From the wreckage, Koriand'r pulls herself to her feet. She sees creatures like her, with two legs, two arms, and a single head of hair; only some are pale or brown. The beings have the same number of limbs as her, but they all appear to lack her orange skin tone. And they all look at her with fear.
They must be weak.
Still, she tests them. She shouts words to the crowd, daring them to step forth and free her. Will now one break my bonds, she would bellow. Show me strength, she would cry out. One stepped forward. He raised his hands and blinded her with a bright flash of light.
Koriand'r flinched but quickly corrected this and charged forward. She would use her bonds like a club, swinging them with all her might. The man, he resembled a man, not nearly as handsome as those from her world, shrieked and fell back before Koriand'r reached him. However, Koriand'r's bonds found a new target, and the pavement was now at risk of potholes. A taxi was made fit for the junkyard with one strike, and a streetlight was rendered useless. The onlookers from the second-story balcony of a pizza joint looked on in relative safety despite how the ground trembled. Until the girl noticed the pillar supporting the balcony, narrowed her eyes, and struck it with her bulking cuffs against it, causing it to buckle and break and the spectators to lose their footing. Something here–anything here had to break her bonds!
Koriand'r did not hear their cries, however. She was confused and furious and wanted freedom and to know what was happening to her home.
So perhaps the last thing she needed was something to strike her squarely on the side of her crown. Nearly thrown off balance, Koriand'r snapped her head towards the perpetrator, snarling.
Batman and Robin stood on top of a car, arms tucked in their capes, a few feet away from the girl. Koriand'r gritted her teeth as Batman stood to his full height. "Who are you?" Batman demands to know. At this, Koriand'r growls, a more primal sound than before, and lunges towards the Dynamic Duo with a battle cry. Batman and Robin watch as she flies into the air before gravity forces her on them like a swinging hammer, and had they not separated, it would have shattered them just as easily.
"Holy earthquake," Robin muttered, then yelped when she advanced on him.
Stronger than she looks, Batman thought as he skidded on the asphalt and as the girl advanced on Robin – as if the damage all around wasn't enough of an indicator. He needed to observe this girl and devise a strategy, already running his hand on his utility belt. But he couldn't allow Robin to risk any direct hits from her.
"Keep your distance, Robin!" Batman called out.
"No kidding!" Robin says, leaping away from her, "She's singled me out! Must be my good looks!"
As Robin used his acrobatic skills to dodge the girl's sledgehammer swings, Batman raced towards them. He reached for two smoke bombs and called out for Robin, and as the girl snapped her head toward him, smoke exploded around her, obscuring her vision. Batman heard her cough as he slipped his breather on. Robin landed beside him, his breather on as they watched the smoke's density increase.
Her coughs became hacks and wheezing. Then, from within the smoke, two glowing green orbs became slightly larger. Then, the girl with glowing green eyes streaked through the air, and Batman and Robin lunged out of the way. The girl had, evidently, decided Batman was the bigger threat as she focused on him. A lame man could believe that this dance could go on forever, but Koriand'r wanted everything to leave her alone, so she stomped the ground, brought a piece of the ground, and kicked it toward him. Her reflexes were sublime, and she was beyond a simple bruiser. Batman dodged the debris, but then the girl brought cuffs down and sent a shockwave where Batman had landed. Batman hit a lamppost, reopening some of the wounds from his fight with the Joker.
Batman struggles to his feet, but leaning on the lamp post causes it to fall. Batman hears the lamp post hit the road, looks up, and his eyes widen when he sees her raising an entire bus overhead, grunting with effort as she did before she launched it at Batman. The crusader made to stand, but a flash of silver crossed his side. Batman's eyes widened when Victor hurdled himself toward the bus, meeting the vehicle head-on. The impact sent him back on the road, but instead of being crushed, the teen planted his metallic boots on the ground and carried the bus for a few minutes before swinging it slowly to his left. The bus fell to the ground with a clunk but damaged nothing and no one.
Koriand'r took a few steps forward, watching these enemies regroup. She watched this gleaming, silver man glare at her for a moment. He turned his back and held a hand for the shadowy man to stand. The shadowy man took it, and Koriand'r was too far away to hear the words they exchanged, not that she could understand or cared to understand. She only sees the difference between them and her captors, the Gordanians, and how they helped each other, how they reminded her of– what weakness was!
Robin moves to the pair and catches Batman as he staggers to his feet. They watch as the girl raises her arms again, crashes them into the road, and something softer hits afterward. Something falls off her cuffs, and now, her orange-skinned hands are free. Her forearms are still linked, making the duo and Victor think it was only to make her more comfortable. Then, her hands glow in the same green light as her eyes. The light shines brighter and brighter, and they all recognize when something is charging up, and Batman shouts:
"MOVE!"
The three run closer to the girl as a hailstorm of blasts fires at them. She fires these like a machine gun, a rapid burst of green fireballs hitting everything she aims at except her targets. Batman and Robin were used to crooks busting out machine guns, trying to kill them, so they knew how and when to jump or duck and how much distance to keep. Fortunately for Victor, she was madder at them than she was at him.
That changed, however, when she lost sight of them and now aimed her blasts at him. Victor ran again, fast and weaving like a string in the wind. A blast hit his shoulder, a spark flashed out, and Victor did grunt. But as soon as it flashed, Victor twisted his body on the momentum and kept running. He was juking when blasts would explode the ground, and instead of tripping, Victor's route went unhindered. Victor scanned the area, searching for Robin and Batman around the wrecked cars. He spotted Robin waving him next to a bus, sitting horizontally on the road, and raced toward them.
When Victor reached them, he noticed how much worse everything had become. The road behind now looked like a tornado or a small warzone had blown over, with lamp posts on the ground and debris everywhere. Victor saw cars with their entire chassis on display or cut in half and briefly hoped the Batmobile was okay. Victor looked at his shoulder and noticed the black burn mark left, but his shoulder wasn't pierced or melted.
"Girl's gonna wreck the whole city," Victor stated.
"If she doesn't wreck us first," Robin said, noting Victor's arm, then turned to his grim mentor, "Kryptonian?"
Batman grunted, "She hits like one."
"What do we do? Get the Kryptonite?"
"I'm not sure she is a Kryptonian, and anyway, I think it's time to rethink our strategy." Batman looked down at him. "I'm sure I've made a wrong impression on her, and I don't need you taking that abuse." He took in a breath. "Try talking to her."
Robin blinked, "Uh, Batman, a smoke bomb to the face is still a smoke bomb to the face."
"It's not a Batarang, either." Batman grimaced, "And the anesthetic gas hasn't taken effect, and we need to keep collateral to a minimum."
"Yeah, and besides," Victor said, glancing at her through the bus' window, "I'm pretty sure those blasts took a lot outta her. Her stress levels ain't past the rough anymore." Then paused, "Um, yeah, I've been scanning her."
Robin sighed and said before Batman could press Victor for more information:
"Alright, I'll handle this."
"I'm right behind you," Batman assured his ward. Robin nodded. The girl advanced towards them until Robin held out his hands. The girl stopped, still gritting her teeth and on guard. To Robin, she looked tired–as if firing all those bolts drained her, but she growled like an animal too angry to know he was helping.
Or maybe too scared, Robin thought, and as he got closer, he looked at the face beneath the M-shaped crown and thought, she's beautiful.
Then, a car horn pierced through the tense silence, and Dynamic Duo and the girl looked away to see flashing headlights barrelling toward them. At once, Robin tried to push the girl out of harm's way, but she merely ran towards the oncoming vehicle, heaved her imprisoned hands, and fired at the runaway truck. It slid like butter away from her blasts and kept getting closer. Batman brought a batarang and flung it to the left tires, trying to veer it off course, but it was too late. Suddenly, the girl launches herself toward the truck and slams the hood like an anvil, tossing it overhead. The truck was only above her five seconds, spinning midair before crashing back down. Before it did, however, a cloud of ash burst through the windshield and twisted itself like a corkscrew or a drill.
Koriand'r's eyes widen, and she jumps away before it touches her. The tip pierces the spot where she was, drilling a hole into the road. Then, the White Rabbit, standing precariously atop his ashes like an umbrella. Jagger held a man on his other arm by the neck of his shirt, unconscious and dangling, and as the ashes dissipated, Jagger dropped him with his arms bound in a dull, light green substance. Jagger flipped forward, then immediately flipped backward to dodge the emerald blast. The ashes parted like a curtain and flowed back around him.
"Woah, a literal hotty!" Jagger exclaims.
Robin runs in and yells, "Jagger, stop!"
Batman groans, and Victor says, "Want me to get the bunny before he gets hurt?"
Victor and Batman follow Robin, hurriedly with the taller teen breaking off from Batman; the girl gaining on her opponent, and Jagger extends a fan and holds one arm behind him, his usagi mask in battle mode. The girl growls and yells something that sounds like a horrible insult toward the Rabbit. So, the White Rabbit smacks his lip and repeats what she said. The girl growls even more feral than before, any signs of fatigue suddenly unapparent, and charges him. The White Rabbit smirks and pushes the button on the object behind him.
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A sleek sheen of silver rushes the White Rabbit, saying, "Come on, you blockhead!" and the White Rabbit is thrown on the sidewalk. The White Rabbit grunts, picks up his fan, and then his eyes widen beneath the green of his mask.
"Oh no," is all the White Rabbit can say before something explodes behind him, and the White Rabbit's lower body is suffused with the dull, light green substance the man he carried was restrained in. Victor backs away from the now encased and thoroughly incapacitated White Rabbit, his eye scanning the substance. He perceives a monomeric resin with some hardening properties, water, and a polymerized block designed to restrain muscle movement with an estimated time of an hour at best. In other words, the kid was stuck in glue.
Victor watched the kid struggle for a moment, shrugged, and said:
"You know what? Sit there and listen to your tunes."
"Hey, wait! You can't leave me here!" Jagger continues to struggle pitifully.
"Brought this on yourself, honestly." So, Victor left him there and rushed back to join the Dynamic Duo.
Jagger fumed within his new prison. His arms were stuck in the cold and brittle but also slightly sticky substance that ground his movements to a halt. From his position, he could see Robin approaching the alien girl. Her figure hunched over, all ravenous and ready to pounce. Robin held up his hands and said a few words to her. Then, he pointed in my direction while his other hand appeased her. Jagger rolled his eyes when they looked at him.
Batman and Victor stood closely behind Robin, trying to appear relaxed while remaining on guard. Robin pulls out something from his utility belt, and her eyes and hands glow that same emerald fire. Robin's telling her to calm down, Jagger can see. They want him out of the way, so he might as well watch. He sees the girl finally trust Robin as the boy takes the bar to restrain her. Robin brings his tool, and a lengthy pause gives Jagger time to try and scratch his nose, then give up.
There's the dull clank and thud on the road and a gasp and shout from Robin. Then, Jagger's eyes widen with the cybernetic teen and Batman as the girl kisses Robin straight on the lips. Robin's shorter than her, so from Jagger's perspective, he was dragged by his neck. The kiss causes Robin to drop his pick, and after a few more seconds, she shoves him before Robin can properly melt into the kiss. Then, she spoke, not in her alien language, but in English:
"If you wish not to die, you will leave. Me. ALONE!"
With this declaration, she took off into the air like a speeding bullet. With only the sounds of car alarms and a few small fires, Jagger mutters:
"Did she suck the English out of him?"
Jagger chuckled at the stupid question, and the little bird boy stared at the sky, gaping at what had just happened. Even Batman looked like he needed to collect himself before shaking his head and walking to his protegee. Batman lifted Robin by his shoulders, shook him, and snapped his fingers, scaring the confusion away. Jagger watched idly as Robin visibly blushed a beet red and fought to regain his composure. Victor Stone, Jagger remembered his name, walked up to them, putting his hands on his waist, smirking down at Robin, to which the latter recoiled in embarrassment.
The three exchanged a few words; Jagger caught a few of them and was experienced enough to know when people decided they were going to chase down answers. Batman didn't appear to hesitate and pulled out a device. Batman moved Victor Stone to the side, and a few seconds later, the Batmobile sped towards them. Batman and Robin entered the car, and Victor Stone stood there as the hatch had yet to close. Then, the teen shrugged his arms in an 'I've got nothing better to do' way and hopped in with them. Jagger saw Victor Stone maneuvering his body to the backseat of the Batmobile, and their heads all disappeared as the top slid shut, and they raced away.
"They completely forgot about me," Jagger said. He groaned and heaved his right arm up, trying to free it. Jagger huffed, then saw all his ashes still on the ground, some having been blown away with the Batmobile, but still enough.
"Okay," Jagger huffs, then concentrates on the ashes. He hones in on their properties, gets the feel of their soft and coarse and fleeting presence, imagines the rough feeling they leave on his hands, and they ripple for a moment. Jagger relaxes for another moment; then his eyes dart upward. The ashes follow his directions, and an intangible wall or platform of ashes hangs limply in the air. Then, Jagger tenses again, and the ashes ripple like water on a beating drum. A small stream breaks away from the collective, trying to flow toward Jagger's position like a feather or a worm testing its surroundings. Jagger sweats under his mask, and he feels the headache coming.
Then, Jagger exhales roughly, and the ashes fall and scatter.
Jagger growls, "Be nice, Jagger. Do the right thing, Jagger. This is what I get."
What Jagger doesn't notice, however, is that a car, having been forcefully lodged into a window, had decided on where it wanted to go. And so, it tipped back, slowly creaked, and groaned as it began to fall on where Jagger lay encased. Jagger looked up to see the car coming down on him. The blonde boy's face fell, and he prepared for the impact.
Then, a hand caught the car by the trunk.
A gust of wind blew at Jagger's hair, and when it settled, he looked up at the man in a blue and red suit and red cape who balanced the heavy vehicle in his palm as effortlessly as an apple. Jagger sighed in relief.
"Oh," he said, "Morning Superman!"
Superman smiles brightly at the boy, then tosses the vehicle to land in his other hand. He takes the car in both hands and gently sets it down. He pats his hands like a job well done, stands tall and muscular, and turns around to face Jagger. His eyes glow blue, then switch to red, and the glue around Jagger bubbles profusely. The boy can feel his arms loosening up.
"I'm a little late. I had to deal with a fire in Brazil." Superman reaches into the glue and pulls Jagger out of these confines, "Speaking of which, happy late birthday!"
Jagger tries not to smile with the Man of Steel. The wind picks up, and Superman's cape moves with it so that all Jagger wants to do is stare. Suddenly, everything around him, from the pebbles on the ground to the sky and the moon, seems so much more important now that he's here. And Jagger feels his birthday is more important than ever, even though it's over.
"What's going on?" he asks.
Jagger scrounges for an answer, "Crazy alien girl. Smashing the city. But she's good now. She kissed Robin."
He pauses and raises an eyebrow, "Really?" Then, a keyword sinks in, "An alien…?"
"Yeah," Jagger answers, "Orange skin, red hair, green lasers, hostile to humans."
"Did she attack first or you?"
Jagger looks ruffled, "Why do you assume I did anything?"
Superman remains silent.
Jagger huffs, "I might have tried to run her over with a truck."
"Marlo!"
"She was fine! She flipped it over!"
"That's not the point." Superman says sternly.
Jagger shrugged and took off his usagi mask. He rubbed his forehead, scratching it. He subsequently snaps his fingers, and the rippling ash flows steadily and freely to him. Jagger opens his satchel, and the ashes flow efficiently into it.
"Well," He says, "Anyways, I hijacked the truck I hitchhiked. The guy was gonna kidnap me before you get mad." Jagger holds his hands up, "I thought Robin was in danger. I wanted to save him. So, I forced the guy to crash into her."
Superman scans the chaotic road for the man Jagger is talking about. He finds a guy with glue wrapped around his arms hanging under a light pole. Superman sighs and crosses his arms, but he doesn't get angry.
"Alright," He says, "I'm going to find that alien girl, and I'll assess the situation for myself. Can you put out these stray fires?"
Jagger recoils, stutters, and then says, "Yeah, I guess."
Superman nods and takes to the skies. He uses his super-hearing to find Batman's car, his voice, Robin's, or the girl, like filtering through different radio stations and static for his favorite song. But the sounds fade in and out like ghosts, and, as luck would have it, he picks out one of his favorite songs(Land of Confusion by Phil Collins), which is playing on a car radio. Superman smiles for a moment, but then he hears Jagger muttering. It's soft, but he distinctly makes out the meaning.
Superman turns back to observe the boy: his feet take him from one place to the other, stop, and then repeat all over. So, the Man of Steel decides to end this loop, but he hears the sound of Batman's voice. Superman looks back and forth from Jagger to the source until he hones in on Batman's location, using his heightened sight and X-ray vision to find Batman. After that, Superman taps his earpiece.
"Superman to Supergirl," he says.
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Jagger snaps his fingers at the fires. They die out, ever so slowly, like a delayed effect. Jagger sways his hands to kill it faster. When the flames die down, the Rabbit-masked teen opens his satchel and shifts the ashes in to replenish his reserve. Jagger sighs, scratching his blonde head and stifling a yawn. The boy moves onto another part of the street, moving ahead of a trail of burning curtains hanging out of their window, then shuffles back to the small fire. He lazily holds up a hand, kills the fire as fast as possible, and then collects the curtains' ashes for himself.
He steps away, only to find Superman in front of him. They stare at each other momentarily, awkwardly, then walk down the street together.
"I always forget your super hearing," Jagger says, breaking the silence, " Any chance you could let me brood?"
"I get enough of that from Batman."
Jagger scoffs and almost laughs.
"I was gonna do what you told me. I'm not running."
Superman says, "I didn't say you were."
"Don't you have to help?" Jagger says.
"Yes, I do," the man answers with a strange emphasis, "but I trust them."
Jagger says 'mmm', and keeps walking. He feels something in his hair, maybe dust or tiny pieces of brick, but ignores it.
"Have you been staying out of trouble?" He asks. Jagger doesn't hesitate to shake his head with an 'uh-uh,' "Marlo…" He says, somehow sterner than before.
"I didn't cause it!" Jagger defends, "I just happened to show up at bad places with fires. So, I thought I'd…you know," He shifts, almost bashfully, "put them out."
This satisfies Superman, as he nods after a moment of studying the boy. He is doing what I told him.
"Well, let's make this right. Help me put out these fires, and then, let's find that girl." Superman gestures to the small fires on the trashed vehicles and buildings. He walks over to one taxi with a fire spreading over its engine, inhales sharply, and blows the fire out like a candle. Superman points to a brick wall lying on top of a door to an apartment building; Jagger nods, cracks his fingers, then lifts his hands like a maestro toward the brick wall, and his ashes slither underneath and push it up. Immediately, the door falls off its hinges, and a couple helps an old lady down the steps, hurriedly rushing out of the building with more following. Jagger watches them all leave, and he mulls whether or not to keep his mask on.
Superman nods at him, "And then, maybe you'll apologize to the girl."
Jagger watches him fly above another apartment building and gently pull a Ferrari from the ceiling like a carrot. It looks so effortless, the way he kind of shines in the moonlight, Jagger thinks; who's luckier here? Then, Jagger remembers to reply:
"C'mon! If anything, she did more damage to that truck. I don't know if I can even hurt her."
But even as he said it, Jagger chewed his cheek. Superman descends, patting the head of a little girl who holds onto her corgi pup, her ear-to-ear grin contagious.
"Nevertheless, if she took off and told you to leave her alone, that tells me a lot," Superman said almost wistfully, "Trust me when I say that the first thing you need to step into a new world is a friend."
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Two ships appear above planet Earth, coming closer and closer from depths beyond the Milky Way and at less speed than that of a twinkling star. One is orange with a vast hole that resembles a flashlight or the barrel of a gun. The second ship has two green holes on the front, a small one on the bottom and a larger one on top, and they advance slowly towards the small Earth.
Within the larger of the two ships, Lord Trogar of the Gordanians sits on a throne in the command center, overlooking his crew hard at work. One of their ships had insisted they would be on time, but that was instantly preceded by the sound of their Tamaranian prize screaming bloody murder. When last Trogar heard of this ship, they were crossing these planets, and after his crew detected no matches for Tamaranian life signs on this gray dwarf of a moon, they followed the green planet.
"We have tracked the prize to this planet!"
Trogar's anger lingered even as he learned the prize wouldn't force them to search too far. He glared at the world, deeming it unimportant, not worth conquering. Not today, at any rate.
"Should we destroy it?"
Trogar responded, "No, we risk ending her life!" Trogar eased back into his throne, "She is strong, but even she must submit. The first thing we need to find our prize is weaponry!"
Trogar's underlings cheered and called out to his scouts to prepare for a search party and to send a message to the creatures of Earth. The Gordanians would have their prize back, and no one and nothing could stand in their way without losing their life.