Phantom 30

 “Flash, are the civilians evacuated?”

“Yep,” the much younger man, practically a boy in his eyes, responded, coming to a stop by his side in a blur of red, errant sparks jumping up and down his suit—some kind of tri-polymer, if he had to guess. “Though, I broke a few windows while going supersonic and above through the city, hope that isn’t a problem for you Bats.”

“We have bigger problems right now,” the cowl-wearing man answered, standing atop his batmobile, binoculars trained upon the building of STAR labs. “What did Dr. Stone say about the incident?”

“Nothing much really,” the younger man clicked his tongue, “I don’t think he knew much at all, if anything. However, there is a cyborg inside that building, trying to connect with whatever is causing this.”

“Hn,” he grunted, removing the binoculars and sitting back down in his vehicle, the engine roaring to life as licks of flame came out of the thrusters behind him. “Evacuate the citizens as soon as possible, I will try to monitor the situation from a safer point.”

“Are we a team now?” the speedster raised an eyebrow, tapping into the otherworldly force that gave him his speed, the world already beginning to slow down for him as sparks jumped up and down his suit. “That would be a first.”

“We are not a team,” the Bat of Gotham grunted out, giving the red-clad man a look as the windshield covered him, wheels beginning to spin as his Batmobile shot forwards. “We just have a common goal.”

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“What do you make of this?!” Arthur shouted against the currents, able to feel just how the cube was propelling thousands of tons of water around it in a vortex, pushing and pulling at the ocean surrounding it as white specks of light appeared around it. “If this continues, Atlantis may be at risk. Do you have some way to transport it somewhere?!”

“Not without risking an explosion, something I don’t think you'd want with how much geothermal energy this thing has sucked up,” he grunted back, doing his level best to keep the turbulent waters from starting a tsunami, as well as wrecking his newest…friend’s home, containing the forces within the water with his magic and shields wherever he could. Eyeing the white specks of interdimensional energy that had stopped growing, he frowned and focused back on the Cube. It was still pulling upon the Earth’s energy, as well as the magic around it, but not as voraciously as before…and the rifts had stopped growing too. Something gnawed at the edges of his senses, a tick that he could identify or feel clearly, but yet, it persisted, dragging his attention. “There is so-”

“The Trench,” Arthur whispered, closing his eyes as he focused on his connection to the Kingdom of Atlantis and its borders, his trident magnifying his powers as he tried to sense the anomaly the Phantom too had picked up. His eyes glowed viridian as a pulse traveled out of him, akin to what the humans used as SONAR in the waters as everything within his domain was made visible to him, his focus especially upon the area where the Trench was. “Something is coming out of it…something old, ancient I’d say—and it is coming here. We need to move towards it. I can’t risk a fight so close to Atlantis, let alone this volatile piece of alien crap.”

“Sounds good,” the mage grunted back, and Arthur watched him wave his hands in a circle, runes, and glyphs forming in the water before him and floating with their eerie, amber glow. “This ought to hold in that pressure for a while till we get rid of whatever is coming out of that trench. Let's move.”

“You are coming to help?” he asked, surprised, even as he pushed off the seafloor and shot towards the Trench, his trident leading the way as he silently commanded all lifeforms to move as far away as they could. “This isn’t your fight, nor your responsibility.”

“Trust me, you will need it,” came the answer as the sorcerer came to match his speed, propelling himself by magic no doubt as the waters turned darker and heavier with each passing moment. “Plus, we are kind of friends, aren’t we?”

“That we are,” he laughed, nodding as he blasted through a sunken ship, tearing through rusted metal and explosives like wet paper. “Tell you what? After this trouble is dealt with, beer at my lighthouse?”

“I will bring the snacks,” Harry saluted back, and Arthur shook his head with a laugh, increasing his speed even more, with nothing but the trident’s glow illuminating the blackness of the ocean around them, as the crushing depths turned colder and treacherous with every mile they swam “But with all seriousness, I can feel whatever is coming up from that hole. It is not natural. It's like a black spot on a canvas, on this reality—not supposed to exist at all.”

“Few things that would come out of the Trench are,” he sighed, as they came upon the said fracture in the ocean’s floor, the gaping crack that ran for hundreds of miles appearing to swallow everything around it, as even the barest specks of light that reached this far into the water failed to penetrate it. Secrets buried in this unforgiving, uncharted fissure were more unfriendly than not, with not even the extensive, ancient archive of Atlantis and its states having any notable information on the Trench and its inhabitants—except for a big red ‘DO NOT APPROACH’ rule. The last time something had come out of this stupid crack, hundreds of Atlanteans and dozens of humans had died to the Kraken before he put it down…and sadly, Arthur knew that it was not the only one in the Trench, or even the biggest, “Poseidonis has always been at the center of trouble, either politically or martially, but this is taking the cherry. I have got interdimensional portals, ancient monsters, and an irritated pregnant wife.”

“I’d say the last one is the most dangerous,” Harry snorted, reaching out with his magic towards the entity he could feel in the darkness below, narrowing his eyes as he felt the way it was recoiling from everything, yet lashing out at the energies around it all the same, “Whatever this is, it is the strangest thing I have yet encountered.”

“Have you encountered a lot of strange things?”

“My school has undead horses that could only be seen by those who have seen someone die. Spooky and dangerous is the most common word of those seven years,” Harry chuckled, remembering the evening, when Luna had disclosed the magical secrets of the Thestrals to him. Remembering the other events of that year, Harry sighed, wondering if in another world, Dumbledore might not have decided to dorn Tom’s ring, and doom himself to a death that led to hundreds of others. “For fucks sake, we had ghosts and poltergeists roaming around through the walls everytime in the castle.”

“You grew up in a castle?” Arthur asked, slowly spinning his trident, the viridian glow around it intensifying as the water too began to follow his movements, forming a whirlpool and spinning with tremendous force at the King of Atlantis's commands. “Shame that it is on another world, I would have loved to visit it.”

“Me too Arthur, me too,” the sorcerer answered, and Arthur watched him raise his hands, several balls of light floating off into the water, illuminating the murky cold depths and throwing the Trench in sharp relief…and the tentacle that was reaching up towards them, “Ah well…that’s big.”

“Fuck this crack.”

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“Didn't they airlift all the animals out of the zoo?” Barry frowned, coming to a stop as he caught sight of a gorilla coming out of a police station, before he saw the grenade belt wrapped around his front, as well as the assault rifles and shotguns slung over his hands. Compared to the normal sights of the thugs and robbers doing this, the moment was so bizarre for the young man that he nearly missed the lowering of the temperature around him. However, as he caught the blue glow reflecting in the car’s windows before him, he sped to the side, feeling the joints of his suit freeze up for a moment, before the motion broke off the frost on them, “Damn, you again?”

“Me again,” the man he had deposited in Central City’s prison a few weeks ago snarled, his rough jacket and signature crimson visor in place as the man raised his palm towards him, and Barry distinctly remembered the man needing to use a bulky gun to emit his ‘freeze blasts’. However, as he saw the mechanical gloves covering the self-proclaimed Captain Colds’ hands, Barry had a feeling that the supercriminal had gotten himself an upgrade. Shooting off to the side as soon as he saw the blue glow light up, he narrowly dodged the beams of sub-zero energy that struck the point where he had been standing, and his eyes widened at the spikes of ice that shot up from the suddenly frozen ground. The sound of laughing reached his ears, and Barry slowly straightened up, turning his eyes back towards the man, watching him look down at the gloves on his hands with what looked to be surprise and glee, before he looked up, crimson visor looking at his face. “My name is Leonard Snart, cunt!”

Beams of sub-zero energy exploded out towards him in bursts, and Barry dodged all over the place, nothing but a blur of red as he dashed through the freezing rays. And each time, he came closer and closer to getting hit as asphalt was frozen, spikes and random pieces of ice covering everything, leaving less and less room for him to move in. and with each attack he dodged, Barry felt his irritation spike. He was multitudes faster than normal bullets, with his top speed easily reaching that of lightning itself, he couldn’t really go that fast right now.

Not with the kind of reactionary force it would throw upon the city’s infrastructure around him, as well as the damage the electricity his body would generate at such speeds would cause. And that was without counting the upgrade Snart’s weapons had gotten, the now gauntleted form shooting out beams that were much faster than bullets. Hell, with how little room he had to accelerate and properly move his legs, it was becoming quite a dangerous game for him. 

He knew from experience that Snart’s beams were capable of freezing things to easily negative two hundred Fahrenheit in an instant, and well, he didn’t want to get his legs flash-frozen into statues at supersonic speeds any more than the next guy.

Ideally, it would have been no trouble for him to rush the guy and disable him. Still, somehow, his gauntlets easily kept track of his movements, the radial aiming discs on his palms moving instantly to his location as he took even a moment of pause, before lashing out with freezing bursts of energy just as fast. And now, with how much the man had covered the area around him in foot-thick, stone-hard ice, it would be uphill getting close to the man. With this short of a distance, he couldn't create enough momentum to jump over the ice blocking his way, and the less said about running over it, the better.

“Dang, he really upgraded the energy direction and speed,” Snart commented in between the attacks, laughing as he barely twisted his hands, but yet, Barry had to move a hundred meters to avoid the sudden trail of fatal ice that he created across the road. “I barely feel the heat, and the cyclotron is running as smooth as butter.”

“Upgraded? You got broken out?”

“He did,” a heavy grunt came from behind him, and Barry whirled around, immediately feeling a couple of his teeth get knocked loose as a powerful punch slammed into face, sending him flying through the air like a bullet, and he crashed headfirst into a building. His kevlar-polymer helmet held up, but Barry still felt his brains crash against his cranium as the vertigo set in, and he barely kept himself from vomiting out his lunch as he groaned, slowly feeling the world around him fall back into place as he opened his eyes. His vision swam, and his head lolled upon his neck weakly as Barry attempted to push himself up, using the wall as a support, “The Flash—reputed to be the fastest man in the world. I am disappointed.”

“Ughhh—the fu-fuck,” he groaned, clenching his eyes shut as his whole torso throbbed with agony. He had not been long in the saving-people thing, but Barry had done a lot in the months ever since he had decided to use his powers to protect. He had stopped an eighteen-wheeler single handedly, cleared out an explosion zone, suffered broken bones, and even fought slimy space aliens…but yet, this one punch from thi…Barry’s thoughts trailed off his eyes somewhat focused on whoever had attacked him, and his brain shut down instantly.

A Gorilla.

A talking Gorilla.

Closing his eyes out of the belief that he was hallucinating from the concussion, Barry took a deep, shuddering breath, wondering if sho-

‘This is real…Barry Allen,’ the same heavy, rumbling voice mused in his….thoughts?

‘Yes, your thoughts. I can hear them all as clear as day, as well as those that are yet to form,’ it repeated. ‘Let me introduce myself. I am Grodd, an evolution to the apes you enclose that has put me much above homo sapiens in the chain of evolution. Stand down, and you may escape unscathed.’

“What the fuck,” Barry muttered, finally feeling his vision right itself as he opened his eyes, and saw the gorilla he had seen coming out of the police station before him, two shotguns aimed at him, while behind him, Snart was casually walking towards him, his own gauntlets aimed at his downed form. “Yo-You are with him?”

“We have a common goal, so yes, I think you can say that,” the gorilla—Grodd, his brain reminded him–answered, turning his thick neck slightly to look at the human beside him, before refocusing back on him. Standing bipedal, the gorilla looked more intimidating than any monkey had any right too, and for a moment, Barry felt like he was on Skull Island, staring up at Kong as the titan demolished skullcrawler after skullcrawler.

Compared to normal gorillas, Grodd was also a decent bit bigger, standing at what looked to be 10 feet tall, with tree-trunk thick arms, his whole body rippling with muscles as his black, steely eyes looked down at him. Of course, the two shotguns pointed right at his face also helped with the intimidation.

“Damn, you really roughed him up with that punch Grodd,” Leonard chuckled, as a beam of frost escaped his gauntlets, and Barry tried to move, to rouse his legs and slip into supersonic speeds…but yet, Grodd’s punch had disoriented him too much for that. With a stab of cold that instantly shot a crippling wave of numbness through his whole body, his legs were frozen in a slab of ice. “Well, Flash…what are you gonna do now you dipshit?”

“I don't think he can do anything right now,” a familiar voice commented from above them, and as one, all three of them looked up, a flaming corona of green enshrouding the man Flash had fought the Imperium beside, and met just an hour ago. The man raised his fist, the ring on his fingers glinting in the afternoon light, before it shone brightly. “However, I can.”

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“My Queen,” Callisto’s voice echoed over the field, and as one, every Amazon turned to look towards the woman as she came to a stop right by Hippolyta, “The Gates…the fires there have alighted.”

“What?” Hippolyta’s voice cracked like a whip, and Diana shared a look with Donna, moving a little closer as the demigoddess gave the tower behind her a look. For the last hour, they had all stood tersely outside the Vault, waiting for the so-called portal to Akopolips to open. Still, instead, the tremors, and the effects of the Cube had died down slowly, the earthquakes stilling down to barely felt tremors instead, even as the weather resumed normalcy. “Are you talking about the gat-”

“I am, The Messenger was there, commanding us to summon you, as well as Princess Diana,” the woman replied, and Diana understood the urgency in the Amazon’s voice, for none on Themiscyra had the daring to cut off their Queen’s words, but yet, Callisto looked worried for far different reasons as she dismounted from her Pegasus. “Please hurry, my Queen. Lord Hermes didn’t look patient or rich on time.”

“You heard her Diana, the Gods have summoned us,” her mother said, turning to look at her as her Pegasus lifted off into the air. “Come daughter, fly beside me. Callisto, you hold command here along with Penelope. Be vigilant, and at the slightest movement from the tower, you blow the horn.”

Nodding at Donna, she jumped, sustaining her flight beside her mother as Hippolyta moved towards the temple of Hermes, where the Gates to Olympus stood. “What do you think has caused this…Motherbox to stop its functioning, Mother?” she asked, sheathing her sword and dismissing Aegis back into her vambrace as she looked up the clouds. While the constant rumbling of lightning had stopped, it didn’t seem like the King of Gods’ mood had improved by much, the storm still blowing through the island and churning waters and winds alike. “And the Olympians, will they take part in the battle should Apokolips come upon Gaea once again?”

“These are answers better left to the Gods themselves, dear daughter,” her mother shook her head, tugging on the reigns and increasing her speeds, the pegasus’ magic moving it much faster than a normal animal might in the air as the surroundings dissolved around the Queen, and Diana matched her—mother and daughter shooting across the length of Themicyra at supersonic speeds towards the Temples. Even this far away, Diana could feel the heavy, tangible weight of Hermes’ power, pressing down upon the mortal realm with all of his authority and strength, and for a moment, she couldn’t help but shudder at the thought of what might Zeus must wield, for him to go unchallenged, and his every whim to be accepted, no matter what it be.

Hermes was by no means weak, but it was known that the Elder Three were on a whole another plane of existence compared to the rest of the Olympians, and even amongst them, Zeus stood supreme. But yet, there had been no word from the Gods regarding any assistance in facing their otherworldly foe. For a moment, she wondered about contacting Harry and asking for his assistance, her hand reaching for the pendant on her neck, before she dismissed that thought. While her mother had certainly enjoyed Harry’s presence, adn even accepted him as her lover, she wasn’t sure about the rest of the Amazons, not with how his last interaction with their forces had gone. 

“Be respectful,” Hippolyta suddenly began, giving her a solemn look as the sted slowed down, and they both came to a stop right above the temple of Hermes, the God's presence much more pronounced, as the very temple seemed to glow and rejoice at its patron’s arrival. Steering the pegasus towards the entrance, her mother nodded towards the shining, pearlescent gates leading towards Olympus. “Your father he may be, but he is still the King of Gods. Don’t incur his wrath daughter…or that of any other Olympian.”

“You speak as if I desire to test their mercurial nature, especially at such a time,” Diana shook her head, her feet touching upon the rain soaked ground, and her eyes instantly snapped towards the Messenger. Clad in an off-white toga with a circlet of snakes and olives upon his dusk brown hair, Hermes looked every bit the God statues and tales portrayed him to be. A chiseled figure akin to the athletes named after him, along with his Caduceus in his left hand, the God of Travellers and Speed looked upon her and her mother with glowing brown eyes, his symmetrical face and soft lips set in a handsome smile. “Greetings, Lord Hermes.”

Her mother echoed her words, and they both knelt down, lowering their heads before the Olympian. “To what do we owe your presence, O Messenger?!” Hippolyta asked, as Hermes waved a hand, signaling them to stand up. “We weren’t prepared for your arrival, and can only beg your forgiveness for the improper welcome you have received.”

“Save all of that for your patrons, Queen of the Amazons,” Hermes shook his head, turning his head to look at the gates behind him. “I am but a messenger today, meant to take you and your daughter to Mount Olympus, for the Gods summon you both.”

“Has the whole Council convened today?” her mother asked, as they both moved forwards, watching Hermes tap the gates with his fingers, and they swung open slowly, revealing the runes carved upon the floor ahead, golden and numerous.

“Yes,” came the answer, as Hermes stood at the center of the runes, beckoning them both with a nod of his head. “Now come, Olympus awaits. Further talks will be held before Father himself…and Diana, a word of caution—do not question his words, whatever they may be.”

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“Thanks for the save,” Barry shouted, covering dozens of meters in an instant and delivering an uppercut to Grodd—only to pull back and shake his hand—he probably did more damage to himself than the burly steroid-amped Gorilla. “Bloody hell, he is tough.”

“Primates and organisms like them usually are,” the Green Lantern commented, flying by him with a fist the size of a truck shooting besides, the green hologram connecting with a surprised Grodd like a semi hitting a traffic cone. However, despite the sounds of the heavy blow connecting with the ape, all it did was push him back a couple of feet, before Grodd grabbed the fist and crushed it into tiny sparks of green power instantly. The man came to a stop in the air above the monkey, creating a giant hammer that he swung down with a heave of his hands, and Barry had to balance himself as the very ground shook with the impact, the road shattering, and out of the corner of his eye, he watched Snart fall on his ass.

But, it seemed as if things were going to continue to be tough, with Grodd lobbing a grenade up towards his ally, forcing him to abandon the construct pushing down upon the gorilla, as a bubble of green materialized around the Lantern. “Your indecisiveness is your undoing,” the ape growled, shooting his shotgun towards him, and Barry dashed away from the spread, only for his body to freeze instantly as he felt a sharp pain shoot through his head, coming out the supersonic speeds and just falling to the ground, “Your ring may protect you from telepathy, but Allen has no such barriers.”

And as Barry felt his whole body jerk into motion without any input from him, he could see every twitch in the Green Lantern’s face, every millisecond of the way his eyes widened in surprise—as he covered all the distance between them in an eyeblink, his fist burying itself in the man’s stomach. “His brain is fast, massively faster than a human…but I am powerful enough to bury his motor controls,” the gorilla explained, and Barry had a distinct impression that the monkey was smiling, even as his speed increased even more, his hands nothing but a blue as they struck the Lantern repeatedly—and what his hands lacked in muscles, they more than made up for it in kinetic energy, as dozens of punches were landed in a single second. The blooming pain on the Green Lantern’s face made him cringe internally, but yet, his body was unresponsive, landing a solid kick on his face before the forming shield could cover his front, and sending the green man careening through the air like a meteor, crashing into a gas station and lightning up the whole place in an explosion of heat and roaring fires.

“He will be enough for the Lantern,” Grodd grunted as his body turned around, staring at the two villains, and Barry desperately thought of a way to restore his command over his body, half of his mind horrified by what he had just done to the Green Lantern—who had become involved just to save him in the first place! “Now, where is that STAR Labs?”

‘Fuck, what to do?! What to d—I can’t let him control my body like this! Besides Superman and that Martian, no one was as fast as me back there…and right now, we need to focus. If these two get to Cyborg, they will destroy whatever he has done to calm the Cube down, and that’s without thinking of what they are going to steal from that building’ he thought, watching Grodd turn around along with Snart as they both began to move towards the STAR Labs. However, before he could think of something else, a green bubble started to form around him, time instantly slowing down as his brain and body both naturally reached supersonic speeds, before his body shot out of the forming prison, automatically blurring through the cars and broken road towards the gas station, fist already reared back in a punch.

“It won’t work twice, Flash,” the heavy voice of the Lantern echoed around him in the flames, and the powerful…flash of green, he was blinded and socked across his mouth in one second, his lithe body once again crashing into a building behind him. However, thankfully, with how he was currently disconnected from his body, he also didn’t feel any of the pain that punch ought to have caused. But, before he or rather, his body could once again rash into another building, a green rope caught him by his ankles, and his eyes moved towards the Lantern, only to snap shut as he was suddenly pulled up into the air, before being slammed down into the ground.

Hard.

But it was of no use. His body could heal faster, move faster, and would slowly overwhelm whatever resistance the Lantern u-oh wait. Barry blinked mentally, following that train of thought, and remembering Grodd’s words from when he had been subjugated mentally.

‘His brain is fast, massively faster than a human…but I am powerful enough to bury his motor controls’

One of the first things Barry had noticed after being struck by that bolt of lightning, had been just how fast his thoughts, his whole brain had become. A single second worth of time could be stretched for as long as ninety by his thinking if he focused enough, his mind and body operating much faster than the rest of the humans, as if he had his own personal timestream. And his mind and body were synced, both operating upon similar speeds, at the same exact times whenever he broke through the regular human limitations. But now…if  Grodd was capable of dampening his thoughts…then he just needed to think faster than whatever the monkey had done to impede his psyche from interacting with his body.

But yet, for all of his hypotheses, he had no way of going about his idea. His speed, the way his body just withstood the effects of going at super-speed, was all unexplainable to him. His powers didn’t come with a guidebook, and neither did he have someone to explain them to him. Despite his mounting frustration, his body moved unimpeded, breaking out of the rope’s grip and dashing up the side of a building, before jumping off in a single second to strike at the flying Lantern. His ring shone like a star, blinding his eyes yet again. However, based on the grunt of pain that came just a split second later, his body had managed to hit the Lantern. And hit him hard, based on the sound of a body hitting metal and the shattering of glass.

“Dammit!” the man cursed as vision retired to his eyes, Barry watched a boxing glove smack into his front, smacking him harshly into the car just behind him, before a dozen gloves began to hit him from every angle, leaving no room for escape, or for his legs to move as shackles erupted out of the ground, wrapping around his ankles and holding him in place. The Lantern walked towards him, his ring raised in his direction as the man wiped a drop of blood away from his lip, and Barry cringed mentally at the sight, “I need to make you fall unconscious Barry, so forgive me if you are feeling this.”

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“Master Bruce, there is a problem.”

“What is it Alfred?” he spoke, watching the Cyborg, Dr. Stone’s son most probably, murmur something incomprehensible, as the Cube—Motherbox, he corrected, remembering Cyborg’s words from when he had entered—inside the wrecked observation room pulsed softly with white light, as if communicating with the young man, “Have you run the scans on the data I sent you?”

“I did, but I think there is a more pressing matter arising in Gotham. Reports have been coming in of a giant humanoid monster rampaging through the area near the Slaughter Swamp,” came the reply, and Batman scowled, looking down at his vambrace, where a section slid backward to reveal a small screen, showing the aforementioned reports, “The Internet is already abuzz with videos and photos, but it's all muted down due to whatever that Cube has been causing in Detroit.”

“...I am coming,” he answered, turning around and walking towards the exit, pressing a button and summoning the Batwing to right outside the doors. Of all the days Gotham decided to spawn a new problem, it had to be this one, as i-

“Batman,” Cyborg’s voice echoed form behind him, and he stopped, turning his slightly to look at the half-metal, half-man. He was still connected to the Cube, but yet, the shining red optic was turned towards him, looking all the more mysterious and menacing in the shadows, “Whatever it is, the Motherbox sensed it, and it was enough to make it pause. Be careful.”

“Hn,” he grunted, resuming his pace as the quiet hum of the Batwing’s engine became audible, and clenched his fist, his mind running through every possible type of altercation he was going to have, even as he worried still about just what the Motherbox intended.