Part 19 (1/2)
Or maybe not.
”Hey!” Harley protested. Bounding onto a table, she ran the length of the table toward the lingering Boom Tube. ”That ugly broad scammed us all! We can't let her get away!”
She dived into the vortex after Granny.
Mary and Holly exchanged disbelieving looks. ”She didn't . . . ” Holly muttered.
”Yeah, she did.” Mary took a deep breath as the Boom Tube began to fade from sight. Within moments, the portal would be gone for good, along with Harley Quinn. Mary glanced at Holly. ”You wanna . . . ?”
Holly ran toward the Boom Tube even as she shook her head in dismay. ”I swear I'm going to kill her one of these days!”
”Not if I get her first!” Mary insisted. She sprinted after Holly, quickly catching up with her. Side by side, they raced for the portal, which was closing up right before their eyes. Infuriating or not, Mary thought, Harley did save my life just now.
Holly seemed startled to find Mary accompanying her. She looked dubiously at the unarmed girl. ”Are you kidding, Mary? What are you going to do?”
The Boom Tube loomed before them, filling up Mary's vision. She glimpsed a s.h.i.+mmering corridor, lined with bizarre, unearthly circuitry. Coruscating energies hummed and crackled. Her skin tingled. The scent of ozone invaded her nostrils. Nightmarish memories of Apokolips sent a chill down her spine.
”I'll figure it out later,” she said.
They threw themselves into the unknown.
The vortex closed behind them with a resounding boom.
11 AND COUNTING.
APOKOLIPS.
Despair burned freely from the planet's core, fouling the atmosphere. The entire world moaned, a sound that chilled the soul with its dull emptiness and infernal malevolence. Walls a thousand feet high enclosed a sprawling megalopolis that burst upward like a pestilent boil as charnel winds extinguished the pallid stars from view. On the horizon, towering techno-temples rested on the halfcalcified bones of a billion failed genetic experiments, thrusting upward into the smoky black sky, while across this revolting graveyard of the universe, the m.u.f.fled, maddening, and monotonous whine of blasphemous wails rose from inconceivable subterranean torture chambers. Gigantic Fire Pits belched enormous gouts of flame.
Donna gazed out over the h.e.l.lish cityscape. The hot air scorched her lungs. ”On my list of the worst possible places to be, this is number one.”
Along with Ray Palmer, the Challengers stood atop the roof of a concrete workhouse in the filthy Armagetto. Donna recognized the dismal setting from past battles against Darkseid and his minions. Turning away from the ugly spectacle, she confronted the Monitor. ”Why exactly are we on Apokolips?”
She kept her guard up. Ever since Solomon's brutal execution of that alternate version of Barry Allen, she didn't trust the Monitor one bit. He may very well have the safety of the entire universe in mind, she thought, but he's made it all too clear that he's willing to sacrifice any one of us to achieve his aims.
So did that make him a dangerous ally-or a mortal enemy?
”Yeah. What's the scoop?” Jason demanded. He methodically polished his knife while keeping a wary eye on their surroundings. So far their arrival had gone unnoticed, but that wasn't likely to remain the case. ”Why this detour to Darkseid's backyard?”
”That is no concern of yours,” Solomon said brusquely. His armored hand was clasped firmly onto the Atom's shoulder, lest his latest recruit attempt to elude them once more. Ray's winter jacket was soiled and torn from the battle back on Earth-51. His red-rimmed eyes held a haunted expression. ”Suffice it to say that I have business on this accursed globe-as does Ray Palmer.”
”Me?” Ray blurted. ”Are you out of your mind? I don't want anything to do with this place!”
Donna wondered if he was having second thoughts about joining their bizarre expedition. Not that I blame him, she conceded. I'm starting to question whether this was such a good idea myself. Prophecy or no prophecy.
”Hold it together, Palmer,” Jason said irritably. He glared at Solomon. ”I'm sure our red-eyed buddy has a good reason for bringing us here. At least he'd better have.”
”As I said,” the Monitor replied, ”that is my own affair.” To Donna's surprise, a column of light suddenly cut off Solomon and Ray from her and Jason. Solomon consulted a display screen on his gauntlet. ”Come, Ray Palmer. We can tarry here no longer.”
”Hey!” Jason shouted. He lunged at the glowing figures, but they had already grown too immaterial to grab on to. Donna watched in dismay as the Monitor and Ray began to fade from view. Jason kicked the rooftop in frustration. ”What about us?”
”You have served your purpose for now,” Solomon declared, even as his sepulchral voice diminished in volume. ”Our paths part here.”
On Apokolips?
”Wait!” Donna called out, but it was already too late. The Monitor had vanished, taking the Atom with him. She and Jason were on their own, and stranded on the most dangerous planet in the Multiverse.
With no way home.
APOKOLIPS.
”It was foolish to follow me!” Granny Goodness cackled. She stood upon the bleachers of a vast a.s.sembly hall within the forbidding confines of her infamous orphanage. Ugly gray masonry, barren of any ornamentation, testified to the soul-destroying bleakness of Granny's infamous inst.i.tution. ”I cannot believe that I thought you mortal trulls had the potential to join my Female Furies.” The genuine articles were perched on the wide cement tiers behind Granny, while a squadron of armed Parademons fanned out before her. ”Now my true Furies will rip you to pieces! Kill them, girls!” she exhorted her lethal favorites. ”Do it for Granny!”
”Are you kidding?” Harley jeered back. She and Holly and Mary crouched behind dense concrete columns, which provided them momentary shelter from the sizzling blasts of the Parademons' energy-rifles. The unleashed firepower chipped away at the pillars. Bursts of orange energy burned through the barriers, narrowly missing the three women. Harley shouted over the din, ”I don't know the meaning of the word fear!”
”Harley,” Holly quipped, her back pressed up against a column, ”you don't know the meaning of most words.”
Mary rolled her eyes. ”I hate to interrupt your oh-sofunny banter, but is there a plan we should be following?”
I can't believe I'm back on Apokolips again, she thought. And without my powers this time. Unlike her armored companions, Mary had only a tattered smock to protect her from their enemies and the elements. The interior of the orphanage was cold and drafty, the better to toughen Granny's unfortunate charges. The chilly cement floor leeched the heat from Mary's bare feet. Smoky fumes rose from mounted torches. The stale air reeked of old sweat and fear. Mary s.h.i.+vered uncontrollably. What was I thinking, jumping through that Boom Tube after Harley?
Paradise Island was light-years away now. Mary briefly wondered what had become of Hippolyta, who had stayed behind to restore order to Themyscira. No doubt she had her hands full dealing with an island full of confused Amazon wannabes. Mary figured they couldn't count on the Amazon queen coming to their rescue. Hippolyta had no way to get to Apokolips even if she wanted to.
We're on our own, Mary realized. And up against an entire planet of evil G.o.ds.
”Plan?” Holly shrugged. ”Don't look at me. I didn't book this trip.”
Granny continued to rail at them from behind the ma.s.sed Parademons. Mary didn't have the nerve to peer around the corner of the pillar, but she could readily imagine the crone's livid face. ”If you've come to free the G.o.ds, you're going to fail miserably!”
Free the G.o.ds? Mary exchanged a startled glance with Holly. ”Did she just say . . . ?”
”Ha!” Harley gloated. Her face lit up with glee. ”I knew this was a good idea.” She gave her accomplices an unmistakable I-told-you-so look. ”Say something mean to me now!”
”Very well,” an amused voice replied from behind the Earthwomen. A flexible steel band whipped out and wrapped itself tightly around the lower half of Harley's face, gagging her. A m.u.f.fled gasp barely escaped the wide silver ribbon. ”I'm going to tear your head off and feed it to my plasmid eels!”
Spinning around, Mary saw three Female Furies charging at them from behind, having obviously circled around them via the orphanage's labyrinthine pa.s.sageways. She recognized them as the elite of Granny's hand-trained warriors. Although she had never fought them before, she knew of their vicious reputation. They gave Supergirl a rough time a while back.
”The name is Las.h.i.+na,” the leader of the Furies declared as she yanked Harley off her feet, ”for obvious reasons.” Chrome-colored strips accented a dark blue bodysuit that fit tightly over her athletic figure. A sleek black ponytail whipped about behind her head. A horizontal metal band divided her face in two, protecting her nose. Cruel blue eyes gleamed above the steel noseguard. Contempt dripped from her ruby lips. ”Allow me to introduce your friends to Stompa.”
The latter was a veritable behemoth of a woman, the size of Solomon Grundy or Gorilla Grodd. A double-breasted brown leather uniform encased her hefty frame. A skull and crossbones was imprinted on the brow of her hard plastic helmet, which made her look like the world's largest roller derby contestant. Tinted brown goggles concealed her eyes, but not the outrage in her voice. ”Which one of you skinny b.i.t.c.hes hurt our Granny?” she demanded as she stamped her heavy antimatter boots upon the floor.
An earthquake shook the a.s.sembly, knocking Mary off her feet. A deep crack snaked across the quivering cement floor. Dust rained down from the rafters. Mary heard Holly crash to the ground as well. The other girl swore.
A third Fury sprang toward Mary. ”I'm Mad Harriet!” She laughed maniacally. Her crazed grin and wild green mane immediately reminded Mary of the Joker, if the Joker were an alien madwoman with jaundiced yellow skin, chartreuse hair, and bulging green eyes. A metallic breastplate s.h.i.+elded her torso, while a lime-colored loincloth flapped between her legs. Her fur-trimmed boots matched her green hair. s.h.i.+ning steel gauntlets were equipped with razor-sharp claws. ”And you made my Granny upset!”
”Granny is G.o.d!” Stompa picked up the refrain. ”We wors.h.i.+p our Granny!”
Holly scrambled to her feet, but Stompa lowered the boom again. Another earth tremor rocked the corridor, sending pulverized stone into the air. A loud rumbling noise drowned out Mary's gasps. Sprawled backward upon the bucking floor, she was tossed about helplessly, which saved her life, ironically enough. The jarring vibrations threw off Mad Harriet's attack, so that the lunatic's claws missed Mary by a hair. The gleaming razors slashed the empty air only inches away from Mary's face.
Talk about a close shave!