Belle Reve was a cinder block dropped down into the middle of the bayou, and right now it was the site of a battle.
In the prison yard, guards lay strewn amid the wreckage of towers and walls. An overturned jeep was on fire, and an unmanned hose was flooding the ground with murky water. Splashing through it, an armed squad rushed at a man in armor, a visored helm on his head crackling with power. Above them, a woman with razor-sharp silver wings soared, singing down sonic blasts at the cell-blocks and easily dodging gunfire.
Prometheus, the armored man, sent a handful of concussion pellets at his attackers, sending them scattering behind a wall of blossoming fire. But a red and yellow streak evaded the explosions, and got within the villain’s defenses. The Flash landed ten blows on him before he even realized she was there. Staggering backward, he recovered quickly, lashing out with his high-tech
tonfa, the Nightstick, catching the Flash a glancing blow.
“Give it up, Prometheus,” the daughter of Barry Allen snarled, pulling herself up from the ground, and wiping a thin trickle of blood from her lip. “The only way you’re getting inside here is in an orange jumpsuit!”
From beneath his helmet, Prometheus’ lip curled in derision. He twirled his Nightstick, adjusted something on his helmet and assumed a fighting stance. “I’m ready for you now, speedster,” with one finger, he beckoned her onward. “Let’s play.”
Flash charged him, intending to veer at the last minute, circle around and take him from behind--- but she didn’t notice the waves of distorted space that throbbed around him until the last nanosecond, and by then it was too late: she was immobilized, caught like a fly in a spider-web, and Prometheus was able to seize her by the throat!
“Did you really think you were a match for me, girlie?” He squeezed and Flash pried at the hand around her neck, to no avail. Her eyes grew wide as her breath was strangled from her body. “I studied all of you so-called superheroes, and I know how to defeat you all! My helm emits a pulse that nullifies the Speedforce within a radius of five feet. You walked--- no,
ran!--- right into my trap!”
Above, the Silver Swan gave a cry of warning. Green Lantern and Firestorm were coming in, fast! She dived to intercept, but recoiled against Green Lantern’s force-field.
Prometheus heaved Flash into the air, throwing her straight at her teammates. Green Lantern pulled up short to catch her, but Firestorm came on. Which was just what Prometheus wanted. He hurled his Nightstick at her, and it hit her like a concussion grenade, sending the Nuclear Woman careening out of the sky. She slammed against the prison wall, and crashed to the ground. Something in the Nightstick had triggered her transformation, and laying there now were two bodies: the dazed and disoriented Lorraine Reilly, and the aged and frail Dr. Martin Stein.
Seeing their vulnerability, Silver Swan cackled in glee and dove in for the kill, the tips and edges of her wings gleaming.
The cybernetically-enhanced villainess was abruptly yanked backward, and pulled down out of the sky, a length of golden lasso looped around her mid-section. At the other end of the rope stood a golden-haired fury in white, gold and red armor.
“Stay away from them, Vanessa!” said the newly arrived Wonder Woman in a clear voice. “You’re not a killer! Fight the implants! You don’t have to do this…!”
Silver Swan sank to her knees in the flooding prison yard, her hands over her ears as if trying to block out voices in her head. Half of her face had been replaced with chromium and circuitry, but the human half seemed tormented. When she lifted her head again, her photo-electric eye pulsed red and she unleashed a torrent of sonic destruction at Wonder Woman.
Green Lantern barely had time to see if Flash was okay; as he set her down, she choked and shoved him away saying, “Take him down, Kyle.”
Kyle Rayner needed no further incentive. His ring spurting emerald fury, he turned on Prometheus, who had by this time retrieved his Nightstick, and launched himself at his foes.
A burst of willpower sent the villain sailing backward, bouncing on the ground and demolishing the jeep he hit. Floating over to him, Kyle constructed a pair of green glowing manacles. “This is over, Prometheus. Right now.”
Embedded in the wreckage of the jeep, the villain’s lips spread in a bloody-mouthed grin. “No, it’s not.” And lights flared on his helmet, from all sides, blinking in a seemingly random pattern, a flurry of colors that blended together in a mesmerizing swirl. Kyle hovered in the air before him, still and transfixed by the lights. “I’ve got you hypnotized, Green Lantern. Your will is
mine now, and I think you want to kill the Flash!”
Slowly, Kyle Rayner turned around, his eyes vacant--- and he flew directly at the stunned Flash!
Prometheus pulled himself to his feet, laughing uproariously. Across the yard, Silver Swan was buffeting Wonder Woman with sonic blasts, driving the Amazon princess to her knees, Green Lantern was aiming blast after blast of emerald willpower at the still-dazed Flash, and on the other side of the yard, the remaining prison guards were rallying to charge Prometheus again.
“Keep away!” A calm, strident voice called from the top of the crumbling prison wall. Prometheus looked up just in time to see the green and brown clad archer pull back on his bow, a gleaming arrow-tip aimed straight at him. “The JLA will take care of him!”
The shaft sliced through the air and ricocheted off the villain’s helmet, much to his amusement. But Green Arrow had not meant the attack as anything more than a momentary distraction: Superman angled in from Prometheus’ blind-side, strafing him with a two-handed blow that sent Prometheus spinning like a top and crashing head over heels. The Man of Steel looped up and came down, facing the groaning Prometheus, just as Green Arrow shot a rope-arrow into a far wall, and slid down on his bow into the yard, tackling Silver Swan and giving Wonder Woman a moment to recover.
“Stay down,” Superman advised, advancing unafraid on his foe. “If I have to hit you again, you won’t be
able to get back up.”
“You think I wasn’t ready for you?” Prometheus sneered, pushing himself unsteadily to his feet and pulling off the glove on his right hand. “Did you think I was that stupid?” From the ring on his fist came the sickly green glow of Kryptonite.
As the waves of nausea washed over him, Superman sank to his knees, catching the wet ground with his palms before he hit it, face first.
“One of the last pieces of Earth, and I have it!” The villain gloated, splashing towards the weakened Man of Steel. “You wouldn’t believe what my benefactor paid for it on the Black Market---.”
Prometheus came to an abrupt and unintended stop. He was within feet of his fallen foe, but just out of striking distance… and somehow he could go no further. He strained forward with all his might, veins standing out on his neck and arms, but some unseen force held him immobile!
“Did
you think we’d let you hurt Superman?”
The villain whirled in place at the droll voice, and was confronted with a living shadow, a being of pure darkness, and he was standing on Prometheus own shadow, pinning him in place.
“You may
think you have a plan to defeat every member of the Justice League, Prometheus,” said the thing of darkness that was Mitch Shelley, the Resurrection Man, “But there’s no way you can plan for
me. I can have a different power every day. All I need do is die.”
The villain was not ready to give up yet. “Let’s see what you come up with next, then,” He jabbed a button on his helmet, and from it came a high-intensity flash of light that bathed the entire prison yard in a retina-burning whiteness. The Resurrection Man vanished in the flare, only the echo of his scream lingering, and all around people staggered, blinded.
For a moment, it seemed as if Prometheus had won. He alone could see, and if he could see, he could slaughter them before they knew what was happening.
But Connor Hawke didn’t need to see to strike at Prometheus.
The skin around his eyes red and seared, Connor Hawke nevertheless found a center of tranquility within himself; relying on the subtlest clues from every other sense he had, he chose a specific arrow by touch, raised his bow and fired at Prometheus.
The villain was rearing over Superman, poised to deliver a Kryptonite-fueled hammerblow when the shaft struck his helmet. Utterly unprepared for this physical assault, the blunt-tipped arrow smashed into the side of Prometheus’ head, releasing an electrical charge strong enough to short out any circuitry!
Prometheus reeled. Green Arrow had taken his deadliest weapon out of play, and now the archer was reaching for another shaft, his head cocked to find his foe. Nor was that the worst news: with the helmet shorted-out, Green Lantern was coming to his senses, and in a moment he and the Flash would be on him as well!
With an inarticulate scream of rage, Prometheus produced a large, unusually-shaped key from his belt--- and in a blink, he was gone! He appeared a second later, at the side of Silver Swan--- who was as disoriented as the JLA--- and gathering his partner-in-crime to his side, they both vanished!
And just like that, the fight was over. A naked Resurrection Man walked non-chalantly among them, his skin bronzed, gleaming and brand new. He helped a still-weak Superman to his feet, as Flash went over to check on Martin Stein and Lorraine Reilly.
“Well, that was messy,” Green Lantern mused floating down to the prison yard and rubbing his graying temples as if to exorcise the vestiges of Prometheus’ hypnotic compulsion.
“They were well prepared for us, Gods damn them,” Wonder Woman said, and her fingers seemed to ache for a neck to throttle. “If it had been for Connor…”
“Nice shot,” Superman smiled weakly at the archer, his admiration and gratitude speaking for them all.
The soul of humility, Green Arrow merely nodded, head down and still blind.
“What I want to know is what this was all about,” Resurrection Man’s brow was furrowed. “What were they after? What did they gain by this break-in? And what did Prometheus mean about his ‘benefactor? But before we can begin to answer these questions, we have wounded to attend to.” Flash and a limping Lorraine Reilly were leading a barely conscious Martin Stein between them. Resurrection Man had Superman’s signal device and was keying a sequence into it. “Watchtower, emergency Zeta Beam transport, on my mark.” The others moved in close around him, as the stunned and shell-shocked prison-guards began leaving the safety of their cover. “Mark.”
A moment later, a beam of light slashed down from out of the sky, bathing the JLA in its amber glow; their forms elongated as if they were caught in a tornado--- and in the next moment, they were gone!
Superman: Jonathan Kent, reporter for the Daily Star, son of the retired Clark and Lois Kent, and as Jon-El, inheritor of the legacy of the Man of Steel!
Wonder Woman: Supermodel Lyta Trevor, warrior-princess of a god-ravaged Paradise Island, doomed to never know love--- or lose the mantle of Wonder Woman!
Green Lantern: Kyle Rayner, family man, heir to the missing Hal Jordan’s power ring, and the last Green Lantern in the universe!
Flash: Carrie Allen, the Fastest Woman Alive and STAR Labs research scientist!
Green Arrow: Connor Hawke, enlightened CEO of Queen Enterprises and modern-day Longbow Hunter of the Urban Jungles!
Firestorm: Bored heiress Lorraine Reilly and her godfather Dr. Martin Stein come together to form the Nuclear Woman!
Resurrection Man: Mitch Shelley, chief strategist and leader of the JLA!
