A Darklight Burning Brightly

A Whateley Academy Fan Fic

by

Solus Nova

Part 3

Friday, June 15th, 2007 8:31 AM
Baltimore, Maryland

The day had started badly for a lot of people. It wasn't getting better.

Agents from the FBI had in the middle of the night shown up at various agencies in the Baltimore area with warrants, certain employees of those agencies had been woken up in the early morning hours, politely but firmly told they needed to accompany these agents, and they were advised of their rights. It was strongly suggested that cooperation would be the best approach. A few grabbed at that lifeline.

Several very carefully picked reporters had received tips from 'high level but confidential sources' of corruption, collusion, civil rights violations and the like. These carefully picked reporters had several things in common, the most common was a bit of idealism and multiple awards for investigative journalism. They fell on the story like a vulture on a three day old corpse.

The head of the Mutant Commission Office in Baltimore had been woken at 7 in the morning by several panicked calls from colleagues and friends, he had been carefully not briefed on a certain operation that never existed anywhere but on paper. Just a hypothetical study he had been told. He picked up his cell and called a number he never had written down anywhere and ordered that the hypothetical study be cancelled until the next financial quarter.

The head of the Advanced Studies and Planning Group had called his site commander and ordered them to start closing up the site, but he didn't give the emergency code, they had enough time to shut everything down properly he thought. On the heels of that thought came the sound of his door crashing open, the last thing he saw for awhile was the image of a stun grenade bouncing on the floor.

Commander Weems aka 'Jones' hung up the phone, he wasn't enjoying his morning, and he had such high hopes for working out his frustrations on that little mutie bitch today. Still orders are orders, so he called his subordinates and told them to start shutting down the site. With any luck he'd be free later to help dispose of the muties. Still Weems thought better take no chances, with that thought he started preparing his own bug-out bag.

Donald Meadows, known more famously as 'Laser Strike' looked over at the FBI agent sitting next to him in the van, the Agent's eyes were closed, to all appearances the Agent was resting, relaxed, just taking a break. Any one of a thousand men in a dark suit and average looks and short dark hair, at rest he was unremarkable, fitter than most with an outdoors tan.

Bane's eyes snapped open, “Lets roll.”

Meadows, or Laser Strike, followed Agent Bane into an office building near the docks. It was a small building, only five stories with a large garage attached, most of the back lot was fenced in with high solid fence. A few people tried to stop them, those that didn't respect the white and gold clad superhero with wings made out of solid light advancing on them, those sterner souls wilted under Agent Bane’s gaze or demanding tone. In a few minutes all organized opposition had been shattered and was in full retreat. They were shown to an interview room given chairs and told that the subject and the site's commander would be with them shortly. The MCO agent that escorted them almost fled the room in haste to get away from the eyes and the presence of the FBI agent.

Commander Weems didn't want to hear it, now, right now, in the middle of a shutdown some Fed had shown up for a dog and pony show, and, and worse yet he'd come in the front door with the unit's number one asset! He'd asked for that mutant by name and number! Weems racked his brain trying to recall if any FBI agents where part of the unit, he was drawing a blank but he didn't know that many names and even less faces outside of his own little unit. Need To Know his boss had told him. Damnit. He could call his boss, BUT the protocols for shutdown meant that he could receive calls but not make them unless everything was going tits-up and he needed to warn everyone involved. Weems let out a breath he didn't know he was holding, yeah this was bad timing, epic bad timing, but the Fed was with their asset, and knew enough to ask for the mutie by name and case number. So no need to panic, get the Fed what he wants and pull up stakes, then he and the boys would be reassigned overseas to a country with no extradition, then it would be a quick resignation from the MCO and transfer to the Knights of Purity. A bump in salary, new toys, and no questions asked when he needed to get rough with someone. That was what he was promised, and if they tried to burn him, well he had backups and copies of every bit of info he could get his hands on. Blackmail if needed or hand it over to the cops for a slap on the wrist.

The tech-head at his door was looking at him, “Tingley get the mutie, and turn that damper up as high as you think it's safe. We want her nice and docile. Then get back to making a third set of backups on the critical data.” Weems snarled, “Move soldier!” when Tingley didn't move fast enough. He moved plenty fast then Weems noticed. He picked up the phone on his desk and ordered a team to bring the mutie to the interview room once Tingley finished making the adjustment to the damper. What else needed to be done, his go-bag was ready, the documents he needed to get out of the country were in his breast pocket. He opened up his briefcase and making sure no one was watching, he placed a large HD backup drive from his desk drawer in it. Time to get this shit over with he thought, then I am so outta here.

Bane waited patiently reading the file the MCO had on the girl, it was surprisingly thin, the Mutant Identification Card, or MID, was the most useful but even that was more guesswork than fact. Of interest was the red border, yet she'd never been convicted of any crime that he could find.

Codename: Darklight
Ratings: Man: 4c; Warp: 4gb;ee;lb;ve; Ex: 5; En:4 unknown
Techniques: Flight, Force Field, Energy Absorber, able to use absorbed energy to boost other abilities
Weak vs: Magick and Psi effects, energy draining attacks, feedback from having constructs destroyed, powers seem dependent on a manifested circlet
Backup/Team Affiliation: Member of the Syndicate, extensive supervillain contacts ref# AD 6709-00821-003

EXTREME CAUTION DFA AUTHORIZED


That was impossible, Bane thought, no one issues a Deadly Force Authorized on a minor, and the card was flagged as a Red, for convicted criminal. The reference gave it way it was old, AD 6709 meant it was created when she, the original Darklight, was arrested/detained in July 1967, this was her mother's card, the original Darklight, the entries quickly copied to a new card. Bane flipped the card over noting her name on the form, Kory(sp?) R. (unknown) Cummings.

So who are you Kory R Cummings?

The door opened at that point the two guards showing Kory Cummings in, she looked a lot like her mother Bane noted, taller than average maybe 5'7” or 5'8” maybe 130-140 lbs normally, metahumans tended to have denser tissues he reminded himself. Dark red hair hung down over her shoulders to her mid back, he got a glimpse of her wide eyes, noting the dark purple colour. Her face had that mix of 'girl next door' and 'heartbreak hottie'. As for rest of her, long legs check, great figure check, the usual for 90% of the superhuman community. In other words depending on your sexual orientation a source of lust or jealousy. But not now, now she looked like a victim, Bane had seen the look in her eyes before, this girl had been abused, violently. Her eyes he noted, were slightly out of focus, she was drugged maybe?

His gaze swept over the two guards with the girl, no with Kory he corrected himself, she was real no longer an image, or a hypothetical person she had a name, a presence. The guards he noted had standard MCO light armour but in black, with full helmets, shock sticks, mace, the usual, but they had pistols as well. That was a no-no Bane thought if you get a desperate enough prisoner they might make…

His train of thought derailed when he saw the third man entering carrying a briefcase and a worried expression.

“WEEMS!”

* * * *

It felt like I had barely been asleep for a few seconds before the lights switched on, two goons and Geeky Goon rushed in, well not rushed but they weren't taking their time. I was still blinking the sleep from my eyes when Geeky Goon hauled me upright and started fiddling with the collar again. As before it felt like the world was getting dimmer and my thoughts began to slow, I tried to fight it, I tried to focus on something or than that strange nothingness that was growing in my head. It didn't feel as bad as yesterday, maybe I'm getting immune to this thing. One of the other Goons grabbed and shook me. He was saying something about getting changed, I found that really funny since I'd already changed. I'd like to have laughed or cried but it was just so hard to think and to feel.

Things faded then got clear as Geeky Goon kept fiddling with the collar, finally stopping after what seemed like a couple of minutes.

“Come on get dressed.” One of the Guard Goons pointed at a bundle of clothing that arrived while I had been zoned out. I looked at the clothes, a standard orange jumpsuit, some slippers, and some cheap underwear. I guess I took to long because one of them shoved me.

“Hurry up freak,” he snarled, “Or we'll have another shower party.”

Those words, they sent a bolt of pure cold fear through me, I flashed back to that horrible assault in the shower, the pain, the humiliation, the feeling of helplessness, just as fast the fear was gone replaced with a white hot rage. The tidal waves of conflicting emotions crashed into the centre where I stood battering at me. I could feel all those emotions trying to claw their way out at once, all I could do was shake, I felt like if I let go of these feelings I'd never be able stop, I'd be washed away with this incredible emotional pressure and never be able to bottle these feelings back up again. I just stood there trying not to breakdown, not give in.

Screw 'em I thought as I pulled the johnny shirt off and changed quickly, or tried to, Of course the slippers were too big by far, and the underwear was way too small. Seeing the smirks on the Goons I quickly figured out it wasn't an accident. Once done they roughly handcuffed me and did a quick half march half drag. Coming up behind me I noticed 'Jones' looking a bit rushed and carrying a briefcase.

I was pushed into the room, to my horror Laser Strike was there, standing against the opposite wall, it was him, white armoured bodysuit, gold heavy gauntlets and heavy boots, a white helmet with a gold half visor finished the costume, it should look tacky but somehow he pulled it off. His backpack flight harness showed, but the solid light 'wings' weren’t in evidence. He looked the same but somehow was more heroic and less like a psycho.

The guy sitting at the table just screamed 'suit', real short dark hair, weathered face with an outdoors type tan, he was sitting like he was at attention reading some folder when I stumbled in, his eyes flicked to me and quickly and intently checked me out. It was creepy, but not the perv creepy that I usually get. His eyes were light blue…

I blinked and caught my breath, I'd seen people that looked like that, usually they worked with Mom on various jobs, very dangerous people. His nerve wracking stare slid off me to the doorway as 'Jones' entered, I saw the expression on his face go from blank to furious as he snarled a name.

It was a very tense few seconds.

The Goon squad went for their guns, Laser Strike charged up and prepared to blast away in my direction so I just did the smart thing and dove under the table. I couldn't see what was going on over my head but nothing violent or explosive seemed to happening, so far so good. The guy in the suit looked under the table, smiled and spoke.

“Miss Cummings, if you would please have a seat.”

I got up and tried to gather my dignity, failed, and looked for a chair. The only one in the room that was available was beside the Suit. Since Laser Strike was still powered up and ready to fire no one objected. As I sat down I noticed that Agent 'Jones' looked very unwell.

The Suit spoke again, “The rest of you can have a seat as well if you can find one.” There were no other chairs in the room.

“Well we can make due with just these two chairs I guess, Laser Strike are you ok where you are?”

“No problem.” The suddenly sane superhero said.

I was looking over my shoulder at Laser Strike, I could swear that he was trying not to laugh.

“I think I should introduce myself to the young lady, manners are important.” He turned to face me but never ignoring the trio of MCO agents, “I'm Special Agent in Charge John Bane with the FBI. The gentleman behind me who with a few seconds of effort could level this compound if he so wished goes by the name Laser Strike, he's a local superhero, quite active in the community, and member in good standing with the local superhero team the Baltimore Battalion.”

My jaw dropped, Laser Strike the nutjob that landed me in this mess could not be the same guy the Suit, no, Agent Bane described. Agent Bane's head turned to face Agent 'Jones' who looked increasingly like he was trying to will his heart to stop.

“This is Andrew Weems,” he motioned to 'Jones', “Captain, US Army,” the temperature in the room dropped, “You should be in Leavenworth Weems, awaiting your date with a noose. Why are you still free and polluting my country by existing?”

Weems swallowed and seemed regain some bravado. “Bane those charges were dropped due to lack of evidence. There was no proof that I did anything wrong.”

Agent Bane's right hand twitched, his thumb tapping on the table, “No proof? I suppose those young girls in the back of your Hum-vee in Fallujah could have been screaming for joy? Maybe just maybe they where so excited that they also tore their own clothes off and tossed them out of the Hum-vee. Yes I suppose you could argue that,” The sarcasm and hatred in Agent Bane's voice could have been used as a chemical weapon, “But that is not what happened is it?”

“Yeah well Bane, face it there was no way a US court would convict me, a decorated officer over a bunch of Aye-Rab bitches.” Weems responded.

Ugh just when I thought this Weems guy couldn't be any more repulsive, he just keeps diving for a new low. Then my spirits which had been rising sank like the Titanic when Agent Bane replied.

“You are right, and the past is not relevant to the current situation that needs to be resolved, which is why I'm here. I'm here to clean up this mess.” Weems expression had shifted to disbelief and hope before settling for an arrogant sneer. The two Goons relaxed sensing the sudden change in their boss's attitude.

“Andrew Weems you are under arrest...” I lost the rest of the speech I felt like I was going to pass out, I put my head in my hands and started to cry. I couldn't believe it, there was a light at the end of the tunnel and it wasn't an oncoming train, this was over, finally over. I finally looked up as Agent Bane finished his speech, “...do you understand your rights as they have been explained to you?”

Weems didn't look like a man who had just been arrested, he looked like he had just remembered he had a hole card left to play. Weems turned to Laser Strike and pointing at Bane and myself and then screamed, “Laser Strike stop those two villainous scoundrels!!”

Laser Strike spoke, “I'm sorry the Laser Strike you want is unavailable. So sit down and shut up or I might turn you into a grease stain, and you two,” speaking to the Goons “Stay very still, don't move and I might forget how pissed off I am and have a three for one barbecue.”

I swear at this point with all sudden reversals, fakes, and wild mood swings half my blood must have been adrenaline. I had no idea at this point what was going on, if Champion himself had suddenly danced through the doorway in drag it would have felt almost normal.
“Miss Cummings, I need to talk to you about something very important, and I need to make something very clear.” said Agent Bane “We need to get you out of that damper device,” he ignored the panicked sounds coming from the MCO agents, I felt a surge of something inside me at the thought of having my powers back. “However I am aware that once we do that you can easily take your revenge on these...men. I ask you not to do that, let the system deal with them. For several reasons. The most important is that I don't want just Weems, I want his backers.” He paused. “The second reason is you'd be breaking the law, I'd have to stop you, or at least try, and Laser Strike can stop you.” That point made sense, considering how he had stopped me before…

“Hold on! Why is he being so nice and reasonable? The first time he saw me he started screaming and shooting and doing his damnedest to kill me! What is going on here?!?” I tried to throttle back the rising hysterical tone in my voice.

Laser Strike replied, “Um this is the first time I met you Miss Cummings, you see...”

I interrupted him, “What you're going to say that the Laser Strike that attacked me is your evil clone?” He started to reply but I just kept going. “No wait better yet he is your long lost twin brother kidnapped by evil gypsies and you are both heirs to some magical kingdom and he's trying to blacken your sterling reputation so he will inherit!”

When he was certain that I had stopped, he continued, “More like my good clone.” Seeing that had shut me up he continued, “Two years ago several key members of the Baltimore Battalion were replaced with clones by one of our enemies, we stopped her, and most the clones just wore out or died if you will. Three of them are still alive and my clone is one of them. While he's ok physically as far as I know, mentally the memory patterns in his head are degrading badly, but his 'programming' to be an ideal superhero is still there. All his 'core' memories that make him, well, that make him think he's me are fading away, his recent memories are still razor sharp and that damn programming to be an ideal superhero is still there he just is losing what that means.” Laser Strike sighed, “I feel sorry for him, as his mind goes he knows he has to be good but doesn't know what good is anymore.”

I stopped and thought about that, “Oh, OH.” Damm that was bad like really bad, like trapped in hell bad. “Wait a minute!” My gaze snapped to Weems, “Why did he think that you were, you know, the other Laser Strike...” A lightbulb went off in my head, “These guys have a way to control, or at least aim your clone at people they want.”

Agent Bane spoke up at this point, “Correct, the incidents involving Laser Strike over the past year nearly doubled, yet his, the real Laser Strike's, incarceration and court appearances had actually decreased. It seems in back rooms of the District Attorney’s Office the word is out that a case involving Laser Strike is likely to blow up in a bad way, in fact Laser Strike may be unstable and you can't rely on him in a trial.” Giving me a second to make sure I was following, “Once I looked into the incidence involving you and Laser Strike, I saw a pattern, in certain situations Laser Strike displayed wanton disregard for proper procedure, and a total disregard for collateral damage. There was a lack of paperwork from various agencies that should have been involved in every one of these incidents. All the agencies that should have been involved weren't, and ones that shouldn't were. In your case DHS grabbed the case from the Baltimore Police Department and FBI which should have been involved with the robbery of a Federal Bank, claiming the attack on the oil transfer station was an act of terror. Once the transfer into DHS custody further investigation showed that it wasn't a terrorist incident but since a Mutant was involved and since the other agencies had seeded jurisdiction...”

I interrupted, “The MCO right, they get them instead.”

Agent Bane looked annoyed at my interruption and stared at me, I gulped and shut up. “Mostly correct but some are turned over to Weems' little group. It seems Weems took over this operation and added a few refinements of his own. Such as human trafficking, selling his prisoners to various third parties, or exchanging them for favours. Weems knew if he skimed his prisoners carefully his superiors wouldn't know or even look to close since it was a covert operation. No one at the top wants to know too much about covert operations, it makes it easier to lie convincingly on the stand.” He looked at me, “Weems and his accomplices are in a bad place, they betrayed their superiors. So if we take that damper off what will you do?”

I looked at Agent Bane, I looked at Laser Strike, I stared at Weems and his MCO buddies. I wanted them dead, so dead that there would body parts raining down on the city. I wanted to make them scream and beg, I wanted to make them feel helpless, “If I kill these fuckers, does that make your job harder?” I asked trying not to sound to eager.

“Yes.”

“Take the damn collar off, I'm not going to kill them.”

I felt Laser Strike move around behind me, I saw a flash out of the corner of my eye, and smelled burning metal and the damn collar fell off.

I could feel my powers returning so fast I swayed. All my aches just vanished.

It felt good, no it felt awesome. It felt so right like the world had sudden become more of everything.

I stood grabbing the table, tore it out of the floor flipping it over as I stalked towards Weems and his scum, I enjoyed the looks on their face as my power flooded to my fingers, wisps of black and purple energy trailed from my fingertips. I grabbed Weems and hauled him off the ground where he had fallen when I tossed the table, holding him in front of my face I snarled at him, “I AM LEAVING ASSHOLE PLEASE TRY TO STOP ME!” I dropped Weems, and I left that room sideswiping and destroying half the room's doorway as I stalked out.

I stopped in my tracks at the main doors to this place as what seemed like a small army of heavily armed men levelled various guns and other things in my direction, I only got as far slamming up the most powerful shield I could before I heard Agent Bane yelling the group of men to stand down. At that time I noticed that everyone looking at me was wearing a patch with the letters 'FBI'. It was just to much, I started laughing, then crying. Agent Bane came out at that time and starting giving orders and more FBI guys showed up, it seems while Laser Strike and Agent Bane had been arresting Weems, the rest of the FBI were arresting everyone else in the compound.

An FBI agent had at Bane's order, escorted me outside and I was sitting on the bumper of one of the armoured SWAT trucks, just enjoying the feeling of being outside, the heady mix of smog and harbour, smelled like heaven, I was just beginning to think about my other problems in my life when someone came over. I looked up as Laser Strike came over after Weems and people had been loaded up and removed so I was looking the wrong way when Laser Fake dropped from the sky, struck a pose proclaiming at the top of his lungs, “Stop villains I won't let you...” At this point I guess he saw me as I spun around when I heard that voice behind me. “You, you foul creature I will defeat you again and again!”

It was one of those perfect 'I hate my life moments'. Laser Fake opened fire, I concentrated and pulled apart his solid light beams, just like old times I thought. I hoped Laser Strike would do something as I lifted off the ground gaining altitude so that if I missed blocking Laser Fake's shots they wouldn't hit anything breakable, like bystanders, buildings etc. Laser Fake was firing golden blasts from his gauntlets like a machine gun, no longer trying to hit me with one big massive blast, smart on his part, much harder for me to block the shots, about half of his little bolts missed me cleanly, I was able to block most of the remaining shots but about 1 in 20 where slipping through, this was not good. I splitting my focus on keeping my shields up, diffracting and absorbing the shots, and flying, I was totally on the defensive. Worse yet I had the odd feeling that Laser Fake hadn't tried anything fancy. Then something fancy came my way, a massive explosion just happened, no warning, no power build up, I tried to block the blast and was rewarded with total failure. I spun through the air clipped something and ended up in, not on, but in the cab of an FBI SWAT truck. Having a really good force field saved my ass again but being shot through armour plate and bullet proof glass hurt. As I dug myself out of the wreckage and used the energy I had absorbed to heal up, while doing that I saw the two Lasers had decided to go mano-a-mano and where busy punching each other as hard as they could, which was pretty useless since they both wore armoured suits. I briefly wondered which was which but I noticed one constantly talking so that solved that pesky targeting problem.

What to do I wondered, I've only been doing superpowered stuff for around a month, I'd never been interested the Cape and Cowl thing and played little attention to what Mom said about what she could do, my sister Val had been the one that was interested in that stuff. What the hell it seemed a theme, when in doubt blast away. Since I was trying not to hit anyone but Fake Strike, I missed both of them by at least ten feet, my second shot was closer I suppose, maybe. Fake Strike noticed me after the second shot, I knew what was coming, this time I could feel it. Yup another big explosion, this time I was better prepared for the blast, it only knocked me back a few feet. It was the second, then third blast that flipped me off my feet and brought me crashing down on the hood of a car parked out front about 30 feet away. I was stunned and staring up into the sky when an FBI agent reached up from behind the car and dragged me out of sight. He kept moving half dragging me, which was good plan because the car I had landed on blew up. I took as much of the blast as I could, then more agents came out of cover behind another SWAT van and dragged both of us back behind the van where a group of agents had huddled looking grim.

The agent that had grabbed me had a few cuts but nothing too serious but he was even more out of it than I was judging by the look on his face. One of the agents was staring at me with shocked look on his face, he then pulled off his bullet proof vest and tried shoving it towards me. I didn't need it so I pushed it back towards him, he shook his head and shoved it towards my chest, it was uncomfortable when the body armour was pressed against my chest and felt…

I looked down at myself and yelped.

Wardrobe Malfunction, two words that can mean so much.

Sometime during those last explosions the prisoner jumpsuit I was wearing was hit by some of the blast that have must leaked through my defences, the result was obvious to anyone around me, the front of the jumpsuit was missing from neck to just above my, um, crotch. Oh my Gawd. I needed something to wear, something, anything that would cover me and not get destroyed how did all these other female superheroes do it, how did my Mom do it for so long?! Why me? Why does this keep happening to me? Why can't I be more like Val, or my Mom!? As those thoughts ran around on the broken hamster wheel of my brain and I swear I could hear my sister Val's voice yelling at me to get up and do something, to stop whining about being having these powers, stop rejecting Mom's legacy and own it. You know what she was right, my Mom was a pain in the ass, not the best role model, would never win any parenting awards, but she never gave up. Sure she sucked at the mundane things but she never gave up, her cooking was always a disaster, she could terminally embarrass me and my sister within ten minutes of waking up, but I knew she loved me, and she never took any crap from any cape. I had her powers, but I also had her legacy, and Darklight would smash this...this clone that was three cans short of a six pack of lite beer, and I was worried about losing to him? Mom had gone toe-to-toe with her nemesis Lady Astarte over the years and this guy was no Lady Ass-Tarty.

I'm not Corey Cummings anymore, I'm Darklight.

With that thought I created something to wear, this Laser Fake would get no free peep show from me, at the same time I set up the strongest set of shields around me I could. I rose up over the SWAT truck that had provided cover and moved away someplace clear of bystanders and agents. The front of the building that I had been held in was gone, blown to pieces by the fight, the two Strikes had gone back to hand-to-hand fighting. Seeing that blast damage, wrecked cars and armoured vans, the craters in the parking lot, the bodies and... bits of bodies. I realized that Laser Strike, by going hand-to-hand was trying to keep the damage that his insane clone could do down to the minium.

Ok what would Mom...I gave myself a mental slap to the back of the head, wrong question what would I, Darklight, do? I loved my Mom but she wasn't the sharpest knife in the drawer, lots of power and control but when in doubt she'd brute force her way through any problem. I didn't have her experience, I didn't have my sister Val's over the top energy and good luck, but I have my brain, I was the smart one in the family, so fight smart. Mom's power's didn't come with a manual, or even FAQ card, but that also meant I wasn't tied down by Mom's preconception of what was possible, for the first few years of her career Mom just created things from what she called 'dark matter' and hit things, but Mom could do a lot more, so could I, but for old times sake…

“Hey Laser Strike, QUACK, QUACK...”, both Strikes looked my way, but one of them dived away and started flying while the other started yapping, he didn't get far into his speech as I created a massive cylinder the size of a telephone pole and threw it at him, “...DUCK!” As the improvised battering ram hit, knocking him further into the rubble of the ruined building I called out, “To slow Laser Fake, much too slow for a real hero!”

With that I started creating more cylinders in the air dropping them into the rubble and hopefully on his head. As I was doing that, I side-slipped about 100 feet from where he last saw me, a good thing I did that as a massive blast of gold coloured light went skyward, looking at the size and power of blast I was suddenly worried for any low orbiting spacecraft. Following the massive blast Fake Strike shot up from the wreckage heading roughly towards where he last saw me. Which meant I was on his side with a clear shot at him, I took it, beams of what Mom called 'dark energy' shot from my finger tips most missed but a couple of shots after I corrected my aim, hit him, it didn't do much damage, in fact there seemed to be a shimmer around Fake Strike which I took for a force field, seems everyone got one these days. As he turned towards me I shot straight up turning to keep my left side at him, with all his attention me the real Laser Strike, accept no substitutions, had a perfect back shot, he took it. Laser Strike's shot was a tight beam, focused and on target. Bellowing with rage Fake Strike spun and fired back, multiple shots scattered in a spray over the area that the back shot had came from. Which set him up for me to shoot him in the back, which I did. Bellowing in rage he spun firing a huge arc of light that just missed me as I accelerated upwards again, this time I kept going, zig-zaging like mad.

I formed all around me a haze of fine razor sharp particles of this 'dark matter', and then dove for the ground as fast as I could, Fake Strike fired at me just missing, as I altered course heading for him, at the last instant I rolled and zigged pulsing the haze of particles outwards as we passed, as Fake Strike ran into the cloud I felt little spikes of pain as he destroyed the fine particles by colliding with them, because the manifested particles where so fine, and unlike the last time he destroyed my construct, I made no real effort to keep them intact once they impacted, the mental feedback this time was no worse a 'pins and needles' feeling. He wasn't as lucky with our combined speeds it was like getting sandblasted by a tornado, I could feel when his force field went down, then the particles hit his body armour and more important his exposed flesh.

His flight path went erratic his hands reaching for his face, his body armor looked like he had gone swimming in razor blades and the solid light wings were flickering so his flight gear was damaged I had no better shot then right now as I thrust my right hand at him, all the energy I had been holding ready to let fly, I hesitated, was this murder? Did I have that right? Should I? Could I?

As I was trying to make up my mind a blast of light tore apart the clone, the remains disappearing in that terrifyingly intense beam. Nothing was left. I just hovered there looking were he had been, maybe there was a wisp of smoke I couldn't tell. Laser Strike flew up to me and held his position about a couple of arm lengths away. We both looked at each other, there didn't seem to be anything to say but as we looked at each other we did an awful lot communicating. 'Strike finally spoke, “Um that's quite a costume Darklight.”

Startled I looked at myself, I'd never seen what I had come up with. When I realized what I was wearing I blushed to my toes. I'd copied Mom's costume, black and deep purple were the colors. It started off with black elbow length fingerless gloves with purple cuffs, black thigh high open toed stiletto heeled boots with cutouts encased my legs, purple laces seemed to hold them together, my body was covered with what could best described as black with purple trim high cut thong type leotard that was like a second skin with a deep 'V' with the point of the 'V' stopping below my navel.

OH MY GAWD!

Why Mom did you have flaunt everything!? Then I remembered when Val asked the same question once, and Mom's response 'When you look better at 50 then you looked at 20 kiddo you'll want to rub everyone's nose it.' Yup that was my Mom. God I miss you so much…

The rest was equal parts horrifying and boring, I tried to help clean up the scene but I kinda started to lose it at all the bodies, my mind kept multiplying the number of bodies and body parts, the agent, Homer Johnson, that had saved me was mostly fine and I was glad for that. The MCO showed up and tried to toss their weight around, that Bane guy was having none of it, I don't what was said to the head MCO agent but the guy looked like he wanted to die after a few minutes and after ten minutes he was in full retreat. Agent Johnson called it the 'Bane Effect'.

After the ambulances had left and the CSI guys showed up the real torture began. Lawyers. More lawyers, statements, more statements. I got some details from Agent Johnson and Bane, it seems the damper they where using on me was illegal because it worked on a person's brain disrupting brain activity. Side effects other than permanent brain damage if used for any extended length of time included a fugue state like major depression with extreme disassociation. When I was on that thing some tame lawyers talked to me and I signed a confession and waved my rights. That got fixed fast. Some of Weems' gang confessed they had used it on several other mutants to make them more compliant. That caused a nasty uproar. It seems the FBI would be looking over MCO operations for the last 5 years for 'evidence of any wrongdoing' or ‘violations of civil rights’. It was about a month of this before my part started to wind down, the other lawyers, agents and like had found other things to chew on. Which I liked.

The new head of the local MCO came by to apologize. Well he tried to apologize, the lawyer with him kept interrupting anytime he tried. The new director finally lost his temper and tossed the lawyer and apologized in private. I really didn't want to like him but he was a good guy it seemed who was equal parts pissed and horrified by what had been done.

The downside is that I had more time to myself, as a key witness I was kept in a safe house that the FBI had in the area, but I had more time to think. I had nightmares a lot, an FBI shrink interviewed me, it was kinda a bust. The shrink was nice but we just came from two different worlds, there was so much that I needed to talk about, like what happened to my Mom, how I got her powers and what I was doing in Baltimore and then all stuff when I was held by Weems and his gang. I finally asked if I could talk to Agent Bane again. He showed the next day.

I was trying to watch TV when he came in. We said 'hello' that kinda thing, finally I explained the problem I was having with my FBI shrink and how we didn't click, and I had bunch of stuff I wanted to talk about but couldn't and I was wondering if he could help me with my problems. He just looked at me and then said; “Of course I will, what do you want to talk about first? How you switched genders?” It was in such a matter of fact tone that I didn't realized that somehow he'd figured out my biggest secret. He just waited patiently while I tried to gather my wits. I just stared at him he had a gentle smile on his face, but it never reached his eyes I noticed.

Swallowing I tried to figure out what to say, “Well here's how my story begins...”