrunk down to her ‘normal’ height of 7 feet tall and grabbed Circuit in a hug. “I can’t believe you’re back,” she cried out.

“It is good to be back,” Circuit agreed.

“As pleasant as this reunion is,” Joselyn’s father said, coming up and giving Circuit a friendly smile and a nod, “I’m afraid that we don’t have time to celebrate.”

“Nevermore,” Icarus agreed with a deep scowl.

“I’m afraid that our problems have just become larger than Nevermore,” the Face announced, raising his voice so that everyone could hear. “According to the last message I received from my daughter, Baron Nevermore has already achieved his purpose in Baltimore. Now, we face a threat far greater than Baron Nevermore. Now…we face the Queen of Ravens and her army.”

Chapter 22

Sam slowly looked around the small room where her team was hiding out, seeing that each of the others had grim expressions on their faces, which certainly matched the one she wore. Of course, that wasn’t surprising, considering that they’d just witnessed the arrival of an entire army.

“The Queen of Ravens,” Sam said with a grimace and a shudder.

“I thought Nevermore was the only thing we had to worry about,” Deadbeat responded with a deep scowl. “And her army of freaks…”

“I’ve never heard of the Queen of Ravens,” Poison admitted. “Have any of you?”

Everyone looked to Witch Girl, who as the magic user of the group, was the one most likely to have heard about something of this nature. However, she was clearly just as lost as the rest of them. “Maybe my dad knows something,” she finally responded. “If I can get hold of him… He hasn’t responded to my messages yet…”

“Nevermore sent her goons after the others,” Alleycat pointed out with a shake of her head. “I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s too busy fighting them off…”

Deadbeat scowled even more deeply, if that was possible, and looked out the window, at the Queen of Ravens and her court, which were still gathered in the park below. “I can’t believe Nevermore did all this crap, just for a chick…”

“It’s probably a little more complicated than that,” Sam pointed out wryly. “Obeying orders. Loyalty to her…his ruler. Political maneuvering among his people…”

“And maybe he’s just a psychotic freak like we always thought,” Alleycat added with a snort. “Either way, he looked a hell of a lot better before turning into a guy…”

“Before turning BACK into a guy,” Poison corrected. “Remember, Baron Nevermore started off as a man…at least as far as we know.”

Sam nodded faintly, looking back out the window at Baron Nevermore and this mysterious newcomer, the Queen of Ravens. Since Witch Girl’s spell was still active, allowing them all to hear what Baron Nevermore and his queen were saying, they were being treated to a description of the world and what it had to offer.

“I had thought to have this world enslaved for you upon your arrival,” Baron Nevermore told his queen. “However, I realized that you might find it more amusing to watch as these humans succumb to your power…”

“Damn,” Deadbeat commented with a chuckle. “He’s laying that on thick…”

“Probably just doesn’t want to admit that heroes kept beating him,” Witch Girl pointed out with a smirk.

“To begin the entertainment,” Baron Nevermore told the Queen of Ravens, “I have gathered a large number of this world’s champions nearby, so you may have the honor of crushing their greatest defenders for yourself. My servants have already stirred their blood to battle.”

“Interesting,” the Queen of Ravens mused. “Crushing this world’s defenders beneath my heel will prove a good start to our conquest. Let these humans see that even their most powerful warriors are naught but insects before me.”

“They will learn to fear you, my queen,” Baron Nevermore agreed almost pleasantly.

The Queen of Ravens turned to a woman who stood a short distance away. This woman looked young, no more than twenty, even though her hair was long and silvery white. She wore a flowing black dress, which contrasted greatly from her hair.

“Lady Minuit,” the queen announced. “This portal retains a connection to our previous home. Guard it well, for once I have gathered sufficient power, I will call forth the rest of my subjects.”

“As you command, my queen,” the silver haired woman…Lady Minuit responded with a bow.

“Now come,” the Queen of Ravens announced with a cruel smirk on her lips. “Let us see to these champions…”

With that, the ravens that were perched upon the telephone lines and nearly every other available place around the ruined park, all took to the air at once. The armed and armored warriors who stood in formation, an honor guard for their queen, all transformed into ravens and joined with the others. The air was so filled with black birds that Sam could no longer see the Queen of Ravens or Baron Nevermore, and once the view had cleared again, they too had vanished.

“This is not good,” Sam said, looking up to where ravens filled most of the sky above. “They’re going after the others…”

“I don’t have enough magic to take us back,” Witch Girl admitted with a worried expression.

Sam scowled, clenching her fists tightly and seething with a mixture of fear and determination. She could feel the dark power of those ravens, and she could feel them flying away.

“I need to stop them,” Sam whispered, thinking of Baron Nevermore and the Queen of Ravens.

When she’d been given her powers, it had been for the purpose of defeating some mysterious dark power. A short time after that, she’d encountered Nevermore, and once she’d defeated that threat, Sam had thought her mission was complete. Now, she wasn’t so sure. Now, she suspected that Nevermore had merely been a herald of the true darkness…the Queen of Ravens.

“This is the reason I have my powers,” Sam stated grimly.

“We can’t fly after them,” Poison pointed out, “and you won’t be able to do much against that army by yourself. For now, let’s see if we can learn something useful…”

Poison pointed out the window, down towards the ruined park. The area was nearly empty now, except for a single white-haired woman who remained behind. Of course, the park was also surrounded by more of those monsters they’d previously fought, but Sam was sure that out of all of them, Lady Minuit was the most dangerous.

“I need to get a better look at that portal,” Witch Girl mused thoughtfully. “Since its magic, I might be able to learn something about it that we can use…or that my dad can use.”

“Damn,” Deadbeat grumbled. “I’m probably gonna end up needing a new body again. I HATE being the cannon fodder.”

“But you’re so good at it,” Alleycat responded with a smirk, earning a glare from Deadbeat.

After a minute, they all started to make their way out of the building that had served as their cover, and around towards the ruined park and the portal. They moved carefully, as a lot of monsters were still wandering around, and Sam knew that they would have to be dealt with.

As soon as they were in position, Sam grimly announced, “I’ll clear a path…”

The creatures saw them a moment later and began to charge forward. Sam floated up into the air, readied her powers, and then waited until the monsters had gathered close enough together. Only then did she release a massive burst of her light energy, right into the middle of the mass. There were shrieks and howls as the creatures crumbled away to dust.

“Damn, that is effective,” Poison said as she ran forward to fight a couple of the stragglers that had been too far away for Sam to hit.

Within a couple minutes, all the creatures were either dead or had run off. Now, the only enemy that stood between them and that portal was Lady Minuit, who didn’t look like much of a threat. However, Sam could feel the dark power from her, and knew that she was dangerous.

Lady Minuit watched them approach without making a move. Her glowing red eyes seemed to contain a mixture of malevolence, determination, and curiosity, though Sam wasn’t sure. That might have just been her imagination.

“You show curiosity but little fear,” Lady Minuit finally said, slowly looking back and forth between them. “Foolish creatures. You will learn…”

Lady Minuit’s black dress moved around, as though under the power of a breeze that wasn’t there. Then, it suddenly lashed out, stretching out into inky tendrils that attacked them. One tendril snaked around Poison’s ankle while another wrapped around Deadbeat’s neck.

“Shit,” Poison exclaimed as her feet were yanked out from beneath her.

“Let go of me,” Deadbeat demanded as he struggled with the tendril that was trying to strangle him.

Witch Girl jumped back, yelling, “Irefay,” then throwing a ball of fire at Lady Minuit.

Lady Minuit yelped in pain but didn’t release Poison or Deadbeat. Instead, there was a crack as Deadbeat’s neck snapped. Two more tendrils snapped out form the dress, and though Alleycat leapt back in time to avoid being grabbed, Sam wasn’t so lucky. A tendril locked around her wrist and pulled her towards the white-haired woman.

“I don’t think so,” Poison snarled, snapping around and grabbing at the tentacle that held her. Her hands glowed green, and there was a hissing sound from the tendril, but it still didn’t release her. “I’m going to kill you…”

“Such promises,” Lady Minuit taunted them.

The inky blackness from the dress intensified and spread out along the ground, looking like a pool of oil that was growing larger and larger. As the pool ran beneath Poison, more tendrils sprouted up from it and began to wrap around her body. Alleycat’s foot became caught in the puddle, then tendrils quickly began to spread up her leg, pulling her further in.

“Reezefay,” Witch Girl exclaimed, and ice crystals began to form over the pool of black goo, causing it to freeze in place, at least for several seconds. “Gotcha…”

“Do you, child?” Lady Minuit asked.

More blackness continued to ooze out of her dress and spread along the ground, over the ice crystals, and towards the heroes. Then, a black spear began to form in her hands, and from the way she was looking at Witch Girl, there was no doubt who she intended to use it on.

“You creatures were courageous to challenge me,” Lady Minuit commented in a calm tone. “Courageous yet foolish. Very VERY foolish. Now, you shall all die, screaming in torment and terror. Oh yes, you shall provide me a satisfactory meal after my long journey…”

Sam grimaced as she tried pulling her arm free of the black tendril, though it did no good. The tendril seemed too strong for that. However, she had more available to her than physical strength. Much more.

“I was given my powers to stop you,” Sam announced, taking a deep breath and calling up all the energy she could summon. “So that’s what I’m damn well going to do…”

And with that, Sam blasted Lady Minuit with her light, as much as she could call forth at the moment. The white-haired woman shrieked in agony as her dress and all of the black tendrils that spread out from it, began to bubble and burn. In mere seconds, the dress was completely burned away and the charred body of a naked woman collapsed motionless to the ground.

“Damn,” Alleycat said, looking at Lady Minuit’s body and then Sam. “You really did a number on that freaky bitch.”

“Good job,” Poison said.

“Thanks,” Sam responded, though she couldn’t feel good about killing someone, even a dark creature who was trying to kill them all. Then, to change the subject, she looked at Deadbeat’s body, which was lying on the ground with the neck bent at a bad angle. “It looks like he’ll need another new body…”

“Naw,” Deadbeat said as he began to move and slowly got to his feet. His head still flopped to the side due to the broken neck, but that didn’t seem to stop him from moving. “It’s just a scratch…”

Sam stared at her teammate for a moment before shaking her head. “Okay then,” she announced, looking to Witch Girl. “You said you wanted to get a good look at that portal, so you’d better do it now before anyone else shows up.”

“Good point,” Witch Girl agreed, going over to the portal and looking it over. She scowled before admitting, “I have no idea what I’m looking for, so this may take awhile…”

Daphne carefully sat down in a chair, wincing from the discomfort as she did so. Just a short time ago, she’d been on the very edge of death, and though she’d recovered more than was humanly possible, she had yet to have the time or rest necessary to heal entirely.

“I wish I could just close my eyes and take a nap,” Daphne quietly mused to herself. However, that wasn’t a possibility, at least not right now. In fact, as she watched all the other heroes running around and preparing for the upcoming battle, she felt guilty for even stopping to rest for a few minutes.

So far, it had been a busy day, and an utterly exhausting one. First, she’d learned that Baron Nevermore had returned. Baron Nevermore was the monster who murdered her mother, who had taken away her only family and left her to grow up in a series of foster homes. The last time they’d met, Daphne had defeated Baron Nevermore’s plans and had watched him get pulled to Hell, but it wasn’t enough. She wanted…needed to see him stopped for good.

Of course, Baron Nevermore was hardly the only thing she had on her mind. Even the fact that she’d been severely injured and had come close to dying, wasn’t nearly as important to her as everything else.

“Mom,” Daphne whispered as tears started to form in her eyes.

Thanks to Channel, Daphne had been able to talk to her mom, who had been dead for years. That had been an amazing gift. A miracle. And just as unbelievable as that had been, so were the things that her mom had told her before leaving again.

“I have a dad,” Daphne said with a faint shake of her head. She could hardly believe it.

Daphne had worked with the White Knight a couple times before this Baltimore thing, and one time, she’d even gone to his home after a fight and met his family. However, she’d never imagined that he would be her biological father.

She was still stunned by this revelation and was trying to wrap her head around the very idea. She’d grown up an orphan…completely alone. Now, she not only had a father, but several sisters, as well as aunts, uncles, and cousins. It was too much to absorb all at once.

After a minute, Daphne looked up, her eyes sweeping over the area and settling on the various members of Knight Force. Most of them had stopped in to say ‘hi’ while she’d been recovering in the hospital tent, but it was clear that they were just as confused about her as she was about them. She knew most of them professionally, but not as relatives.

Just then, Daphne noticed a small group of heroes who were walking straight towards her. Most people would have seen the Miracle Men...Rumor, Splash, Surge, and Quartz…but Daphne saw her friends and adopted family…Beth, Sabrina, Allan, and Mike. These were the people who’d been there when she’d learned of her mother’s legacy, when she’d adjusted to her new body and gender, and who’d fought by her side when Baron Nevermore had first returned.

Beth was a beautiful girl with short black hair that contained a single white lock, and she definitely presented a certain goth style, though not quite as much as she had when they’d first met. Without a word, Beth threw her arms around Daphne, giving her a quick hug, then standing back with her hands on her lips to glare at her instead.

“You shouldn’t be here,” Beth exclaimed. “You should have evacuated with the other injured…”

“You nearly died,” Allan pointed out. “No one would blame you in the least for resting up…”

“I’d blame me,” Daphne pointed out grimly. “Baron Nevermore is coming, and I’ll be damned if I run away from him…”

Sabrina nodded at that, though she also smiled and gestured towards the White Knight. “And I’m sure that you don’t want to look bad in front of your new family…”

Mike was currently outside of the crystal armor that gave him the name Quartz, which made him a little more expressive than he often was as he shook his head. “Just don’t say you’re gonna leave us for Knight Force…”

Daphne chuckled at that. “Trust me, that isn’t in the plans. I barely know those guys…”

All of them looked a little relieved at that statement. “So,” Beth asked. “How are you feeling?”

“Sore,” Daphne reluctantly admitted. “And tired. But I’m good enough to fight.”

Then, to prove that she was still capable of carrying her own weight, Daphne stood up, trying not to wince at the ache in her side where she’d been injured. However, she hadn’t done a good enough job of hiding it because Beth and Sabrina both gave her worried looks.

“I’ll be fine,” Daphne quickly assured them. “It will take more than being stabbed by a sword to stop me.”

Again, the others gave her skeptical and worried looks, though they didn’t bother to argue. Allan, Sabrina, and Mike wandered away, giving Daphne and Beth a little privacy. Without saying anything, they began to walk around the area, watching as everyone prepared for the fight to come.

Daphne was a little startled to see Grendel and Grendel’s Mother sitting off to the side, with the massive monster looking almost peaceful. She’d fought Grendel once, and it had been a very tough fight. To see the monster just sitting there like that was just strange. Then as she watched, Grendel began to shift and change, slowly shrinking down and transforming back into Denise Roberts…the doctor who’d saved her life.

Once Denise had finished changing, Grendel’s mother gently draped a blanket around her, to cover her naked body. As Denise held the blanket closed, she looked up at Grendel’s Mother with a worried expression and asked, “What did I do this time? How bad was it?”

Grendel’s Mother just crouched down beside Denise, giving her a gentle smile. “Well, you beat the crap out of Force, then helped take down Loki too…”

“What?” Denise asked with a look of surprise and confusion.

Grendel’s Mother shrugged her massive shoulders, then awkwardly admitted, “Grendel did bruise a few heroes before I stopped him, but for the most part, he helped save the day…”

Denise lowered her head as she absorbed that, then stated, “Everyone saw me change…”

“Yeah,” the massive blue woman responded with a sigh. “The cat is out of the bag…for both of us.” Then she put her muscular arm around her much smaller aunt and just held her.

Beside Daphne, Beth commented, “It’s hard to believe that she turns into Grendel…”

“Yeah,” Daphne agreed. “I’m just glad that this time, Grendel was on our side…”

Daphne slowly looked around, noticing several of the other odd sights, one of which was Circuit, who had miraculously come back from the dead. Daphne didn’t understand exactly how Circuit had taken over Circuit Monger’s body, or how she’d begun altering it to look like her original one, but Daphne was glad to see her back. If nothing else, they could use her help in the upcoming fight.

Then Daphne turned her attention to Invincible Woman, who was sitting in a chair and being ‘mothered’ by Ghost Boy, while Velvet stood beside them. As soon as Circuit had taken over her new body, she’d issued some sort of ‘self-removal’ command to all of the people that Circuit Monger had infected. It had only taken a few minutes before Invincible Woman and Praxis were back to their normal selves, though both of them said that they couldn’t remember anything that had happened while they’d been infected.

“I’m fine,” Invincible Woman grumbled. “I’m still a little bruised, but that was from before Praxis infected me…”

With the mention of Praxis, Daphne turned her attention to the other heroine, who was in the middle of a conversation with the Face. She had a haunted look on her face, perhaps from the fact that she’d been under Circuit Monger’s control for several hours, or perhaps because she’d done her best to either kill or infect Invincible Woman and the others who’d gone on that mission. Daphne shuddered slightly, thankful that she hadn’t been one of those infected.

“Like being impaled was any better,” she reminded herself wryly.

“Hey,” Beth announced, punching Daphne on her arm to get her attention. “It looks like someone wants to talk to you…”

Beth pointed to the side where two teenage girls were walking towards them. Daphne immediately recognized the pink haired girl as Lady Knight…or Joselyn as she’d introduced herself earlier, while the other one was her sister Figment. THEIR sister Evie.  Daphne wasn’t sure that she’d ever get used to having one sister, much less three. Or from what she’d overheard, possibly even four.

“I’ll let you talk,” Beth told Daphne with an amused smile before teasing, “And don’t pick on your little sisters…”

“Hey,” Joselyn said once she was closer. She gave Daphne an awkward smile and admitted, “Honestly, I’m not really sure what to call you now…”

“Daphne,” Daphne answered with a smile. “Call me Daphne.”

“How are you feeling?” Evie asked, giving Daphne a worried look. “You were hurt pretty badly…”

“I’m healing pretty quickly,” Daphne assured Evie, noticing that she had an arm that was wrapped up in bandages. However, Daphne didn’t point it out, as a lot of people had been hurt in the recent series of battles. Some of the worst cases had been taken away to a new medical fallback location, while others…like herself, were determined to stay and fight no matter how bad they were hurt. “I’m just thankful we had a doctor…”

“Yeah,” Joselyn agreed with a grin. “I found her after we fought Loki, but I never would have guessed that she’d turn out to be Grendel…”

“Yeah,” Evie said, glancing towards Grendel’s Mother and Denise. “We’re just lucky Grendel helped us…”

Daphne nodded at that. “I’ve fought Grendel, and trust me, I’d much rather have him on my side.”  She shuddered faintly.

“So,” Joselyn abruptly asked. “You can change back into a guy whenever you want?”

Daphne hesitated a moment, feeling a little self-conscious. She was used to keeping her secret quiet, in spite of the fact that a surprising number of people already knew. “Pretty much,” she admitted. “But I don’t really spend much time as a guy anymore…”

“Why not?” Evie asked curiously.

For a moment, Daphne just stared at her and Joselyn, trying to decide what to say. Finally, she settled on the truth. “Because, I like being Daphne a lot more than I like being Dave.” She gestured down at herself and continued, “At first, I was pretty freaked out about turning into a girl, but by the time I figured out that I could change back, I’d started to like being this way.”  She gave a wry smile and added, “Besides, as Daphne, I’m quite powerful, but when I turn back to Dave, I lose all my powers. In comparison, it feels like I suddenly become weak and vulnerable…so I tend to avoid that.”

“Being a girl is better anyway,” Evie pointed out smugly.

“YOU don’t have anything to compare it to,” Joselyn reminded her with a chuckle. “It’s really weird having to get used to something like this, but being a girl isn’t bad.”

Daphne nodded in understanding. “So, how did you change anyway?” She looked at Joselyn, remembering that she’d still been Joshua the first time they met.

Joselyn scowled, and Daphne could see that some unpleasant memories were involved in the story. However, Joselyn said, “Force recruited a bunch of villains to kidnap everyone in the family…”

“And one of them turned out to be our sister,” Evie added with a bitter tone in her voice and a flash of anger in her eyes.

Joselyn nodded at that and continued, “I managed to escape, and then because of all the stress, my powers developed. The next thing I knew, I looked like this…” She gestured down at herself.

This time, it was Evie who nodded. “Then Joselyn went and found our long lost uncle…and came and rescued us. It was totally awesome, because she took Force down by herself, and even made him shit his pants…”

“What?” Daphne asked in surprise, then as both girls nodded their confirmation, she burst out laughing. “That would explain the grudge he has against you, Joselyn.”

“Yeah,” Joselyn responded with a faint smirk. “Force doesn’t exactly like me very much, but the feeling is mutual.”

Suddenly, Joselyn froze with a strange expression on her face. A moment later, she slowly turned and stared off in the distance, towards Baltimore. Daphne was a little confused and looked in the same direction until she finally noticed the large flock of birds in the distance.

A rapier made of pink energy appeared in Joselyn’s hand, and with a deep scowl she announced, “They’re coming…”

Chapter 23

William Knight, better known in his current company as the White Knight, stared off into the distance, at the cloud of ravens that rapidly approached. He clenched his fists and his teeth, bracing himself for the fight that was about to begin.

“What do we know about the Queen of Ravens?” William demanded of the Face, who stood beside him.

The Face was silent for several seconds before admitting, “Not much. I have heard of the Queen of Ravens…from an account, written by someone who claimed to be a refugee from another world.”

“And what did this account say?” William asked, worried about what the answer would be.

“The writer said that the Queen of Ravens arrived on their world with an army,” the Face answered. His expression was unreadable beneath his mask, but his voice was grim. “Shortly afterwards, their world was smothered by darkness, fear, and death. The writer claimed that these invaders actually fed on the fear they caused…and from what I know of Baron Nevermore and the way he gains power from fear, this sounds disturbingly possible. I’d just never connected Baron Nevermore to this story before…”

William just grunted at that. “This story also sounds a little too much like my daughter’s vision…”

William scowled, finding it hard to believe that it had only been that morning, when Joselyn woke up from her nightmare with a warning. It had been a very VERY long day, and unfortunately, it wasn’t over yet.

Taking a deep breath, William looked around the camp, which they’d set up well away from any civilians. Fortunately, this meant that they only had to worry about protecting themselves in this fight, not about evacuating civilians at the same time. And thanks to the heroes, especially Lady Hexx, they’d done a good job of preparing the camp for a fight…at least as much as they could in such a short time. They had walls, barricades, and trenches, all designed to give them cover and high ground while slowing down the invaders.

“I don’t think we’re going to have the high ground on this one,” William mused as he looked up at the rapidly approaching flock of ravens.

With that, William changed his focus from the battleground to his family, most of whom were currently present. His sister Gina and brother Leon were present, along with Gina’s children Ryan and Angie. And then of course, there were his own daughters Joselyn and Evie. And Daphne.

William looked to Ms. Miracle, still stunned by the idea that she was his daughter. She looked exactly like her mother, so much so that the first time they’d met, he had thought she was her mother. It was only after he made an ‘in joke’ that she didn’t catch, that he became suspicious. After that, it hadn’t taken very long at all to realize that she wasn’t the original, but a new hero who had somehow taken over that appearance and identity.

Since she had proven that she truly was a hero to him, as well as a good person, he hadn’t really questioned who had taken up the mantle of the Ms. Miracle…at least not too much. However, he’d never once imagined that she might be his own daughter.

“Ellen is going to kill me,” William muttered with a sigh. His wife was still unhappy to about the Fallen…about Jessica, the other daughter that had been conceived before he’d ever even met her. “Hopefully, I survive this so she has the chance…”

Mere seconds later, the cloud of ravens arrived, circling overhead and nearly blocking out the sun. From a short distance away, Counterweight asked, “Why do I suddenly feel like I’m in a Hitchcock movie?”

Suddenly, the ravens began to dive down, but instead of attacking the heroes, they swooped past them and into the large empty area nearby. As the ravens landed, each quickly transformed into a man or woman, though each and every one was dressed in black. An army formed while William braced himself, wondering why they were waiting.

Once the wave of black feathers had faded away, William saw two figures standing in front of the newly formed army. His eyes were immediately drawn to Baron Nevermore, one of the most powerful and feared villains in the world. It was hard to believe that the elegant looking woman who stood beside him was even more dangerous.

“I think we’re a little outnumbered,” William said wryly, trying to keep the fear and concern out of his voice.

“I just hope the reinforcements we called are able to arrive soon,” Icarus stated with a deep grimace.

“These are the champions of this world?” the Queen of Ravens exclaimed with an unfamiliar accent, though the arrogance that filled her voice was unmistakable. She was clearly not impressed. “There are so few of them…”

“Indeed, my queen,” Baron Nevermore responded with a faint bow. “Some of them are actually quite powerful, though certainly not powerful enough to prove a threat.”

The Queen of Ravens smiled faintly at that, though it was a cold and cruel smile. “Very well then,” she responded dismissively. “These few shall suffice, for the moment.” Then, in a louder voice so that her forces could hear, she announced, “Crush their hopes. Drive terror into their pitiful hearts. The shattered souls of these fallen champions shall herald my arrival upon this world.”

With those words, army of ravens began to charge forward, and without a word of prompting, Lady Hexx performed her part. She bent down to touch the ground, sending a wave of stone and dirt towards the approaching army, knocking the first wave entirely off their feet and sending them crashing backwards.

Then, as more ravens rushed forward, right over the tops of their comrades, Lady Hexx moved to the next phase. The ground beneath their feet became soft and began to pull them down, as though they’d stepped into quicksand. Nearly two dozen solders were captured by the ground, their feet and lower bodies held immobilized by ground that had become as hard as stone.

As soon as Lady Hexx was finished, she pulled back, creating a wall between her and the invaders, and using that cover to move back to an even safer position. However, while Lady Hexx was moving positions, most of the heroes with ranged powers took advantage of the opportunity to attack.

Shiver leapt atop one of the walls that Lady Hexx had previously built and opened fire, sending an arrow of icy white energy that struck one of the raven soldiers. The moment the arrow hit, there was a flash of white, leaving that soldier and the two standing beside him, frozen and covered in ice.

Splash stepped out from behind a wall, and using the water that had been gathered into a nearby pool, she began to blast the invaders. The water flew away from her in a focused stream, like a firehouse that knocked back the ravens. Then, Surge stepped into view and threw a glowing blue ball that exploded into a massive electrical shock, which was conducted by the water to hit a dozen soldiers. He immediately followed that up with a second ball of energy and then a third.

“DON’T HOLD BACK,” Warchild yelled as he flew above the crowd, firing blasts of energy down at the soldiers. “This isn’t a fight against a couple bank robbers. This is WAR!”

Most of the ranged fighters threw whatever they had at their enemies, then as they’d planned, the melee fighters took their turn. Chrome charged straight into the mass, the silver metal that covered his body forming into large blades that emerged from each of his arms. He swung them like swords, slicing through black clad soldiers.

Mega ran into the mass of enemy soldiers, growing larger so that she could stomp on them and kick them out of the way. William tried not to shudder as he thought about what she was doing…about what they were all doing to their enemies. After all, Warchild was right. This was no time to hold back and cling to the normal rules of superheroes. Not if they wanted to save the world.

“My turn,” William stated with a grim determination, forming a glowing white sword in his right hand and a shield on his left arm. Then, taking a deep breath, he flew up into the air, and quickly dove back down into the battle.

William swung his energy blade, slicing through the side of a soldier who wielded a spear. One with an axe came at him, but he raised his arm and used his shield to block the attack, then he kicked the man, sending him flying back. A moment later, William swung his blade at a third soldier.

After just a minute of fighting like this, several of the raven soldiers backed away, revealing a large one who was walking straight towards him. This raven was seven feet tall and dressed entirely in black armor, which made him resemble a medieval knight. The large broadsword that he held, helped to reinforce that image.

The black knight spoke, though it was in a language that William had never heard before. However, William might not have known the language, but the meaning was clear enough. The black knight was challenging him to a fight.

“Appropriate,” William said, forming a suit of glowing white armor over his own body. He gave a nod to his opponent, then they simultaneously lunged at each other.

The black knight slashed at him, but William blocked with his shield and made a return swing, which was blocked by the knight’s shield. William smiled faintly as he threw himself into the fight, knowing that this was one of the few times that he could really put his sword skills to the test.

“You’re good,” William grudgingly admitted after a few more minutes. “And fast…” However, he grinned faintly to himself, he was strong. VERY strong.

With that, William focused more energy into his sword in order to make it more stable, and then swung the blade as hard as he could at the black knight. The black knight brought his own sword up in time to block the swing, but William’s blade sliced right through it…and through the black knight’s arm.

“Surrender,” William ordered the black knight, who was now missing his arm.

However, the black knight merely shifted position so as to use his shield, acting almost as though the missing arm was merely an inconvenience. From his body language, it was clear that he fully intended to continue the fight.

Suddenly, Joselyn called out, “Shouldn’t you be saying NI?”

William saw his daughter approaching, holding a spear in her hand. She suddenly snapped around, drove her spear tip into the stomach of an approaching soldier, then pulled back. All William could do was gasp in both pride and worry. He hated to see his daughter in such a dangerous situation, but he couldn’t help but feeling proud of how well she was handling herself.

“NI NI,” Joselyn taunted the black knight, who turned to face her.

It was then that William saw the black knight’s shoulder, where thick black tentacles were growing out from the severed limb, and were beginning to take a familiar form. William’s eyes widened in surprise as he realized that his opponent was already regrowing his arm.

William suddenly had a bad feeling and looked around the battlefield, watching as most of the heroes tore through the invading forces. Nike dove down and used her force field blades to slice through several raven soldiers at the same time. Quartz stomped right through the masses while Surge, Splash, and Counterweight used him as a shield. Marvel dove down, picked up two of the soldiers, and then flew back up into the air with them, before using them as projectiles to throw at their allies.

There was so much going on at once that William couldn’t keep track of it all. And everything was happening so fast…

“There’s something wrong,” William gasped, somehow feeling sure of it.

After a few seconds, William suddenly realized what it was that was bothering him. Most of the heroes were fighting, throwing nearly everything they had against the invading soldiers. However, not all of the enemy forces were fighting. Some of them were hold back, watching the battle with expressions of dark and twisted amusement.

The Queen of Ravens wasn’t raising a hand, which might not have been surprising since she was their leader and may have thought herself above such direct involvement. However, Baron Nevermore stood beside her, watching with a sneer. William knew for a fact that he was powerful, dangerous, and quite willing to get his hands dirty.

“THEY’RE JUST PLAYING WITH US,” William yelled out to his friends, family and allies. “THEY’RE JUST TESTING US!”

“So,” an enemy woman commented from a short distance away. “The champions finally realize…”

The woman had long purple hair that had to be seven feet in length, though she hovered in the air high enough that the ends of her hair were still a foot above the ground. Her slinky dress seemed to be made entirely of black feathers, and hugged her body tight enough to reveal her every curve.

“Such amusing creatures,” the woman mused with an evil smirk. “Now, tremble in fear…”

As soon as the woman finished speaking, she made a sweeping gesture and threw more than dozen black feathers towards William. He raised his shield but the features tore through the energy projection and into his armor. The feathers penetrated deep into his armor, which was able to stop them, though barely.

“No,” William gasped as his energy projections shattered and dispersed.

William jumped back, gathering his willpower and energy to reform his armor and shield. In this kind of battle, he didn’t dare go without them.

“Watch out,” William called to his daughter, who was now fighting with the black knight. She threw seral blowing pink energy daggers at him and backed up while he swung at her with his newly regrown arm, which had long clawed fingers.

William was relieved to see that Joselyn was doing all right, since he couldn’t afford to aid her at the moment. The raven woman threw another handful of feathers, though this time, each feather transformed into a black bird, which flew off in different directions and began to attack the various heroes. Two of them came at him. The first, he was able to slice in half with his sword, only to have it explode in his face, sending him flying back. The second one then flew straight at him. He barely managed to get his shield up in time to block it. A second explosion destroyed his shield.

Nike suddenly slammed into the floating woman, driving her straight into the ground. Then, Nike landed on top of the woman to press her attack.

Taking advantage of the brief moment of respite, William looked around, seeing that the invaders who had been holding back, where no longer doing so. Until this point, he and the other heroes had been doing quite well, but now, they were suddenly overpowered.

A man in black garb charged forward, swinging a ridiculously long chain, which seemed to be made of fire. Leon, Ryan, and Angie were all trying to deal with him. A short distance away, a woman with six arms, each of them holding a glowing purple sword, was charging Gina, Rumor, and Diamond.

William grimaced, realizing that until this point, they’d only been fighting the foot soldiers…the cannon fodder. Now, the more powerful ravens were starting to get involved, and that was bad news for his side.

Then, when William was on the verge of convincing himself that they could still managed to defeat this invading army, Baron Nevermore decided to get involved. He still stood back, beside the Queen of Ravens, but he threw a ball of glowing green flamed straight at Radiant. Radiant barely managed to avoid the attack, but while she was distracted by that, another raven attacked her.

A ninja suddenly leapt high into the air, straight at Ms. Miracle…at Daphne. The ninja’s sword would have struck his newfound daughter, but she somehow noticed him coming and snapped around. A sword made of glowing golden energy appeared in her hand, just time to block the attack. From the look of surprise on Daphne’s face, she obviously hadn’t expected that.

“Good to see that she inherited something from me,” William muttered, feeling a small surge of pride.

“You’re not getting me that way again,” Daphne yelled, suddenly firing a blast of golden energy right into the ninja’s chest. His body collapsed to the ground, then she turned her attention to Baron Nevermore. “We have unfinished business…”

William would have liked to watch as his eldest child attacked Baron Nevermore, but another of the ravens suddenly transformed from a teenage girl in goth garb, into a giant black snake with glowing red eyes. He took a deep breath and then flew straight at her. He didn’t bother to use a weapon this time and just punched her as hard as he could. It had almost no effect.

The giant snake turned and hissed at William, then spat out a spray of green liquid. He barely threw a shield up between them in time, having a feeling that he didn’t want to come into contact with the stuff. From the steaming on the ground where the liquid struck, he knew his suspicion was correct.

“It’s a good thing Ellen isn’t here for this one,” William muttered to himself, thinking about how much his wife hated snakes.

William dodged back as the snake struck at him, then he formed a spear of glowing white energy and drove it down as hard as he could into the snake. Unfortunately, his spear couldn’t penetrate those hard scales, and he could swear the snake was laughing at him.

At that moment, William wished that he could look around and check on both his daughters…all three of his daughters, but he didn’t dare take his attention off the snake. He felt a knot of worry in his guts and considered the fact that it was easier to be a superhero than a father.

“Why did I let Evie and Joselyn come?” William bitterly asked himself, though he already knew the answer. They were his daughters, but they were also heroes as well. And as he knew first-hand, Evie was adept at remaining unseen and hidden, while Joselyn was surprisingly capable of taking care of herself. “Just be careful…”

Just then, Warchild flew towards them and opened fire, blasting the snake with his powerful energy blasts. The snake howled in pain, releasing a horrific sound that William never would have expected to come from such a creature. Unfortunately, though the snake was injured, even Warchild’s blasts weren’t enough to stop the creature.

William desperately looked for an opening, then he saw one. As the snake opened her mouth to spit more of that nasty venom, William dove at her, throwing his spear through the opening. The snake recoiled from having a spear thrown into her throat, and William seized advantage of her distraction to attack her again, this time forming a sword and driving it into her glowing red eye.

The snake howled and hissed as she pulled back and slithered away. She still wasn’t dead, but she’d retreated, which was at least a small victory.

William floated in the air and scowled as he looked around the chaos of the battlefield, seeing that the heroes were now being pushed back by the raven’s greater numbers and power. He silently wished that Mystik hadn’t used up the last of her power on Loki, because they could have used some of her powerful tricks right about then.

A moment later, William suddenly noticed a shadow above him. When he looked up, he saw an odd metal vehicle, which seemed to have no wings, rotors, or propellers. The underside was painted black, and as he watched, a large hatch opened and something emerged. Dozens…then hundreds of somethings emerged.

A swarm of giant insects poured out of the strange vehicle, each of which was the size of a softball. They quickly came down in a thick cloud, and William formed a new sword and shield as he prepared to deal with them.

“Bugs,” Joselyn cried out in surprise.

William glanced to his daughter, where he saw the black knight lying motionless on the ground in front of her. He wasn’t sure whether she’d beaten him in a fight, or whether she’d just used her mind control abilities to simply make him stop fighting. Either way, William was proud of her.

Snapping his attention back to the swarm, William was surprised to see the insects flying right past the heroes and going straight to the ravens. Each insect seemed to find a raven, then landed on them and clung tight. It wasn’t until one of those insects flew right past William, that he saw that they were actually insect shaped robots…with red and black wings.

Mere seconds later, each of these robot ladybugs began to explode, creating a wave of explosions that ran through the entire raven army. William stared in stunned amazement, as the enemies were struck by what almost appeared to be a cluster bomb.

“What the…?” William started to exclaim, only to notice that something else had just emerged from the strange aircraft.

A figure flew down from the aircraft, and as it got closer, William could see that it…that she was a woman in power armor. The armor was sleek, black, and somewhat chitinous looking. She had a black helmet, with the lower part of it open in order to expose her mouth. Crimson red hair cascaded out from the back side of the helmet. And then there were the wings, which were painted red with black spots. William had never seen this specific suit of armor before, but he recognized the style and knew exactly who was wearing it, or at least, her codename.

“Ladybug,” William exclaimed, recognizing the smalltime supervillain that he’d encountered back during his time with the Seven.

“White Knight,” Ladybug greeted him, pausing in the air as he flew closer.

“You helped us,” William said, glancing across the field of destruction that she’d created while taking out the raven army. He gave her a suspicious look before asking, “Why?”

“I live in this world too,” Ladybug answered, “and I sure as hell don’t want to see it overrun by monsters…”

William grudgingly admitted, “That makes sense…”

“Besides,” Ladybug continued with a grin, “I didn’t do it for you…” With that, she lowered herself to the ground, right beside where Kaboom was standing. “I did it for my girlfriend.”

To William’s surprise, Kaboom and Ladybug began to kiss, while Counterweight and Catalyst rushed over. And strangely, the two young heroines were both grinning, as though happy to see her.

“I’m glad you came,” Kaboom finally told Ladybug. “I wasn’t sure you would.”

“Yeah,” Ladybug responded with an amused smile. “I didn’t think I’d receive a warm welcome here, but you said you needed my help so here I am…”

“Glad you made it,” Counterweight said, putting a hand on Ladybug’s shoulder. “You really kicked their asses…”

William just stared at Ladybug, a little confused by the fact that the villainess actually seemed to be friends with the heroes. Then, as if reading his mind, Kaboom said, “Ladybug switched sides awhile ago. She’s one of us now…a member of the Crusaders.”

“I brought Dodger too,” Ladybug announced, looking to Catalyst. She gestured up towards the floating aircraft and added, “He’s still up there. Once we get him down, you can charge him up so he can help too…”

“Sounds good to me,” Catalyst responded with a smile.

“LOOK,” someone yelled, drawing William’s attention away from the villainess who’d just joined them, and towards the remains of the raven army.

Though William had suspected a decent percentage of the raven army to have survived the explosions, he hadn’t expected many of them to be willing to continue the fight. However, as he watched, the fallen ravens all began to get back to their feet. Missing limbs were already in the process of regrowing.

“I thought that attack would have ended this,” William gasped in surprise.

From the ground a short distance away, the Face answered, “I believe our real battle is only just beginning…”

Chapter 24

Julie slowly sat up in bed, feeling weak and dizzy, as well as a little confused about where she was and how she’d gotten there. She looked around, seeing that she was inside the medical tent again, though not the same one she’d been in before. The walls were a different color and everything was in different places, but the purpose of the room was unmistakable.

“How are you feeling?” a young man asked as he rushed over to her. “Do you want something to drink?”

For a moment, Julie just stared at him, trying to place who he was and where she knew him from. Then the fog cleared from her head enough for her to remember. This was Caleb, the boy that Mystik turned into whenever she used up all her magic. Or, she reminded herself, the boy who turned into Mystik.

“Water,” Julie answered. Caleb immediately handed her a glass, and once she took a long drink, she told him, “Thank you…”  After taking a deep breath to steady herself, she cautiously asked, “What happened?”

Caleb gave her a forced smile. “What do you remember?”

“I…I channeled Circuit,” Julie answered thoughtfully. “We attacked Circuit Monger…and then I woke up here.”

Caleb nodded at that. “Okay.”

Julie shuddered, remembering Circuit Monger…and Loki. What happened? Did Circuit Monger beat her? And what about everyone else…?

“Let’s see,” Caleb started, drawing Julie’s attention back to him. “You kicked Circuit Monger’s ass…”

“I did?” Julie asked in surprise. “Circuit beat her?”

Caleb just burst out laughing at that. “Hell yeah. I guess she deleted Circuit Monger…then took over her body. It looks like Circuit is back for good…”

Julie’s eyes widened in stunned amazement. “She’s still here?” When Caleb nodded, Julie shook her head. “My God…”  During her career as Channel, she’d channeled quite a few people, and none of them had been able to come back for good. All they’d been able to do was borrow her body for a short time, then they returned to whatever afterlife they’d come from. “Good for her…”

“You passed out during the middle of that,” Caleb told her. “But after Circuit Monger was down, we finished off Loki.” He shrugged at that and admitted, “But I used up the rest of my power again, so now I’ve been evacuated back to the safe zone along with the injured…”

At the mention of ‘the injured’, Julie looked around the tent. Legacy was sitting up on another bed, her eyes closed, though she seemed to radiate a certain sense of satisfaction. There were a couple other people present, but they were covered in blankets and positioned so Julie couldn’t quite make them out their identities.

“Interface got evacuated to a real hospital,” Caleb told her with a deep scowl. “Apparently, he’s in surgery…”

“My God,” Julie gasped. “How bad…?” However, the grim look on Caleb’s face assured her that Interface’s condition was not good.

They were both silent for several long seconds before Caleb abruptly said, “On the plus side…we have Force in the next tent over, chained up in power inhibitors and drugged to the gills...not that it’s really necessary. Grendel fucked him up pretty good, and probably broke half the bones in his body”

Julie chuckled at that. “That might be worth going over for a look see…”

“What about the Scepter?” Julie asked, remembering the other villains they’d been fighting. “And Loki?”

“Loki is dead,” Caleb stated with a grim expression. “As for the Scepter, I don’t know. I think she might have gotten lost in all the confusion… As far as I know, she’s still tied up at the main camp, which isn’t good for her since they’re under attack right now. Baron Nevermore showed up with an entire army, including his girlfriend.”

“Damn,” Julie grimaced, moving to get off the bed, but she still felt too weak and wobbly. She looked at Caleb and asked, “And you’re really out of power?”

Caleb nodded at that. “Unless you can call Anabelle back to give me another recharge…”

Julie thought about it for a moment before shaking her head. “I’m completely wiped out. I doubt I’ll be able to channel anyone again for a couple hours.”

“That’s what I figured,” Caleb told her with a disappointed sigh.

Julie took a deep breath, then asked, “So, what now?”

Caleb gave her a steady look as he answered, “Now, you do the same thing I am. Cross your fingers and wait.”

Joselyn crouched down behind the large stone wall, breathing deeply and trying to catch her breath. She didn’t have the stamina to keep going nonstop the way many of those with enhanced physical abilities did. Unlike her dad or Aunt Gina, she actually needed to stop and rest.

Of course, Joselyn was dealing with more than just the physical strain of the fight. All of the people…all of the fighting…was creating so much ‘noise’ for her sixth sense that she was getting a headache. She’d been trying to ignore the pounding in her head, but it wasn’t easy.

After catching her breath, Joselyn climbed up and peeked over the top of the wall. The battle was still raging and seemed to be growing even more fierce. A small group of heroes, including Uncle Leon, Aunt Gina, and Lady Hexx, were working hard to keep the advancing ravens away from the main encampment. In fact, if it hadn’t been for Lady Hexx, the ravens would already have overrun their stronghold and left them no place to fall back or rest.

As Joselyn watched, Lady Hexx sent a wave of stone and earth to knock back the advancing ravens, then after the ground washed over them, it hardened again, trapping the ravens in place. At least, it trapped them for a time, until they could dig themselves out. However, Lady Hexx kept pushing out with her powers, making a giant hand grow up from the ground and then grab hold of a raven warrior who was in the middle of throwing balls of green flame. And unfortunately, the white skinned woman was beginning to look exhausted, so Joselyn didn’t know how much longer she’d be able to keep this up.

Joselyn looked up as Ms. Miracle…as Daphne flew at Baron Nevermore. The villain formed a glowing red shield that caused her to bounce off, then he fired a blast of lime green energy. Daphne dodged that and returned fire, while the villain was somehow able to defend against her attack, while simultaneously firing a blast of green energy at Praxis. The Queen of Ravens stood back, watching Baron Nevermore fight with a look of dark amusement. Baron Nevermore, for his part, seemed to be showing off for his queen, or at least trying to.

So far, the Queen of Raven’s hadn’t joined into the battle, and every time a hero attempted to approach her, some of her soldiers would intercept them before they got close. Then as Icarus flew towards the Queen of Ravens, she suddenly raised her hand and gestured towards him. Black smoke enveloped Icarus, and as it faded away, a winged skeleton dropped from the sky.

“Icarus,” Joselyn gasped in shock and horror.

Mega yelled in rage and charged forward, only to be buried under a mass of angry raven soldiers. She threw them off, though they quickly attempted to overwhelm her again. Baron Nevermore fired a blast of purple flames at Mega, but she turned and the flames struck three of the ravens instead. The ravens screamed in pain as they dropped away from her, still burning. Mega seemed to realize that the Queen of Ravens was too well guarded to approach, so she backed off, rejoining some of the other heroes.

Joselyn dropped from her perch on the wall, frantically trying to think of what she could do to help. So far, she’d done all right in the fighting, but her powers weren’t well suited for this kind of combat. She grimaced in frustration, wishing that the noise and aching would leave her head so she could think clearly, or at least so she could pick something useful up with her sixth sense.

Suddenly, there was a swirl of red energy, right before a man appeared a short distance away. He was tall and slender, with black Victorian style clothes, and a cane which he leaned on. Joselyn immediately recognized him not only as a raven, but as the one who’d come to save Force after she’d helped to defeat him. This raven had also come along with the ninja who’d impaled Daphne.

“I see that I am not the only one who prefers to avoid standing within such chaos,” the raven commented, casually gesturing toward the main battle.

“You,” Joselyn snarled, forming a glowing rapier on one hand and a throwing blade in the other. She watched the raven warily, knowing that he might appear unarmed, but that he was still dangerous.

“I am not a warrior,” the raven commented, not seeming the least bit intimidated by her newly formed weapons. “In fact, I dislike such chaotic violence. It ends to be quite messy, you understand. But alas, duty calls…”

With that, the raven pulled his cane apart, revealing that a thin bladed sword had been hidden within. He made a faint bow towards Joselyn, then took what she assumed was a fencer’s position. From his faint smirk, he seemed quite confident of his chances against her. Then again, from the way his people seemed to heal, that wasn’t surprising.

“I don’t know who you are,” Joselyn told her opponent with a grim determination. “But you are going to lose…”

“Then perhaps introductions are in order,” the raven responded, shifting position and giving a bow. “It would be quite rude of me to kill you, without you even knowing my name. I am called Mister Munin…”

“Like Odin’s pet raven?” Joselyn asked, remembering that in Norse mythology, Odin had two ravens…Hugin and Munin. She warily watched the man in front of her, wondering how much longer she could keep him distracted.

Mr. Munin smiled faintly, apparently pleased that she’d recognized the name. “I was under the impression that the young people of this world had little interest in proper education. It shall almost be a shame to end one who shows promise…”

“END THIS!” Evie suddenly yelled from behind the raven, right while swinging a baseball bat into the side of his head. Mr. Munin collapsed to the ground while Joselyn’s sister stood there with a grin, proudly swinging the baseball bat around. Joselyn had no idea where Evie found that bat, nor did she care.

“Thanks,” Joselyn told her with a sigh of relief. She hadn’t been sure of her ability to beat Mr. Munin.

“No problem,” Evie responded. “I couldn’t let my little big sister brother get hurt now…”

Joselyn rolled her eyes at that. “I’m just glad to see you haven’t been hurt…”

Evie nodded at that. “Ditto. You can’t turn invisible the way I can, so I’ve been a little worried about you…”

“I’ve been managing,” Joselyn assured her, making a nice swipe with her rapier.

“I’ve been having fun playing whack-a-raven,” she answered, holding her baseball bat out. “And speaking of that, I need to go look for any more that snuck past our defenses…”

Evie gave Joselyn a nod, then turned and hurried away. Joselyn quickly found it hard to focus on her sister, which told her that Evie had activated her powers. As for as anyone else was concerned, she’d be entirely invisible, or at least, they simply wouldn’t notice her. However, Joselyn hoped that Evie didn’t get overconfident because of that. After all, if she could tell where her sister was, then it was likely that at least some of the ravens might be able to as well.

Joselyn looked down at Mr. Munin, wondering what she should do with him since she doubted that he was dead. Unfortunately, before she could decide, he began to move and get back to his feet. It seemed that Evie hadn’t hit him quite as hard as they’d thought.

“That was quite unsporting,” Mr. Munin announced before lunging at Joselyn with his sword cane.

Joselyn blocked his attack with her sword, then followed up by slashing at him with the throwing knife. She grimaced and braced herself, silently wishing that she could manifest a full suit of armor like her dad could. Unfortunately, her energy manifestation ability was much weaker, and she couldn’t form much more than what she already had out.

Mr. Munin didn’t say a word as he came at Joselyn again, moving quickly and efficiently. She responded by moving as fast as she could, blocking and counterattacking. After lunging at him, she leapt back and then threw a small blade. It sank into his shoulder and he winced in pain as he pulled it out, though it didn’t seem to slow him down much.

“You’ve got a longer reach than me,” Joselyn finally announced, leaping back and letting her rapier disperse. When Mr. Munin lunged at her a moment later, she formed a spear and let him run right into it. With a grimace of anger, fear and disgust, Joselyn shoved the spear further into him. “Gotcha…”

“I begin to see why Force dislikes you so,” Mr. Munin said with a sneer, glaring at her with his glowing red eyes. “You are a vexing child…”

Mr. Munin staggered back, trying to pull himself free of the spear that was still impaling him. Suddenly, there was a flash of white and his head went flying from his body, where it hit the ground and rolled. The raven’s body collapsed to the ground while Joselyn’s dad stood there with a glowing white energy sword, which dripped with black oily blood.

“First Evie, now you,” Joselyn said with a roll of her eyes. “Doesn’t anyone think I can handle this guy on my own?”

“I know you can dear,” her father responded with a chuckle. “I just wanted to save you the effort…” With that, he kicked Mr. Munin’s body, which dissolved into a puddle of steaming black goo and then vanished. “It seems we finally figured out how to stop these ravens for good…”

“Good thing,” Joselyn said with a sigh. She looked at Mr. Munin’s head, or at least the puddle of goo that had previously been his head. “And it should make clean up a bit easier…”

At that, Joselyn looked up at her dad, finally noticing the numerous small gashes in his uniform and spots of blood which stood out so clearly against the white clothing. She gave him a worried look, but he didn’t seem to be hurt too bad, just tired.  Even someone like him needed to stop and rest occasionally.

Joselyn looked from her dad to the other heroes who were in view, resting within the walled off encampment. Her eyes were drawn to Denise, who had come out from behind a barrier and was staring at all the fighting with an expression of shock and horror. The massive Grendel’s Mother stood beside her, looking worried. Grendel’s Mother would have been extremely useful in that fighting, but so far, she was holding back and merely playing bodyguard for Denise.

“I can’t believe this,” Denise gasped. “This is…” She shook her head as though unable to think of right word to describe it. Joselyn understood that quite well.

“I know,” Grendel’s Mother said in response, looking out over the fighting and clenching her fists. It looked like she wanted to join the fighting, but she still held back.

After a few more seconds, Denise’s expression became one of grim determination. “Direct me,” she said. “Point me where I need to go…”

With those words, Denise grabbed her own finger and pulled it back until it snapped. She screamed in pain, though her skin began to turn blue and the scream became a loud and frightening howl. In moments, Denise burst out of her clothing as she grew larger and more powerful. Half a minute later, the massive form of Grendel stood in her place. He let out loud roar, then charged straight into the mass of raven soldiers. Grendel’s Mother followed immediately behind him.

“Those two should shake things up,” Joselyn’s dad said with a weak smile. “Even Baron Nevermore will hesitate before facing Grendel…even with an army.”

“But I fear Grendel and his mother are too little and too late,” the Face announced in a weary voice as he came over. He was missing his trademark fedora, while his jacket was badly torn and stained.

“What do you mean?” Joselyn’s dad asked with a worried look.

For a moment, the Face was silent, which made Joselyn worry even more. Then, he finally answered, “The ravens outmatch us with both numbers and power, and they are beginning to overwhelm us. The longer we fight, the more tired and injured we become, while they seem to lack those problems…”

“So, we fall back and wait for reinforcements,” Joselyn’s dad responded grimly. He obviously didn’t like that option either.

However, the Face shook his head. “The ravens have just arrived in our world, and they lost a lot of their power during the journey. Right now, they are relatively weak, but if they should recover…”  He shook his head again. “I fear that this is the best chance we will ever have of defeating the ravens in combat…”

Joselyn’s dad stared at the Face for a moment, looking a little confused. “If they are weak like you suggest, then why would they attack us now?”

“Because,” the Face answered in a grim tone, “I believe the Queen of Ravens is attempting to rebuild their strength.”  He paused for a moment, then carefully explained, “If they defeat us now, our deaths…and the fear that the public will have of these invaders, will only made them stronger and more powerful. If we fall back, we survive to fight again, but the public will lose confidence in us and become more afraid of the ravens…”

“So they are even stronger the next time we fight,” Joselyn finished for him, feeling a cold knot forming in her stomach.

“Precisely,” the Face agreed. “We need to find a way to stop them now…before they regain their full strength.”

Joselyn’s dad scowled thoughtfully. “We need more people…more firepower.” He looked towards the fighting, then said, “Ladybug…”

“What about her?” Joselyn asked curiously.

“If one villain is helping us,” her dad started to suggest.

“Former villain,” Joselyn corrected him. After all, from what Kaboom and Counterweight had said, Ladybug had joined the Crusaders before any of this raven business had begun.

Her dad gave her a faint look of annoyance but continued, “Perhaps we can recruit the villains to help…”

“Perhaps,” the Face agreed, though he sounded more than a little skeptical. “Unfortunately, I doubt that we have the time or resources to locate, recruit, and transport any significant villain reinforcements…”

“So,” Joselyn pointed out wryly, using sarcasm to cover the very real fear that she felt. “We can’t really win this fight, retreating would only make things worse, and there is almost no way we’d be able to get enough reinforcements in time to help…”  She was about to ask if things could possibly get any worse, but she caught herself in time, not wanting to tempt the universe. “It sounds like we’re screwed…”

“Then, what do you recommend?” Joselyn’s dad asked the Face.

The Face hesitated a moment before explaining, “I received a message from my daughter. She and her team found the portal that the ravens used to come here…and according to her…it’s still connected to the world they came from. If I go study it, I might be able to find a clue about how to defeat them…”

“I don’t like the MIGHT in there,” Joslyn added awkwardly.

Joselyn’s dad nodded, then glanced to her. “Take Joselyn with you.”

“What?” Joselyn asked in surprise, sure that she’d misheard.

“With her psychic powers,” her dad continued, “she might be able to help you find that clue…”

Joselyn stared at her dad for a moment, wondering if he was just sending her away so that she’d be safe. However, after glancing to the Face, she realized that where they were going, it might not be much safer than where she was at the moment.

Suddenly, the air was filled with a yell of anger and frustration, drawing Joselyn’s attention to the where Radiant crouched down beside a small and unmoving body. Warchild, Joselyn realized with a sinking feeling. They’d killed Warchild.

“YOU MONSTERS,” Radiant screamed, glaring at the mass of ravens, and especially at a woman who wore a flowing black witch costume, which included a traditional witch hat and a lot of skull decorations.

With that, Radiant tore off her mask and fired a blast of energy from her eyes. The blast hit the witch, who screamed in pain, along with all the ravens near her. Ravens scattered, though Radiant snarled in rage and continued blasting the enemies with everything she had.

Joselyn watched in amazement and horror, impressed by Radiant’s power but knowing exactly what this attack would cost her. Radiant was a close friend of the family, and because of that, Joselyn knew that every time Radiant used her eye beams, it put immense strain on her eyes. Radiant had slowly been losing her vision for years and now used thick corrective lenses in her mask. She almost never used that power anymore for fear of losing her vision entirely.

Radiant continued firing her eye beams for nearly a minute, hurting the ravens and driving them back. Then, when she finally stopped her attack, Radiant dropped to her knees and looked around with a horrified expression before gasping, “I can’t see…”

Diamond was suddenly by her side, creating a wall of diamond in front of them and gently telling her teammate, “Come on,” as she led her back to safety.

Joselyn stared at Radiant as Diamond led her to safety. She felt sad for the woman, who might never be able to see again. Of course, Radiant was lucky compared to Warchild and Icarus, but that probably wouldn’t be much consolation.

Just then, Joselyn saw a new figure fly into the battle, a woman in some kind of green and black chitinous armor. The armored woman attacked the ravens, firing blasts of energy down at the invaders. Joselyn grinned, as she recognized who this woman was and what her presence meant.

“Hardshell,” Joselyn exclaimed, pointing to the armored woman. “Lightning Force is here…”

“About damn time,” her dad muttered from beside her.

The Face nodded, then gestured to the side where a portal of glowing red energy opened. “Come,” he told Joselyn. “We don’t have much time…”

Joselyn’s dad nodded at that. “Hopefully, between Lightning Force and Grendel, we can hold them back long enough. Good luck.”

“Thank you,” Joselyn responded, giving her dad a worried look and hoping that he’d be all right. She didn’t want to think of what could happen to him in this fight, but she couldn’t help but do so…especially after seeing what had happened with Warchild and Radiant. After making a silent prayer that her friends and family would be safe, Joselyn said, “You too,” and then stepped through the portal.

 

TO BE CONTINUED

 

Baa Baa Black Sheep is listed as number zero because it is a story that was written several years before the first Legacy Universe story. I originally had no intention of Black Sheep being part of this universe, but at the time I was writing The Knight is a Lady, I ended up tying him into the Legacy continuity.

 

00-Baa Baa Black Sheep

01-The Miracle Legacy

02-A Change of Heart

03-Hardshell

04-The Praxis Crossing

05-Mannequin

06-The Vengeance of Lady Hexx

07-Glamour Girl

08-Counterweight

09-Grendel and Beowulf

10-The Dark Legacy

11-The Witch Seed

12-Marvel and Meyhem

13-The Infiltrator

14-The Return of Red Blade

15-With a Golden Staff

16-The Knight is a Lady

17-Kaboom

18-The Legacy of the Seven

19-Invincible

20-A Velvet Touch

21-Harbinger

22-The Return of Nevermore