Post by redsycorax on Sept 9, 2018 1:03:10 GMT
Prologue: In a darkened lab, a genetically engineered virus percolated within a secure facility, concealing a malignant objective- targeting the Xq28 gene, the project therein was intended to obliterate all lesbian or gay humans on the face of its Earth. In one batch, though, a reverse transcription era occurred- and the resultant mutant GEV would target only those without the Xq28 gene. And then, destiny intervened. At 09.45.08 GMT, the facility was convulsed by a major earthquake. Outwardly, no major damage was done, yet it would mark the fission point between the old and new worlds for this alternate reality. A robotic holder arm short-circuited and the test tube that contained the GEV spiralled to the floor, bursting open.
An hour later, a hazmat clean-up team member noted a trail of liquid adjacent to the door. He was running late for an important appointment, so he hurriedly cleaned up the trail, splashing some of the viscuous liquid onto his protective clothing.
Several hours later, he waved goodbye to his parents and grandparents at Los Angeles International Airport, a major international transport hub as they left for Guatemala. That day, the travellers destinations included every major city on the face of that world.
Inside the JLA Watch Tower, several days later, Mikaal Tomas (Starman) stood aghast as the sensor array indicated escalating disaster without cease or respite. The unknown epidemic had killed most of the non-alien Terran members of the Justice League and most of Earth's other metahuman organisations. The Atom. Aquaman. Mera. Batman. Nightwing. Red Robin. Robin. Batgirl. Flash. Kid Flash. Jesse Quick. Black Canary. Green Arrow. Green Lantern. Wonder Woman. As a result, the non-Terran JLA members were being run ragged trying to deal with the scale of the disaster that had befallen humanity.
Although the JLA's alien complement had tried to cope with the mounting casualties and find a cure, many of them were traumatised. Superman had lost Lois Lane and everyone else significant in his life, while Starfire had discovered Nightwing's body in Bludhaven. Apart from Obsidian, none of the other members of the Justice Society had survived. Only Todd had answered Mikaal's desperate Watchtower call for assistance, having come from the deathbeds of his father and sister (Green Lantern and Jade).
The League had had to draft in new members amongst Earth's surviving metahumans. Nowhere on Earth was safe. Even on Paradise Island, the funeral pyres for Queen Hippolyta, Princess Diana, Donna Troy and Cassie Sandmark spiralled into the sombre night and New Themiscyra's hospitals were filled to overflowing.
John Constantine and Catwoman's forms firmed into solidity within the JLA teleporter. Catwoman's face was gaunt as she downed stimulants and relieved Mikaal at the global surveillance console. She hadn't slept in days. Selina had held Bruce as he slipped away, fighting to stay with her and the city that he had protected. Before he'd gone into a more permanent stygian blackness, he had made Selina promise to protect Gotham in his stead, now that no-one else was left to do so.
As for the usually cynical John Constantine, he was nursing his own dull,unmitigated ache inside his soul. The plague had not spared homo magus any more than it had homo sapiens. All Zatanna's magicks hadn't saved her in the end, nor had any of her counterparts. When he had encountered a shell-shocked Death of the Endless, even the anthropomorphic incarnation of mortality was anguished, beyond measure. She told her old associate about her brother Destiny's sepulchural statement about what was unfolding on this world. Behind her, her wings whirred unceasingly in the background.
Near Crime Alley, four figures met in congress- Pied Piper, Trickster, Poison Ivy and Harley Quinn:
"It's settled, then? Suspension of hostilities?"
The Piper nodded: "Hell yeah. What's a rogues gallery without the Flash?"
"Harley?"
Safe in her beloved Ivy's arms, Harleen Quinzel viciously kicked a jack in the box with all her strength. Her heel smashed down on the shattered jesterface repeatedly, cutting its histrionic laughter short abruptly. She sneered:
"It was worth it, Ivy, doll. I sat by his bedside and taunted him while he was vomiting his guts out and messing the bed. For every time that woman-hating piece of $#!* hit me while we were still together. He didn't even get to kill Bats, his core obsession. He begged me to provide him with an easy way out and suffocate him with a pillow. He was screaming in pain as he went into the darkness. I left him there. The maggots are probably feasting on him now. It's all he's good for."
Elsewhere in Gotham, Commissioner Maggie Sawyer pressed a cup of coffee into her wife Batwoman (Kate)'s hands. In a corner, Superman and Starfire talked about Lois Lane and Dick Grayson and what their lovers had meant to them. Koriand'r swallowed through her tears as she said:
"When this is over, I don't think I'll be able to stay on this world. It's too raw. It hurts too much."
'I might come with you, Kory. There's nothing for me here now. I swore to protect this planet. I failed."
"And the others?"
"Karen said she's keeping an eye on Todd. She's worried that he might go off his antipsychotics. What good is being a 'man of steel' if I couldn't even protect the woman I loved the most in the world? I feel like I'm back in Smallville when Ma and Pa died from that unknown virus. Kara said whatever I decided, she'll go with me."
"Ryand'r said that Tamaran would send a shuttle to this world to pick me as soon as I'm ready. But for now, I have to be here, stay here and deal with what's happening. But. All the Titans are gone, apart from Bunker."
"And most of the League. But who's going to replace me?"
Mikaal watched the sepulchural quietness of Los Angeles. The city had fared better than many others, even given what the current incarnation of the Justice League had accomplished. Little damage had been done to the LA skyline, but CCTV cameras showed a handful of cars travelling down its boulevards, and far fewer citizens and tourists throughout its iconic landmarks. It was an austerely sculpted, beautiful city of ghosts. As the night fell, though, the truth emerged. There were a tiny handful of lights scattered across the vast silent mausoleum.
Batwoman cleared her throat: "I managed to find the laboratory where that GEV had been manufactured. It was called "Virtue Biochem." Huh. Some concept of virtue. Power Girl gave me a micro-organism read out and Obsidian told me that there'd been a reverse transcription error and door sealant failure. All it took was a minor earthquake and..."
"How is Todd?"
"How do you expect, Mikaal? Like the rest of us, he's had to deal with the death of his family. On top of that, there's his schizophrenia."
"Speaking of which, there's a downtime delivery from the Legion, uptime in 3015. "Thought this might come in useful for Obsidian. Thom and Nura."
"What is it?"
"Looks like some 30th century pharma..."
GOTHAM:
Todd Rice blinked open his eyes. The voices inside his head were gone. He nestled closer to Damon Matthews, his lover and now husband and kissed him:
"The pills worked. I'm asymptomatic."
"Great. So, what's on the schedule for you this morning?"
"I relieve Kate up on the Justice League satellite. You?"
"Hugh and Jeremy are house-hunting so I volunteered to introduce the boys to the post-apocalyptic property market in New York."
JUSTICE LEAGUE WATCHTOWER:
The teleporter hummed into activity as the form of Miguel (Bunker) Barragan firmed into solidity as Kate (Batwoman) Kane waved from the scanner array: "Hola, Senora Kane. Anything to report?"
"I've just been on the phone to Maggie, my wife, and Gotham Police Commissioner. Apparently, we have a new Green Lantern- Gannon Molloy, a former Bludhaven police officer. Unfortunately, while he was still learning the ropes, he was attacked by Dez Trevius, one of the deadliest Sinestro Corps members. Fortunately, however, we were forewarned by Jerry Wakefield - Tuatara, the Kiwi superhero, and a precog. I've been compiling a list of potential Justice League members, and one of them, Josiah Power, has energy refraction and durability powers, so we got him to run interference."
"Got to say that I'm a little apprehensive about this. I was not a member of the Teen Titans for all that long."
"Well, at least the aftermath of the epidemic is diminishing."
"Excuse me if the question sounds somewhat naive, but does your catalogue also include references to unreconstructed supervillains who might not reform?"
"Hart- Pied Piper- has been extremely helpful from that perspective, Miguel. Although most of the major echelon metahuman villains also died of the Decima plague, such as Luthor, Joker and the Cheetah, and others reformed, such as Catwoman, Hart himself, Poison Ivy and Harley Quinn, there are still some stand out exceptions. Trevius is one such figure, although he's an exception because he's an alien metahuman and Sinestro Corps member. Brain and Mallah died after an attack on the Doom Patrol went wrong just before the Decima Plague happened. And there are some who can't be salvaged. Mort Drake- the Cavalier- lost his partner Karl Courtney -Stingaree -to Batman and the Flash- is one. Two merenaries- Saber and Cannon -are others. Most worryingly of all, there are references to a woman named Madeline Giles."
"Obsidian told me about her. Was she not a Golden Age adversary of the original Sandman, Wesley Dodds?"
"She hasn't aged. She also vanished at the end of the forties and as far as I can make out, didn't re-emerge until after Wesley's death several years ago. I suspect she's a darkside mage or vampire."
"Ah. That is Menalippe, the new Wonder Woman. But who is that?"
"Derinoe. Dark Amazon, separatist. Do not approach unless you are Kryptonian or Daxamite class."
"So we have a new Wonder Woman. Good. What about gay Atlanteans or Kryptonian class individuals?"
"There's an Atlantean, the former Aqualad II. As for Kryptonians..."
<Kate, this is Gan. I've detected spaciotemporal fluctuations. I believe it to be from Earth's future.>
<Josiah, Menalippe, Val, Big Thunder, prepare to teleport on my signal.>
As the figure emerged, Kate raised an eyebrow: "I'm Zar-Al, formerly of the Convocation of Metasapients in the forty first century. We disbanded in 4035 and I'm known as Krypton Man. Kal-El contacted me uptime and asked me to assist you."
"Which answers that question."
"What does worry me is that our opponents are also mobilising to exploit the chaos, Miguel. I'm convening a Justice League meeting, one week from now. We need cohesion and networks. What say you get to work contacting the younger metahumans available to us...?"
JLA WATCHTOWER:
"Kate..." At some time or another, she guessed that this moment might come. She didn't turn:
"Renee. You took your time."
"Yeah, well, detective work. Not even hello?"
"Sorry, I've been trying to keep things together after the world went to hell in a handbasket."
"How's Maggie?"
"How would you expect, Re? She's just lost her daughter and nothing can bring her back. Dear God. So much grief, so much mourning. And I'm not sure that all of us are going to make it. Most of our activity has been expended on rescue work and reconstruction."
"Don't, Kate. Don't push me away. Not now."
"It damned well hurts, Renee. I'm not made of stone. I lost my dad in all this, next to Mags, the person I loved most in this world. Even with Krypton Man and Power Girl on full time duty, we keep missing people."
"That's not what the papers say, not what the media says. The new Justice League is the only thing giving people hope during this whole damned darkness."
"You know what hurts the most, though? Darkseid didn't do this, nor did the Antimonitor, nor any of the other multiverse class supervillains. Humanity did it. We did it to ourselves. Do we even deserve to survive as a species?"
"Zar-Al and Kara love this planet. They've sworn to protect it. Mikaal found it a sanctuary from the religious dictatorship on Talok III."
"I'm not sure I can do this alone, Renee."
"As long as I'm here, baby, you won't..."
Grim and foreboding as she was, Batwoman collapsed sobbing into the Question's arms.
Harley Quinn gradually removed her clowns outfit and removed her whiteface makeup. She pulled on a new outfit, one full of jagged edges and sharp blades. She smiled in the mirror:
"Looking good, Razor."
"Uh, hi, Mr Molloy." Terry Berg nervously shuffled his feet until the Bludhaven police officer looked up:
"What can I do for you-"
"Terry. Terry Berg. Listen, I was a friend of Kyle Rayners, the old GL."
"How the hell did you f-"
"It's not important. I've got a terrorism alert for you."
"Damn. Molloy to JLA Watchtower. Civilian says we have an impending crisis situation at..?"
"STAR Labs, Metropolis. Her name's Razor, she says. She's here to demolish the 'oppressive past.' Namely the Heterosexual Genome Recovery Project based there."
"Harley?!" Selina Kyle reacted, as she saw the grim newly clad figure clutching the detonator in front of her. Green Lantern tried to wrest the device from her, but there was a yellow blur as a forcescreen shot up around her. Power Girl gritted her teeth and hurled herself at the yellow coruscating bubble, but was flung violently back. Krypton Man tried his heat vision on the detonator, but found that the bubble deflected energy as well as kinetic force. John Constantine was next as he shut down the threat. Around her circulated creatures from her nightmares, but the former Harley Quinn was impervious to the former spectres of her mind. Former, because she stared at the brutal image of the Joker, fielded an ectoplasmic gun and shot it through its head:
"You see? I'm not the masochistic little blond girl anymore. When the Joker died from Decima, I saw things clearly for the first time. And can you honestly deny that I've got reason to hate that past? God. I was so weak. Not any more."
"Nope. You've just turned into a psychotic $!^@# in your own right. No way, Harls. The rest of us mourn what happened. We had straight partners, lovers, friends and family members. It may be too late to bring them back, but we can insure that there can be others."
"And bring back the deadly edge to our lives from less altruistic straights? Sorry, Renee, sugar, but I don't think so." The Question nodded to Blitzen as the speedster accelerated around the bubble. With a scowl, Harley/Razor snapped: "It's not over!" Then she teleported away.
And it wasn't. On the face of it, when they struck next in Berlin, where the Bahnhof Zoo interchange had been rehabilitated into the Decima Memorial Museum, Razor and her entourage looked like a happy, carefree group of teenagers. Except teenagers didn't throw grenades into holographier dioramas and smash information terminals with crowbars and sledgehammers. Razor laughed in delight as she ran, hand in hand with her beloved Ivy, through the maze of corridors that had once been anodyne Berlin shopping malls, until two flares of light registered in the main auditorium:
"Oh, $#!*." Razor growled in frustration.
"Don't sweat it, babe. There's a teleport soft spot on top of the building."
"Ooh, Ivy, love the way you think. Overgrowth?"
"Done."
Batwoman and Bunker were in damage control mode:
"This is just nihilism. Evil, disgusting nihilism."
"I am just glad my parents and confreres are not alive to see this, Senora Kane. But who did this?"
"The ringleader is that little $!^@# Harley Quinn, or as she now calls herself, Razor."
"She does have some following."
"Not all of the Decima survivors want to desecrate the memories of those we loved and lost like this."
"But some do. I am not saying that I sympathise with them. But would you blame anyone for burning down an abandoned televangelist studios, for example?"
"This is not a hatemonger facility. Not all straight people were like that. My dad wasn't. Dick Grayson wasn't. Maggie's daughter wasn't. Miguel, if this continues, Razor will plunge our world into civil war."
At a hot sweaty London disco, John Constantine was there to forget the faces of ghosts. But Zee kept appearing in front of him when he was in bed, or high, or drunk. From a corner, a blueskinned guy waved:
"Johnny!"
"Mik. How's it hangin'?"
"Better now I've seen you."
"Seriously, though, I hardly know you."
"And that's a problem how, exactly?"
"You do realise that I'm also involved with a woman?"
"You do realise I'm a Talok III alien and polyamorous triads are a basic social unit on my world?"
"Mate, that is the most unusual chat-up line I have ever been fed."
"Let's get out of here and see what happens."
Ah hell, why not? Constantine said to himself.
"No. Are you high on something, Harley?"
"Harley Quinn is dead. I'm Razor."
"Whatever. Kate told me what you did to the Decima Memorial Museum. I thought we were supposed to be beyond that now."
"Not everyone had the hots for Bats the way you did."
"Not everyone had a sick, dysfunctional relationship the way you did with the Joker."
"Past tense. Like I said, that woman is gone. You don't have to play morally ambiguous anymore."
"Get out, Harley-Razor- whatever juvenile pathetic label you go by now."
"This isn't over, Selina."
"It is for me. You may have seduced Ivy into this nihilistic bull$#!* but I'm stronger."
"You keep on telling yourself that, honey. Until it's too late. Never say I didn't give you the chance."
As Razor disappeared into the void, Selina bit her lip before she turned on her Justice League telepathic plug:
[Kate?]
[Selina. I take it that this is about a mutual accquaintance?]
[Harley-Razor tried to talk me into joining her outfit. Naturally, I refused.]
[B-Bruce- who-what d'you-]
[Come on, I knew Dick was Nightwing. It's not exactly hard to work out.]
[What she did in Berlin sickened me, Kate. Count me in.]
"Mortimer Drake- Cavalier?" Mort Drake looked up from his whiskey and took in the two women standing in the doorway. Ivy laid a yellow rose next to him and hugged him, swallowing back her grief:
"I'm so sorry. I hardly knew Karl...Stingaree... but I know how much you two loved each other. At least that $!^@# Jeanette went up in flames when the Decima plague happened."
"Thank you, Ivy. I'm glad to see you two found each other. And H-Razor, I understand. I hate the fact that I couldn't even marry Karl before he wasn't with me anymore. Even if it's the other way around for you. I'm sorry, I'm not making much sense. I mean...I'm with you."
"It's okay Mort, honey. And wait until you see the makeover I've got in mind for you..."
"Risa del Toro?"
"Who wants to know?" A young looking woman suddenly became alert to the three intruders within her room. If one looked closely at the mirror above the dresser, she cast no reflection. Her eyes flashed crimson and her elongated incisors stabbed forward, until Razor held up a placatory hand:
"Rest easy, sweetcheeks. Nice reflexes. I'm putting together a little group of my own to avenge what was done to us before Decima came along and freed us."
The female vampire raised an eyebrow:
"Why should I?"
"Because that self-righteous rich $!^@# Kate Kane thinks money can buy everything and wants us all to live by the straight and narrow. Like we're supposed to pretend everything was peachy keen and oh so nice before the apocalypse. Like homophobic violence never happened. Like LGBT kids never killed themselves. Like there was never any employment, accomodation or service discrimination against us. Comprenez?"
"Batwoman, huh? Her inspiration murdered my family. I mean, I'm strong enough to go it alone..."
"Obviously, but isn't that the problem? The JLA has teamwork and trust. Their opponents never did, particularly alpha males like Luthor, Professor Zoom and the Joker, apart from the boys and girls in the Flash's Rogue's Gallery. And with Karen Starr still around, we need a heavy hitter. Don't worry, Ri. We'll watch your back if you watch ours."
"Okay. I'm in."
Razor smiled to herself as she raised a cellphone: "Mads? Just five more to go."
"Excellent, my dear."
"This is Toby Raynes, WGBS News. Eight months after the Decima plague swept the world, some of its more obvious consequences are visible to anyone who cares to look. The world's population has been reduced to seven hundred million, with resultant breakdowns of infrastructure and massive depopulation in some areas. Fortunately, the United Nations has been able to form a global relief infrastructure to cope with the massive concerns that beset us now. Unfortunately, although reduced somewhat, brushfire wars still occur in the Middle East. In other areas, cholera, typhus and other infectious diseases are rampant, particularly Nigeria and Uganda. Nations with former healthy LGBT records before the plague have fared the best- but with significant reprecussions for some areas. In the United States, much of the South is depopulated, with little trace of human life. The US army has moved in to secure strategic assets such as Texas oilfields. In Canada, similar moves are understood to be underway in Alberta.
Earth's metahumans appear to be locked in the midst of a civil war. Justice League of America leader Batwoman said that the League would tolerate no further incidents akin to the one that took place in Berlin's Decima Memorial Museum, which was vandalised by figures alleged to be former Batman adversary Harley Quinn, now known as "Razor," amongst others. Razor is understood to be assembling her own group of former metahuman criminals. However, as to the funding of such an organisation, questions are still being asked."
In her LexCorp office, Madeline Giles stretched herself, still astonished at her resurrection after decades of suspended animation. At least her foes, that interfering mystery man Sandman and his colleague Green Lantern, had been dead for decades- she hoped. Along with her past lovers, it must be said. But that was unimportant. She nodded to her bodyguard: "Call Dersinoe in here." After her revival, she was similarly surprised to find that the deceased founder of LexCorp, a savant and entrepreneur named Lex Luthor, had bequeathed her the operational management of this corporation, endowing her with millions to follow her schemes. A deceptively decrepit figure walked into the CEO's office:
"Hola, Madeline."
"Hola, Dersinoe. Still working on the Paradise Island mystery?"
The elderly Amazon nodded: "Yes. And it is a cause for concern. As you are aware, my own primary relationship was with Queen Hippolyta, Wonder Woman's mother and Amazon Queen. Until we met at the launch party to celebrate your takeover of this establishment and corporation. I was there when they cremated her back home. She should have survived, yet I and several other samesexer Amazons did and she did not. And I am still unsure why."
The first Earth-Q metahuman that died was one of the youngest. Miguel (Bunker) Barrigan was young, idealistic and committed to defeating the weak and innocent. Kate trusted and valued him for his enthusiasm, and reasoned that he would be safe with John Constantine and Starman alongside him as elders and protectors when they faced off against a Razor terrorist strike. After all, it was Captain Stingaree, a 'hokey old Batman villain' suffering from mental illness. But Kate should have remembered- Harleen Quinzel had been a brilliant doctor before her turn toward psychosis.
"Go easy on him, mate. The poor old bugger lost his partner a while ago. He's not major league. Treat him with kid gloves."
"Si, senor Constantine. As you say..." Miguel formed an energy shell around the ostensibly non-metahuman Stingaree, which would have been enough to contain him under normal circumstances. But instants later, Miguel's shell disintegrated into a haze, at which point Stingaree stepped out of his erstwhile confinement and aimed his hand at the startled youth. Too late, Constantine recognised something was wrong here and was summoning a counterspell when disaster struck. Mikaal found something was interfering with his gem and he was flung back as he tried to interpose himself between the suddenly inhuman, hymenopterid Stingaree and the frozen, inexperienced youth. In the next second, there was a blinding viridian flash and a scream as tendrils of radiation coursed toward Bunker and seared into his skin. With his own energy projection abilities, he should have been able to defend himself, but he was young, inexperienced and had never met a being with abilities beyond his own to this extent. He screamed as the radiation roasted his skin until he choked and fell to the ground, his corpse still smoking. Stingaree's insectoid mandibles leered inhumanly as he was teleported away.
At the new Injustice Infinity headquarters, Madeline and Harley laughed as they touched glasses of champagne, while Misa slapped Stingaree on the back: "Damn good, man. Who's my quarry?"
Madeleine smiled at the vampire, nodding at the insignia on the holographier display before them:
"That red-haired Kryptonian replacement for Kal-El. That will be a coup."
"Mikaal, Miguel, John? Come in, please."
"S-Selina? It's Mikaal. One of us...didn't make it."
Kate and Selina exchanged worried glances:
"Please clarify."
"Stingaree. He...he was enhanced. Somehow. He. He killed Miguel."
"Merciful god, no." Selina whispered.
"Get everyone up here, Selina. This is a counsel of war. That psychotic $!^@# has crossed a line and she has to pay."
After that, the apprehension proceded according to plan. Misa lunged toward Krypton Man as he broke into the Injustice Gang's headquarters, but then Power Girl interposed her body between them and grabbed Misa by the throat:
"Y-you cannot do that! I am a creature of magick. Y-you..."
Batwoman stood silhouetted in the cavern, staring banefully at Razor:
"You and me, Quinn. Now."
The insane woman laughed aloud: "You stupid $!^@#. You do realise I've had metahuman enhancements, don't you?"
"Ahem. And you do realise we have alien team members?" There was an unreadable expression on Razor's face, but then she snarled and leapt forward. Despite the fact that she had military combat training, Batwoman found the going rough, but her Kryptonian allies soon located her newfound ally:
"Madeline. Time to say farewell." A Phantom Zone projector stabbed into ghostly life as the temporally misplaced scientist became a transparent outline and then blurred into extradimensional imprisonment.
Stingaree was next. There had been a last minute substitution, the speedster Blur. As blue Cherenkov radiation crackled through the cavern, she sliced through the exoskeleton and plunged a demutagen syringe into the enhancile. He cried out as he transitioned back into mere humanity and Catwoman hit him, hard:
"That's for Miguel, you bastard."
Blur asked Selina: "Should we help out Batwoman?"
Selina shook her head: "Razor may be good, but she's over-exerting herself. Uh uh, Misa," Selina plunged a silver stiletto into the vampire, who screamed and combusted into ash and charcoal within seconds of her impalement. In the centre of the cavern, the two warriors seemed to be too easily matched.
Finally, Razor seemed to tire and fell to her knees. Batwoman beckoned to her Kryptonian allies: "Guess what, Harley? You'll have plenty of time to regret what you did."
"Meanin'?"
"You were a biochemist before the Joker turned you. I don't blame you for wanting to make that psychotic woman-hating piece of $#!* suffer, not after what he did to Barbara. And you were a battered woman. But you were jointly responsible for the Decima plague. You destroyed six billion, three hundred million people on this world, our sisters, brothers, parents, grandparents, merely because you wanted to see him contort in pain and die. Except you didn't limit it to him. You're guilty of genocide beyond any nightmare in comparison. The Justice League and I have had a little discussion. You're going into the Zone, Harley. And because what you did can never be forgiven, you will never escape."
Long after the mocking, spiteful laughter had faded away, Batwoman stood at the Watchtower apex, looking out over the newly becalmed Earth. It hadn't brought any of the Decima plague casualties back, but at least Razor wasn't there to interfere anymore. And for what she had done, Harleen Quinzel deserved an eternity to suffer for her crimes. She turned away, longing for Maggie Sawyer Kane's arms, and for her own healing to begin.
THE END
An hour later, a hazmat clean-up team member noted a trail of liquid adjacent to the door. He was running late for an important appointment, so he hurriedly cleaned up the trail, splashing some of the viscuous liquid onto his protective clothing.
Several hours later, he waved goodbye to his parents and grandparents at Los Angeles International Airport, a major international transport hub as they left for Guatemala. That day, the travellers destinations included every major city on the face of that world.
Inside the JLA Watch Tower, several days later, Mikaal Tomas (Starman) stood aghast as the sensor array indicated escalating disaster without cease or respite. The unknown epidemic had killed most of the non-alien Terran members of the Justice League and most of Earth's other metahuman organisations. The Atom. Aquaman. Mera. Batman. Nightwing. Red Robin. Robin. Batgirl. Flash. Kid Flash. Jesse Quick. Black Canary. Green Arrow. Green Lantern. Wonder Woman. As a result, the non-Terran JLA members were being run ragged trying to deal with the scale of the disaster that had befallen humanity.
Although the JLA's alien complement had tried to cope with the mounting casualties and find a cure, many of them were traumatised. Superman had lost Lois Lane and everyone else significant in his life, while Starfire had discovered Nightwing's body in Bludhaven. Apart from Obsidian, none of the other members of the Justice Society had survived. Only Todd had answered Mikaal's desperate Watchtower call for assistance, having come from the deathbeds of his father and sister (Green Lantern and Jade).
The League had had to draft in new members amongst Earth's surviving metahumans. Nowhere on Earth was safe. Even on Paradise Island, the funeral pyres for Queen Hippolyta, Princess Diana, Donna Troy and Cassie Sandmark spiralled into the sombre night and New Themiscyra's hospitals were filled to overflowing.
John Constantine and Catwoman's forms firmed into solidity within the JLA teleporter. Catwoman's face was gaunt as she downed stimulants and relieved Mikaal at the global surveillance console. She hadn't slept in days. Selina had held Bruce as he slipped away, fighting to stay with her and the city that he had protected. Before he'd gone into a more permanent stygian blackness, he had made Selina promise to protect Gotham in his stead, now that no-one else was left to do so.
As for the usually cynical John Constantine, he was nursing his own dull,unmitigated ache inside his soul. The plague had not spared homo magus any more than it had homo sapiens. All Zatanna's magicks hadn't saved her in the end, nor had any of her counterparts. When he had encountered a shell-shocked Death of the Endless, even the anthropomorphic incarnation of mortality was anguished, beyond measure. She told her old associate about her brother Destiny's sepulchural statement about what was unfolding on this world. Behind her, her wings whirred unceasingly in the background.
Near Crime Alley, four figures met in congress- Pied Piper, Trickster, Poison Ivy and Harley Quinn:
"It's settled, then? Suspension of hostilities?"
The Piper nodded: "Hell yeah. What's a rogues gallery without the Flash?"
"Harley?"
Safe in her beloved Ivy's arms, Harleen Quinzel viciously kicked a jack in the box with all her strength. Her heel smashed down on the shattered jesterface repeatedly, cutting its histrionic laughter short abruptly. She sneered:
"It was worth it, Ivy, doll. I sat by his bedside and taunted him while he was vomiting his guts out and messing the bed. For every time that woman-hating piece of $#!* hit me while we were still together. He didn't even get to kill Bats, his core obsession. He begged me to provide him with an easy way out and suffocate him with a pillow. He was screaming in pain as he went into the darkness. I left him there. The maggots are probably feasting on him now. It's all he's good for."
Elsewhere in Gotham, Commissioner Maggie Sawyer pressed a cup of coffee into her wife Batwoman (Kate)'s hands. In a corner, Superman and Starfire talked about Lois Lane and Dick Grayson and what their lovers had meant to them. Koriand'r swallowed through her tears as she said:
"When this is over, I don't think I'll be able to stay on this world. It's too raw. It hurts too much."
'I might come with you, Kory. There's nothing for me here now. I swore to protect this planet. I failed."
"And the others?"
"Karen said she's keeping an eye on Todd. She's worried that he might go off his antipsychotics. What good is being a 'man of steel' if I couldn't even protect the woman I loved the most in the world? I feel like I'm back in Smallville when Ma and Pa died from that unknown virus. Kara said whatever I decided, she'll go with me."
"Ryand'r said that Tamaran would send a shuttle to this world to pick me as soon as I'm ready. But for now, I have to be here, stay here and deal with what's happening. But. All the Titans are gone, apart from Bunker."
"And most of the League. But who's going to replace me?"
Mikaal watched the sepulchural quietness of Los Angeles. The city had fared better than many others, even given what the current incarnation of the Justice League had accomplished. Little damage had been done to the LA skyline, but CCTV cameras showed a handful of cars travelling down its boulevards, and far fewer citizens and tourists throughout its iconic landmarks. It was an austerely sculpted, beautiful city of ghosts. As the night fell, though, the truth emerged. There were a tiny handful of lights scattered across the vast silent mausoleum.
Batwoman cleared her throat: "I managed to find the laboratory where that GEV had been manufactured. It was called "Virtue Biochem." Huh. Some concept of virtue. Power Girl gave me a micro-organism read out and Obsidian told me that there'd been a reverse transcription error and door sealant failure. All it took was a minor earthquake and..."
"How is Todd?"
"How do you expect, Mikaal? Like the rest of us, he's had to deal with the death of his family. On top of that, there's his schizophrenia."
"Speaking of which, there's a downtime delivery from the Legion, uptime in 3015. "Thought this might come in useful for Obsidian. Thom and Nura."
"What is it?"
"Looks like some 30th century pharma..."
GOTHAM:
Todd Rice blinked open his eyes. The voices inside his head were gone. He nestled closer to Damon Matthews, his lover and now husband and kissed him:
"The pills worked. I'm asymptomatic."
"Great. So, what's on the schedule for you this morning?"
"I relieve Kate up on the Justice League satellite. You?"
"Hugh and Jeremy are house-hunting so I volunteered to introduce the boys to the post-apocalyptic property market in New York."
JUSTICE LEAGUE WATCHTOWER:
The teleporter hummed into activity as the form of Miguel (Bunker) Barragan firmed into solidity as Kate (Batwoman) Kane waved from the scanner array: "Hola, Senora Kane. Anything to report?"
"I've just been on the phone to Maggie, my wife, and Gotham Police Commissioner. Apparently, we have a new Green Lantern- Gannon Molloy, a former Bludhaven police officer. Unfortunately, while he was still learning the ropes, he was attacked by Dez Trevius, one of the deadliest Sinestro Corps members. Fortunately, however, we were forewarned by Jerry Wakefield - Tuatara, the Kiwi superhero, and a precog. I've been compiling a list of potential Justice League members, and one of them, Josiah Power, has energy refraction and durability powers, so we got him to run interference."
"Got to say that I'm a little apprehensive about this. I was not a member of the Teen Titans for all that long."
"Well, at least the aftermath of the epidemic is diminishing."
"Excuse me if the question sounds somewhat naive, but does your catalogue also include references to unreconstructed supervillains who might not reform?"
"Hart- Pied Piper- has been extremely helpful from that perspective, Miguel. Although most of the major echelon metahuman villains also died of the Decima plague, such as Luthor, Joker and the Cheetah, and others reformed, such as Catwoman, Hart himself, Poison Ivy and Harley Quinn, there are still some stand out exceptions. Trevius is one such figure, although he's an exception because he's an alien metahuman and Sinestro Corps member. Brain and Mallah died after an attack on the Doom Patrol went wrong just before the Decima Plague happened. And there are some who can't be salvaged. Mort Drake- the Cavalier- lost his partner Karl Courtney -Stingaree -to Batman and the Flash- is one. Two merenaries- Saber and Cannon -are others. Most worryingly of all, there are references to a woman named Madeline Giles."
"Obsidian told me about her. Was she not a Golden Age adversary of the original Sandman, Wesley Dodds?"
"She hasn't aged. She also vanished at the end of the forties and as far as I can make out, didn't re-emerge until after Wesley's death several years ago. I suspect she's a darkside mage or vampire."
"Ah. That is Menalippe, the new Wonder Woman. But who is that?"
"Derinoe. Dark Amazon, separatist. Do not approach unless you are Kryptonian or Daxamite class."
"So we have a new Wonder Woman. Good. What about gay Atlanteans or Kryptonian class individuals?"
"There's an Atlantean, the former Aqualad II. As for Kryptonians..."
<Kate, this is Gan. I've detected spaciotemporal fluctuations. I believe it to be from Earth's future.>
<Josiah, Menalippe, Val, Big Thunder, prepare to teleport on my signal.>
As the figure emerged, Kate raised an eyebrow: "I'm Zar-Al, formerly of the Convocation of Metasapients in the forty first century. We disbanded in 4035 and I'm known as Krypton Man. Kal-El contacted me uptime and asked me to assist you."
"Which answers that question."
"What does worry me is that our opponents are also mobilising to exploit the chaos, Miguel. I'm convening a Justice League meeting, one week from now. We need cohesion and networks. What say you get to work contacting the younger metahumans available to us...?"
JLA WATCHTOWER:
"Kate..." At some time or another, she guessed that this moment might come. She didn't turn:
"Renee. You took your time."
"Yeah, well, detective work. Not even hello?"
"Sorry, I've been trying to keep things together after the world went to hell in a handbasket."
"How's Maggie?"
"How would you expect, Re? She's just lost her daughter and nothing can bring her back. Dear God. So much grief, so much mourning. And I'm not sure that all of us are going to make it. Most of our activity has been expended on rescue work and reconstruction."
"Don't, Kate. Don't push me away. Not now."
"It damned well hurts, Renee. I'm not made of stone. I lost my dad in all this, next to Mags, the person I loved most in this world. Even with Krypton Man and Power Girl on full time duty, we keep missing people."
"That's not what the papers say, not what the media says. The new Justice League is the only thing giving people hope during this whole damned darkness."
"You know what hurts the most, though? Darkseid didn't do this, nor did the Antimonitor, nor any of the other multiverse class supervillains. Humanity did it. We did it to ourselves. Do we even deserve to survive as a species?"
"Zar-Al and Kara love this planet. They've sworn to protect it. Mikaal found it a sanctuary from the religious dictatorship on Talok III."
"I'm not sure I can do this alone, Renee."
"As long as I'm here, baby, you won't..."
Grim and foreboding as she was, Batwoman collapsed sobbing into the Question's arms.
Harley Quinn gradually removed her clowns outfit and removed her whiteface makeup. She pulled on a new outfit, one full of jagged edges and sharp blades. She smiled in the mirror:
"Looking good, Razor."
"Uh, hi, Mr Molloy." Terry Berg nervously shuffled his feet until the Bludhaven police officer looked up:
"What can I do for you-"
"Terry. Terry Berg. Listen, I was a friend of Kyle Rayners, the old GL."
"How the hell did you f-"
"It's not important. I've got a terrorism alert for you."
"Damn. Molloy to JLA Watchtower. Civilian says we have an impending crisis situation at..?"
"STAR Labs, Metropolis. Her name's Razor, she says. She's here to demolish the 'oppressive past.' Namely the Heterosexual Genome Recovery Project based there."
"Harley?!" Selina Kyle reacted, as she saw the grim newly clad figure clutching the detonator in front of her. Green Lantern tried to wrest the device from her, but there was a yellow blur as a forcescreen shot up around her. Power Girl gritted her teeth and hurled herself at the yellow coruscating bubble, but was flung violently back. Krypton Man tried his heat vision on the detonator, but found that the bubble deflected energy as well as kinetic force. John Constantine was next as he shut down the threat. Around her circulated creatures from her nightmares, but the former Harley Quinn was impervious to the former spectres of her mind. Former, because she stared at the brutal image of the Joker, fielded an ectoplasmic gun and shot it through its head:
"You see? I'm not the masochistic little blond girl anymore. When the Joker died from Decima, I saw things clearly for the first time. And can you honestly deny that I've got reason to hate that past? God. I was so weak. Not any more."
"Nope. You've just turned into a psychotic $!^@# in your own right. No way, Harls. The rest of us mourn what happened. We had straight partners, lovers, friends and family members. It may be too late to bring them back, but we can insure that there can be others."
"And bring back the deadly edge to our lives from less altruistic straights? Sorry, Renee, sugar, but I don't think so." The Question nodded to Blitzen as the speedster accelerated around the bubble. With a scowl, Harley/Razor snapped: "It's not over!" Then she teleported away.
And it wasn't. On the face of it, when they struck next in Berlin, where the Bahnhof Zoo interchange had been rehabilitated into the Decima Memorial Museum, Razor and her entourage looked like a happy, carefree group of teenagers. Except teenagers didn't throw grenades into holographier dioramas and smash information terminals with crowbars and sledgehammers. Razor laughed in delight as she ran, hand in hand with her beloved Ivy, through the maze of corridors that had once been anodyne Berlin shopping malls, until two flares of light registered in the main auditorium:
"Oh, $#!*." Razor growled in frustration.
"Don't sweat it, babe. There's a teleport soft spot on top of the building."
"Ooh, Ivy, love the way you think. Overgrowth?"
"Done."
Batwoman and Bunker were in damage control mode:
"This is just nihilism. Evil, disgusting nihilism."
"I am just glad my parents and confreres are not alive to see this, Senora Kane. But who did this?"
"The ringleader is that little $!^@# Harley Quinn, or as she now calls herself, Razor."
"She does have some following."
"Not all of the Decima survivors want to desecrate the memories of those we loved and lost like this."
"But some do. I am not saying that I sympathise with them. But would you blame anyone for burning down an abandoned televangelist studios, for example?"
"This is not a hatemonger facility. Not all straight people were like that. My dad wasn't. Dick Grayson wasn't. Maggie's daughter wasn't. Miguel, if this continues, Razor will plunge our world into civil war."
At a hot sweaty London disco, John Constantine was there to forget the faces of ghosts. But Zee kept appearing in front of him when he was in bed, or high, or drunk. From a corner, a blueskinned guy waved:
"Johnny!"
"Mik. How's it hangin'?"
"Better now I've seen you."
"Seriously, though, I hardly know you."
"And that's a problem how, exactly?"
"You do realise that I'm also involved with a woman?"
"You do realise I'm a Talok III alien and polyamorous triads are a basic social unit on my world?"
"Mate, that is the most unusual chat-up line I have ever been fed."
"Let's get out of here and see what happens."
Ah hell, why not? Constantine said to himself.
"No. Are you high on something, Harley?"
"Harley Quinn is dead. I'm Razor."
"Whatever. Kate told me what you did to the Decima Memorial Museum. I thought we were supposed to be beyond that now."
"Not everyone had the hots for Bats the way you did."
"Not everyone had a sick, dysfunctional relationship the way you did with the Joker."
"Past tense. Like I said, that woman is gone. You don't have to play morally ambiguous anymore."
"Get out, Harley-Razor- whatever juvenile pathetic label you go by now."
"This isn't over, Selina."
"It is for me. You may have seduced Ivy into this nihilistic bull$#!* but I'm stronger."
"You keep on telling yourself that, honey. Until it's too late. Never say I didn't give you the chance."
As Razor disappeared into the void, Selina bit her lip before she turned on her Justice League telepathic plug:
[Kate?]
[Selina. I take it that this is about a mutual accquaintance?]
[Harley-Razor tried to talk me into joining her outfit. Naturally, I refused.]
[B-Bruce- who-what d'you-]
[Come on, I knew Dick was Nightwing. It's not exactly hard to work out.]
[What she did in Berlin sickened me, Kate. Count me in.]
"Mortimer Drake- Cavalier?" Mort Drake looked up from his whiskey and took in the two women standing in the doorway. Ivy laid a yellow rose next to him and hugged him, swallowing back her grief:
"I'm so sorry. I hardly knew Karl...Stingaree... but I know how much you two loved each other. At least that $!^@# Jeanette went up in flames when the Decima plague happened."
"Thank you, Ivy. I'm glad to see you two found each other. And H-Razor, I understand. I hate the fact that I couldn't even marry Karl before he wasn't with me anymore. Even if it's the other way around for you. I'm sorry, I'm not making much sense. I mean...I'm with you."
"It's okay Mort, honey. And wait until you see the makeover I've got in mind for you..."
"Risa del Toro?"
"Who wants to know?" A young looking woman suddenly became alert to the three intruders within her room. If one looked closely at the mirror above the dresser, she cast no reflection. Her eyes flashed crimson and her elongated incisors stabbed forward, until Razor held up a placatory hand:
"Rest easy, sweetcheeks. Nice reflexes. I'm putting together a little group of my own to avenge what was done to us before Decima came along and freed us."
The female vampire raised an eyebrow:
"Why should I?"
"Because that self-righteous rich $!^@# Kate Kane thinks money can buy everything and wants us all to live by the straight and narrow. Like we're supposed to pretend everything was peachy keen and oh so nice before the apocalypse. Like homophobic violence never happened. Like LGBT kids never killed themselves. Like there was never any employment, accomodation or service discrimination against us. Comprenez?"
"Batwoman, huh? Her inspiration murdered my family. I mean, I'm strong enough to go it alone..."
"Obviously, but isn't that the problem? The JLA has teamwork and trust. Their opponents never did, particularly alpha males like Luthor, Professor Zoom and the Joker, apart from the boys and girls in the Flash's Rogue's Gallery. And with Karen Starr still around, we need a heavy hitter. Don't worry, Ri. We'll watch your back if you watch ours."
"Okay. I'm in."
Razor smiled to herself as she raised a cellphone: "Mads? Just five more to go."
"Excellent, my dear."
"This is Toby Raynes, WGBS News. Eight months after the Decima plague swept the world, some of its more obvious consequences are visible to anyone who cares to look. The world's population has been reduced to seven hundred million, with resultant breakdowns of infrastructure and massive depopulation in some areas. Fortunately, the United Nations has been able to form a global relief infrastructure to cope with the massive concerns that beset us now. Unfortunately, although reduced somewhat, brushfire wars still occur in the Middle East. In other areas, cholera, typhus and other infectious diseases are rampant, particularly Nigeria and Uganda. Nations with former healthy LGBT records before the plague have fared the best- but with significant reprecussions for some areas. In the United States, much of the South is depopulated, with little trace of human life. The US army has moved in to secure strategic assets such as Texas oilfields. In Canada, similar moves are understood to be underway in Alberta.
Earth's metahumans appear to be locked in the midst of a civil war. Justice League of America leader Batwoman said that the League would tolerate no further incidents akin to the one that took place in Berlin's Decima Memorial Museum, which was vandalised by figures alleged to be former Batman adversary Harley Quinn, now known as "Razor," amongst others. Razor is understood to be assembling her own group of former metahuman criminals. However, as to the funding of such an organisation, questions are still being asked."
In her LexCorp office, Madeline Giles stretched herself, still astonished at her resurrection after decades of suspended animation. At least her foes, that interfering mystery man Sandman and his colleague Green Lantern, had been dead for decades- she hoped. Along with her past lovers, it must be said. But that was unimportant. She nodded to her bodyguard: "Call Dersinoe in here." After her revival, she was similarly surprised to find that the deceased founder of LexCorp, a savant and entrepreneur named Lex Luthor, had bequeathed her the operational management of this corporation, endowing her with millions to follow her schemes. A deceptively decrepit figure walked into the CEO's office:
"Hola, Madeline."
"Hola, Dersinoe. Still working on the Paradise Island mystery?"
The elderly Amazon nodded: "Yes. And it is a cause for concern. As you are aware, my own primary relationship was with Queen Hippolyta, Wonder Woman's mother and Amazon Queen. Until we met at the launch party to celebrate your takeover of this establishment and corporation. I was there when they cremated her back home. She should have survived, yet I and several other samesexer Amazons did and she did not. And I am still unsure why."
The first Earth-Q metahuman that died was one of the youngest. Miguel (Bunker) Barrigan was young, idealistic and committed to defeating the weak and innocent. Kate trusted and valued him for his enthusiasm, and reasoned that he would be safe with John Constantine and Starman alongside him as elders and protectors when they faced off against a Razor terrorist strike. After all, it was Captain Stingaree, a 'hokey old Batman villain' suffering from mental illness. But Kate should have remembered- Harleen Quinzel had been a brilliant doctor before her turn toward psychosis.
"Go easy on him, mate. The poor old bugger lost his partner a while ago. He's not major league. Treat him with kid gloves."
"Si, senor Constantine. As you say..." Miguel formed an energy shell around the ostensibly non-metahuman Stingaree, which would have been enough to contain him under normal circumstances. But instants later, Miguel's shell disintegrated into a haze, at which point Stingaree stepped out of his erstwhile confinement and aimed his hand at the startled youth. Too late, Constantine recognised something was wrong here and was summoning a counterspell when disaster struck. Mikaal found something was interfering with his gem and he was flung back as he tried to interpose himself between the suddenly inhuman, hymenopterid Stingaree and the frozen, inexperienced youth. In the next second, there was a blinding viridian flash and a scream as tendrils of radiation coursed toward Bunker and seared into his skin. With his own energy projection abilities, he should have been able to defend himself, but he was young, inexperienced and had never met a being with abilities beyond his own to this extent. He screamed as the radiation roasted his skin until he choked and fell to the ground, his corpse still smoking. Stingaree's insectoid mandibles leered inhumanly as he was teleported away.
At the new Injustice Infinity headquarters, Madeline and Harley laughed as they touched glasses of champagne, while Misa slapped Stingaree on the back: "Damn good, man. Who's my quarry?"
Madeleine smiled at the vampire, nodding at the insignia on the holographier display before them:
"That red-haired Kryptonian replacement for Kal-El. That will be a coup."
"Mikaal, Miguel, John? Come in, please."
"S-Selina? It's Mikaal. One of us...didn't make it."
Kate and Selina exchanged worried glances:
"Please clarify."
"Stingaree. He...he was enhanced. Somehow. He. He killed Miguel."
"Merciful god, no." Selina whispered.
"Get everyone up here, Selina. This is a counsel of war. That psychotic $!^@# has crossed a line and she has to pay."
After that, the apprehension proceded according to plan. Misa lunged toward Krypton Man as he broke into the Injustice Gang's headquarters, but then Power Girl interposed her body between them and grabbed Misa by the throat:
"Y-you cannot do that! I am a creature of magick. Y-you..."
Batwoman stood silhouetted in the cavern, staring banefully at Razor:
"You and me, Quinn. Now."
The insane woman laughed aloud: "You stupid $!^@#. You do realise I've had metahuman enhancements, don't you?"
"Ahem. And you do realise we have alien team members?" There was an unreadable expression on Razor's face, but then she snarled and leapt forward. Despite the fact that she had military combat training, Batwoman found the going rough, but her Kryptonian allies soon located her newfound ally:
"Madeline. Time to say farewell." A Phantom Zone projector stabbed into ghostly life as the temporally misplaced scientist became a transparent outline and then blurred into extradimensional imprisonment.
Stingaree was next. There had been a last minute substitution, the speedster Blur. As blue Cherenkov radiation crackled through the cavern, she sliced through the exoskeleton and plunged a demutagen syringe into the enhancile. He cried out as he transitioned back into mere humanity and Catwoman hit him, hard:
"That's for Miguel, you bastard."
Blur asked Selina: "Should we help out Batwoman?"
Selina shook her head: "Razor may be good, but she's over-exerting herself. Uh uh, Misa," Selina plunged a silver stiletto into the vampire, who screamed and combusted into ash and charcoal within seconds of her impalement. In the centre of the cavern, the two warriors seemed to be too easily matched.
Finally, Razor seemed to tire and fell to her knees. Batwoman beckoned to her Kryptonian allies: "Guess what, Harley? You'll have plenty of time to regret what you did."
"Meanin'?"
"You were a biochemist before the Joker turned you. I don't blame you for wanting to make that psychotic woman-hating piece of $#!* suffer, not after what he did to Barbara. And you were a battered woman. But you were jointly responsible for the Decima plague. You destroyed six billion, three hundred million people on this world, our sisters, brothers, parents, grandparents, merely because you wanted to see him contort in pain and die. Except you didn't limit it to him. You're guilty of genocide beyond any nightmare in comparison. The Justice League and I have had a little discussion. You're going into the Zone, Harley. And because what you did can never be forgiven, you will never escape."
Long after the mocking, spiteful laughter had faded away, Batwoman stood at the Watchtower apex, looking out over the newly becalmed Earth. It hadn't brought any of the Decima plague casualties back, but at least Razor wasn't there to interfere anymore. And for what she had done, Harleen Quinzel deserved an eternity to suffer for her crimes. She turned away, longing for Maggie Sawyer Kane's arms, and for her own healing to begin.
THE END