Welcome to Chapter Two of Future Perfect, where I decide to make things very darker.I do not own DC comic books, nor the characters. Chapter Two
Mission Time!
Supergirl
My dreams were different this time. Instead of dreaming of the upcoming battle like I had been for weeks, I instead had a peaceful dream. I was seating on a hilltop back home, with Brainiac 5 sitting right beside me. Instead of wearing his normal uniform he was wearing a dark blue sweater and blue jeans. I realized that we were on Kal’s farm and I wondered why we were even here at all. Why was Brainy here?
“Will you be coming back to the Legion?” He asked, looking at me. I plopped his ball cap back on his head and realized that his hair was longer. It looked better on him then the short look he had now. “After I figure out a way to get back?”
“Yeah, of course. Clark will be a little upset with me, but I owe you guys my life. And besides, the world doesn’t exactly like me coming back. Did you read the newspaper?”
“Yes, and it wasn’t true. Earth does need Supergirl, no matter how much they think to the contrary. They may just not be ready for you in this time.”
I gave him a bright smile, and wrapped one arm around him in a hug. He went stiff in my grip, but smiled slightly anyway. “Now come on, Brainy. Lets go and have some fun. Your in the 21st century so you might as well have fun!”
As the dream ended and I awoke to consiness, I had a feeling that these dreams were getting a little out of hand. I mean, my last dream told me that I was going to the future. Did this dream tell me that Brainiac 5 and me were going to get stuck in the 21st century for a while, and I just might want to come back to the Future? I sat up in bed and stretched, feeling much better than I did yesterday. Or what ever day it was. I found out that my room had its own private bathroom, and laying by the bathtub was a new uniform. Seem they really had everything prepared for me to stay in this time. Pretty nice of them.
After taking a shower and getting dressed, I made my way to the common room. Everyone was already up and talking to one another, looking short of like the Justice League on a day off. When I came into the room, wearing my new uniform, Tinya came over to me.
“Good morning! The new uniform looks great on you.”
“Thanks.”
“Its time to introduce you to the rest of the Legion,” came Imra’s voice from beside me. “Today will be your first official day on the Legion and so I will be showing you around.”
The rest of the Legionnaires stood up and slowly made a crowd around me. Their were at least eight of them their, the rest had to be on mission or leave. They introduced themselves one by one; Shrinking Violet (Salu), Cosmic Boy (Grim), Dream Girl (Nara), Element Lad (Jan), Spark (Ayla), Star Boy (Thom), Sun Boy (Dirk), and Triplicate Girl (Luornu). They were all so friendly, and sweet that I almost felt like I belonged here. Then I realized Brainy wasn’t there, so I looked over at Imra.
“Oh, Brainy is still asleep. He’s been up for the last few days preparing for the conflict.”
I smiled slightly. Figured the big brain was a workaholic, and maybe a little bit of a insomniac. Weren’t they all? I sat down at one of the tables and Comic Boy came over to me. “Is good to have another from the house of El fighting on our side in this coming conflict.”
“I’m just glad to be of help, even though I have the strangest feeling you might have done better by just asking Superman to help you.”
“Brainiac 5 said that it was your time to directly influence the future. Superman had his time, and no doubt he will again. This may be your only time.”
I was about to say something when a alarm went off loudly in the room. A warning bell. A holographic image of Brainy appeared in front of us. It looked like he just woke up. “We’re getting an Omega level message. I’ll patch it through.”
His image was replace with an image of a dark-haired woman with green skin, looking scared for her life. Despite the burning ruins behind her and the sounds of laser blast that went off around her, she had to get her message out. “Legion! Colu is under attack by some kind of machine race, they are destroying everything they can! Also, they are using the confusion to distract most people from the fact that they are drilling into the planet, setting charges. Please, get here quickly! Colu depends on you!”
The image cut out, being replaced with a grim looking Brainiac 5. “We have a mission. Supergirl, Cosmic Boy, Lighting Lad, Saturn Girl, Star Boy and Timberwolf will come with me on this mission. Head to the tele-pad right away.”
The image flickered away, and we all jumped up. So much for my grand tour, but then again I wasn’t complaining. Rather get this mission over with so we could stop Imperix and I could go home. Try to salvage my super-heroine reputation. I followed Saturn Girl as we flew down hallways. She was saying something to Cosmic Boy about how strange it was that Brainy was coming along with us.
“It is his home world. If it were mine, I’d do the same.”
So Colu was his home world? No wondered he seemed so grim when he talked to us after the message. I let the thought of ’what if it were my world getting destroyed’ go though my head. It was already destroyed, so I promised myself I wouldn’t let it happen to Colu.
We reached the tele-pad with in seconds. Brainiac 5 was typing something into the computer before he turned to us. He still looked tired, but there was a quiet determination in his eyes. It made him look… kind of cute. Intense may be the better word. He pressed a key down and the gate burst into life. A blue ring of energy showing little of what was beyond formed behind him, glowing brightly.
“We’ll be entering a battle zone, so be prepared. Our first priority is to stop those charges without setting them off. The planet’s core must not be damaged, because it could begin a chain reaction that will destroy the entire planet. Second is defeating the invading army. We’ll deal with it as soon as the bombs are disarmed. Ready?”
“Lets go,” Lighting Lad said, his fist sparking white. I liked his eagerness. Brainiac 5 nodded and jumped into the gate. I followed right behind but I wasn’t prepared for what I saw beyond the portal. Destruction and death unlike I had ever seen before, bodies laid all around my feet. Brainy shivered in front of me, trying his best to hide his emotions I bet. I reached over and put a hand on his shoulder, he turned to me.
“We’ll stop this, I promise.”
He nodded, and as soon as the others joined us we hurried down towards the heart of the battle. Using my X-ray vision I could tell exactly were the drilling was taking place. Deep in the heart of the heart of the planet, they had already set the charges! I told the others and we dived towards to drills. We were, I knew we would be, expected.
Brainiac 5
It was hard for me to focus on the battle, my mind was moving faster then it ever had before. I had to save my home, that was the one thought that kept me focused. Supergirl pushed into the line first, using her heat vision to cut a path into their line for us. Lighting Lad moved in next, and he was being supported by Cosmic Boy. I dived into the battle before suddenly I found myself some where else. A empty white space, with a scarlet robbed man in front of me.
“The Time Trapper,” I muttered, and the figure chuckled. It seemed that no matter how many times we destroyed this villain, someone else always took his place. Maybe the power to control time was too strong of a lure. Or maybe they start out wanting to do good and get corrupted by the power. What ever the reason, I stood my ground in front of the Time Trapper and waited.
“Brainiac 5, it is a pleasure to see you.” The Time Trapper had a different quality to his voice now. It contained no anger or spite, just a quite calm. “How do you like returning to your home world?”
“Its under attack.”
“Oh, I thought you might find it interesting. Your people always had a knack for avoiding being attacked, despite how advance they are. It is about time they suffer.”
“So this invasion was your doing?”
He looked at me, and I shivered. They was something unsettling about him, and something familiar. It was like I knew this person from someone, but with his hood covering his head I couldn’t tell who he was. “Of course it was my doing. Your sins are coming to haunt them. Observe.”
He made a image appear before me of the battle going on in Colu, and of the Drill that was drilling in the crust of the planet. But it had stopped, and the charges were set. They were set to go off in exactly five minutes. That wasn’t enough time to get the people to safety, let alone the Legionnaires that had came with me. The Time Trapper seemed to smile at me and he said;
“You will watch them die, from the safety of this little nexus of calm. You will pay for your sins, and your people will die for them.”
Supergirl
We had zero time to save everyone, and pretty soon it became apparent to me that the only thing we could do was save ourselves. I went to tell Brainy, but he wasn’t anywhere to be seen. Not even with my X-ray vision. It was like he had been erased from existence. We couldn’t leave without him, so I dived into the drill hole. No other way, I had to get rid of these bombs.
“Supergirl,” came Saturn Girl’s voice inside my head. It surprised me for a second, and I crashed into a drill. “Sorry, but you have less than two minutes to disarm the bombs.”
Rubbing my head as I took off, I sped up. Soon I was near the core, where the bombs were laying neatly around it in a ring. The heat was incredible, but I knew what had to be done. Quickly I grabbed the bombs, and took them up with me into space. They exploded nicely and safely, so I turned my attention to the planet bellow. To my horror, a green mist was expanding across the planet. I dived back to the others.
“What is going on?”
“According to the scanners, it’s a virus that was created to kill Coluians. Its
spreading too fast,” Cosmic Boy cussed under his breath. “We can’t stop it.”
“We have to try,” I told him, and I returned to the ground. “Shrinking Violet, open up a gate to Legion HQ. We’re going to get as many Coluians as we can through the gate before the virus reaches us.”
Her voice came back from the transmitter distorted, but clear enough for me to understand. “Got it Supergirl. Prepare for gate in three, two, one.”
A blue energy gate appeared before me and I began to grab Coluians and almost literality throw them into the portal. Most went in willingly, but some were a little bit more stubborn. Those I threw in. Saturn Girl helped to keep the people calm, sending telepathic waves of soothing thought. I tried to use my x-ray vision to find Brainy, but no matter where I looked, he wasn’t there. Where the hell was he?
“Supergirl!” Brainiac 5’s voice came over the transmitter, loud and clear. He seemed scared, and perhaps worried, but he was trying to hold it out of his voice. “Head through the gate, and get the others to come with you. I’ll be there in a second.”
“But Brainy-”
“Just go!”
I bit my lip, but I did what he told me. I gathered the others and as soon as we got the last of the survivors we could, we headed through the gate. It took a few minutes to wait, floating back and forth until I was ready to go through the gate after Brainiac 5. But then he reappeared, landing outside the gate in a heap.
“Got exposed,” he said, muttering as he looked up at us. “Only a little, but enough to make me sick. Colu though won’t survive.”
“The readings are coming in,” Shrinking Violet said, and her expression changed to horror. “The planet is caving in on itself.”
“Just incase something would happen to our people that we couldn’t survive, we had a back up plan. A mass of dark matter was planted deep inside the crust of the planet, the size of basketball. When activated, it would create a black hole effect and destroyed the planet and all the people on it.”
“But why?”
“We had to do it,” Brainy said, standing up. He wobbled slightly as he stood, before he leaned against a computer consul.
“You need to head to medical,” Cosmic Boy said, helping him stand. Brainy pushed him away though, and looked frustrated.
“I can get there myself. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ll head there now.”
I watched him walk off, before I looked at the readings from the planet. I was beginning to realize that this Legion of Superheroes and this time really, was far more cut-throat then my time. People here were so ready to deal with the destruction of their entire civilization that… it was a little scary. But… I guessed that was what the Legion was for. So they wouldn’t have to make such hard decisions.
Brainiac 5
As I made my way to Medical, I ran over the last few minutes on Colu over and over again in my head. Despite what I said, there was no dark matter implanted into the crust. At least by the government of Colu. As I watched my people suffer from strange machines and then by a virus the invaders unleashed , the Time Trapper gave me a choice. I could either let my people suffer and die, or put them out of their misery. He offered me a sealed ball of dark matter, and I could feel him smiling at me.
“You know what to do.”
And so, left with no other less pleasing solution, I did it. I put the sell of dark matter into the core where the bombs had been, and set it to go off. As soon as I was through the gate, I set it off. The planet caved into itself and destroyed the majority of my people. The only ones that were left were those who were off planet, or rescued by the Legion. My calculations put the number at only a thousand survivors.
And it was all my fault.
Part number one of the saga though is really Superman: : Last Stand of New Krypton # 1 where Brainiac comes to New Krypton to reclaim that which was stolen from him, Kandor. Zod though has a plan.. though I'm a little scared to see what it is. Here is the summery.
The second part of the Brainiac and the Legion of Superheroes takes place in Supergirl #51. Fresh after the death of Lana, even Supergirl can't be cut a break. Here is the summery;
The third part takes Superman back to the comic he belongs in; Superman #698 has Superman and Mon-El taking the fight to Brainiac's Ship and showing him what's up. Here is the summery;
