Star Trek: A Home in the Stars, Part 2

Years later, Cid still had Avellaneda's story stuck in his head.  He realized one day why, and so he set about writing his version of it:

A boy named Sancha had no idea what his parents did for a living.  All he knew was that they were away a lot and that their jobs somehow involved space.  Sancha himself had never been to space, but he liked to imagine life in a spaceship.  He believed the biggest improvement was the kind of food he would be eating, with greater restrictions and yet more variety, from untold civilizations.  He didn't know many aliens personally, and so it wasn't alien life he thought about so much as what human life looked like, but for some reason it was the food he most wondered about.  He imagined being grossed out more often than not, but that it would also be fun to pretend he didn't mind, because his parents probably would.

One day he snuck aboard his father's shuttle, the one Sancha pictured either sitting in the backyard or blasting into the night sky, something mundane, and was surprised to find his father wearing a uniform, with a patch that read "Starfleet."  Sancha was immediately disappointed.  Everyone knew Starfleet didn't even leave the solar system, nine times out of ten, unlike the deep space freighters.  But then, the more Sancha thought about it, the more it made sense.  His parents were never gone that long.  The freighter crews probably had as little concept of Earth as he did of their environs.

More than an hour into the flight, Sancha was tense.  He'd never left orbit before, not even on the field trips to Mars in grade school he refused to take, out of fear, so his nerves were on edge, and he couldn't believe his father really didn't know he was aboard.  Finally, he decided to reveal his presence, and was surprised when his mother stepped out from behind him, wearing the same blue Starfleet jumpsuit as his father, and his parents said they'd known the whole time, and that they were proud that he'd finally done it.

Sancha couldn't bring himself to talk to them about it.  He decided to spend more time in silence, as the trip, wherever they were headed, continued interminably.  He'd brought a book, so he wasn't completely bored, but the one thing he'd never really thought about was how there was really nothing to do in space, unless you had a job.  His parents, of course, were busy the whole time.

They landed without Sancha even noticing.  He'd been dozing.  They seemed to have docked at some kind of station.  Sancha stepped timidly behind his parents as they exited the shuttle.  They were greeted by aliens Sancha thought he recognized as Vulcans, the most famous ones because they were the first aliens humans had ever met, the famous Cochrane incident that came up in school so much. 

It was only later he realized his mistake, when he was much older, when he had become privy to secret knowledge, which is to say, what the Romulans looked like.  He wondered at that point if he had earned his place with Section 31, or if he had been groomed for it, right from within his own family.  He became positively obsessed about it, which affected his job performance, which further strained his relationship with his parents, and he thought back all those years and wondering all over again, was that what it had all been about?

And Cid wondered the same thing.  He became convinced that the girl on Draylax had told him that story, in the first place, to help him along his own journey, one he was still struggling to reconcile.  Well, such was life in the stars...

Star Trek: A Home in the Stars, Part 1

The day the ECS Chivalry crash-landed on Draylax was the day Cid Benengeli's life changed forever.

Cid, like all boomers, grew up in space.  It was all he knew.  He'd never even seen Earth.  He'd never even seen Draylax, for that matter.  He had a support role aboard the Chivalry.  His parents attempted to connect Cid into the operations of the ship by signing him up for a pen pal program, which connected with a Draylaxian youth named Avellaneda, who came from Tarragona province.  Avellaneda always said he wanted to be a writer.  He'd send Cid, in lieu of actual correspondence, the latest story he was working on.  Most of Avellaneda's work was incomprehensible to Cid, but it was also almost the only fiction he read, and he spent a great deal of time trying to figure it out.

He was still a boy when the Chivalry crashed on Draylax.  His parents died instantly.  Most of the crew died.  He was all but completely orphaned. 

He went in search of Avellaneda.  Nobody knew who Cid was talking about.  He finally found the name listed at a local nursery.  Avellaneda was four years old, six years younger than Cid.  And Avellaneda turned out to be a girl.  She had been recording herself telling stories, which her tablet transcribed.

"Hello!" she beamed at him.

"Hi," he replied, crouching awkwardly in front of her.

"Would you like to hear my new story?"

Star Wars: DJ Did It

In the lockup holds on Canto Bight, there's a legend about a guy named DJ that holds, if you need something done, he's your man.  The thing is, it's really only the people in the lockup holds who traffic the legend.  Everyone else there thinks they're the ones who can do whatever it is you need. 

Canto Bight, in short, is the kind of planet with two distinct levels of social order.  The top level is the one having all the fun.  The bottom level is the one being tossed into the lockup holds.  On any other world, you might be able to get away with dismissing the ones in the lockup holds as criminal element, but on Canto Bight, you have to understand that this is perhaps the planet that best illustrates life under the New Order, where corruption reigns supreme and the only way to get ahead is to not care who you're stepping on to get there.  Guys like DJ are the ones who get stepped on. 

He'll be the first to stab you in the back, don't get me wrong, but he has limits, and that's what makes him different from that top level.  There are no limits in the top level.  The bottom level, here's where you get all the poor suckers who set limits, who might compromise themselves sometimes, but who otherwise don't live their lives by compromising their principles.  Even if they have no idea what they believe in, they know what they don't believe in. 

DJ was a regular scoundrel, let's just get that out of the way.  He would stutter when feeling cornered.  The only real way to know he existed at all was to stumble across the man himself.  But those who knew him, never forgot him. 

He could break any code.  If there was a particularly tricky job done anywhere he'd been, you can be sure he did it, or was involved or in all likelihood consulted, even by those who were supposed to be his rivals.  He was indispensable, once you knew he existed. 

But was he particularly liked?  Of course not.  I mean, he was liked, but he wasn't the type to go out of his way to make friends.  He had acquaintances.  Friendship implies an interest in sticking around.

Long story short, the residents of Canto Bight's lockup holds considered DJ responsible for...everything.  The good and the bad.  If anything was ever going to change there, he would be given the credit, even if it was a change for the worse.  I didn't say the guy was lucky. 

But on the whole, he was a pretty good guy.

Assorted Heroic Words: Zenith

the point of the heavens directly over the head of the observer

Marty had always
struggled with feelings
of hopelessness,
and that didn't change
when he put on
a colorful costume;
he had a hard time
seeing
something bright
come out of
a life he found
increasingly worthless,
wondering why he survived,
what was the point
even when he was
a superhero,
an emblem,
hollow,
shallow,
just out of reach,
out of his vision...

The end.

Assorted Heroic Words: Yore

olden times

Marty began
turning to
a different source
of inspiration,
a lost golden age hero
called Wesley Harding,
the Doughboy,
who had fought in WWII
as a volunteer
in the French resistance.

In time he retired
his Sandman look.
He ended up looking
sort of like a Mountie.

Assorted Heroic Words: Xiphoid

sword-shaped

Marty came into possession
of a curved scimitar blade,
which he kept mostly
in ceremony
but now and again
brought it along with him
in costume
for effect.

Eventually its owner
came to retrieve it.

Assorted Heroic Words: Watchman

a guard

Marty never stopped going to school,
following the shooting;
what he did,
and he couldn't imagine
anyone doing any less,
was become painfully
aware
and stood vigilant,
and that he saw
as his most sacred duty,
but it also meant
he was paying attention
perhaps for the first time
to everyone there,
meeting them
for the first time,
so in a way
it made him better,
a little more human,
forming new affection,
not less.
It's just,
such attention
comes with a price.
You lose yourself
in the bargain.
Such is selflessness.

Assorted Heroic Words: Ultimo

in the month preceding the present

For someone
constantly reliving
a specific
moment in time,
their second thoughts
dwell
on the period
immediately preceding it
as what life was like
before it.

Marty, for instance,
before the shooting,
had been acting in a play
based on
The Last of the Mohicans,
in which he was cast
in an incidental role,
a random soldier
with few lines,
and all he could think
was how pointless it was.

After the shooting,
of course,
he longed
for such
simplicity.

Assorted Heroic Words: Verisimilitude

the appearance of truth or reality

An attitude Marty was
eager to adopt
in his new career
was verisimilitude,
the ability to speak
truth to power,
to hold those in power
to the words they speak,
not merely in the facile
"fact-checker" domain
but in the manipulative
self-serving
self-aggrandizing
manner
designed to humiliate,
to silence opponents,
the kind of speech
so eagerly embraced
by those who don't realize
what they really support
because the confluence of modern agendas
has become toxic
rather than
uplifting,
a curious phenomenon,
a peculiar institution
of public discourse.

Assorted Heroic Words: Trace Element

a chemical element, as iron, copper, etc., essential to nutrition, but only in very small quantities

The thing Marty understood,
from reading comics,
about his own nature,
was that it was okay
to be a minor superhero,
that he never had a shot
at being the most-loved
or most-famous
or best,
but that he could still play
an important role,
that his efforts
could still be noticed
and even
appreciated.

Assorted Heroic Words: Sandman

a mythical person supposed to make children sleepy

Marty gained a younger sibling
late enough
so that he could understand
how difficult
it actually is
to get small children
to fall asleep.

It's one of those paradoxes
where no matter how easy
it becomes
to fall asleep
when you're older,
it appears to be the very last thing
you want
early in life,
as if it's tantamount
to the end of the world
(and I guess it might as well be)
to be caught dead sleeping.

That's a little
of what Marty thought,
eventually,
about being a superhero,
and maybe about
good & evil,
and how people decide
which one to be,
the extreme reluctance
to be good
and the sudden ease
to be evil,
a reverse
of how it's usually thought
to be.

Assorted Heroic Words: Roly-poly

a short, pudgy person

What do you make of our Marty?
What sort of figure does he strike?
Round in the middle,
short as a griddle,
roly-poly,
roly-poly,
roly-poly!

Assorted Heroic Words: Quixotic

chivalrous or romantic to extravagance

Don Quixote
was actually a parody
of his creator's interpretation
of a literary craze from before his time,
a criticism,
perhaps become something else
but not what he became,
not some wild idealistic crusade,
but a fool's errand,
a cantankerous sop.

In his darker moments
Marty wondered if that was after all
what he allowed himself to become,
swept up in a romantic delusion,
a comitragic insult
destined to be misremembered,
a gritique of his times
or somesuch nonsense...

Assorted Heroic Words: Photochronograph

an apparatus for recording very minute intervals of time

One of the mistakes
commonly made about
superhero folk
is that they might be considered
less than damaged,
that taking the law
into their own hands
automatically makes them
noble,
pure,
justified.

But what if
they're not?
What if
you can define them
as compromised,
not by the violence they choose to make
regardless of outcome,
an absence of malice,
purity of intent,
but rather
some unhealthy obsession,
resulting in a categorically
insane perspective?

What would you say
if told that Marty
lived the rest of his life
inside the moments
of the shooting,
that he spent all spare time
measuring and remeasuring
that signal event,
being warped by it
more and more,
fashioning a crude machine
that aided his efforts,
a photochronograph.

Would that negate all his other deeds?
Would framing Marty in such light
be sufficient
to condemn him forever
in the vicious court of public opinion?
Once poisoned,
always contaminated?
A psychopath
pinned forever,
culpable to a crime
he never committed?

A kingdom,
a kingdom for a horse,
is all he asks,
a hunchback of the mind,
skeletons thrust into history,
conjured by malice,
by lust for power,
the switch thrown
by greed for a throne,
an iron will
and an enemy
that could never be defeated,
and indeed celebrated
for all time...

Assorted Heroic Words: Obeah

a form of African witchcraft

Marty was introduced to obeah
(pronounced o-bi-a)
by John Bull
before their relationship
soured;
ironically
they ended up
using it against
each other.

Finding items
for this
led Marty
to the nth phone;
the nth phone in turn
led Marty
to the aliens
who had introduced
obeah to humans
in the first place.

Assorted Heroic Words: Nth

of an amount or degree too large to be measured

Marty's greatest asset
was his nth phone,
which never needed charging
and could hold
an infinite amount
of data;
eventually, though,
his use of it
attracted the attention
of the aliens who had left it
behind,
and that caused
an equal amount
of complications
(some of them
were good).

Assorted Heroic Words: Metaphysics

the branch of philosophy that examines the nature of first principles, the problems of being and reality, and the origin and structure of the universe

Marty had spent so much time
reading comics
that becoming a superhero
resulted in some
existential problems,
such as his sudden inability
to see himself as
more than a fictional character.

In some ways this helped him
and in others it got in the way.

He wondered if other callings
came with such pitfalls,
or if it was exclusive
to his peculiar new life.

It only got worse
when he started reading
fan fiction
based on his exploits.

Assorted Heroic Words: Libertine

morally or socially unrestrained

Marty found his greatest challenge
in the Libertine,
who broke all the rules,
who was capable of anything,
who might not even be thought criminal,
who held sway over a cult,
who made him rethink everything,
who came to take all his time,
who alienated him from the superhero community,
who in the years ahead took his family from him,
who made things personal,
who learned Marty's secret identity,
who made Marty question his sanity,
who made Marty question his intelligence,
who called himself Ellah;
Ellah of the mind,
Ellah of the soul,
Ellah of the plains of the earth,
Ellah of the end times,
Ellah of the beginning,
Ellah of all times,
Ellah of madness,
Ellah of balance,
Ellah of reason,
Ellah of chaos,
Ellah of disorder.

And yet finally Marty emerged,
intact, and yes,
perhaps tilting at windmills,
but the mirrors all lied.
He had emerged from his cocoon,
found himself,
found peace,
and that was all that mattered.

Assorted Heroic Words: Knight-Errant

a medieval knight in search of adventure, especially of a chance to show his skill and redress wrongs

One of the biggest decisions Marty made
was to become more a knight-errant
than a vigilante,
to dispense with the idea of a patrol
and instead seek out wrongs
that needed righting;

this had the effect
of freeing up his time
to devote to its particulars
and not just beating people up
(in truth he was not good in a fight,
try and try as he might)

Assorted Heroic Words: John Bull

the English nation or an Englishman personified

Gateway wasn't Marty's only mentor,
but he quickly discovered the other for
the fraud he really was.

John Bull, an English fop
appeared with a hop
after Marty changed his identity
to Grit, hoping to craft a legacy
all of his own.

This was a man
who seemed too grand
but the accent alone
left Marty prone
to fall for John's trap.

Somewhat long story short,
Marty had to abort
and they became enemies.

Assorted Heroic Words: Infer

to conclude or decide from evidence at hand or assumed

Marty's heroic career
almost ended as soon as it began
thanks to his faulty application
of detective reasoning:

he attempted to solve a mystery
through inference
and got it horribly wrong,
or at least couldn't prove it.

This had the effect
of teaching Marty
all about humility,
another thing
superheroes ought
to learn.

Or so he
quickly decided.

Assorted Heroic Words: Hellion

a person who delights in causing trouble

There were two others
called to extraordinary action
after the shooting:
one was Rachel
(whose story is her own)
and the other was Hellion,
who took all the wrong lessons
from that day.

Marty's first heroic triumph
was putting an end
to Hellion's mad rampage,
and in doing so he became
quite a local favorite.

Assorted Heroic Words: Gateway

a means of entry in an obstacle with a gate

What Marty discovered
about the superhero community
was how difficult it was
to be accepted into it;
he found a friend named Gateway,
a mentor for budding heroes.

Gateway had been around
since the Golden Age,
and told Marty
how Wesley Dodds himself
had done the same for him,
and how it was an honor
to finally return the favor.

Assorted Heroic Words: Finalist

a contestant in the final competition of a series

Shots rang out
(bang!)
in the halls of the high school
(bang!)
and suddenly Marty's narrative
(bang!)
changed tracks
(bang!)
forever.

Everything that had come to define
(bang!)
Marty's perception of his life
(bang!)
was suddenly no longer true.

There were still leftovers
(bang!)
but all the essentials
(bang!)
were recontextualized.

That was why he put on a mask
(bang!)
why he decided to embrace
(bang!)
the legacy of Wesley Dodds
(bang!)
namesake of his school
(bang!)
the erstwhile Sandman
(bang!)
who had skulked the streets
(bang!)
in a gas mask and suit
(bang!)
in a previous era.

When Marty had thought of the past
(bang!)
before
(bang!)
it was a dead subject
(bang!)
left to dull classrooms.

Now he understood
(bang!)
its significance
(bang!)
and resonance
(bang!)
and relevance
(bang!)
and urgency.

And he wanted
(bang!)
desperately
(bang!)
to feel as if he belonged to that
(bang!)
and not to his new status
(bang!)
as some kind of finalist
(bang!)
in a sick game
(bang!)
of mere survival
(bang!)
in a world
(bang!)
that no longer made sense.

Assorted Heroic Words: Emend

to make corrections

What Marty saw
as the distinction of his craft,
what he was doing
as a vigilante
working outside the law,
was emending it,
filling in the gaps.

He was the last line of defense
for the cause of justice.

Assorted Heroic Words: Donjon

the massive, heavily fortified, principal tower or keep of a medieval castle

Marty became a superhero,
and all superheroes need
a secret lair,
which Marty decided
would be the most likely one
for a kid who grew up
reading comics:

his donjon would be
a comic book store

Assorted Heroic Words: Chiliad

a thousand

Marty had chiliad reasons
for putting on a mask,
but mostly it was because
he wanted to hide his face,
give himself a new one,
and so he assumed
someone else's,
the gas mask of
a legend.

He would become Sandman,
fast as he can.

Assorted Heroic Words: Bogy

an imaginary frightful being

When he was very little,
Marty's father would threaten him
with a bogy:
"Touch that ashtray
and the bogy will get you!"
or,
"If you don't eat your dinner,
the bogy will throw a shoe!"

Consequently,
Marty did not mind stealing
that suit.

Assorted Heroic Words: Astray

out of the right way or in a wandering condition

Marty Kirby stumbles
late at night,
wearing a garish mask
and a suit he stole
from his father's closet,
which is too big for him
except around the waist,
where it's too tight.

Somewhere along the way,
Marty has gone astray.

Crisis Weekly #21

PAGE ONE

Panel 1

El Dorado mid-disappearing, in the office of the president at Los Pinos.

Panel 2

El Dorado mid-appearing, his arms around Bloodwynd and Doomsday, in the wreckage of Washington. 

Panel 3

Close-up of Bloodwynd and El Dorado sharing a look.

Panel 4

El Dorado mid-disappearing with the two combatants.

Panel 5

El Dorado mid-appearing with the two combatants in space.

Panel 6

El Dorado letting go and mid-disappearing as the combatants grapple each other in space.

Panel 7

Close-up of Bloodwynd, his face stoic.

Panel 8

A giant explosion, nothing else visible, including bodies.

Panel 9

El Dorado mid-appearing, looking up at the sky at the explosion in space.

PAGE TWO

Panel 1

Rachel Rogerson standing in front of Wesley Dodds High School.

CAPTION: I was there.  I was there when it happened.

Panel 2

Rachel reluctantly entering the building.  Other students around her don’t seem to notice Rachel.  It seems to be just another ordinary day.

CAPTION: But I’ll never really be able to talk about it.

Panel 3

Rachel is passing Guy Gardner, now a clean-shaven security officer at the school.  He nods his head at her. 

CAPTION: It sucks, having something like that as a part of you.

Panel 4

In the foreground, Rachel continues walking.  In the background Guy is exchanging words with a black youth, Joe Gary.

GUY GARDNER: Good morning.  New to the school?

JOE GARY: Yeah.  Just transferred.

JOE GARY: Gary.  Joe Gary.

Panel 5

In the foreground, Rachel continues walking.  Farther in the background now are Guy and Joe Gary.

GUY GARDNER: Hey, you know what?  You look strangely familiar.

JOE GARY: I’m just a kid.

GUY GARDNER: Maybe I know your old man?

JOE GARY: Then you’d be better off in that regard than me.  Gotta get to class, sir.

Panel 6

Rachel continues walking in the foreground, while in the far background are Guy and Joe Gary.

GUY GARDNER: Hey, call me Guy.

GUY GARDNER: Look, I don’t mean to bug you, but it’s gonna nag me all day.

JOE GARY: I don’t know what to say.

JOE GARY: Maybe you saw him on TV?  Whatever, man.  Gotta go.

Panel 7

Rachel is running into Marty Kirby in the foreground, completely startled.  Guy is alone in the background, but we’re still listening in on him.

GUY GARDNER: Sonovabitch!

GUY GARDNER: He had a son!  He had a son!

GUY GARDNER: Rest in peace, my friend…

PAGE THREE

Panel 1

Now Rachel and Marty are squarely our focus.

RACHEL ROGERSON: Marty!  Didn’t expect to see you again!

MARTY KIRBY: Yeah.  Almost didn’t come back. 

MARTY KIRBY: Really surprised to see you here, too.

Panel 2

Rachel and Marty continue walking the halls.

RACHEL ROGERSON: My other plans didn’t really work out.  I didn’t know where else to go.

MARTY KIRBY: I know what you mean. 

MARTY KIRBY: I made a real mess of things.  But I think I ended on a good note.  I’d like to think so, anyway.

Panel 3

Rachel and Marty are standing in front of the door to a classroom.  We can see Ray Palmer inside, writing something on the chalkboard.

RACHEL ROGERSON: Don’t really want to go in there.

MARTY KIRBY: They managed to make it look like nothing ever happened, didn’t they?

Panel 4

Marty has walked in, while Rachel continues to hesitate.

CAPTION: As much as I didn’t want to go inside that classroom, I desperately needed to get out of my own head.  I needed a distraction, and somehow, even there seemed like a viable option.

PAGE FOUR

Panel 1

Rachel, seated at a desk in the back of the classroom.

CAPTION: Listening to Mister Palmer talking about science for a change wasn’t such a bad thing.  The man clearly had a passion for it, undiminished.  Used to use it to create gadgets as a superhero.  Now taught robotics.  Maybe the clockwork functions of a robot explained how he could be standing there as if nothing had happened.

Panel 2

Ray Palmer is standing in front of Rachel now, addressing her to see if she was paying attention.

RAY PALMER: Earth to Rachel.  Anyone home?

RACHEL: Uh, yeah.  Yes, Mister Palmer.

Panel 3

Rachel is staring ahead with a little more attentiveness, but she’s once again alone.

CAPTION: “Earth to Rachel.”  Interesting choice of words.  “Anyone home?”  Hard to say.

Panel 4

Rachel has leaned down toward her desk.  She has begun writing in a notebook.

CAPTION: Let’s try to understand all this.  Let’s try to make sense of it.

PAGE FIVE

Panel 1

Now Rachel is in the cafeteria, sitting alone, with a tray of food, untouched, in front of her, and she’s still bent down scribbling in a notebook.

CAPTION: I found out something about myself, something important.

Panel 2

Rachel is now sitting outside, leaning against a tree.  We can see Wesley Dodds High School in the background.

CAPTION: The invulnerability turned out to be the less interesting discovery.  I found out how I got it.

Panel 3

A car has pulled up near Rachel.  The driver is Ezrah.  Rachel doesn’t look up.  She continues to write in her notebook.

CAPTION: Turns out it wasn’t just a random thing.  I didn’t get it from some freak accident.  I was born with it.

Panel 4

Rachel is now inside Ezrah’s car.  Ezrah is looking at her, worried, as he continues to drive.  Rachel is still writing in her notebook.

CAPTION: Turns out I’m a White Martian.

PAGE SIX

Panel 1

Ezrah and Rachel are on the hood on his car, in a field.  Ezrah is sprawled out, looking at Rachel, who is of course sitting writing in her notebook.  It’s nighttime.

CAPTION: There was a call, a telepathic one, sent out by the Martian Manhunter, to all White Martians.  President Reilly held a press conference announcing it.  They wanted their cooperation, for them to join the fight.

Panel 2

Ezrah and Rachel are back in his car.  This time Ezrah is looking straight ahead, a sad expression on his face.

CAPTION: The moment I heard the Manhunter’s voice in my head, I knew.  And suddenly it all made sense.

Panel 3

Ezrah and Rachel are standing in front of her doorstep.

EZRAH: Listen, I get it.  I’ll give you space. 

Panel 4

Rachel is in her bedroom.  In stark contrast to how we saw it way back in Crisis Weekly #3, the walls are now bare.  She doesn’t have the energy to follow boy bands anymore.  We can see her Bulletproof costume crumpled on the floor.  Rachel is sitting on her bed writing in that notebook.

CAPTION: So, yeah. 

PAGE SEVEN

Panel 1

Rachel is reacting to a sound she hears at her window.

Panel 2

Rachel has opened the window and is looking out.

Panel 3

Rachel is looking at the Russian Centaur, who has a bare, ripped chest.

Panel 4

The Russian Centaur, Yuri, is motioning for Rachel to come out and join him.

PAGE EIGHT

Panel 1

Rachel is climbing out her window as Yuri watches.

Panel 2

Rachel is now standing in front of Yuri.  They’re staring at each other.

Panel 3

Rachel is now staring at her feet, embarrassed.  Yuri is looking warmly at her.

YURI: I suspect we have much in common, Rachel Rogerson.

YURI: My name is Yuri.

Panel 4

Rachel is riding Yuri’s back, clutching her arms around him, leaning her head.  They head off down the street, away from us.

YURI: We have much to talk about. 

YURI: Fortunately we have all night.

TITLE: “My Own Worst Enemy”

WRITER: Tony Laplume

FIN

Crisis Weekly #20

PAGE ONE

Panel 1 (splash)

In the skies above the White House, Doomsday and President Lorraine Reilly/Firehawk clash.  Firehawk should already exhibit having been in an intense fight.

CAPTION: To confuse the monster with a mindless brute, interested only in destruction, is to completely misunderstand it.

CAPTION: The name it was given, “Doomsday,” is approximate to the intent of its existence.

CAPTION: Simply put, this was a creature engineered to usher the end of worlds.

CAPTION: From its release by the Caballero in Mexico, it went straight to the heart of western civilization, and there it was confronted by the one person with ultimate responsibility, the one person who had come to embody all that society had been led to despise, but also all that stood in its way: Firehawk, also known as Lorraine Reilly, also known as the President of the United States of America.

CAPTION: History will show that she handled herself bravely, without hesitation.

CAPTION: And that she was the first to fall.

TITLE: “It’s the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)”

WRITER: Tony Laplume
 

PAGE TWO

Panel 1 (splash)

Doomsday and Guy Gardner, armed with his yellow ring, clashing.  Doomsday is swinging directly at Guy’s face (evoking Guy’s crushed face from their first encounter), while Guy is unleashing the full power at his disposal, a brilliant flash that lights up the whole page, something few ring-wielders have ever done before.

CAPTION: Though he did not fall that day, Guy Gardner’s legacy, too, was immediately restored in his outstanding act of courage, stepping up before all others.

CAPTION: Where the public had been led to believe he was a moral deviant, Guy instead demonstrated the highest standard of heroic caliber.

CAPTION: He did not die, but he was defeated soundly and almost instantly.

CAPTION: The wreckage of the White House is the testament of his stand.  Already observers are saying that the grounds will be refashioned as a memorial to his efforts, and that the home of the president will be relocated elsewhere.

 

PAGE THREE

Panel 1 (splash)

Doomsday versus an army of Green Lanterns, including Hal Jordan, John Stewart and Kyle Rayner.  They are engaging in the upper atmosphere.

CAPTION: The effect of Guy’s fall had severely tarnished the ability of the Green Lantern Corps to operate within the confines of Earth, their legitimacy having been challenged by a joint resolution of the world’s governments.

CAPTION: Hal had chosen to honor the apparent wishes of his home planet and dedicated his efforts elsewhere within the sector.

CAPTION: But came back, as all heroes do, when it became clear it no longer mattered what anyone thought.

CAPTION: And to rescue his friend and colleague.

CAPTION: Even this was not enough to stop the beast, however.

 

PAGE FOUR

Panel 1 (splash)

Doomsday clashes with Superman and Wonder Woman, with various other well-established heroes off in the distance, including the Crisis Compact, which now includes our pudgy Sandman.

CAPTION: Superman had been leading the rescue efforts in Washington in the wake of the creature’s devastation. 

CAPTION: Like Hal he had been maintaining a low profile in apparent deference to the will of the population.  Even in retreat, the consummate hero.

CAPTION: Everyone knew what had happened the last time he met this opponent.  Everyone feared it would happen again.  And, just perhaps, the thought occurred to him as well.

CAPTION: He hesitated, just perhaps, for a moment.

CAPTION: Doomsday, though, grows inured to all previous challenges.  This is to say, he always grows stronger.

CAPTION: So that even a superman isn’t strong enough anymore, to defeat him.

 

PAGE FIVE

Panel 1 (splash)

Doomsday against the arrayed collection of White Martians, including the likes of Karma, Boxer, the Man-Bats, the Bully Boys, and Russian Centaur.  The Creeper is there, too.  There are thousands represented.

CAPTION: What we realized was that we would have to put aside our petty differences.

CAPTION: The very agency that had been used to pollute us, the White Martian menace, that great unknown…

CAPTION: Martian Manhunter and myself finally put aside our prejudices and held an emergency council with their leaders, and we came to an understanding, at last.

CAPTION: And…we finally slowed the onslaught.

 

PAGE SIX

Panel 1 (splash)

Doomsday standing in a cloud of dust, apparently triumphant.

CAPTION: None of it was enough.

 

PAGE SEVEN

Panel 1 (splash)

Bloodwynd, in costume, clutching his blood diamond with a determined look on his face.

CAPTION: There is a Martian legend.

CAPTION: Mars is a dead world today.  We all know this.  All life on it came to an end.

CAPTION: Doomsday came to the red planet.

CAPTION: The legend states that an ultimate weapon was conceived to defeat the ultimate predator.

CAPTION: A blood red diamond.

CAPTION: This was to be a last resort, when all else was lost.

CAPTION: The cost would be great.

CAPTION: Like all bombs, it would consume itself as well as its prey.

CAPTION: I suppose I’ve always known…

 

PAGE EIGHT

Panel 1 (splash)

Doomsday confronting Bloodwynd, still clutching his blood diamond.

CAPTION: The hope is that this will end its menace forever.

CAPTION: In other words, worlds will live…

Crisis Weekly #19

PAGE ONE

Panel 1

Henrietta is looking directly at us, in the first of a nine panel grid in the style of the confessionals from Heroes in Crisis.  She is a ten-year-old girl.  She looks sad.  She’s a blonde.

HENRIETTA: Everyone’s talking about the death of the president, but I guess I’m most sad about the little girl who died.

Panel 2

Black panel with text.

TEXT: Henrietta, aged ten.

Panel 3

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: Her name was Maria, she was three, I think.

Panel 4

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: We were both living here in D.C., (my mom calls it the suburbs), where nobody really thinks about.  I used to see her at Walton’s.

Panel 5

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: I used to go there for the comics.  I don’t think I’ll be able to read about superheroes again for a while.  One time my mom said she thought she saw Maria’s mom stealing shoes.  I didn’t care.

Panel 6

Henrietta is silent this panel.

Panel 7

Black panel with text.

TITLE: “We Didn’t Start the Fire”

WRITER: Tony Laplume

Panel 8

Henrietta continues to talk. Tears are beginning to form.

HENRIETTA: I mean, Maria didn’t deserve to die!  She was just a kid!  She liked to giggle and be silly and…

Panel 9

Silent panel.  Henrietta is outright crying.
 

PAGE TWO

Panel 1

Henrietta is older, a twenty-year-old now (every page will advance a decade for her, and will be nine panel grids).

HENRIETTA: Yeah I remember where I was when the president died.

Panel 2

Black panel with text.

TEXT: Henrietta, aged twenty.

Panel 3

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA; I was just a kid.  Seems like a lifetime ago!  Was it really ten years ago?

Panel 4

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: Now you can’t go anywhere without seeing some kind of reminder about Firehawk, about her brave sacrifice.

Panel 5

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: I mean, there’s the little souvenir statues that copy the one in Washington.  I grew up there.  Got out as soon as I could, went as far away as…

Panel 6

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: As far as I know, Alaska has never had any superheroes, right?  I’ve never heard of them.  Was there a Justice League in the Antarctic?  I think I heard something about that.  One mission maybe.  That was as close as they ever got.

Panel 7

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: There were some comics, that didn’t feature superheroes, set here, taking advantage of the weird daylight.  Those are basically the only comics I’ve read…in the past decade.

Panel 8

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: I mean, the president died defending the country against Doomsday, and she was a superhero.  You can’t really top that.

Panel 9

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: Anyway, I don’t see why you would want to.  Time to move on, right?

 

PAGE THREE

Panel 1

Henrietta is now thirty, of course.

HENRIETTA: Has it really been twenty years?  I can still remember exactly where I was when it happened.

Panel 2

Black panel with text.

TEXT: Etta, aged thirty.

Panel 3

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: I mean, in school they used to have us write essays about it all the time.  I spent ten years writing those things.  Sometimes it seemed like that was all they really wanted us to do, right?

Panel 4

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: They finally made a movie about it?  I guess that was always inevitable.  In bad taste, maybe.  Younger people will probably be able to watch it, older people.  People my age, we grew up with the horror of it.  Not really escapism material for us. Not for me, anyway.

Panel 5

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: I mean, there have always been superhero movies, right?  They just keep making them.  And I guess I’ve probably seen a lot of them, the ones you kind of can’t escape.  And it’s a little weird, because you read about superheroes all the time on the internet, you can see the actual footage, and there are the comics, and then these movies.

Panel 6

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: I guess I just don’t want the movies to talk about the realities of it.

Panel 7

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: Because when you start, you have to continue, and there’s a lot you can’t just leave out.

Panel 8

A silent panel.  Henrietta is looking thoughtful.  We can assume she’s thinking of Maria.

Panel 9

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: What?  Oh, nothing.  Just lost my train of thought. 

HENRIETTA: Then you have to start thinking about them as real people, and the real people around them, I guess.  It changes things.  Not what I want to see in superhero movies.

 

PAGE FOUR

Panel 1

Henrietta is now forty.

HENRIETTA: We’re doing this again, I see. 

Panel 2

Black panel with text.

TEXT: Etta, aged forty.

Panel 3
Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: I actually did get married, and had a kid, yeah.  She’s three now.

Panel 4

Silent panel.  Henrietta is looking thoughtful again.

Panel 5

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: What?  Oh, nothing.  I was just thinking of someone I used to know.

Panel 6

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: I tell her about what it was like, the day President Reilly died.

Panel 7

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: There was so much happening, and of course that monster continued it rampage for a while longer, until it was finally stopped for good (thank goodness!).  I just try to keep it simple for my daughter.  Tell her where I was when I heard, what everyone does.

Panel 8

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: I was maybe her age when Superman died fighting that thing, but of course he came back eventually, and so did it.  But not this time. 

Panel 9

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: I guess some of us expected that maybe Firehawk would be as lucky as Superman.  Makes it sadder.

 

PAGE FIVE

Panel 1

Henrietta is fifty now.

HENRIETTA: Yes, fifty years old now.  They always say that fifty is the halfway point, when you can no longer kid yourself about getting older.

Panel 2

Black panel with text.

TEXT: Etta, aged fifty.

Panel 3

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: I mean, I knew a decade ago that I definitely had a lot of history at that point, but now history begins to seem like something you’ve really lived through, something that’s as much something that’s in books as it is in your memories.

Panel 4

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: Yeah, for instance this Firehawk thing.

Panel 5

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: I feel like I’ve been talking about it forever!

Panel 6

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: Even though I was there, in Washington, where I grew up, when it happened, I was just a kid.  A lot of the details are things I learned later.  At the time it was just sensation.

Panel 7

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: On TV it was inescapable!  My parents had it on all the time, and I didn’t get to watch my cartoons.  (That was a big deal at the time.)

Panel 8

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: Anyway, I found out about a lot of things, after the fact.

Panel 9

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: But it didn’t diminish her sacrifice.  Nothing will ever do that.

 

PAGE SIX

Panel 1
Henrietta is now sixty.

HENRIETTA: This year’s the big fifty year anniversary. 

Panel 2

Black panel with text.

TEXT: Etta, aged sixty.

Panel 3

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: Suddenly it’s everywhere again.  Even the little statues, exactly the way they were when they first popped up.  People!

Panel 4

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: Now they’re making movies about her that don’t even involve the tragedy.  About time, if you ask me.  There was the “origin story” one, of course.  I remember reading about how Firehawk got her powers, but that one really affected me, I have to admit.

Panel 5

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: Yeah, I admit it.  I kind of became obsessed.  I have shelves full of books about her.  My mom was the same way.  She was young when the last assassination happened.

Panel 6

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: Yeah, it surprised me, too, when it began being talked about as an assassination, but that’s basically what it was.  You grow old enough, and history starts to take on new language.  Things take on new names they didn’t have at the time.

Panel 7

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: The trial of the Mexican president, everyone remembers that, yeah.  It was controversial, at the time, that they could execute him.  A lot of people talked about the French Revolution, but the parallels weren’t really there.

Panel 8

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: For one thing, El Dorado was around to replace him, and that was…the beginning of a bold new era for everyone, right?

Panel 9

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: A lot of things would’ve been different if he had been in office from the start.

 

PAGE SEVEN

Panel 1

Henrietta is now seventy.

HENRIETTA: Oh, yes!

Panel 2

Black panel with text.

TEXT: Etta, aged seventy.

Panel 3

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: Lorraine Reilly, that old battlehorse, as us older folks like to call her!

Panel 4

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: When you think of how briefly she was actually in office…!

Panel 5

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: It’s been long enough now, historians have started forgetting.  Not the ones writing about her specifically, mind you, the others, the ones ranking the presidents.  She didn’t serve long enough in office to make an impact, they say.

Panel 6

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: The nerve of them! 

Panel 7

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: I’d love to give them a piece of my mind!

Panel 8

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: Maybe they have short memories, but there are plenty of us who don’t.  We know exactly the impact she made, the sacrifice…!

Panel 9

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: What she did for us, for all of us, can never be forgotten.  Should never be forgotten!

 

PAGE EIGHT

Panel 1

Henrietta is now eighty.

HENRIETTA: You know, as time goes by, I find myself thinking about the girl more and more.

Panel 2

Black panel with text.

TEXT: Henrietta, aged eighty.

Panel 3

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: The girl, Maria.  She was three that day.  She’ll always be three.

Panel 4

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: She was from Mexico, you know. 

Panel 5

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: Oh, I never said that?  Well, she was.

Panel 6

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: There was such an age gap between us.  Seven years is a long time when you’re young!  We weren’t friends.  She was just someone I knew from the neighborhood, someone I saw all the time.  It was a smaller world, then, or so it seemed.

Panel 7

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: What was I saying?

Panel 8

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: She died the same day, trampled by the monster, before Lorraine Reilly could reach it, before it was finally stopped.

Panel 9

Henrietta continues to talk.

HENRIETTA: I still miss her.  I still think about her, that’s all.