Waking

By Chicago

Disclaimers: Characters and settings owned by DC Comics. They've been borrowed for fun, not for profit. The situation and plot belong to us.

Approximately month 8 of the J'onnverse.

Canon notes:
part 2: Max Mercury's ability to commune with the Speedforce is detailed in various issues of Impulse.
part 3: Details of Barry Allen's demise in Crisis on Infinite Earths.
part 4: "Ra's Babel effect" is a reference to JLA 43-47
part 5: Explanation of J'onn's "home in the Gobi" in MM 23 (a gift of the Spectre). K'hym's words and M'yri'ah's reactions come from MM 0. References to the sleeping Martian gods in MM 12 and 33.
part 9: Thanks to Darklady for insight into Plasticman on this one, and see JLA 50-54, 60, 65 and JLA Incarnations 7 for implications that lend that insight weight.
part 10: Explanation of zo'ok in MM 8. History of Bruce's zo'ok in Darklady's fic, "Ace," and in "Paper Hearts." H'ronmeer's Curse - pretty much any issue of MM, but particularly 0, 5-9, and 34, and the 1988 mini.
part 11: Martian theology cobbled together from MM 12, 33, and 1988 mini. Martian relationship to water from JLA: Foreign Bodies. Explanation behind Martian trueform in MM 14.
part 13: J'onn's message to Kyle from MM 36. The 853rd century references from DC 1,000,000. The White Martians were banished to the Phantom Zone in JLA 58.
part 16: Green Lantern stopping a super-nova refers to DC 1,000,000.
part 18: J'onn shut down his body in the JLA mini "Paradise Lost."
part 19: Doctor Mid-nite's remembered crash from Matt Wagner-authored Doctor Mid-nite TPB. Hippolyta (Wonder Woman's mother and member of the JSA) died sometime during Our Worlds at War.
part 20: The quotation from J'onn's mother comes from MM 33.
part 23: Amy Rohrbach's family got all of three panels in NW, but they are canon.
part 25: Thanks to Luke for letting me borrow the "crash room." Superman's memory of Batman's search for Lois, including the quote, comes from Action Comics 766.

Continuity notice: OWaW is within JV continuity. Canon developments after JLA #58 are adopted as they appeal to us. At present, we are ignoring the Bruce Wayne: Murderer/Fugitive storyline as presented in canon. The "Obsidian Age" JLA arc is replaced by "All's Fair" in this `verse.

Rating: Runs the gamut from G to R, some violence, some adult themes.

Archive: Batslash and J'onnverse page.

Waking
by Chicago

The apartment door slammed open and closed with a sound near to breaking, prompting a frown to cross Linda West's face. "Wally," she protested as the blur entering the kitchen stopped suddenly to kiss her cheek. "Easy on the door."

"Sorry," he apologized, but his face wore a broad grin. "Busy day. You look great. What smells so good?"

Linda sighed. At least he was talking at an intelligible rate, even if he was leaping from subject to subject with Bart-Allen like inattention. "That'd be dinner," she replied. "And if you'll go wash -"

He was gone and back before she could finish the sentence, his uniform traded for his civvies, his smile infuriatingly smug. "Even scrubbed beneath my nails," he announced, holding his hands out for inspection.

"Fine." Linda waved him off with a pot holder. "Go. Sit." No sense wasting breath on full sentences.

And of course, he was at the table already, tapping his foot in habitual impatience. Some days, Linda questioned the wisdom of marrying a superhero.

But these were things she'd more or less learned to live with, and she ignored her husband's body language as she pulled a pot roast out of the oven.

"Home cooked!" Wally exclaimed, recognizing at once that this was not one of the fast meals that were the watchword in the West home as a matter of sanity. "What's the occasion?"

Linda smiled. "No occasion. You've just been so busy lately -"

Her words were interrupted by another kiss to the cheek as Wally whisked the baking dish from her hands and set it on the table. Then he was back again to kiss her more fully. "You are wonderful," he breathed, his arms tightening around her. Linda returned the embrace, resisting comment on the fact that she could feel his ribs.

"Let's eat," she suggested, propelling him toward the table.

Wally took the hint, serving up portions for both of them in the time it took Linda to sit down. By the time she had taken her first bite, he was up again. "I know you wanted a quiet dinner, and I appreciate it," he began, already back in the uniform of the Flash, "but there's just so much I gotta do."

"But-"

It was too late - he was gone. Another time, Linda would have been angry - furious even. Now, however, she pushed her own plate back, worry putting hunger at a distance. So much to do. More and more every day for weeks. And for the fifth time in as many days, she was going to be putting leftovers in the fridge. Leftovers that, if the current state of the refrigerator was any indication, would not get eaten. And whatever else might be true of the world, leftovers just were not meant to last in the oft-raided refrigerator of the West household.

She glanced toward her computer desk, just visible through the dining room door. She'd been resisting the urge for days now, telling herself that Wally would never forgive her if he felt she'd gone behind his back. But she could barely get him to sit still long enough to talk to him, and a rather large portion of the night's pot roast remained untouched. "Sorry, Wally," she said to herself, rising to cross into her study, "but it's time to call in some heavy hitters."

*

An unfamiliar alert pinged in the monitor womb, drawing J'onn's attention from a fire in Madrid which had demanded superhero intervention. He glanced down at the control console, recognizing the discrete signal system created for the families of various heroes. He hastened to answer, his eyes racing across the monitors as he did so. It wasn't exactly an "emergency use only" system, but it rarely sounded on any other occasion.

"Watchtower," he answered.

"Uh, hi. This is J'onn, isn't it?"

J'onn felt his alarm fading even as he picked up a different kind of worry from the voice addressing him. "Yes," he answered. "Linda?"

"Um, yeah. Listen," she sighed, and he could hear her struggling with what she wanted to say. "I'm sorry. I know you guys are busy, but -"

"It's okay, Linda," he reassured. "Were you hoping to reach someone else?"

"No, no, that's not it. It's just - I'm worried about Wally." The last words rushed out, a worthy imitation of her husband in their haste.

"He has been losing weight," J'onn observed.

"So you've noticed it, too!" She sounded relieved. "Did he explain it to you, or-"

"Linda," J'onn interrupted.

"Sorry." He heard her take a deep breath and let it out slowly. "He just laughs it off, I know. And it wouldn't worry me so much, except -"

"Except -?"

"He's not eating right, either. I mean, not eating enough. He's always in such a hurry. Even for him. It's not that he seems like he's worn out or anything, just -"

"Just working harder than it seems like he should be able to," J'onn finished thoughtfully.

"Yeah. So you have noticed it!"

"Not exactly, but something like it," J'onn allowed. He thought a second longer. "How are you doing?"

"Me?" Linda sounded surprised. "I'm fine. Great, actually, aside from being worried about Wally, I mean. Work's going better than ever and I'm getting caught up on a bunch of projects I'd been putting off forever." An odd note of realization crept into her tone. "You don't think -?"

"No," J'onn answered firmly. "I'm quite sure Wally's not feeling like you don't have time for him. I just understand that this is a hard business to be married to."

"Oh." There was a moment of silence. "I shouldn't have called, should I?"

"Linda," J'onn said sternly. "You were quite right to call. Something is affecting your husband, and you are in the best position to notice it before it becomes more serious. I do not know what the best course of action is from here short of persuading him to slow down, but this is a cause for concern. You'll contact us if anything changes?"

"Yes," Linda agreed with a hint of relief. "Thanks."

"You are welcome. Watchtower out."

J'onn closed the connection and leaned back in his chair, deep in thought. Then he leaned forward, fingers flashing across a keyboard as he pulled data up on the main monitor. A deep frown creased his features. "Should've noticed..." he murmured to himself, cross-referencing the data on the screen with more rapid-fire keystrokes.

Definitely troubling.

He opened a communications channel.

"Batman," a dark rumble answered.

"Bruce, it's me."

A side monitor snowed for a moment and then cleared to reveal Batman's face. "J'onn. I was about to go on patrol."

"Anything pressing?"

Batman shook his head. "I've been able to keep pretty much ahead of things lately. Something wrong?"

J'onn hesitated. "I'm not sure." He lifted his hands from the keyboard, deciding not to send the data amassed on the central screen. "You sleep last night?"

Batman's expression grew wary. "A little. J'onn, what's-"

"Can you finish patrol by midnight?"

"Unless something comes up. J'onn, do you need me up there?"

J'onn shook his head. "Not right now, just -"

"J'onn." There was a warning note in Batman's tone.

"Just sleep tonight, okay? Eight hours."

"J'onn, what's going on? You know I can't promise-"

"Please."

Something warred on Batman's face for a moment. "You'll explain this?"

"In the morning. I promise."

Batman nodded brusquely. "Fine. Batman out."

J'onn stared at the darkened screen for a moment, then shook his head and returned his attention to the central monitor. It didn't have to mean something was wrong, he told himself, scanning the data again. But somehow, that didn't comfort him.

(2)

Kyle Rayner was in a good mood that even a JLA summons couldn't quite erase. For once, he was over a month ahead of deadline, and he had caught a wave of mysterious sympatico with the writers he worked with. Everything he drew seemed to be golden - right the first time and
accepted with delight by his editors.

He wondered if that explained why his head had seemed so much clearer as Green Lantern. Without the nagging worry of impending deadlines and juggled bills, he found his focus in costume had improved dramatically. He felt as a consequence he was developing more finesse with the ring, anticipating "right" responses to various criminal threats and natural disasters with an efficiency that made him feel a little more worthy of the Green Lantern legend. For the first time, he hit the teleporter without that nagging dread that he would make a rookie mistake or
otherwise disgrace himself among people who were as much his heroes as his friends and allies.

The teleporter area was quiet, and he wasted no time there, striding instead toward the conference room. "Hey, everybody," he greeted. "What's the situation?"

Superman looked toward J'onn.

"I'd rather wait until we're all here," J'onn demurred. "Hello, Kyle. How are you?"

There was something in J'onn's tone that suggested the question was not merely a polite inquiry, and Kyle gave the Martian a hard look. "I'm fine. Never been better. And you?"

"Worried. Have any of you-?"

"Hey, J'onn, everyone-" Plasticman's voice broke in through the conference room comlink- "I just got a call from the Flash. They're taking Max Mercury to STAR Labs - something weird with the Speed Force. Wally thinks he should stay there and look into it."

"That's-"

"Weird how?" J'onn overrode Superman, earning a surprised look from his teammate.

"I don't have the specifics, although Wally did say they found Max unconscious."

Wonder Woman frowned. "Unconscious? And no sense of why?"

"That's why they're going to STAR Labs."

"Ask Wally to keep us posted," Superman requested, his eyes resting on J'onn's face.

"Roger-wilco," Plasticman replied.

"And re-signal Bat-"

"I'm here, J'onn," Batman's voice interrupted, drawing the others' attention as he walked through the door.

"Then if Wally's not coming we can get started," Aquaman stated with a hint of impatience.

"Plasticman, are you with us?"

"One ear tuned, Green Guy."

Kyle smirked slightly at the visual. As much as Plasticman's contortions could be annoying, there was something right with the world as long as their elastic teammate continued to clown.

"Fine. I'd rather the Flash were here, but I presume you've all noticed that he's been losing weight?"

"You summoned us here to talk about the Flash's weight!" Aquaman exploded, startling Kyle. The Atlantean could be very short tempered at times, but it wasn't entirely in character for him to snap at J'onn with so little provocation.

"Arthur," Superman warned. "J'onn, what is this about?"

"Just that. I suspect that Wally's weight loss and Max Mercury's collapse are related - and are in fact part of a larger trend toward over-extension that seems to be affecting the whole planet."

The conference room monitor flashed on, and Plasticman's distorted torso crossed the screen. "Like this?"

If J'onn were annoyed by the interruption, he gave no sign. In fact, he seemed strangely tentative to Kyle.

"More like the fact that in the last month we have seen more technological innovations, more improvements in national GDPs, and less violence than in any similar span in recorded history."

Kyle blinked. "And that's a bad thing?"

"It is if all that efficiency and productivity are coming at a human cost - which I suspect is what Wally's weight loss and Max's collapse are hinting at."

Diana stopped just short of a scoff. "Come on, J'onn. Wally's already suggested there's some problem with the Speed Force. And while I agree that that might be something we need to be addressing, to stretch that -"

"Diana, how are you?"

Wonder Woman blinked. "I'm fine, J'onn. Really. Actually enjoying the recent lull in criminal activity, since it gives me more time with my sisters. But I'm a little worried about you. This kind of paranoia..."

*Too much time with Batman,* Kyle thought, finishing her sentence, knowing the others were undoubtedly thinking the same. He felt a hint of guilt when he saw a faint frown crease J'onn's features.

"And you, Kal?"

"Same as always, my friend." There was a hint of sympathetic humoring in Superman's voice.

"Plasticman?"

"Heck, couldn't be better! Practically bouncing."

"So I see," J'onn remarked dryly. "And you all have noticed nothing peculiar about your sleep or eating patterns in the last few weeks?"

"J'onn," Aquaman stood up, "I'm sorry, but I've got better things to do than worry about what's right with the world. I can't run up here for every surface dweller hang nail that develops." He began walking toward the door.

"Hold on, Arthur," Batman ordered, turning from the table and putting a hand to his cowl. "Go ahead, Nightwing."

There was silence for a moment as Batman listened, and Kyle thought the grim set to Batman's face grew a shade grimmer.

"Understood. Batman out."

Batman turned his attention back to the others. "Nightwing reports that Jesse Quick passed out during a meeting this morning. She came to disoriented and has been in and out of consciousness several times since then."

Superman glanced around the table. "Plas, get Wally."

"Already done," Plas reported, and Wally's visage replaced his on the monitor.

"Plas I told you -"

"Wally," J'onn broke in.

"J'onn, didn't Plasticman explain-"

"We know, Wally. Something similar seems to have affected Jesse Quick."

"Damn. I'll go look-"

"Wally," Superman interrupted, "I think given that whatever is going on is affecting speedsters, I think it might be best if you took it eas-"

"What, because you guys are so equipped to deal with the Speed Force? Sorry. I'll let you know when I've got this wrapped up." The screen went blank, leaving the room silent for a moment.

"I'll go talk to him," Superman decided. "Wonder Woman, you should go to STAR Labs and see what they've found out, if anything. Batman, is Jesse Quick-"

"The Titans are taking her there now."

"Good. Lantern, if you could go by JSA headquarters and let Jay Garrick know what's going on and warn him. Plasticman, you've got monitor. Find out if Impulse is at STAR Labs with Max. If not, let Kyle know so he can go round him up. Batman, be prepared to interface with STAR Labs. Arthur, we'll call you if we need you. And J'onn -" Superman gave the Martian a concerned look - "maybe you should catch some sleep yourself, get away from the monitors awhile."

Without further comment, Superman followed Aquaman from the room with Wonder Woman not far behind. Kyle hung back, approaching J'onn where he still sat at the table with Batman. J'onn's expression was difficult to read, but somehow Kyle couldn't help feeling that there
had been something ignoble about the way his concerns had been dismissed by the team. He set his hand on the Martian's shoulder. "I'm glad you called this meeting," he said quietly.

J'onn mustered a faint smile. "Thanks, Kyle. You should go see to the JSA."

Kyle nodded and left the room.

(3)

It was easy enough to trace the Flash's location, although it did take a few minutes to catch up with him - minutes that had Superman deep in thought. There was something troubling about the meeting J'onn had called, about the way they had interacted as a team. Or rather, not as a team. Yes, J'onn's concerns seemed far overblown, even with the troubling collapses of Max Mercury and Jesse Quick. But something about the way the Martian presented his worry was off. He had been too willing to let his teammates dismiss him, in fact had grown increasingly withdrawn as the meeting progressed. And there was Batman's curious silence to consider.

That was nagging him.

Had Bruce shared the League's opinion, he would have spoken up.

Had he agreed with J'onn, he would have made a point of supporting him.

Wouldn't he?

He filed the question away as he finally dropped down into a run beside the Flash, prompting exactly the reaction he hoped for. Wally stopped.

"Go away, Superman," he ordered.

Superman met the speedster's eyes, noting the thinness of his face and the strain in his features. He *had* lost weight - rather more than could possibly be healthy. "Wally," he began gently, "I think we need to get you back to STAR Labs."

Wally shook his head. "I've already talked to them more than I want to. They don't know what's wrong. Max would be the one who could tell us if he was conscious. He could commune with the Speed Force-"

A beep sounded from the JLA comlink, causing Wally to pause. "Superman here."

"Superman, I'm at STAR Labs," Wonder Woman's voice answered.

"Any word?" the Flash broke in.

"Nothing good. They've got Impulse under observation now, unconscious with a possible concussion."

"Concussion?"

"Odd accident. He was apparently zipping around the lab and somehow got distracted enough to crash into a wall head first."

"That's not Bart," the Flash said grimly. "Whatever else you can say about him, he knows how to live at superspeed."

"That's what Helen pointed out. And really, he didn't seem to hit hard enough to be out so long."

"And there's no sense of what's happening to them?" Superman asked.

"Nothing. They've examined Jesse and are no closer to figuring it out than before."

"Thanks, Wonder Woman. Keep us posted. Superman out."

"The answer is in the Speed Force," Wally insisted. "Let me deal with it."

Superman looked sharply at the younger man. "Deal with it how?"

"I gotta commune with the Speed Force - catch up with it - hey!"

Superman had caught Wally's wrist in a firm grip. "Catch up with it. Wally, you're proposing you should run into it?"

"How else? I'm not Max, I can't-"

"Wally, listen to yourself. You're not thinking clearly. That's how Barry *died*."

"I know," the Flash answered coldly. "So LET GO!"

"No."

"Fine."

A sudden burning drew Superman's eyes down to his own hand, and he realized Wally was vibrating, building up the speed to phase through Superman's flesh. "Wally-" he protested, then gritted his teeth as Wally vibrated his wrist free of Superman's grip in a flash of heat. Before Superman could reestablish his hold, the Flash turned and shot off - and dropped to the ground only 50 yards away.

"Wally!"

In less than a second, Superman was at the Flash's side, fearful for a moment that Wally's heart had stopped. But no, he was still breathing, still alive - just limp and completely unresponsive. Superman lifted him easily, opening his comlink as he did so. "Wonder Woman, tell STAR Labs we've got one more for them. Wally's just gone down."

"Make that two more," Kyle's voice broke in.

"Lantern, report," Superman ordered, flying toward STAR Labs.

"I'm at Jay Garrick's home with Dr. Mid-Nite. The doc had ordered him to take a few days bed rest for multiple stress fractures, but apparently he wasn't keen on the idea of lying around. Joan found him collapsed in his yard."

"Stress fractures?" Superman asked, handing Wally over to the STAR Labs technicians and meeting Wonder Woman's worried eyes.

"Running around too much. Mid-Nite says Jay was trying to hide it, kept working through it until the team confronted him yesterday. They thought it was just Jay, though, not something with the Speed Force."

"Well, credit Wally for figuring that much out. You're on your way?"

"Should be there in about five minutes. I'm bringing Doctor Mid-Nite as well."

"Good thinking. Plasticman, are you monitoring all this?"

"Yep, sure am," Plasticman chirped. "Sending info down to Batman right now, so we should -"

"Batman here. Have you consulted the Atom?"

"Right on schedule!" Plasticman cheered.

"The Atom?"

"He might be able to find something in a little spelunking expedition that the STAR Labs doctors can't pick up." Superman could hear the strained patience in Batman's tone.

"Right. Kyle-"

"I'll pick him up after I drop these guys off."

"Great. Batman, any thoughts?"

"Not enough data yet. Although from what J'onn put together, all the speedsters were showing dramatic increases in activity over the course of the past month and increasingly erratic sleep schedules. The stress fractures, the distractability - I suspect the Atom will find further signs of exhaustion and physical fatigue."

"Over-extension," Superman mused. "Do you think the Speed Force was somehow driving them-?"

"That is not for me to speculate. Batman out."

Wonder Woman blinked at Superman. "That was - cold. Even for Batman."

Superman nodded absently, his eyes turning toward the doctors examining the Flash. "We should've noticed this sooner."

"Clark." Diana rested her hand on Superman's arm, drawing his attention. "We're all busy people with demanding lives. That one or another of us is working particularly hard at any given time isn't unusual. Unless Wally or Max or someone had said something, there is no reason why we should have investigated further."

"J'onn thought there was - which makes me think he might be noticing something else we should be paying attention to."

"You think this isn't the Speed Force? That it's something affecting the whole planet?"

"Batman does."

Diana sighed. "Batman has a personal interest -"

"He's not usually one to let that affect his opinions, Diana, and you know that."

Wonder Woman withdrew her hand as if stung. "Very well. But consider the facts. Have you been over-extended, not sleeping, working too hard?"

Superman gave her an apologetic look. "Well, no."

"And neither have I. And you heard Kyle at the meeting - he's never been better. And Plasticman is so on right now that he's anticipating all of us."

"I suppose - yes, doctor?"

"Sorry to interrupt," the STAR Labs physician apologized. "We've looked over the Flash, and the most obvious reason we can find for his collapse is dehydration and possibly malnutrition. We're going to run the same labs we're running on Max Mercury and Jesse Quick and Impulse and hopefully come up with something in common, but for the moment-?" He shrugged.

Superman nodded. "I understand. Just do what you can and keep us informed. Green Lantern should be arriving shortly with Jay Garrick and Doctor Mid-Nite. Wonder Woman, if you could stay to brief Lantern when he arrives - then I think the best we can do is just get back to our work for the time being. Doctor, there'll be someone at the Watchtower at all times, so any new information can go there and it'll get to the right people. Thank you for your help."

"It's what we're here for," the doctor pointed out, accepting Superman's handshake. "We'll get them through this."

"I know you will." Superman released the doctor's hand and with a final glance toward the fallen speedsters, left STAR Labs. It wasn't until he was flying over the Atlantic that he opened his comlink.

"Superman to J'onn."

Silence.

"J'onn?"

"Sorry, Big Blue," Plasticman's voice cut in. "J'onn's shut down his link."

Superman frowned. "Shut down? But-" He trailed off. They'd told him to go get some rest. After telling him that he was overreacting. It wasn't like J'onn to pout, but given their latest interaction? Superman couldn't really blame him for deciding to follow orders, to really get away from the monitors - and his teammates - for a while.

"I can send an emergency signal," Plasticman offered, interrupting Superman's thoughts.

"No," Superman decided. "I wanted to talk with him, but it's not urgent. Keep us posted if there's any news from STAR Labs."

"Will do. Plasticman out."

Superman sighed and curved back toward Metropolis. He still wasn't sure that J'onn was right, but the Planet seemed to be a place to investigate the possibility.

(4)

"Hold on a sec, Doc. Next shift is arriving so you might as well talk to us both," Plasticman directed, noting the soft signal from the activated teleporter.

"Wise idea," Doctor Mid-nite agreed, settling patiently into the chair at the STAR Labs communications array.

"Made even better by cutting the middle man," Plasticman pointed out, stretching an arm to open the monitor womb door and admit Batman. "I present the man with the plan!" he announced with a flourish.

"Not yet," Batman contradicted grimly, taking the lift up to the level where Plasticman sat. "Hello, Doctor."

"Batman," the other man acknowledged. "More bad news I'm afraid."

"Ray."

The Doctor nodded. "He confirmed your suspicions - all the speedsters have physical symptoms of overexertion. Frayed tendons, build up of lactic acid in muscle tissue, stress fractures. Plus they're showing early signs of various ailments associated with vitamin deficiencies and varying degrees of dehydration. Their bodies were shutting down in self-defense. Which is exactly what has happened with the Atom."

"Because in his miniaturized state, his body is relatively accelerated."

"That's my hypothesis."

Plasticman let out a low whistle, contorting into a passable imitation of J'onn in the pose of the Thinker. "So J'onn was right?"

"So it appears," Batman remarked harshly, causing Plasticman to hold up a warning hand and stretch his head and body far from his teammate.

"Ease up, Bat Guy. I never doubted Mr. Green and WAAAY Smarter than Me."

"What is the status of your team?" Batman asked Mid-Nite, ignoring the man pretzeling beside him.

"Resentful, since they all claim to feel great. All minus Dr. Fate, who seems to feel no differently, and our youngest members, who are hinting at irritability beyond what can be attributed to normal adolescence. But they all seem to be going along with a toned down schedule."

"Good," Batman approved. "What is the prognosis for your patients?"

"I'll worry more if they don't start regaining consciousness in about 24 hours, but at the moment, I'd say they're getting much needed rest. We've brought their families in, and we'll probably send them home as they wake up."

"And you?"

"Going off shift now," Mid-nite reported dutifully. "As I suspect you will order our stretchy friend to do?"

"Hey, I'm no workaholic. Send me home, Bats!" Plasticman formed a set of wings and aimed himself toward the door.

"A moment, Plasticman. Good night, Doctor."

"Good night." The monitor winked out, and Plasticman immediately stopped posturing.

"This is serious, isn't it?" he asked.

"Yes."

Plasticman frowned. "But it doesn't *feel* serious. I don't feel tired - I feel like I could take on the world."

"Which is why it's serious. You will have a good meal and get some sleep."

Plasticman pushed back his omnipresent sunglasses and made his eyes cartoonishly doe like, fluttering exaggerated eyelashes. "Whah Batman, Ah didn't know you cayred," he drawled.

"Go," Batman growled.

"Going, going. Sheesh." Plasticman slapped a hand down on the security panel. "It's all yours."

Batman didn't respond, and Plasticman departed for the teleporter.

A moment later, a new signal pinged in the monitor womb.

"Go ahead, Oracle."

"Hey, boss. Nightwing just signed off for the night. That's the last of our crew."

"Good. He gave you his report on the Titans?"

"It's lining up with the rest of the teams. Troia unaffected. Tempest and Dolphin showing the same irritability as Aquaman, albeit less extreme. And here's a twist. Neither Lian nor Cerdian seems particularly off-schedule."

"Hm. And Argent?"

"A bit edgier than usual, but still feeling pretty on top of things."

"Like Robin."

"And the rest of Young Justice," Oracle agreed, "except Superboy and Wondergirl, of course."

"Of course. I'll take over now."

"You sure?"

"We need you at peak - not just feeling that way."

"I could say the same about you."

"I got 6 and a half hours of sleep last night, plus a four hour nap this afternoon. You?"

The Oracle mask winked out, replaced by Barbara Gordon's face. She stared intently at him through the monitor for a long moment, then sighed. "I can't argue with that. And I know why you're worried. But - I'm not really tired."

"Sleep anyway. Batman out."

He closed his end of the comlink, but he watched the display board narrowly until Oracle's signal went off-line. Only then did he turn his attention to the latest information he'd received.

Irritated Atlanteans. Disabled speedsters. Utterly unaffected aliens and Amazons. And everyone else over the age of puberty feeling more energetic than they had in years. The pattern was there, but he couldn't see the answer. Something was working on the earth's population - something that struck him as misguided rather than malicious. But what accounted for the exceptions? And the variations? It wasn't avoiding meta-genes per se. Perhaps there was something in human body chemistry - particular hormones, perhaps? That would explain the lack of effect on young children, and might account for differing reactions to whatever it was. But that suggested a chemical agent, and analyses of air, soil, and water samples showed no
appreciable difference from similar samples over the long duree.

He began manipulating spreadsheets, shifting variables and adding notes to the work J'onn had begun. It still wouldn't come clear.

He leaned back for a moment where he perched, considering. It wasn't as if people were ignoring their bodies. He could gauge from his own experience - he literally wasn't feeling any muscle aches or sense of fatigue. It wasn't until J'onn's insistence that he get sleep that he'd even noticed that, given his schedule, he *should* be exhausted. And even then, it wasn't until he'd taken the time to engage a meditation technique designed to increase mind-body awareness that he'd discovered that his body *was* wearing down, and that something was preventing even as simple a feeling as hunger from registering in his brain. Only his sense of obligation to Alfred had kept his diet balanced.

Some electronic broadcast, he mused, like Ra's' Babel effect? He ran an analysis of both sound and light waves blanketing the earth. Nothing.

A dream broadcast then, or telepathy...

That was J'onn's territory, and the Martian had already warned him before he had gone silent that it might take him some time to isolate such forces.

Batman's thoughts went back to the morning's meeting. The League had been uncharacteristically dismissive of J'onn's concerns, almost cruel in their rejection of his insight. J'onn had been philosophical about it, reading it as evidence that whatever was affecting the planet did not want to be discovered - or at least, not challenged. Still Batman had felt J'onn's emotional response, had been hard pressed not to chastise his teammates. It was one thing when the League occasionally dismissed Batman - he frequently preferred to work beneath their radar anyway. But to ignore J'onn -

Batman stilled his renewed outrage. J'onn had been fighting his own battles for longer than any of them; Bruce's sense of indignation on J'onn's behalf might be a welcome note of sympathy for the Martian, but J'onn did not require defending.

J'onn did have a point, though. The reactions of Superman and Wonder Woman suggested that they were not necessarily immune to the manipulations which were affecting their more mortal compatriots. It seemed rather that they-

Abruptly, a mental scream echoed through Bruce's mind, forcing him to grab a balancing handhold as the monitor womb turned topsy-turvy to his senses. Batman gasped, blinking at white hot figures swarming his vision, reaching out with flaming intent. Another writhing cry twisted through his mind, and he felt his heart in his throat as he recognized the telepathic voice.

*J'ONN!*

(5)

J'onn floated quietly beside the well of souls, trying to bring the tumult in his mind to match the silence of his surroundings. J'onn's suspicions had only been confirmed by Batman's data, shared after the rest of the League had precipitously abandoned their meeting to deal with fallen or soon to be fallen comrades. There *were* troubling trends in sleep deprivation and appetite suppression attached to the recent wave of global productivity - troubling enough that Batman had warned all his acolytes to self-consciously monitor their calorie intake and sleep patterns. By extension, both the Titans and Young Justice found themselves suddenly subject to sleep schedules and communal meals.

The Bat had spoken.

It still didn't resolve the potential crisis which would occur when the same raw exhaustion that had caught up with the accelerated lives of the world's speedsters finally touched the lives of ordinary citizens.

And it still didn't answer the question of why.

Which was why J'onn had retreated to his home in the Gobi, declining Bruce's offer to return with him to the Manor. J'onn needed to distance himself from the constant hum of thought around him, to isolate his own thinking, to address his own suspicion that there was some sort of telepathic influence behind the sudden bon homie and efficiency of the world. He couldn't do that in the mentally busy home of the Batman, nor within his telepathically dampered quarters in the Watchtower.

Not that being in his transplanted home was necessarily working either.

Relative distance calmed the continuous clamor that touched his mind, the omnipresent blanket of thoughts that were an inevitable part of being among humans. Normally he welcomed the respite, although this evening he found himself reaching for the stray snatches of thought
that drifted his way, catching at anything that distracted himself from his own thinking.

He frowned slightly as he forced himself to exercise more mental discipline. He needed to isolate himself within a sea of thought, to let the distant waves of human consciousness become a uniform thrum, if he wished to pick up any other influences within the mix. The fact that such an exercise was a struggle implied an external sort of resistance. He needed to anchor himself in something that was distinctly his...

The sought after state blossomed suddenly in unwelcome images, human thoughts rendered distant by a flicker of flame.

Particular flame.

Flame that danced in Martian bodies which cried their last consciousness to his deafened mind as J'onn forged through choking smoke to this home, then on Mars, to his wife and daughter, warned against the plague...

*Papa? I can't hear... the great voice... I feel hot...*

A sob welled in his throat - a human reaction, tears that burned as he turned away and futilely entreated his wife to do the same.

*M'yri'ah, don't-*

One desperate moment of longing pushed him forward, breaking the long established pattern of memory as he sought this time to open his mind to them to find...

*SON OF MARS!*

He recoiled, eyes blasted by the light that shone off the beings that interposed themselves between him and the now flaming, screaming bodies of wife and child.

"H'ronmeer," he gasped.

*Not H'ronmeer,* a mental voice boomed, *although fitting you should call on the only one of us that you remember.*

He forced his eyes open, wincing at the brightness and shying from the flame. "But - but you sleep -"

*Because you abandoned us! Abandoned your people! Left us to die!*

"No. Not abandoned. Not deliberately. I never knew you - never felt
-"
*FEEL US NOW!*

The flame brightened, intensifying still further, demanding his attention, forcing his focus to read only its dancing, macabre light, consuming flesh and soul...

*J'ONN!*

And it was gone, reduced to echoing afterimages and the taste of desert sand. And burns. He could feel blisters rising on his flesh, somehow soothed by the pressure of his body against the cold ground...

*J'ONN!*

He blinked. The mental shout was not a part of the trance. *Bruce?* he projected weakly.

*You were crying out.* Resolute calm was overlaying the earlier panic of Bruce's tone. How had he- yes, J'onn must've cried out - reached out to Bruce at the height of nightmare, or there would be no link between them now.

*I am sorry, my friend.*

*No.* Worry rendered the mental tone harsh. *No apologizing. What were those things?*

*Are you all right? Did they harm you?* J'onn mentally cursed himself, keeping the thought hidden from Bruce. To what dangers had he exposed his lover by reaching out so blindly?

*I'm fine, J'onn. But you were hurt - they were attacking -*

*Not attacking. Disciplining.* And as he projected it, he knew that was their intent.

*Disciplining. With fire.*

*It is apt.*

*J'onn, I'm at the Watchtower, but I'm sure I can get someone to-*

*No.*

*J'onn, whatever you've tapped down there is dangerous, and I will not-*

*Martian gods.*

*What?*

*The Martian gods. In my meditative state, I dreamed they'd awakened.* He pushed himself upright, staring into the well of souls. Ashes. Ashes to ashes.

*Dreamed... J'onn, that wasn't a dream. It was-*

*Death. The death of Mars.* And the waking of her gods to a barren planet and a lone survivor adrift in a teeming mass of unschooled minds. He stared down at his arms, blisters now burst and oozing, and shuddered.

*J'onn?*

Bruce again, uncharacteristically tentative. Vulnerable, although he didn't know it. Because of J'onn. He closed his eyes, sensing again the caressing of human thoughts, the mental signatures of his friends, of those who were close to him. All vulnerable.

*Forgive me, Bruce,* he murmured, quietly closing his mind. He needed to confront his gods again, and he would not risk those he loved.

(6)

Clark Kent sat in his kitchen, rereading the note from his wife. He had already known what it would say when he found it on the refrigerator - she clearly had not anticipated him stopping at the Planet before coming home. A hot lead, story to be scooped, off to some small republic in Europe and then on to Asia. Only the hastily dashed "Love you" added to the information he'd gotten from Jimmy earlier in the day.

It was far from the first time he'd come home to a note. In fact, such notes were part of their relationship - this one was written on the back of his own refrigerator post early that morning, "Meeting w/John & Co." Tonight, though, he sat and tapped the note against the kitchen table, worried. Not so much about Lois - she'd in fact called from her hotel less than an hour earlier - but about what he'd observed in Metropolis through the day.

Yesterday he had reveled in it, the sense of urban joy that radiated from the city streets. The entire city seemed to be operating like a well-oiled machine, and even the usual snafus had been minor and scarcely enough to eliminate the good mood of late spring. He had even remarked to Lois how nice it was that for an unprecedented stretch of 46 hours, he had been able just to be Clark Kent. Lois had laughed, and they had gone dancing...

Even with a full day's work behind her, Lois had had energy to burn. They had dressed up for the occasion, and she was a vision, eyes bright, color high, her voice hinting at laughter as she straightened Clark's tie and led him to the dance floor. They'd been out until 2, a rarity for a night when neither of them was working or saving the world. And then home, and to bed, if not to sleep...

He should be smiling at the memory, but instead his face creased in a frown. He'd had his share of weary moments soothed away by Lois in the past few weeks, but her energy had scarcely flagged. She was always high energy, but even her reserves were not inexhaustible. And her energy seemed mirrored by every employee at the Daily Planet, down to the janitorial staff which cleaned offices with smiles and vigor. Perry had even joked - joked! - that Clark was slacking his pace compared to his colleagues.

Yesterday, he would have laughed. Today? The warning he had laughed off in the morning was haunting him now. It was all coming at a human cost, J'onn had said. Yet even with evidence before his eyes, Clark had refused to accept it.

*bdeet* *bdeet*

Startled, Clark picked up his JLA signaler. "Superman," he answered.

"Hey, Superman. It's Green Lantern."

"Kyle. Something wrong?"

"I don't know. I was just trying to check in at the Watchtower, let them know that toxic waste situation was all sewn up, but there's no answer."

"No answer at the Watchtower? That's weird."

"Tell me about it. Especially since it's Batman's shift."

"I'll look into it. Why don't you call it a night?"

"J'onn's got you spooked, too?"

"It's after 1 am, Kyle."

"Really? Dude. Yeah, I guess I'll head in then. Just give me an all-clear signal if everything's okay upstairs."

"I will," Superman promised, shifting the frequency of his signaler. "Superman to Watchtower."

He listened to silence for a moment.

"Batman?"

Nothing.

His mind began whirling through possibilities as he shot from his apartment as Superman, heading unerringly to the moon. Attack? It would have to be a pretty impressive attack to take out Batman without a distress signal alerting the rest of the team. Satellite failure? Batman had more alternate modes of communication than anyone - he would just re-route signals. Something innocuous - a call of nature, maybe? He discarded the idea as soon as he thought it. Batman never missed calls when he was on monitor duty. He might ignore calls at other times, but on the moon?

Superman entered the Watchtower through the hangar and headed directly to the monitor womb. No Batman. That was odd, although not unreasonable. Monitor duty did not require constant presence in the monitor womb, although many of the Leaguers preferred watching there to the task of rerouting the feeds to other parts of the station.

Superman scanned the monitors quickly, then tapped in the command to bring up the internal views. No one in Batman's quarters. Or the gym. Or - he hesitated a moment, then checked anyway - in J'onn's quarters. He wasn't in the workshop, and Superman would have noticed him in the hangar - there! A familiar shape, half tucked into shadow near the teleporters. Superman opened a channel triumphantly.

"Batman, report."

No answer. Or movement. Superman frowned, looking more deeply into the shadow, realizing as he did so that Batman would have noted his presence by now, that the man in the shadows was not so much lurking as slumping.

"Damn!" he muttered, zipping through the Watchtower to the teleporters. "Batman!" he cried, reaching into the shadows and cradling his unconscious colleague. Bruce Wayne's head, uncowled, lolled as Superman lowered him to the floor. Sweat streaked his face, and Superman could feel fever radiating from him.

"Bruce!" he said urgently, shaking him slightly.

This prompted a faint muttering from Batman, incoherent save for the word "no." He pulled away from Superman's grip fitfully.

"Bruce, it's me. Clark."

Batman continued to pull unconsciously away from Superman, his muttering growing in intensity.

Superman reached for his signaler and opened the emergency frequency. "Superman to JLA. I need you at the Watchtower, now."

He didn't wait for acknowledgement, barely noticed that the teleporters were already humming to life as, for the second time that day, he scooped an unconscious colleague into his arms and rushed to the med bay.

(7)

*BDEET* *BDEET*

"Wuzzat?" Dick Grayson came awake in a fog that quickly cleared as he recognized Oracle's emergency alert. He swung out of bed and into his desk chair, scarcely aware of his feet touching the ground. "I'm awake," he announced.

"Nightwing, good." The Oracle mask faded to Barbara Gordon's worried features. "It's Bruce."

A cold feeling curled in his stomach. "What's wrong?"

"It's not clear. Superman just found him delirious up at the Watchtower. He's called an emergency JLA meeting and asked me to contact you."

"Delirious?" He already had half his costume on.

"Fever of 105 degrees."

"Jeez." He pulled his uniform top over his head. "He didn't sound sick when I talked to him this evening."

"I signed off right after midnight, and he was fine. In fact made a point of the fact that he'd slept over 10 hours in the last 24."

"Ten?" He affixed his mask to his face. "Maybe he *was* coming down with something."

"I don't think so. More likely he was catching up after J'onn brought it to his attention that none of us were getting much sleep."

Nightwing nodded as he pulled on his boots. "Preparing for the shit to hit the fan. You think he stumbled on whatever it is that's causing the mind-body disconnect?"

Barbara's brow creased in a frown. "I've pulled the notes he was working on from the JLA mainframe. It looks like he'd narrowed down possibilities."

"Switching to the comlink. And?" Nightwing swung out the window, flying across the rooftops to the warehouse where his bike was stored.

"It's not chemical or electronic. He seemed to think it might be telepathic, or something from the dream realm." She paused. "He seems to have already discounted magic."

Nightwing started his motorcycle and roared out of the warehouse, heading for route 61. "Yeah, we talked about that earlier. Garth reported that his magic had been decidedly even-keeled since the whole Poseidonis thing."

"Oh, right. I see that here, along with a note from Doctor Mid-Nite that Dr. Fate seems unaffected. And -" another pause - "it looks like he touched base with Zatanna at some point during the day. She had actually noticed her own physical tiredness *because* of her magic."

"Huh. But nothing definitive?"

"Not recorded here. Although if he did figure it out, whatever it is could have acted to take him out as soon as he thought it."

"That's not a comforting thought. Listen, call Alfred and let him know what's up. And contact Leslie. I'm about twenty minutes out from the Manor; I'll teleport out from there. They've still got Bruce on the moon?"

"Yeah. I think they're waiting for instructions from you."

"Tell 'em to hold tight. And see what else you can find out."

"Will do. Oracle out."

Nightwing tightened his grip on his bike, increasing his speed as he hurtled down the interstate toward the Bristol offramp. Whatever was happening could no longer be shrugged off, and now, it seemed, it was personal.

*

"His fever was so high we had to -" Superman tried to explain as he half led, half followed Nightwing to the med bay. His voice trailed off as they entered the room and Bruce's pale features and sweat-tangled hair became visible.

"You did what needed doing," Nightwing said gruffly, crossing quickly to Bruce's side.

"Normally we would just take him to STAR Labs, but I figured-"

"He'll appreciate that," Nightwing cut him off. The younger man had already stripped off one gauntlet to take Bruce's hand in his and was studying his mentor's face intently. He leaned over and spoke softly into Bruce's ear, words so quiet that only Superman's enhanced hearing allowed him to pick them up: "Bruce, it's Dick. You're in the Watchtower with a high fever. We're not sure what's wrong with you, but I'm taking you home to Leslie and Alfred. Okay, partner?"

The final question had almost a note of levity compared to the matter-of-fact tones of the rest of Dick's briefing, a nearly ironic check with a senior partner who was not in a position to object. Or was he? Superman could see Bruce's hand tightening around Dick's, and the stillness of his body was giving way to the same fitful tossing he had exhibited earlier. Bruce's eyes flew open, wildly unfocused.

Dick stayed right at Bruce's side, again squeezing his hand and murmuring, "I'm right here, Bruce."

"J'onn," Bruce gasped. "Find-"

"Shh," Dick soothed, shooting a hard look at Superman. "Where is J'onn?" he asked, his voice hinting dangerously at an accusation that somehow J'onn had not been informed of Bruce's condition.

"We don't know," Superman answered, holding back a cold response to the implied lack of trust. "We tried to reach him, but he's not answering his signal device and Aquaman can find no telepathic trace of him."

"No telepathic-" Nightwing echoed, looking back down at Bruce's anguished face. "I'll find him, Bruce," he promised. "Somehow-"

"NO!" Bruce objected, half-rising from the bed. Superman was immediately at his side, helping Dick urge him back down.

"His fever's rising again," Superman said grimly.

Nightwing nodded absently, his attention focused on Bruce who was now muttering incoherently. Then abruptly he looked up at Superman. "This isn't the same thing we've seen in the others. Do you know what he was doing when he collapsed?"

Superman nodded. "We've got the Watchtower tapes, but I frankly don't know what sense to make of them. We were hoping you might take a look at them."

"You didn't run them by Oracle?"

Superman felt a flush rise in his cheeks. That would have been the sensible move, one that had not occurred to him in his anxiety to get Bruce cared for and contact his family. The tape had seemed secondary to the needs of the moment.

"Never mind," Nightwing dismissed, somehow managing to make the dismissal as cutting as any of his mentor's pointed comments or silences would have been. His eyes were back on Bruce, now being tended by Plasticman. "I'm betting J'onn's involved in the tape."

Superman nodded, not bothering to ask how Nightwing had come to that conclusion. Whatever trace remained of the young man who had once been the light to Batman's dark had been swallowed by the brusque demeanor of a leader in a time of crisis.

(8)

Green Lantern glanced up as the door to the monitor womb opened, faintly relieved to see that Nightwing accompanied Superman. The distinctly unproductive meeting of the remnants of the JLA had left Kyle uneasy - in the absence of an enemy which could be identified or confronted, it became clear that the League had been effectively crippled by the loss of Batman and J'onn. What had begun merely as a confirmation of J'onn's suspicions that something was affecting the
planet had suddenly become an attack with pinpoint accuracy.

"How is he?" Kyle asked as Nightwing nodded in greeting.

"Still fevered. You've got the tapes cued?"

"Have 'em waiting for you." Kyle tapped on the keyboard, starting the video feed.

"Wait a minute," Nightwing ordered, prompting Kyle to hit the pause key. "This is feed from the teleporter room."

"Yes," Superman confirmed. "That's where I found him."

"Not here at the monitor."

"No. I-"

"I've got the monitor tape here somewhere if you want -"

"That's okay, GL. I might want you to find it, but let's go with this for now."

Kyle nodded, comforted rather than annoyed by the fuss over details. That was what they needed right now. He restarted the tape.

Nightwing leaned forward, resting one hand on the back of Kyle's chair and studying the monitor intently. Batman was at the teleporter, bringing someone through. There was the usual light display, then J'onn stepped free of the teleport tube with a decided look of reproach. "Bruce-" he began.

Batman stepped forward, pushing back his cowl and meeting J'onn's eyes. His jaw tightened, and for a long moment they stood, squared off, in perfect silence.

Despite having seen the tape before, Kyle shuddered. "It's like watching your parents fight," he remarked to no one in particular.

Nightwing's reply came unexpectedly over his shoulder. "Tell me about it."

Kyle bit his lip in sudden embarrassment. Somehow it hadn't occurred to him that this relationship that the JLA had tacitly agreed not to talk about would be a little more central to Nightwing's life, something with which the other man had had to become comfortable. On
the heels of embarrassment came guilt - he'd welcomed Nightwing's presence as a tactician without considering that they were asking him to effectively put all his emotions for a fallen mentor on hold.

The tension from the taped scene seemed to leach into the room, and Kyle could only speculate about what they were arguing. Whatever it was, it seemed that Batman lost the stare down, for suddenly he ground out the words, "I won't let you go through that again."

The words broke the spell, for suddenly J'onn's expression became almost unbearably tender. "Bruce-" he said with an air of helplessness, and then he stepped forward.

Kyle, knowing what was coming, averted his eyes in time to see Plasticman entering the monitor womb, then to watch his teammate drop his jaw to the floor and bug out his eyes in an impressive display of cartoon shock. Kyle felt rather than saw the frown form on Nightwing's face as he leaned forward to pause the tape and said, "I don't like the look of that."

"I'll say!" Plasticman burst out, drawing all eyes to him. "Geez, did J'onn put the whammy on him or - or -" He stopped, looking warily at the three men gathered at the monitor, waving a finger at them suspiciously. "Wait a minute. There's something going on here that I don't know about." He took an involuntary step backwards as Nightwing shot him a hard look and returned his attention to the screen.

Kyle, feeling faintly voyeuristic, joined him in his perusal of the still frame of Batman and J'onn locked in a passionate kiss while Superman asked, "Plasticman, you needed something?"

"Yeah, a better connection to the gossip line, apparently," he snorted. "How long have those two-"

"Plas!"

"Fine. Don't tell me. Don't give me any information. I came to tell you that preliminary tests indicate that there's nothing physical causing Batman's fever. No infection, no sign of illness - nothing." He looked back at the monitor with a faint expression of distaste. "I'll go back to Bat-sitting now." He exited the room.

"What are you seeing?" Kyle asked, eager to get past the discomfort that Plasticman's remarks were causing him.

"A goodbye," Nightwing said softly, still transfixed by the image. One gauntletted hand reached out in an aborted gesture toward the screen, but whatever had caught Nightwing's attention eluded Kyle.

"Start it up again," Nightwing ordered, and Kyle unpaused the tape with a sudden sense of tragedy. A goodbye. He didn't even want to contemplate what that might mean.

The couple finally broke apart and J'onn brushed one thumb across Batman's cheek before stepping back into the teleport tube. No more words were exchanged as Batman turned his attention to the teleport controls.

"Do we know where he sent him?" Nightwing asked.

Superman shook his head. "No," he said quietly as J'onn's form began to shimmer. "He scrambled the coordinates."

On the monitor, Batman stepped forward, his eyes fixed on J'onn's disappearing eyes.

"There!" Nightwing suddenly burst out, reaching past Green Lantern to pause the tape again. "Back it up just a bit," he demanded. "Frame by frame."

Mystified, Kyle did as he was told.

"Stop," Nightwing finally ordered. "See how he's going to his belt here?"

"Yes, but-" Superman began.

"Lantern, zoom in on J'onn's face."

"He's basically already gone, but okay." Kyle obeyed, focusing on the echo of J'onn's features still hovering in the teleport tube.

"Okay, forward again, still frame by frame. See? Look at his face."

Kyle saw what Nightwing meant. Barely there, just more than an afterimage, J'onn's face took on a sudden expression of surprise before it disappeared entirely.

"I see it," Superman said, "but what does it mean?"

Nightwing glanced at him but ignored the question. "GL, flag these frames so Oracle can look at them when we send the tape, then start it rolling again."

The tautness of Nightwing's body registered in his grip on the back of Green Lantern's chair, and Kyle wordlessly followed his orders. All three men watched intently as Batman stood facing the teleport tube for a while. Then he drifted into a shadowed part of the room, a motion which drew a grunt from Nightwing. Batman's face, still without its mask, was dimly visible in the shadow, and he still regarded the teleporter. For several minutes, nothing changed, and at a casual glance it seemed the room was empty. But for their focus on it, they might have missed the moment when Batman's head and shoulders suddenly slumped into the deeper shadow.

"Flag that, too," Nightwing directed. "How long after that was it before you found him, Superman?"

"About a half an hour."

Nightwing nodded. "Okay. GL, ship that off to Oracle - I'll want his take on it. And- thanks." He sank back into a green chair that Kyle willed up for him with an expression of obvious relief and scrubbed his hands over his face.

"Nightwing?" Superman's face was creased with concern.

"I'll want to get Oracle's take on this, but I think it's a fair bet that whatever is behind whatever is going on is telepathic in origin. And an equally fair bet that J'onn figured it out."

"And went to face it alone?" Kyle interjected, looking up from the keyboard. "We can't let him-"

"No, I think we have to trust him on the decision to face it alone."

"Nightwing-" Superman protested.

"Look, Batman was pretty adamant that we not find J'onn. And based on what we saw here? I've got to believe there's a good reason for it."

"So we do nothing?" The incredulous tone in Superman's voice matched Kyle's unvoiced feeling.

Nightwing shook his head. "I'm not entirely sure what we do," he confessed, letting his eyes rest on Kyle's face. "But I do know some things. Like Kyle here looks like ten miles of bad road."

"But-"

Nightwing held up a hand. "You're doing good work, GL. But until we figure out exactly what's going on and what to do about it, our top priority has to be making sure that we're all rested and well and able to face whatever's coming. Get some sleep."

Kyle started to protest, but something in Nightwing's face stopped his tongue. And, he realized, for the first time in weeks he really *did* feel tired. Not quite adrenaline and caffeine crash tired, but genuinely weary.

"Nightwing's right," Superman pointed out gently. "We'll wake you if we need you."

Kyle nodded as Nightwing stood, allowing Green Lantern to let the chair he'd crafted dissipate. "I'll be in my quarters," he informed them, aware that Superman and Nightwing were about to talk serious strategy and suddenly too tired to care that he would not be included. He stumbled a bit as he made his way to his Watchtower apartment and was asleep almost before his head hit the pillow.

(9)

Plasticman could not get the image out of his mind. To see the grimly stone-featured face of the Bat suddenly soften, to watch the hard line of his mouth open to accept a kiss - somehow that was more unsettling than the green lips which prompted such tenderness. Eel O'Brian had long relegated Batman to a world of sexless asceticism - a creature who walked like a man and talked like a man - a very desirable man - and yet existed at a distance from normal human desires. He depended upon Batman's humorless impatience to remind him from time to time that
friendship with him, let alone anything more, was impossible.

Not that he particularly *wanted* Batman - he was happy with Woozy. But a boy could still lust, and a body could still betray desires which were not JLA approved. He didn't want to discomfit his teammates enough to let them find an excuse to expel him.

Except - that kiss floated back to the surface. It wasn't a first kiss, that he could tell. And from the reactions of Nightwing, Green Lantern and Superman, it wasn't news. But it also wasn't something anyone was talking about. In a way-

"OW!" Eel jumped back, half-falling to the floor as he pressed his hand to the puncture wound in his torso.

"Plasticman?" Aquaman stood over him, reaching out to give him a hand up.

Eel accepted the help with an embarrassed laugh, stretching out an arm to create a faux cane and tapping blindly with it. "You wouldn't hit a guy with glasses, wouldja?" he joked, ready for the irate growl.

It didn't come. "Are you all right? You just walked into me like -"

Plasticman patted the already sealed and healing hole in his side. "Just like one of those tires that can run over - never mind. Sorry about that." He moved to step around the Atlantean.

"O'Brian, wait."

Eel froze. "Did you just call me 'O'Brian'?"

"I mean it. Are you okay?"

"Sure I am - see?" He morphed into a ball and bounced from floor to ceiling a few times to illustrate his point. He stopped when Aquaman turned back toward the window he'd been standing at when Eel had rounded the corner into him and his hook. Thinking he had gratefully
slipped back to being ignored, Plasticman again made to walk by him.

"It's quiet," Aquaman said, halting him again.

"It's space," Plasticman returned, adopting the shape of the ship from Space Trek.

This at least got a hint of irritation. "I mean here." Aquaman touched his temple. "It's like a noise that built up too gradually to notice suddenly ceased."

Eel gasped and became a sea monster. "You mean you can't hear the fishies anymore?"

"No. It's as if a sound that made them harder to hear is finally gone. It's a relief."

Something clicked into place in Eel's brain and triggered unexpected defensiveness. He quickly morphed into a cartoon Martian to hide the reaction. "You think it has something to do with J'onn."

Aquaman shrugged. "His voice is gone, too."

"Well, whatever, Aquaman. I've gotta go check on our patient. Ciao."

Eel hastened down the hall, his thoughts moving in a new direction. Could a malevolent telepath sidle into their minds on J'onn's link? Eel knew - knew beyond a shadow of a doubt - what J'onn would do if he discovered such a situation. He would immediately and without warning pull out of their minds, even uprooting the passive links which he'd once explained were an inevitable by-product of telepathic connection. A mind - once touched - remained in a telepath's memory as much as the memory of a face stayed with a human. Or that's how J'onn had explained it on one boring night of monitor duty when neither of them had had any place else to be.

Eel wondered what sort of passive links a telepath shared with a lover.

"I thought you were heading for bed," Wonder Woman greeted as he entered the med bay.

"It was lonely without you," he mugged, earning a withering look. "You're taking him somewhere?" he asked, gesturing toward Batman who had been transferred to a gurney.

"Nightwing wants to get him home." She sighed, smoothing Batman's sweat dampened hair.

Plasticman staved off the shudder prompted by the vulnerability of the unmasked Bat by dropping into the shape of a grotto in a cliff face. "Behold the healing powers of the CAVE!" he intoned.

"Given we don't know what's wrong with him, it makes as much sense as anywhere else," Wonder Woman defended.

But we do know what's wrong, Eel didn't say. Instead, he volunteered, "I'll take him down to the teleporters. Nightwing's waiting there?"

"Yes, but I can -"

"Ya wanna help me?" Eel waggled his eyebrows suggestively.

"Go," she ordered him with a hint of disgust, relinquishing her place at the head of the gurney.

"All right-y, Bats - alley oop!" Plasticman chirped, pushing the gurney out of the medbay and down the hall. And once he was out of Wonder Woman's sight, he let one hand press comfortingly on Batman's shoulder, trying not to notice that the other man shifted with the contact and breathed a word that might have been J'onn.

(10)

"This is an unholy mess," Superman reported over the comlink. "What happened?"

"Human error," Oracle replied. "A combination of inattentiveness by overworked staff and tired mistakes by the construction crew. And disregard of known safety rules by the man caught in the power array."

"He's already dead," Superman noted grimly, his comlink crackling from the electricity zinging around him.

"The minute he stepped in there. But they couldn't do anything to start restoring power until they got his body out of there. You were the only man for the job," she apologized. "I've got Wonder Woman helping the local police with crowd control in the blacked out area and Aquaman is dealing with a dam break in Indonesia. I put the Titans on the Cordova riots and the JSA is covering the shut down of emergency services in Mexico City."

"All in 15 minutes," Superman remarked. "This poor man-"

"But nothing new in the past five," Barbara pointed out, feeling herself relaxing into control of this crisis. A corner of her mind realized that wasn't really a good sign, but at the moment, she would take the energy and the consequent calming of a frightened world.

"You need me anywhere else?" Superman asked as another call beeped through.

"Hold on a sec, Superman. Go ahead Troia."

"Hey Oracle, this is really weird. The riots just kind of - stopped."

Barbara nodded to herself. "Understood. Situation?"

"There were a couple of casualties in the crowd, but that was before we got here. It's like we showed up and - I don't know."

"Hang tight there for a few minutes and if it looks like it won't erupt again, get your team home," Oracle directed.

"Got it. Troia out."

"Superman, I had a couple of things but it looks like local authorities have them under control. Why don't you call Aquaman directly and see if he needs help?" Another line pinged. "I've got my hands full at the moment but I'll call you at the Watchtower later. Oracle here."

"Oracle, it's Mr. Terrific. I'm helping the crews here reset the emergency system and it looks like they'll be operational within a half an hour."

"Good." She heard a rustle at her window. "Let me know if anything changes. Oracle out." She closed the connection. "How is he?"

Dick's hands rested on her shoulders, beginning a gentle massage of her neck. "His fever was starting to spike again just before I came over here," he answered. "You need me out there?"

She shook her head and leaned back into his soothing touch. "Everything's quieting down as quickly as it flared up. "I think our mysterious telepaths are reasserting control."

"I figured," he noted grimly. "I got a second wind on my way over. You get a chance to look at that tape?"

She gestured toward one of her projection screens where a still shot of Batman reaching for his belt floated. "I got that far before all hell broke loose. I was just trying to figure out what you were flagging."

Dick released her shoulders and walked over to the screen, studying it intently. "I also sent the monitor womb tape right before this. Sorta weird."

"Yeah," Barbara acknowledged, wheeling over to join him. "You ever see him lose balance like that before?"

"That had to have something to do with J'onn. I suspect teleporting him up was not J'onn's idea."

"No," she agreed. "What are you thinking?"

Dick reached out to the screen, his fingers marking the compartment Batman was reaching toward. "Zo'ok."

Barbara blinked. "Lost me there, Hunk-wonder." A comlink kicked in. "Excuse me a sec. Oracle."

"It's Wonder Woman - things are under control here. Have we got any better sense of what's going on?"

"Nightwing and I are working on it now. We'll contact you. Oracle out. Okay, Dick, what's zook?"

"Zo'ok. Something Martian." He closed his eyes as if remembering. "I wouldn't know about it except Batman pulled it out when Torque had me strung up."

"The Scarecrow/Hatter thing?" Barbara asked with a shudder. That case had given her the hairiest fifteen minutes of radio silence that she could remember.

"Yeah. It was weird - started as a batarang, then twisted through the locks and ropes and stretched like decel on the fall. Then I swear it scampered back to him after I was on the ground."

"Okay, that is weird. I'm surprised you didn't mention it before."

"I wasn't sure I hadn't dreamed it," he confessed. "At least, not until now. I asked Batman about it at the time, and he grunted the word 'zo'ok' and wouldn't say anything else. But it acted like it was telepathically controlled."

"Hence Martian. Except Bruce has the telepathic ability of a shoe."

Dick gave her a sidewise glance. "I think we've got to quit letting you and J'onn hang out."

Barbara snorted. "Just try it." She looked back to the screen. "But he could telepathically control this zo'ok."

"Which suggests he could use it to open a link to J'onn."

"If J'onn shut him out," Barbara finished, an idea dawning. She rolled back to her keyboard and pulled it onto her lap, tapping in a series of commands. The tape rewound and at her cue, began again.

Again she felt the tension of Bruce and J'onn's silent argument, and the words, "I won't let you go through that again." She paused the tape.

"I think I finally realized what he's talking about here."

"And?"

She tapped at her keyboard, opening a file on another screen. Dick looked at it. "H'ronmeer's curse? Babs, that wouldn't be affecting humans. It's telepathically spread or something - like you have to be Martian to even be susceptible to it, right?"

She nodded. "That's not why I pulled it up." She scrolled down the file. "These are J'onn's notes. Here." She highlighted a portion of the text.

"'The only known defense a telepath has against H'ronmeer's Curse is to entirely close his mind to telepathic contact,'" Dick read. "'Even the briefest touch with an infected mind guarantees infection, and infection is inevitably fatal. Because the disease can only be transmitted telepathically, it can only go so far as it find minds open to it - it then dies with its hosts; in this case, the entire Martian race.' I still - wait. This is how J'onn survived, isn't it? By closing his mind?"

"To everyone, including his wife and daughter."

Dick stared at the monitor, and Barbara could see him thinking it through. "Damn. I can't even imagine the strength of will..."

Barbara recued the tape from the Watchtower and Bruce's voice seemed to echo in the silence of her workroom. "I won't let you go through that again."

"J'onn thinks it's the same thing. Something working on humans through a telepathic medium-"

"And must think it is somehow working through him," Barbara finished.

"And believed it strongly enough to convince Bruce."

"So when Bruce used the zo'ok to re-establish contact-

"He was getting his way again." Dick began pacing, his natural restlessness asserting itself. "That's Bruce all over. Babs, call the Cave."

She didn't hesitate, and Alfred's voice came over the line. "Yes, Oracle."

"Hi Alfred," Dick jumped in. "What's Bruce's status?"

Alfred's reply was all strained professionalism. "His fever spiked at 105 shortly after you left. Dr. Thompkins has finally stabilized his temperature, but it's sitting at 102.5."

"Has he said anything?"

"I'm afraid not, Master Dick. Although he does seem rather reluctant to part with his belt. We decided it was not worth struggling with him over it."

Dick nodded, then remembering they didn't have visual feed, said, "Let him keep it"

"Master Dick?"

"I don't know, Alfred. When I figure it all out, I'll let you know. You'll contact us if anything changes?"

"Of course."

"Thanks, Alfred."

Barbara wordlessly closed the connection, looking curiously at Dick's face. "If he's decided he's going to stay linked to J'onn, I don't want to deal with what he'll do if we disrupt that link. He agreed to let J'onn go, and I'm trusting in J'onn's instincts here that whatever he's dealing with probably wouldn't be a good thing for humans to handle."

"And if J'onn is just being Bat-ish?"

"I've got to trust he hasn't rubbed off that much. And he did convince Bruce. That had to take some cold, hard logic."

Barbara grimaced appreciatively. "So where does that leave us? The JLA is chomping at the bit to get out there and take someone down."

Dick opened his arms. "Take who down? We still don't have an enemy to fight, aside from our own insensitivity to our bodily needs."

Barbara chuckled, struck by a sudden image. "Should we have Justice League PSAs? 'Superman slept 8 hours today. Did you?'"

Dick snorted. "That'd be rich. Although..."

"What is it?"

"I'm wondering if this is really an enemy. I mean, what's the motive of making people more productive and happier and more able to pursue their passions?"

"World peace and communal harmony?" Barbara guessed.

"But without an understanding of how to work with humans to make it happen."

"You think we're being manipulated by a bunch of alien do-gooders?" She was joking, but once the words were out of her mouth, they made sense. She imagined an alien perspective, a view of the world based not on living in it, but on the rhetoric of utopianists and people's deepest wishes. "We work together..." she murmured.

"What if J'onn is trying to negotiate with that kind of power? Maybe what we just saw happening was an initial acceptance that they might be doing more harm than good-"

"And when they pulled back, they saw things worse than before. So they jumped back in."

"This is making my head hurt," Dick complained. "Help me out, Babs. It's clear enough we can't fight the battle as directly as J'onn can - we have no idea what we're dealing with. But is there a way we can signal to them, help him prove his point? They're clearly aware of what we're doing."

"I have no idea," Barbara confessed, "although this might be a good point to bring in the JLA."

"Yeah," Dick agreed slowly. "I think you may be right."

(11)

Being this deep in the canals meant almost perpetual shadow. The relatively weak light of the sun, 48 million miles further distant than he'd become accustomed to, only penetrated this far at highest noon in midsummer. Bruce would love it, he thought incongruously, then forced the thought out of his mind. Bad enough that Bruce had not let him go, had found a way to establish a link after J'onn had deliberately shut him out, catching him without the will to close him out again.

Zo'ok cozied around him in a familiar blue, obeying an impulse of its own. Or, more likely, from Bruce. Damn him.

*SON OF MARS!*

Again the piercing voices of his gods, pitched in unison against him. He refused to raise his head.

*SON OF MARS, WHY DO YOU ABANDON YOUR TRUEFORM?*

J'onn frowned, realizing belatedly that he wore his beetle-browed shape. When had he shifted? Sometime in the middle of that cacophony of human misery, funneled directly into his mind by these same gods. They could not understand that they'd only further proven his point.

*SON OF MARS!* they trumpeted again, their rage at his sacrilege palpable, rising up from the very rocks beneath his body.

*ENOUGH!* a new voice interceded, torching across the oppressive presence in his mind and sending it hissing back. *YOU WOULD KILL YOUR LAST CHILD?*

*h'ronmeer,* a whisper trickled. *my double, the half of my whole and the whole of my half. this wayward child - you claim him?*

Something was lifting him, soothing away the defensive Manhunter guise, calling forth his trueform again. The touch burned, and yet...

*S'luvanzi, _we_ claim him.* The reprimand was evident, and the name triggered memories from youth. S'luvanzi, god of water, life, healing. As revered as its opposite was feared, the rare blessing of water on an arid planet.

*ahhhhhh.* It was the sound of water sinking into the sand, relief in a sigh. A new touch across his blistered flesh took away the pain, although he found he still couldn't raise his eyes. *he marks our unity that you could soothe where I would scorch. it is we as you say, brother.*

A caress brushed wonderingly across his cheek. *he wastes?* J'onn did not remember the tears it touched.

He opened his mouth before he realized the folly of trying to form words in the thin atmosphere. Human habits. He would have to - *No,* he protested weakly. *Not waste. Honor.*

*blasphemer! rites of foreign gods!*

*No,* he protested again, his head dropping to the sand, his mind at a loss to communicate with this wakened creature of myth. Had he been gone from Mars so long that he forgot-

*STOP!* H'romeer ordered, and the dance of its flame heated J'onn's flesh. *He has also danced in flames.*

J'onn felt the collective recoil from this announcement, dimly recalling the purification of double sacrilege. They were the clarifying rituals of adepts of the highest orders, those purged of
taboo to commune with the gods. Gods that had been silent all his life - save for the tower of flame shielding him now.

*S'luvani, join with me,* H'ronmeer urged, and J'onn knew it had done so when he felt the fire flood sweep through him, tangling through every cell with agonizing fury.

*the great voice! this fragment!* An inchoate howl tore from his body - not his sound, but that of the joined god which curled protectively around what it found in him, wrenched by a renewed sense of loss.

*the last... The Last... THE LAST!* The mantra grew in intensity as it was picked up by the other gods, swept into a frenzied grief that only the presence of the gods within him prevented J'onn from being sacrificed to it.

Under this torrent, though, a smaller voice rose. *But he woke us.*

The sudden mental silence left J'onn reeling, would have dropped him to the ground if he were not already half collapsed. A hum began, snatches of conversation too intensely _felt_ to be understood. Then the small voice again. *See me, child of Mars.*

J'onn opened his eyes with an effort, uncertain when he had closed them. An impish face regarded him curiously from the sand. *You dared to stand before us all and distract us from our purpose. Why?*

J'onn struggled for clarity of mind. *They are not Mars.*

The sand swirled in puzzlement. *But we woke and found the great voice forgotten.*

*Not forgotten. They are not -*

*So you said. But when we withdrew, they showed desire for the great voice. They must relearn.*

*D'infad,* J'onn suddenly recognized, prompting a shiver of delight from the face in the sand. Then he felt more grains of sand, pulling together, rising under him to push him upright, brushing across his body with only the slightest hint of friction.

*Our child!* the face announced gleefully.

And echo resonated through the rocks at J'onn's back. *OUR CHILD?* He felt a curious probe of his mind.

*T'jorsham, it is our child!* The sand was practically laughing, sliding over the surface of the rocks around him.

Again J'onn was caught in a mental whirl as the gods of new learning and old wisdom joined through him, their constant cycle of erosion and rebuilding tearing at his sense of self. *REMEMBERING!* D'infad's/T'jorsham's joint voice rang out, and now the clamor of the gods was unbearable, shrieking demandingly through his mind.

Except...

*J'onn.*

A still point, a tiny flicker of light a thousand times more delicate than the Martian gods could comprehend. It was buffeted by the torrent of thought threatening to fuse J'onn's very cells, but it would not go out. It sat there, a sacred trust.

*J'onn.*

His mind wrapped around the little light, less to protect it - because he could not - than to draw comfort from it. He still dared not risk opening a return link, but he gathered the warmth of his emotion under his fear and confusion and pain and let it feed this tiny spark for a moment, acknowledging, *Bruce.*

The tangle of gods still beat at his consciousness and he could feel his body shutting down little by little. He ignored it, already in some ways beyond consciousness, what energy he possessed directed only toward this spark from his lover, toward this touch of home.

Then he felt it - the great voice! Or rather, the ghost of it, the souls of ancestors stirred to rise in collective, embracing him, fortifying him, drawing forth an ache at his long isolation. The great
voice! The shared mind of an entire people, generations of knowledge, of experience, of love, of wonder - history never written because it was always there in memory. In the great voice, no one died. Within the great voice, something of the mind still lived - no longer distinct or individual, but present nonetheless. As it was now in the exact feeling of the love of his wife and child and mother and father, not truly them, but the spirit of their lives in the great voice.

It was only a whisper, but feeling it allowed him to straighten his body, once again bowed under the gods' power. He raised his chin and rose to his feet, defying the tempest that roiled through him. His hands balled into fists at his sides, and in the core of his being, the great voice rallied, stretching through him. He opened his mouth, and this time sound did issue forth, finding purchase in the thin air to echo through the canyon: "I.... AM!"

The sound forced the gods back, reducing them to awed whispers. *the great voice... the great voice...*

There was the feeling of flame around him again. *Ours,* H'ronmeer asserted, daring the others to disagree.

*I will remember and name you,* J'onn projected, his strength of purpose supported by the great voice now fused with his. *I will tell you of what happened as you slept - but you must listen to me.*

They still held the earth in thrall, he knew, but they opened a space around him, settling down like eager children to a promise of sweets. He could look upon their forms in the shadows, could meet their minds rather than beg for forbearance. A deep risk, he knew, for if they could not be made to believe, to understand - the great voice reminded him of others who would defy the gods, their shuddering fates cementing old faith, ironically teaching the lesson so well that the gods had been lulled into slumber by the unthinkability of disobedience. So lulled they could not be wakened in Mars deepest hour of need. He would not allow them to assuage their guilt - and he understood now that it was guilt and remorse - by destroying another world.

(12)

The grim expressions around the table mirrored his own, Superman knew, as they listened to the end of Oracle's report. There was a heavy silence in the air for a long moment.

"So," Nightwing finally spoke, leaning forward in Batman's chair, "we have a pretty good idea that whatever is causing the mind-body disconnect is telepathic in origin, and reason to suspect it might not be malicious."

"How can it not be malicious?" Kyle demanded. "It's like we're being worked to death and made to feel happy about it."

Nightwing held up a hand. "I didn't say it wasn't malicious, just that we should leave open the option that it's not."

"I say it is," Aquaman snarled, setting his hooked hand on the table and glaring around the table. "Maybe you surface dwellers are lost in euphoria, but things aren't so rosy in Atlantis."

"Aquaman?" Superman probed.

"Political factions have risen in the provinces, pseudo-leaders who held things together in my absence and developed a taste for power." Aquaman's face distorted in a distasteful expression. "Civil unrest has been intensifying in the last couple of months. And when that sound cut out? We had our first hour's peace in several days."

"Sound?" Nightwing asked sharply.

Aquaman gestured emptily in the air near his head. "Telepathic chaff. I didn't even notice it until it stopped for a while tonight, but now it's back."

"Arthur," Superman began slowly. "Why didn't you mention this when J'onn called his meeting?"

"What's the point!" the monarch exploded. "The League has made it clear time and again that our concerns are secondary to those of your surface dwellers."

"Arthur!" Wonder Woman sounded genuinely affronted. "I don't see how you can believe that after -"

"Enough," Superman interceded. "Sniping at one another won't get us closer to any answers."

"No," Nightwing agreed slowly, "but I think - Oracle, you were working with Batman before he went down. What was he pursuing?"

"A moment, Nightwing. You know he asked for reports on all the teams, and the spreadsheet he left on the Watchtower computer shows him working variables for the different effects."

"Different effects?" Superman asked.

"Yes. He'd identified four discrete reactions to whatever is happening, and he was trying to figure out the pattern."

"Oracle, can you lay those out for us?" Nightwing requested.

The conference room monitor flared to life, the Oracle mask floating in one corner. A summary of categories lined up on the screen, ranging from no effects to increased aggression. In between sat bodily unawareness and complete collapse. "He seems to have decided that the middle two terms were variations of the same reaction," Oracle interpreted, "that collapse was just an advanced state of bodily unawareness. He was trying to make sense of the other two
alternatives."

"Children, Kryptonians and Amazons," Plasticman noted. "One of these things is not like the others," he sang, adopting the logo of educational television.

Nightwing frowned. "Superman, Wonder Woman - you've noticed *nothing* different over the past few weeks?"

Both heroes shook their heads.

"So either you are somehow immune to this whatever it is or-"

"-or whatever it is is ignoring them," Oracle put in.

"Does it matter?" Aquaman grumbled.

"It might," Nightwing said thoughtfully. "If there's some trait these three groups share that distinguishes them from adult humans."

"Hey," Plasticman interrupted, twisting his torso into a big number 7. "Isn't 7 regarded as the age of reason? Maybe a telepathic assault requires certain abstract thinking skills."

"Which would mean that the lack of effects might be coincidental rather than sharing a common explanation. Good thinking, Plasticman," Nightwing acknowledged.

"And teenagers are affected by becoming more aggressive because they lack emotional control?" Green Lantern volunteered, half-joking.

"Watch what you're implying, Green Lantern," Aquaman growled.

"It could be a hormone thing," Oracle speculated.

Aquaman slammed his hook down on the table. "This is getting us nowhere! I have a kingdom on the brink of civil war, and we sit here and talk. If we're not going to get to the bottom of this, I've got better uses for my time!"

"Arthur!" Superman barked, rapidly losing patience with his teammate despite his sympathy for the Atlantean.

"He has a point," Lantern put in. "This is a question for better minds than mine. I need to know what I can do right now to help."

"Is there some way we could block a telepathic signal?" Wonder Woman asked. "We've lost J'onn's link before. Maybe..." She trailed off, and an increasingly uncomfortable silence descended on the team. Superman shifted in his seat, glancing uncertainly at the others' faces.

"Okay, is anyone else feeling really bothered by the fact that they can't even remember what J'onn sounded like right about now?" Plasticman asked.

A set of relieved murmurs answered him.

"That's gotta mean something," Kyle commented.

"I've run the computer through all occasions when we've lost J'onn's link," Oracle's voice announced, quieting the group. "In each case, it's either been because something has happened to J'onn or because there was something disrupting his focus - usually some mental noise louder than he could penetrate."

"Is that the principle of the telepathic dampeners on his quarters?" Nightwing asked.

Superman shot a glance in Nightwing's direction, temporarily dismayed that a non team member knew that detail of the Watchtower's construction.

"No," Oracle reported without hesitation. "That's a bit of Martian technology. There's some STAR Labs devices that work on a white noise principle, though."

"So we could put something in orbit to shield the planet?" Superman suggested.

"It would take a while to put together something of that scale," Oracle said. "It's not the kind of technology that's been developed for much use outside the Slab and STAR Labs."

"But it wouldn't be impossible," Nightwing put in. "Although - GL, you think you could head down to J'onn's quarters and see what effect it has on you?"

"Um," Kyle shifted uncomfortably. "It's kinda his private space, y'know?"

Wonder Woman gave him a comforting smile from across the table. "I doubt he'd mind, and I think I see what Nightwing's getting at. If those dampeners are enough to cut off the telepathic signal then we've got something we can work on replicating -"

"And maybe I can figure it out enough to temporarily jury-rig something through the ring," Kyle finished, rising from his chair. "Okay, I'll call from down there."

"Although," Superman began as the door slid shut behind Kyle, "if we shut off the signal, are we going to see more of what we saw earlier tonight?"

"Be fine by me," Aquaman muttered. "Might actually get some sleep."

"But not so fine if surface chaos spills into your oceans, Arthur," Superman pointed out.

"That is another question, though," Nightwing noted. "What we saw earlier was more than just people suddenly aware of how tired they were. That was true for people working in areas of the world where it was night time, but in the daylight zones?"

"Like crazed junkies," Plasticman murmured, morphing into the shape of a syringe.

"Plasticman, how-?"

"I had monitor, Wonder Woman." He smiled sulkily. "And not all of grew up on the right side of the tracks."

"Wait - does this mean that we're dealing with an *addictive* telepathic presence?" Superman asked, the notion alarming him.

A com signal beeped.

"Go ahead, GL," Nightwing answered.

The monitor shifted to show Kyle standing amidst a pile of books, his face twisted into an odd expression. "I'm here," he reported. "And I feel like I could sleep for a week."

"You look it, too," Superman observed. "Thanks, Kyle."

"Wait," Nightwing ordered. Kyle hesitated, his hand paused mid-motion over the comlink as he looked questioningly at Nightwing through the monitor. "What else?"

The odd expression began to resolve itself, settling into lines of misery. "I'm really lonely," Kyle said, a faint whimper in his tone.

"Get out of there, GL," Nightwing ordered. "Report straight here."

The monitor winked out and Superman blinked. "That answers that, I guess."

"I wonder-" Nightwing mused, then shook himself. "Right. So cold turkey isn't going to be the answer, or the world is going to be in serious trouble. But telepathic dampening isn't a bad idea."

"They tuned in gradually," Aquaman suddenly spoke up. "I didn't hear them start up - just noticed them when they went silent and came back."

"So maybe we can tune them out gradually," Wonder Woman added speculatively.

"Oracle, we should explore getting some production lines set up to build orbital dampeners."

"Investigating possibilities now, Nightwing."

"Good. Superman?"

"Thanks, Nightwing. I don't think we should quit looking for the source of this, but this at least gives us some action. We work on creating dampeners and stay prepared to deal with any fall out should whatever's doing this decide to go on its way. Which means keeping the superhero community on alert and rested-"

Plasticman stretched out two heads - one wide eyed and the other snoring. "They'll like that order," he remarked.

"They don't have a choice," Superman pointed out. "Nor do we. Which means I think we should adjourn this meeting, rest and see where we are in about six hours."

"About time," Aquaman groused, brushing past Green Lantern as the younger man entered the room.

"I miss something?" Kyle asked.

"Not at all," Superman said wearily. "Everyone, get some rest. Oracle, as soon as you can leave your work to the computer, do so. We're back here at 10 am Eastern."

The meeting disbanded, but Superman did not wait to watch them all leave. Instead he eschewed the teleport tubes and flew toward the comfort of Lois.

(13)

Kyle stood just inside the threshold of the conference room, watching his teammates file out, waiting until only Nightwing remained at the table. Then he stepped forward, taking J'onn's empty chair. "Nightwing," he began tentatively.

"Yeah," the other man answered, his tone hinting that he was waiting for Kyle's report.

Kyle glanced up at the rotating Oracle mask over the conference table.

"I'm going to start my search engines," the synthetic voice said. "Call me if you need me."

"Thanks, Oracle," Nightwing replied, watching as the mask winked out. Then he turned to Kyle. "I'm covering monitor. You want to walk there with me?"

Kyle nodded wordlessly and fell into stride beside the other man, trying to order his jumbled thoughts. "I'm not sure-" He stopped speaking.

"Go ahead."

"I'm not sure we should be trying to stop this," he confessed guiltily.

If this surprised Nightwing, he gave no sign. He just kept walking. "Tell me more."

"What I felt in J'onn's quarters - it wasn't the same as when the whatever it is stopped before."

"I gathered," Nightwing acknowledged. "I'm sorry I made you stay longer."

"No," Kyle shook his head. "I think it's something we needed to know. I just - I'm not sure I trust the League's judgment right now." The door to the monitor womb opened, and Kyle followed Nightwing in. "Did they remember to set you up with the security codes?" he asked.

"Oracle," Nightwing replied, "and I think you're right."

"Huh?"

"About the League. Their judgment's been off on this one since J'onn first brought up the idea that it was something to worry about."

"You know about -"

"Batman put me on alert right before you guys met. When Oracle didn't report any change in operating procedure? I can imagine how things went." Nightwing settled into the monitor chair, and Kyle floated cross-legged beside him.

"It wasn't very fair to J'onn," Kyle admitted. "Which is kinda why-"

"Go on."

Kyle sighed. "You remember that whole thing a while back with the guys from the 853rd century or whatever it was?"

Nightwing nodded once.

"Okay, when that whole thing was going on, the future J'onn left a message for himself - here." He tapped his temple.

Nightwing actually shuddered. "I hate it when he does stuff like that."

Kyle gave him a startled look. "Huh?"

"Never mind. I take it you know what the message was?"

"Well, J'onn kinda told me when he retrieved it. He said it was a vision of the future - a beautiful vision of peace and beauty and justice. Something about minds and spirits evolving. It just - I
could tell it really inspired him."

"Something like that would."

"Well, look - what if that's part of what's going on right now?"

"How do you mean?"

"I mean, yeah, I figure it's an outside source and all, but what if J'onn's out there convincing them how to do it right. To really help us - I dunno - evolve or something."

Nightwing leaned back, steepling his fingers in front of his face in an eerie echo of his mentor. "Tell me more."

Kyle shifted. "It's just, when I got into J'onn's quarters - listen, do me a favor."

Nightwing raised an eyebrow at him.

"Look, I just realized - clear your mind for a sec, okay?"

Nightwing nodded. "Okay."

Kyle closed his eyes and concentrated. He focused all his mental energy on remembering the exact rush of joy he'd felt on the occasions when his League seniors had complimented him for his performance, making it the sole content of his thought. Then he opened his eyes.

It was faint, but there was a hint of a smile on Nightwing's face.

"You felt it," Kyle stated.

"A sense of joy? Yes. Trick of the ring?"

"No. I didn't notice until it was cut off, but something since the energy came back, it vibrates with everyone's emotions. Like actually *feeling* the link between everyone. And when it was gone -" Kyle shuddered. "Being in J'onn's room almost hurt."

Nightwing's face creased into a frown. "You sure you weren't picking up some of J'onn's energy?"

Kyle stared at him for a moment, the idea triggering a sense of horror. "Dude, I hope not."

Nightwing waved the reaction away. "It's neither here nor there. The issue is more isolating accurately what's really going on before we address it."

"But it sounds like you're already getting-"

"The League has a distorted sense of industry," Nightwing dismissed. "Even in an emergency, it'll take time to get security releases on the dampener technology, and more time to set up the production process. It's doable in a reasonable time frame if it proves that's what we have to do, but I knew none of them would rest until it sounded like we had a possible solution."

"You're manipulating them," Kyle accused.

"No," Nightwing met his eyes. "I just trust their judgment at the moment as much as you do."

Kyle bowed his head in acknowledgement. "So what do we do?" he asked.

"We look for clues. We find out if children aren't affected by this because they're immune or because they're beneath notice or because whatever it is understands enough to not harm a child. We figure out what's different about humans and Atlanteans - and why Amazons aren't troubled by this. Why J'onn felt it and Superman doesn't."

This last had a speculative tone, and Nightwing leaned forward to open a comlink. He was answered instantaneously. "Oracle."

"Oracle, it's Nightwing with Green Lantern. Did you get anywhere on that scrambled teleport sequence?"

"Not a pinpoint - Batman covered his tracks pretty well. Or J'onn's tracks."

"But you have an idea?"

"Not down to Earth, certainly."

"Somewhere else in the solar system then. I presume those things don't have any kind of galactic range."

"Not without some serious tinkering. What are you thinking?"

"I'm thinking the answer is under our noses and we don't know where to look," Nightwing replied.

"Mars," Oracle stated.

"White Martians?" Kyle worried. "But they're all -"

"Not White Martians. J'onn wouldn't have insisted on facing them alone."

"But what? There's nothing on Mars anymore. At all."

"Kyle, when you ran into J'onn in the 853rd century-"

Kyle snorted. "I didn't run into him. He was just suddenly there with a telepathic link. I don't think anyone saw him."

"Oracle, do we have any record of J'onn's presence, anything in the debriefing notes-"

"Searching - just fragments of his appearance over their headnet thing. The notes are horrible anyway because of the whole secret plan."

"Right. Kyle, you were there. Do you remember what he said, if he gave any indication of where he was -"

"Oh, he was on Mars - which was weird because it was the only planet they hadn't colonized..." He trailed off, a flash of memory coming back to him. "I'm wrong," he said quietly. "He wasn't *on* Mars. He *was* Mars. You don't think-"

"I don't know what to think," Nightwing replied grimly, "beyond we need to do a lot of reading up on Mars."

(14)

The fingers of Bruce's right hand gripped his belt with white knuckles. He was aware enough of his surroundings to know that Dick understood, had directed Alfred to leave the belt with him. That was the only reason he had allowed Alfred to remove it from his body to rest on the bed beside him - admittedly a more comfortable proposition than allowing the compartments to continue to dig into his fevered flesh.

He was also dimly aware of Leslie sitting vigil, Alfred long since sent to bed with promises he would be alerted if anything changed. A bit of guilt gnawed at him for causing them worry, but he knew where he was needed. If he had any doubt, the torrent in his brain effectively stilled it, even as it left him incapacitated.

Not that he understood it. Most of what came through the link that Ace had opened was little more than flashes: light, fire, pain, confusion. Occasional lulls in which he could almost feel J'onn. A moment in which he swore he heard J'onn's voice.

He could feel Ace trembling in its compartment in his belt. He was demanding too much of the little zo'ok, asking it to do a task that perhaps was easy for a fully bonded, mature symbiote. But Ace was not mature, and the poor creature could never be fully bonded in the way that Zo'ok was a part of J'onn. It's trembling increased at this train of thought, and Bruce tried to soothe it. Maybe not fully bonded, but it *was* bonded and feared being cast aside by him. He never would, he tried to make it understand.

He felt a cool hand on his forehead and heard the beep of a thermometer in his ear. "103.2," Leslie tsked. "Not good, Bruce." She ran her hand over his forehead again in an almost maternal gesture, and Bruce knew that if he opened his eyes, he would see her looking down with concern. That concern would be enough to break his concentration, and with the images beginning to filter through to him now? He would not risk leaving J'onn alone...

There was wind and sand and flame now where they had quieted before, howling abrasively through the pinhole link to rage in smaller scale in Bruce's mind. The Martian gods, booming out fearsome threats and curses, screaming rawly - familiarly - tumbling Bruce into his own nightmare... gunshots... blood... the warm hand that had clasped his falling limp, empty to the ground, to clasp no more... the bouncing - who knew pearls could bounce so high?... waistcoat growing darker before his eyes as pooling liquid spread...

...spread redly to stain a stretch of yellow, to mar the brightness at his side... squelchy grind of bone on bone as fingers cradled broken skull... breath gone... shrapnel tears... wood and metal forced through flesh...

...flesh torn by building's fall... stench of decay among the rubble... don't look... don't see...

...the fires... burning... flames erupting everywhere... staggering corpses to be... reaching out... reaching out... don't look... don't see...

...beloved child... crying... don't look...

...flames...

...dying... unheard death wails... whys unanswered as more fall... only flames... flames...

...crackle...

...echo...

...screams gone silent...

...slipping away...

...flames...

"J'ONN!"

...silence...

Hands on his bare shoulders, urging him back.

...silence...

Gentle orders, murmured in his ear.

...silence...

Cooling sweat, making him shiver.

...silence...

Needle prick.

...silence...

Enveloping darkness.

...silence...

...silence...

*

Leslie looked down at the digital readout. "His fever's broken," she announced, noting the visible tension in Alfred's body ease.

"Thank god," Alfred breathed, letting himself settle into the bedside chair. His troubled eyes rested on Bruce's now sleep calm features. "I thought - that last round -"

"I know," Leslie acknowledged, using every ounce of professionalism to keep a quaver out of her voice. She could feel the adrenaline crash coming. The sudden fever spike had caught her off-guard, and she suspected it was nothing she had done that had finally sent Bruce's temperature spiraling back to a more normal range.

"I should call Dick," Alfred stated, although he didn't rise.

"Shall I-?" Leslie offered.

"No." Alfred shook his head. "He's not at one of his usual haunts." He leaned down for a moment and straightened up with Bruce's belt in his hand. "He must've let go of it," he mused.

Not surprising, Leslie thought, given the way he was flailing. But she only nodded in acknowledgement.

Alfred stood with a sigh, placing the belt back on the bed beside Bruce. "I think, Doctor Thompkins, that I will stay here a bit, if you'd like to retire upstairs?"

Leslie studied her patient for a moment. "Yes," she decided. "Just for a bit." She rested a hand briefly on Bruce's shoulder, then turned for the stairs, able to hold back tired tears of reaction until she was out of sight of the cave floor. She was relieved, yes, but something told her that her relief had come at a cost.

(15)

"Done!" Lois announced triumphantly, hitting the send icon on her screen. "And 15 minutes to deadline. C'mon, Smallville, let's - Clark?"

Her husband was sitting in the midst of the Planet's small, smoky Cordova office, staring at the screen in front of him. She allowed herself an internal smile - he looked so innocently befuddled.

"You blocked?" she asked sympathetically. "It's not like Perry ordered up a special. He won't mind if you send it for tomorrow's edition." She nudged his shoulder with her hip, making space for herself in front of his screen. "Besides, you always over-think things when you get-"

She stopped, her eyes taking in the breakdown of Clark's normally readable prose. A lucid account of the underlying ethnic and religious tensions in the small nation-state gave way to scattered notes, phrases like "planetary delusion," "mass reaction to exhaustion," and "telepathic assault" jumbled together into nonsense sentences and eliptical space. At the bottom of the screen, in all caps, the cursor blinking at its end, was one isolated question:

WHERE IS THE JUSTICE LEAGUE?

Lois looked over her shoulder at her husband, noted the way his brow creased, and made a decision. With swift keystrokes, she deleted the file.

"Hey! Lois!"

"We're going someplace quiet to eat, Smallville," she ordered, "and then we're going back to the hotel to have a long talk. What time is your meeting?"

"Five o'clock," he answered numbly.

"That gives us almost three hours." She took hold of his hand, pulling him insistently to his feet. "And I want the whole scoop, Smallville, not the Cliff Notes version."

She bullied him out the door, ignoring the looks and head shakes directed at them by the local reporters. It wasn't precisely news that Lois wore the pants in their household, even in this remote corner of the newsworthy world.

On the street, Clark seemed to relax a little, although his eyes darted among the crowd as if he were looking for something and the tightness of his mouth suggested he wasn't liking what he saw.

"I know just the place for the late lunch crowd," Lois breezed, only the tightening of her fingers in Clark's hand signalling her worry. "Quiet, out of the way, decent grub - and," she added in the barest of whispers, "you can tell me what the hell is going on."

That drew his attention, prompting him to disentangle his fingers from hers and put his arm around her shoulders. He pulled her close enough to kiss her forehead.

<"Ah, young love!"> a voice called from the market stall they were passing, and they turned to the grinning old man who manned the stall. <"You should buy such a beauty a flower, sir!">

Clark smiled his most affable Midwest farmboy smile at the man and asked, "What's he saying?"

He knew well enough, she knew, but Clark Kent didn't have quite the facility with language that Superman did. "He wants you to buy me a flower," she reported, her face wearing the appropriately flattered smile.

"Then I will," he announced, leading her to the man's stall and looking at the selection of late spring blooms. He plucked an early rose from amongst the buckets and smiled at the man. <"How much?"> he asked in appropriately broken Cordovan.

The man reached out and took the flower from his fingers, snapping the stem to a length that would tuck into the button hole of Lois' trench coat. <"For young love? I think today the flower is free."> He stepped forward to thread the flower into Lois' coat with a smile. <"We need to encourage such blooms,"> he remarked, his expression kindly.

Lois colored slightly and said, "He wants to give it to me," she explained.

"Oh, but I - <sir, I shall... ought...>"

"No, no!" the man protested in English. "For loving, you see? Love?" His face expressed his earnestness, and he nodded approvingly when Clark's hand dropped from his back pocket.

<"Thanks to you,"> Clark said, turning his smiling eyes to Lois and again kissing her forehead.

<"Tell him you two together makes an old heart happy,"> the vendor stated.

"We make him happy," Lois explained, admiring how well Clark stayed in Smallville form. <"And you've made us happy,"> she said brightly to the vendor. <"Thank you! Good-bye.">

She gave a little wave as she led Clark away, noticing as soon as they were clear of the stall the worry line in his forehead was creasing again. "Planetary disaster?" she asked quietly, half in jest.

He only tightened his arm around her, his fingers brushing the petals of the rose.

*
Lois gave up on small talk in the final blocks to the restaurant, and he regretted the worry he was causing her. It seemed wrong to be worried on such a bright spring day, on cheerful city streets untouched by the early morning riots. In fact, the riots seemed largely forgotten, and that was troubling. Somewhere people were mourning the half dozen killed, but there was no sense of citywide shock. Just business as usual - better than usual, where an old man felt he could afford to give away a flower to an obvious American. The capital of Cordova seemed like a pleasant tourist spot in a sleepy nation, full of quaint charms and happy locals. It shouldn't feel wrong, but after the nightmarish moments when the veil had been ripped aside? It was eerie. He felt like he was watching for puppet strings.

"Here we are," Lois announced, guiding him a short way down a side street to the restaurant entrance. "Local fare, well prepared, and not so much gouging of the Americans." Her tone was light with the faint sardonic edge that no good reporter was without - though it sounded forced.

They stepped from the bright street to the dim restaurant and were met at the door by a middle aged woman. She nodded politely at their entry and, at a word from Lois, led them back to a small booth where she left them with menus.

"Okay, Smallville," Lois hissed. "What's going on?"

He shook his head, not sure where to start. "Lois, this is going to sound weird, but - there's something not right about all this good will and high energy that's been going around."

She nodded, her eyes watching him narrowly. "So you think John was right."

He almost started, then remembered he had told her about the previous day's meeting. He sighed. "John's missing. And something's wrong with our favorite man in black."

"Wrong how?" Lois asked.

"Fevers. High enough he couldn't come to work."

She raised an eyebrow. "That doesn't sound good."

"No," Clark agreed. "And then these riots last night - we heard several other distress calls in the same window of time."

She met his eyes. "Where was Big S?" It was not a challenge or demand, just her usual unfailing sense that he had been somewhere that left him troubled.

"Power plant disaster. Pulling a body out of the grid."

Her hand reached across the table to clasp his. "Oh, Clark. I'm sorry."

He was silent a moment, accepting her sympathy.

"But things calmed down," she prompted.

"Rather suddenly." He touched his temple, trusting her to put together what he was saying. "Telepathy."

Her brows lowered in a frown of concentration. "What did John say?"

"He was already long missing by that point. I haven't seen him since yesterday's meeting."

She considered this for a moment. "And Wally's still out sick?"

"And Ray."

"Ray, too? Man, that must be something nasty going around."

"And we're sitting on our hands," Clark sighed, fidgeting with the menu. "I feel like we should warn people, make a press announcement or something. But tell people what? They should sleep more?"

Lois snorted. "That'd go over like a lead balloon."

"I know," he admitted helplessly. "I can't help wishing we'd paid more attention when John first pointed all this out instead of putting him in a position where he felt he had to fight it alone."

"Hey, Clark," Lois increased the pressure of her fingers on his hand. "It sounded crazy. It still sounds crazy. If I didn't know what's going on, if I didn't know *you* so well, I would laugh at the idea."

"But it's our job to pay attention to these things-" he protested, his sense of defeat growing.

"You order ready now?"

Clark glanced up at the waitress, his hands opening the menu. "Uh, yeah. Just - why don't you get me..."

He trailed off as he turned his eyes back to the waitress' face. In the time it had taken him to look down and pick a number her eyes had developed a glassy look and her lip trembled as if she were fighting tears. "Miss? Are you all right?"

His query was met by a strangled sound across from him, and he looked over to see that Lois' face had reddened, a tear already rolling down one cheek. "Lois?"

There were more sniffles, and he realized that everyone in the restaurant was rummaging for handkerchiefs, tears streaming down their faces. "What-?" he wondered.

"Oh, Clark," Lois sniffed. "It's just so sad."

"What?"

"I'm sorry," she apologized to the waitress, already rising from her seat. "We're not so hungry after all." She pulled at Clark's hand, dragging him in blinking bewilderment out to the sidewalk. There, too, peoples faces were distorted by emotion.

"Lois, what's going on?"

"I don't know," she sobbed. "Let's just - let's just go back to the hotel, okay?"

"Sure," he agreed in a daze. This time he took the lead for the few blocks to the hotel, traveling through a landscape made surreal by the weeping faces that surrounded him on all sides. He navigated the lobby, startled as guests and staff clung to each other, bound together in some grief-induced fog that he could not fathom. He kept Lois curled protectively to his chest as he stepped into the elevator. "What number?" he asked.

"Five," she choked out, pressing her face into him.

He waited until he had her in the room before he activated his JLA signaling device. The answer came quickly.

"Watchtower."

"Nightwing, it's Superman. I'm in Cordova and-"

"We know," came the grim reply. "It's happening everywhere. Seventeen countries have already declared national days of mourning, and the UN is holding an emergency meeting right now."

"What is it?" he wondered, still stroking his wife's hair comfortingly.

"No idea." He realized suddenly that there was a tighter note of control than usual in Nightwing's voice, that if it were happening everywhere, it would also be-

"I'll be there in a minute," he promised. "Superman out."

Lois lifted her tear streaked face to look at him. "I know you have to go," she croaked.

He brushed at her tears. "I'm sorry, Lois. I love you."

"I know, Clark." She hugged him tightly, and he wished for a moment that he could just be Clark Kent, could worry about nothing greater than comforting his wife. Then he gently pulled away from her and kissed her.

"I'll figure it out," he promised.

"I know," she acknowledged, stepping back and letting him slip out the window and across the clear afternoon sky.

(16)

"It's official," Barbara reported, glad the Oracle synthesizer would hide the quaver in her voice. "Unanimous world declaration of global mourning."

"I'll take weird things you never thought you'd see for 1000, Alex," Plasticman quipped, giving himself the appearance of a suave game show contestant. For once, no one shushed him.

"I still don't understand," Wonder Woman puzzled.

"You would if you could feel it," Green Lantern noted. "It's like your best friend just - died or something." He was gamely fighting his emotion, but the sudden hitch in his words had the quality of a suppressed sob.

"That level of shock," Nightwing put in in cold, clinical tones. Barbara could see Plasticman contorting into the shape of a twisted bicycle, one wheel turning forlornly, and noticed Superman look away as if faintly stricken. "Not," Nightwing continued, "like something you've had a chance to process or develop any kind of anger towards - more raw, unexpected grief."

Like the feeling of the exact moment when you realize those broken bodies on the ground are your parents, Barbara imagined for him, biting her lip for what he was going through. It was easier to concentrate on his grief than her own.

"And you believe this has the same telepathic source?"

"No, it's coming from the moon!" Aquaman snapped. "We keep having this conversation!" Across from him, Plasticman stretched into a giant stop sign.

"It's an opening," Nightwing said calmly.

"An opening?" Wonder Woman asked.

Nightwing nodded.

"J'onn," Kyle added, looking as if he might want to say more but didn't trust himself to complete the thought.

"Now I am lost," Superman confessed. "How-?"

"Oracle?"

She swallowed hard. "We've been going through the data that Batman and J'onn put together, along with new information as it's come in. We have reason to believe that this telepathic blanket has been affecting the planet for several months but has only recently become so intrusive. We've tracked a steady decline in lawsuits, increases in charitable giving and volunteer work. Aquaman's observation of the steady increase in telepathic chaff, as he called it, got us digging deeper."

She paused for Aquaman's grunt of acknowledgment as Plasticman began a cartoonish display of shoveling.

"We suspect whoever or whatever is behind this was already in play even before the recovery of Poseidonis, but was so low level as to be undetectable."

"Oracle, forgive me, but what does this have to do with J'onn?" Wonder Woman interjected.

"We need the whole picture, Wonder Woman," Nightwing answered for her, giving Barbara a grateful moment to take a deep breath. He understood - it was easier to operate in report mode than to jump to the chase, which they'd already discovered intensified the feeling of grief.

"We don't have a firm start date, but since the gradual build first becomes evident in our records, there have been only two notable changes in its nature. The first was the sudden weariness and panic that flared up several hours ago. We discovered shortly after that something about the telepathic signal had changed, amplifying human empathic ability."

"Wait, why-?"

Nightwing held up a hand. "We weren't sure of the significance of the change," he pointed out. "It seemed silly to drag you all back here over every scrap of clue we found."

"Glad someone's thinking," Aquaman muttered, ignoring the display of lightbulb shapes that Plasticman floated over Nightwing's head. "Go ahead, Oracle."

"As I said, there was something in the signal that carried some sort of catalyst for human empathy. Since both these events happened after we lost contact with J'onn-"

"You think he might be behind this," Superman finished, effectively covering the fact that Barbara could not have completed the sentence if she wanted to. Even Aquaman's expression wavered slightly, and Plasticman had assumed the form of a court reporter's teletype.

"This latest shift," Nightwing picked up smoothly, "is only the second interruption of the good-will vibe - or aggressive signal for Atlanteans - and unlike the first, it is motivating people to power down their lives a notch, to rest their bodies and gather peacefully, if rather grief-stricken. Even the Atlantean situation has shifted, even though no one is speaking to one another, they've lain down their arms if I understand you correctly, Aquaman."

"Right," Aquaman confirmed.

"J'onn bought us an opening," Wonder Woman breathed in sudden understanding, freeing any of the others from the uncomfortable prospect of presenting that fact. "But what do we do with it?"

"Recent events suggest the world might be particularly receptive now to suggestions of a general slow down," Barbara pointed out. "The magnitude of the sense of grief is such that no world leader would doubt that there is some influence at work. There is a possibility that consciousness of it might immunize the populace to some degree once this grief cycle runs down."

"Are we sure it will?" Wonder Woman asked, and Barbara couldn't answer for the sudden tightness in her throat. It had to, she thought desperately.

"We have to believe it will," Superman asserted firmly, although his eyes had a distant expression. "We have to plan on it, and we have to mobilize world leaders to spread the word, to get the information to every corner of every city that this influence is real and there is a way to think past it."

"And if it doesn't go away?" Green Lantern asked. "If people stay shell-shocked?"

Superman's expression grew more determined. "Then we make sure we get the telepathic dampening technology into every corner of the world as quickly as possible."

Barbara actually rallied a faint smile. This was doable, and Superman's faith in it would carry them. It helped clear the fog, and she tapped back into her report networks.

"We should also consider how we can offer relief in the present moment," she observed. "Essential services are still functioning, but folks are gutting it out on pure will down here."

"Good thinking. Oracle, contact all teams, reserves, everyone you've got on tap. Diana-" Superman turned to his teammate. "I know the policies of Themyscira, but since your land is unaffected, perhaps some of your sisters can be persuaded-"

"I'll do what I can," she promised.

"Kyle," Superman continued, "I hate to ask this of you, but should this grief spell not break, can you muster the power to ring up a dampening field?"

"Planet scale?"

"Of course he can, Big Blue!" Plasticman suddenly declared, bouncing up behind Kyle's seat. "This is the main man. The king of the ring. Remember, he stopped a SUPER-NOVA! And I don't mean a souped up Chevy. You with me, Ring-Ding?"

Green Lantern nodded. "I can try."

"That's the most we can ask," Superman allowed. "Aquaman, you have your own work cut out for you..."

Barbara frowned as the sudden beep of an emergency signal distracted her from the Watchtower feed. Her already pained psyche felt a deepening of dread as she reached for the switch to the Batcave link. She actually closed her eyes as the monitor flared to life.

"Miss Barbara?" Alfred's voice filtered through her speakers uncertainly. It was all she could do to open her eyes and see the narrowly controlled sorrow on his face.

"Go ahead, Alfred." She didn't want to hear this.

Nor did he seem to want to say it. He paused, then finally revealed, "Master Bruce has disappeared."

(17)

The hard knot in Nightwing's gut tightened as he rushed down to the teleporters. *I always wanted my own ulcer,* he thought, the hard irony distracting him from the thickness in his throat. It was hard to separate the real anxiety he felt for Bruce from the strange sensation of grief that had befallen the entire planet, and he had time for neither. He worried he was just deferring a breakdown for when this mission was over, mostly because worrying about it gave him something to think about when there was no other demand to prevent him from collapsing into a heap in Barbara's arms, which is what he wanted to do.

He stepped into the teleport tube and nodded to Green Lantern, signaling his readiness to go. Kyle had impressed him a great deal over the past 24 hours, not the least of which for the way he managed to handle the heartache that only he and Plasticman of the remaining JLAers could feel. Nightwing wondered if his teammates could even fathom the strength of will it took not to burst into weeping at the conference table as they pussyfooted around what appeared to be part of the source of the grief.

J'onn.

He let himself think it as the teleporter took hold, knowing he would have to confront it in the Cave.

The knot in his gut was even tighter as he stepped out into the dim light of the Cave. Alfred stood waiting, his expression a model of "stiff upper lip" thinking. Dick took a moment to reach out for the older man and hug him tightly. They clung to one another for a moment, fighting the tears that, once released, would be difficult to stop. Then Dick stepped back and asked, "What happened?"

Alfred followed him as he started toward the computer. "He was resting here - asleep I thought after the fever broke. And then, when -" He paused. "I worried for Dr. Thompkins upstairs alone, so I left him for only a few moments."

"It's okay, Alfred." Nightwing's tone was more Bat than comforting, but he needed the Bat right now. "You know how he is."

"Yes." There was an attempt at drollery in the comment, a stretch to make this business as usual.

Nightwing settled into the computer chair, noting Alfred's half begun attempt to trace a teleporter signal. "So he teleported out. Did he take anything?"

Alfred shook his head. "He suited up, but all inventory is accounted for save for the suit he was wearing and his belt."

Nightwing furrowed his brow. "And he didn't teleport anything down before he left?"

"No."

"Dammit, Bruce," Dick muttered. "What are you thinking?"

"You have an idea where he might have gone?"

"*Had* an idea, Alfred. I figured he went to Mars."

For a second, he could see Alfred's composure crack, and then it was back. "Master Dick, without a space suit, would that not be-"

"Suicide? Yes. Unless he's got something else up his sleeve. Which he must, since Bruce isn't one to teleport himself into a near-vacuum."

"Is there nowhere else he was likely to go?"

Nightwing stared at the scrambled teleporter signal on the screen for a long moment. Was there? The Watchtower, but he hadn't appeared there. J'onn's home in the Gobi? His fingers flew across the keys, accessing WayneTech and JLA satellites to pull an advanced infrared scan and to read the various bandwidths of Batman's equipment. Nothing. Not that Bruce couldn't hide from such surveillance, but to what end? No, Dick knew in his heart of hearts where Bruce had gone, and he could only pray it wasn't a fool's errand.

"Master Dick?"

Nightwing sighed and swiveled the chair away from the monitor to face Alfred. Just that move was enough to prompt the older man to sink into the other available chair, his face worried.

"He went to Mars, Alfred. I don't know how he's managing the atmosphere - unless there's air pockets in those old Martian homes."

"After J'onn." Alfred's voice broke a little on the name, and he swallowed hard as he struggled to control his features.

Dick nodded, peeling off his mask and scrubbing tired eyes. "Alfred," he began, "we figured something out up there, something we haven't told the League."

"Go on."

"When we started tracing things back, when we realized that whatever's behind this has been going on for quite a while-" Dick pulled his hand away from his eyes and wrapped his fist around the teardrop that had managed to cling to his fingers. Not now, he reminded himself firmly.

He cleared his throat. "We know that this all started before Aquaman and Poseidonis were rescued. We tracked back all the little trends - isolated variables that seemed to belong to the phenomenon, and we think they know when they started."

Alfred stared at him, a sense of dread recognition dawning in his eyes.

"I don't even know if they realized it, although I imagine J'onn figured it out."

"It's about Bruce and J'onn, isn't it?" Alfred's hands were white knuckled in his lap.

Dick took a steadying breath. "That's what it looks like. Like this all started about the time they got together."

"Coincidence," Alfred dismissed, although it was clear he didn't believe his own words.

"I've been trying to make myself believe that," Dick said, no longer able to look at Alfred's face. He stared off into the dark of the cave. "And I've also been trying to figure out why J'onn would
completely sever ties with Bruce. Why he would abandon him."

"Abandon-?" Alfred echoed, his voice choked.

"He said good-bye, Alfred. The way you just don't say good-bye to Bruce, made him accept it. Or tried to. And then he left. And none of us could remember his voice or his face anymore." He would've urged Alfred to try, but he knew the barely dammed sorrow in the old man would break then, and if Alfred began to cry... he forcefully closed his mind to the image.

"He went to Mars. Because every link leads back there. And it's the one place where Bruce couldn't watch his back, and Bruce knew it.

"Alfred," he continued, no longer able to keep the tears from his cheeks, because he *knew* beyond a doubt where his grief was coming from. "I think J'onn's dead."

(11)

Batman stayed crouched in deep shadow as the teleport beam faded, activating Starlite lenses against the gloom. There was barely enough light for them to function, and much of the area around him remained shrouded in dark. But there was enough. Enough that he could pick out a lighter shape against the red rock and sand.

He crossed the distance between them in two long bounds, fighting to keep his pulse and respiration level as much as he struggled to understand his own strength in the substantially lesser gravity. The latter was easier as he pulled himself back to the ground, settling onto his knees beside J'onn's body.

He was half-embedded in the bedrock of his home planet. His torso twisted back from the shoulder fused into the soil, stretched across a rocky outcrop. His left arm splayed out, palm up, the deceiving delicateness of his true Martian form giving him the appearance of a bird slammed roughly to earth, wing still unfurled. His neck stretched vulnerably, the weight of his head dangling past the rock and over open space, baring his throat. It was as if he were staring up at the narrow ribbon of night sky visible above him, except his eyes...

His eyes were half-open, dull, clouded - lifeless.

Batman bowed his head for a moment, willing away Bruce Wayne's emotion as he sought more rational memory. J'onn had shut his body down before, lain corpse-like as his spirit traveled in realms not meant for flesh, a noble effort to join Zauriel's defense of heaven. They'd brought him back then...

It had been the Flash who'd been the catalyst, jump-starting J'onn's cells with a transfer of kinetic energy. That wasn't an option now.

But neither was J'onn's death.

Beneath the encasing bubble of Ace, feeding air and warmth to his too fragile flesh, Batman's face took on an expression of determination as he stretched his hand out along J'onn's arm. He gently folded the extended limb back towards him, pulling J'onn's hand to his chest and, as a consequence, rolling the Martian onto his side. A desperate part of his mind tried to take comfort in the fact that J'onn remained supple, even as the logician in him remembered that there was no reason to assume that Martians underwent rigor mortis. It had been over an hour since Bruce's tenuous link to his lover had suddenly snapped, and it was possible that the sudden silence was not an act of conscious will - that J'onn had died then.

He forced the thought aside, raising J'onn's hand to his face. He was glad now that he had eschewed a clumsy spacesuit in favor of trusting the powers of his zo'ok. The little symbiote phased enough to allow him to press J'onn's palm to his face without letting valuable air escape, and the feel of the cold green flesh was almost enough to wrench a sob past his control. *J'onn,* he thought softly, pressing a kiss into the palm.

There was no response.

He lowered J'onn's hand and reached for the sightless eyes, drawing lids down over them. It almost looked like he was sleeping now, except Batman knew that this was not how J'onn slept. He brushed a hand over the high forehead, thinking.

And while the Bat tore through scenarios to replicate the experiment that brought J'onn back before, Bruce Wayne animated the body that continued to stroke J'onn's brow and hold his hand. Neither particularly noticed the way Ace was stretching out, expanding its armoring presence to blend with another zo'ok.

Not right away at any rate.

That Batman and J'onn J'onzz shared the same bubble of air only became evident when Bruce found himself interlacing his fingers with J'onn's and leaning down to kiss one sunken cheek. He remained there, his forehead resting on J'onn's temple, unwilling to admit defeat, but unable to imagine an answer. A sigh finally escaped him and he closed his eyes, the detective giving the man leave to mourn.

And the hand Bruce held began to return the pressure of his fingers.

He didn't dare open his eyes, holding his breath as he felt the familiar penetration of Martian cells into his body. He surrendered almost instantly, letting J'onn pour into him, feeling the deep core of Mars traveling through him on the currents of his lover's mind. There were no thoughts sent his way, but he *knew* the touch which surrounded him, and he found he could only let the sensation fill him, his own emotion inchoate.

*WHAT IS THIS _THING_?*

The unexpected bellow in his mind flattened him against J'onn, forcing the air from his lungs with a rush. He sensed Ace scrambling as cold suffocation pressed in on him, and then he was in J'onn's warmth, sheltered and breathing in desperate gulps. *J'onn?* he questioned, reaching for reassurance and information. But while he could feel his lover around him, there was no answer.

*WHAT DARES DISTURB OUR LOST CHILD!?* The voices screamed through Bruce's skull, disorienting him, disrupting his already tenuous sense of up and down on an unfamiliar world. He felt Ace wrapping tightly around him, responding to his confusion and pulling his cape around him. He found himself lost in memory for a moment, remembering the way J'onn's cape - his zo'ok - sometimes curled possessively around J'onn's body. How much did the little creatures sense danger, protecting in the only ways they knew how? He curled into it, into J'onn, still surrounding him, still silent.

A new voice distinguished itself from the polyphony zinging through his mind. *Human!* A figure of flame rose up, separating itself from deep shadow to stand before them.

*H'ronmeer,* Batman recognized, galvanizing himself to sit upright, prepared to defend J'onn.

H'ronmeer stayed where it was, its voice taking on a gentleness Batman had not imagined possible for the god. *The zo'ok protect him. You may stand down, little soul.*

Bruce felt J'onn's essence flowing obediently away from him, and he tightened his hold on the hand in his. *Don't leave me,* he ordered, striving to will the Martian essence to remain entangled in his as he witnessed J'onn returning to the dimensions of his corpse. There was still no answer, but their hands remained fused, blended.

*You love our child, human,* H'ronmeer stated plainly, and behind him a groundswell of whispers rose.

*What is it? How is it? This is human? No, human is -*

*Quiet, my siblings,* H'ronmeer said. *You will do harm.*

*Let him go, H'ronmeer,* Batman growled mentally, his teeth gritted against the intrusions in his thoughts.

He thought the god sighed. *In a million million years it would not be ideal. I warned you.*

*You kill him!* Batman raged, rising to his feet defiantly, fingers still entwined with J'onn's.

*No,* the god denied. *He sacrifices.*

There was sand in his boots. Batman looked down, caught between horror and confusion at the ground swirling around his feet, penetrating to taste at his toes.

*It is like rock and sand,* a voice marveled. *Yet it thinks.*

*D'infad,* H'ronmeer chastened, and Batman knew that he was naming the sand, and that the sand was not merely sand.

*My brothers and sisters, it is NEW!* There was pure delight in the tone, and again the voices began to hum in Bruce's skull.

*It is not new, my sibling of curiosity,* H'ronmeer contradicted. *It is human.*

*IMPOSSIBLE!* The force of the denial pressed Batman back to his knees. *HUMAN IS THE GREAT VOICE FORGOTTEN!*

*STOP!* Bruce projected with his entire will, prompting a stunned silence. J'onn's hand in his began to stretch again among his cells, and in the quiet, a new sound began.

It was like singing or dancing, coiling with unreserved energy through Bruce's soul. It commingled love and joy and fear and pain and wisdom and innocence, a tension of opposites within which lay the truth that bubbled with the thrill of a million million voices. And with in the very heart of it? There was a space, a quiet. A quiet that was being urged to join the song around it, but which seemed to be tuning out the beauty to stare fixedly from within at -

*THE GREAT VOICE!* There was awe and anger in the buffeting clamor of the gods. *INSIDE THIS ROCK.*

*This human,* H'ronmeer corrected, and Bruce felt the god's scrutiny. *Little soul, you wait for him. Despite all, he has become your whole.*

*IT CANNOT BE! THE LOST CHILD IS MARS! HE WOKE US!*

*They woke you.*

The rising argument of the Martian gods was still deafening, but Bruce found it receding as he focused on the little silence staring out at him. In his mind's eye, he touched it and felt it ache in lonely empathy. It would be eased, he knew, if it just joined the harmonies that bathed its surface, and he could not understand why he resisted the urge to soothe it into the stream of consciousness that so desired it.

He became aware that H'ronmeer now stood with him in his own mental plane, watching the way he caressed the silence. *That is his human part,* H'ronmeer explained.

*I don't -* Bruce began, bewildered rather than enlightened by the explanation. *I don't understand.*

*You hear the great voice.*

Bruce gestured around himself. *All this? Yes. It is beautiful.*

*It is Mars. The essence of every life, every soul.*

*BLASPHEMER! YOU BETRAY US, BROTHER, TO TELL THIS ROCK-*

H'ronmeer took the brunt of this shout, sheltering Bruce from its blast as the man continued to cup the silence in his hand.

*FOOLS!* H'ronmeer blasted back. *YOU WOULD DESTROY ALL THAT WE ARE
BECAUSE YOU CANNOT RECOGNIZE HIS TRUTH, THAT THIS IS WHAT HE DIES FOR!*

Bruce was barely listening. He was gathering the silence toward him, sharing its loneliness and echoing its ache in the deepest corner of his own heart. He should let it go, a part of him argued, but with it here in his hand? He wanted only to protect it, to hold it close...

*BUT HE IS MARS! THE GREAT VOICE! WE MUST MAKE IT REMEMBERED!* came a
plaintive cry, and Bruce wasn't sure if they were pleading against H'ronmeer's words or Bruce's actions in the expanding eye of a mental hurricane.

*IT IS NOT FORGOTTEN!* H'ronmeer objected, exasperation evident in his tone. *_WE_ FORGOT. BUT THESE MINDS YOU TOUCH NOW? THEY ARE AS THIS ONE!*

Fire seared through Bruce's mind, but an island remained where his mental self still cradled a little silence in his hands. Dimly he sensed tears of pain too intense to be borne on his physical cheeks. A clamor arose, shrieks that flayed his skin and forced the air from his lungs, but the silence before him was growing, pushing back the denials and doubt-filled cries of the gods, making them seem as distant from him as his own flesh now felt. Even the dancing voices were retreating as the silence loomed, fixing him with its own intensity. It rose until it seemed to fill every space and then...

He was in it. Absolute silence, stripped even of his own heartbeat or the rush of blood through his body. He remained frozen within it, feeling that he should be frightened, or at least concerned, but he was only in the moment. The perfectly silent moment. He did not know what his body was doing, and it didn't seem to matter. All that mattered was the unbreakable silence.

Or not unbreakable. For even as he began to marvel at the wonder of the silence, a familiar voice spoke in tremulous tones.

*Bruce?*

(19)

Pieter pushed back his goggles, allowing himself his blindness for a moment. It was a mistake, he realized too late, as the rawness of the crash, it's aftermath, forced itself churning back into prominence in his mind. He clenched his fists impotently, fighting the grief that he knew wouldn't fade because it hadn't yet, even after three hours. What was it Oracle had said? "We gut it out because we have to, Doctor. Because we call ourselves heroes." Dinah had mentioned that Oracle could be ... tough to take sometimes. Right at the wrong times. Or at the right times, as frustration at her rightness gave him the strength to dash his tears away and resettle his goggles over his eyes.

"Doctor Mid-Nite?"

He turned, his features controlled now. "Yes, Lenore?"

"My sisters report that emergency room traffic has slowed to a trickle around the world. We will stay as long as we are needed, but it appears -"

"I understand, Lenore. I will inform Oracle."

The woman nodded stiffly and left the room. Amazons, he reflected - a handful of them, but strangely, enough. Only those with some taint of the man's world already on them, and a few striplings driven more by compassion than sense, but their presence had had a striking impact
where they had been stationed. Most of them wouldn't even speak to the men they worked alongside in the hospitals and counseling centers of the world, but the women - the women they met all seemed empowered by the natives of Themyscira. He wondered what words passed between cultures that allowed these women to hear the message of the Amazons and overcome their crippling grief enough to stand as supports for so many others. He imagined Hippolyta for a moment, bringing new stinging tears to his eyes. Once more he struggled for his composure as he
keyed in the signal for Oracle.

A faintly Grecian-looking mask appeared on his monitor, accompanied by a synthesized voice. "Oracle here. Go ahead, Mid-Nite."

"Oracle, it appears that whatever else is happening here, the need for emergency services is diminishing."

There was a hint of a pause. "That's consistent with other reports. Thank you, Mid-Nite."

She didn't wait for his sign off, and he let himself be annoyed. He wanted to talk to her about what it all meant, that such heartfelt grief had somehow not only virtually ended human assaults on one another, but had also stayed the hands of many would-be suicides. It seemed counterintuitive, yet emergency room traffic was grinding to a halt. Not even traffic accidents or kids falling out of trees, just the continuing care of the already ill. He mused on this for what
seemed like a long time, a niggling idea hovering at the edges of his consciousness.

He was almost startled when the idea blossomed into full clarity of thought. For the first time in several hours, Doctor Mid-Nite smiled, rising from his chair with new strength of purpose. He knew what he had to do, and in the energy of action, he almost didn't notice that the grief of the morning had fallen completely away.

*

"So now we're dealing with an alien force that can control our moods," Lex Luthor said acidly.

"Mr. President," Superman began carefully, "as I told the UN, we are not certain what is behind these strange effects, but we suspect it may be of alien origin, yes."

"And what is your sainted League doing about it?"

"Our priority right now is to find a way to shield the planet from the effects. We're still working on finding those responsible."

"Or shielding one of your members gone rogue?" To Superman's ears, Lex's voice sounded a little rough. "It seems to me you have a pretty powerful telepath among your ranks."

Superman stiffened. "I can assure you, Mr. President, J'onn J'onzz is not behind this. In fact, he was instrumental in discovering the influence."

"So you say." Lex stared hard at Superman, who calmly met his eyes. They stayed silent for a moment, and Superman was vaguely surprised when Lex broke the eye contact to swivel his chair around and look out over the gardens.

"Mr. President, I appreciate that your concern is for the defense of the American people. At the moment, though, I must urge you to consider how we can first free them from whatever thrall they are in."

"Yes," Lex replied, his tone carrying a certain heaviness.

"If I might suggest, we know STAR Labs has been working on telepathic dampening technologies and that the DEO has also funded considerable research into this field. As a matter of national security-"

"You want me to issue an executive order to have that technology mass produced," Lex finished. He turned his chair back around sharply, and Superman noticed a hint of moisture on one cheekbone. "Tell me this, Superman. Should I issue such an order, and such devices are installed globally, that pretty much guarantees our world is left telepathically deaf, does it not? Which not only exorcises our present demons, but it also nullifies any means of detecting future assaults. You say you have reason to believe that this particular episode is not the precursor of some invasion, but what if it is? Or what if a future situation arises where we require awareness of efforts to
telepathically control our thoughts?"

"With all due respect, Mr. President, this continuing wave of grief over the planet may render such concerns moot unless we are able to arrive at some alternative means of-" Superman paused. An odd expression crossed Luthor's face, and he suddenly rose crisply from his seat. His hand had already slapped the call button on the intercom on his desk.

"Yes, Mr. President?"

"Rourke, get the Oval Office ready for a press conference. I want blanket media coverage - no alternative programming. Alert the media."

"Mr. President, Lydia is fielding calls now from the heads of GNN and the major networks offering to preempt all other programming. Couvade is prepared to coordinate with the mayoral network to organize assembly sites in all major metropolitan areas."

"Tell him to go ahead. I'll be out shortly." Lex looked up at Superman. "I appreciate your concern, Superman, and your interest in national security. But if you'll excuse me, I have a country to run. I trust you'll see yourself out."

Superman could only blink as Lex Luthor brushed by him with a sense of purpose. Then his signaler began to beep.

*

"This isn't working," Kyle sighed in frustration, swallowing hard against tears. "I can't focus past it enough to even imagine what I would feel like without the telepathic influence, let alone will that
feeling into existence."

"Tut, tut!" Plasticman scolded, adopting the shape of an Egyptian sarcophagus as he spoke. "Can't will get you nowhere. We've got to consider the problem sideways." He stretched himself thinly
horizontal.

"Sideways, backwards, upside down," Kyle protested. "We've tried everything. Even sitting around J'onn's quarters to try to get the feel of it. All that did was make it hurt more when we got away from the dampeners." Now a tear did trail down Kyle's cheek, trickling along the side of his nose to drip finally from its tip as he hung his head in despair.

"That's it!" Plasticman announced, bouncing excitedly out of the observatory.

"What's it?" Kyle questioned. "Hey, wait up!"

"We tried everything except having you try to work your will from inside J'onn's quarters," Plasticman explained.

"What good would that do?" Kyle asked, rushing to keep up with Plasticman's extra-long legged strides. "You wouldn't know if it worked if you were already in the room with me."

"I didn't say *I* would be in the room," Plasticman pointed out, halting at the door of J'onn's quarters. "I'll stay out here and you concentrate on blocking the telepathic influence from the whole tower. Then I can -"

"-tell me if it works. O'Brian, you're a genius!" Kyle exclaimed. He punched the entry code into a touch pad on the wall and glanced over at his companion. For the briefest instant, he noticed Eel's lip had begun to quiver. A manifestation of the grief effect, surely, Kyle reminded himself, already feeling the relief provided by the dampening field. Before he could offer any comfort, though, Plasticman was in the shape of a stopwatch.

"Get a move on, GL!" Plasticman barked, contorting into a drill sergeant.

"I'm moving," Kyle shot back, slipping into the quiet of J'onn's quarters and shutting the door behind him.

The sudden dissipation of emotion, even though he knew it was coming, left him weak-kneed. He sank down beside a low table that graced the small entry room to J'onn's quarters, resting his head on his arms for a moment. He was exhausted. It had been easier to ignore when he and Plasticman had come into J'onn's quarters together, but here alone, freed from the effort of fighting the grief effect? The earlier sense of loneliness he'd felt still haunted these quarters, compounded by his own fears for what had happened to J'onn and what might happen to them all.

He shook himself, realizing he had no time for such thoughts and that he was dangerously close to falling asleep. He focused his attention on how his present state differed from that under the telepathic influence outside, trying to isolate some telltale that would help him create a block to the mental manipulation.

"IT'S WORKING!" Plasticman's voice suddenly blared from the comlink on the wall.

Kyle frowned and rose to open a reply channel. "I'm not doing anything yet," he reported.

"Are you sure?"

"Pretty damn sure," he grumbled.

"Well, then, you better get out here, stat. We need to get to the monitor womb and call Supes."

"On my way," Kyle answered, puzzled. He went back to the door, steeling himself, and passed out into - a sudden sense of energy and a realization. Plas was right; they needed to make some calls and get things moving. He felt himself smiling as he hastened toward the monitor womb. Things were going to be okay.

(20)

Bruce Wayne had no idea how much time had passed since his mind had been enveloped by this oddly comforting silence. An eyeblink or an eternity - either option seemed viable. He felt he should care more, but after J'onn had querulously pronounced his name, Bruce became aware
of J'onn all around him - that the silence WAS J'onn. More importantly, it was J'onn not leaving him.

Almost as if on cue with this thought, J'onn's voice sounded again. *You cannot stay here.*

*I know,* Bruce projected. *We've got a planet to save.*

*No, my friend,* J'onn corrected, his mental tone both pained and patient. *You have a home to help set back to rights.*

*So you've persuaded them, then,* Bruce noted with approval. *We can-*

*_You_ persuaded them - or we both did. Which is why you need to return now. Go home where you are needed.*

*Me,* Bruce remarked flatly.

*Yes.*

*Not you.*

There was a tiny pause. *Yes.*

Batlike firmness bled into Bruce's tone. *Not an option.*

*Bruce-*

*I told you I would not let you go through this again. You are not going to suffer the loss of all you love-*

*Bruce, it's my decision. The right decision.*

*I do not accept that. And I will not leave you.*

A hint of despair entered J'onn's tone. *You'll die, Bruce. Ace and Zo'ok can only keep your body alive and protected for so long if your soul does not-*

*Soul.*

The mental equivalent of a nod projected into Bruce's mind.

Bruce stretched his consciousness, taking in the pocket of silence. At its fringes, he realized he could still hear the great voice. *This is your soul.* He could not keep a hint of accusation out of his tone.

*Yes,* J'onn admitted.

*And when I leave, you will join the great voice.*

J'onn's voice grew quieter. *Yes.*

Bruce's mind flashed back to H'ronmeer's words: <Little soul, you wait for him.> An unwanted vision of J'onn's body splayed over the Martian rocks forced itself into his memory, and he stiffened his resolve. *No.*

*Bruce, don't you see? This is the only way - they need this closure, this -* There was a sigh that radiated around and through him.

*Explain.*

For a long moment, it seemed that J'onn would not answer him, and Bruce wondered if he would be able to resist if J'onn were to actually force him to leave.

*We woke them, Bruce.*

The words were a tangle of remorse and longing.

*How?*

*Love.*

Another long silence reigned before J'onn continued.

*When we - when we realized we could do this, that we could love each other - that stirred the great voice. The souls of my people, they live on through me. I anchor them, and my loneliness - they respected it. They muted the great voice so as not to remind me more painfully of what was gone.*

*They sing now,* Bruce observed, struggling to understand.

*Yes. You remember when they began.*

It wasn't a question, and Bruce realized suddenly he did remember that late night after a hard case, when J'onn had come to him, when for the first time they had made love without compromise, blending Martian and human into something uniquely theirs. His mind still easily summoned up the faint awe that graced J'onn's face in the moonlit bedroom, the sense of joyous music still resonating in Bruce in the warm afterglow of their intimacy.

*The gods of my people, they are - not precisely custodial. There is no human equivalent for their role in relation to the great voice. The great voice feeds them, and they in turn guard it, direct the people in concrete ways how to maintain it. They are not idols, but more properly a means of expressing ideas which are sometimes hard to grasp, the ways in which the great voice could come into being as we grew and learned as a people.*

*Like Hindu gods,* Bruce grunted.

*Similar, yes, in that they are the road to understanding the true ineffable power which invests a soul. But more real - the Martian gods did walk Mars, although we came to think them myth.*

*Why?*

*As the great voice grew, as everyone became enabled to hear it, even the living, even relatively young children once they had established themselves enough not to become enthralled and lost in the great voice and suffer death for the desire to meld with it - the gods became less necessary. They became as parables, their lessons acting as powerfully as they could. So they slept.*

*Except H'ronmeer.*

*Except H'ronmeer,* J'onn agreed. *We had not yet conquered our fear of death, of loss, despite the knowledge that death was only passage into the great voice. We still knew the selfishness of individualism, and to lose that in the great voice made us cling to life rather than allow death. H'ronmeer would have been the last to sleep in any case.*

*It called this your human part,* Bruce observed.

Another sigh filled the silence. *I do not wish to give you up.*

*Then don't. Simple.*

*I don't have a choice, Bruce. This is how it must be.*

Bruce felt his temper rising. *Why? You still haven't given me a reason!*

He regretted his outburst when he felt a wave of anguished sorrow around him.

*J'onn,* he began gently, trying to blend into J'onn's consciousness as a comforting presence.

*I'm sorry, Bruce.* It was the softest of whispers across Bruce's mind, a quiet voice breaking over the words.

Bruce fought the desire to lash out, instead forcing himself toward acceptance that he didn't want, if only to bring J'onn's silence closer. *Just explain,* he pleaded. *Please.*

The great voice was sounding louder, its joy and power now grating to Bruce. He swallowed the anxiety it prompted.

*Please,* he repeated.

*I opened Earth to them, their misunderstanding.*

*The gods?*

The silence felt like an acknowledging nod. *When I let myself love you - it had been so long since the great voice had sung...*

*The gods woke. You already-*

*Bruce.* There was reproach in J'onn's mental tone. *Yes, they woke. And they heard the great voice only singing with the dead, not the living. Save me. And you.*

Bruce waited for him to continue, fearing what he would say but needing to know, if he was to lose J'onn, why it must be so.

*They thought you were Martian.*

Bruce snorted. *Dumb gods.*

The great voice hummed louder, and he imagined J'onn wrapping around him, reminding him painfully of what was at stake. *They saw what I saw. Not that I saw you as Martian, but that I loved you, could love you. That you were becoming my whole.*

The last words were almost unintelligible, and Bruce could hear the echo of H'ronmeer again. He felt his soul twisting, and wondered bitterly if he had somehow just died and gone to hell, if the raw pain of inevitable loss was his eternal reward. *I opened Earth to them then,* he pointed out acidly.

There was another shift in the silence, as if to comfort, and he tried to steel himself to it. *No, Bruce. You did nothing wrong. I -*

*Neither did you!* Bruce objected hotly. *What kinds of gods are these that would rather see you suffer than allow you what comfort I can give you!*

*Lonely ones,* J'onn answered succinctly. *Confused gods, who saw only that somehow, in their slumber, the responsibility of the people to the great voice had been abandoned. Gods who needed to teach a new generation how to hear the great voice.*

*Humans are not Martians!* Bruce argued, anger winning over sense as he felt himself wounding his lover.

*I know,* J'onn replied.

The great voice intensified.

*J'onn, I-*

*Imagine sleeping finally, believing your work done, and then waking to the absence of all life. And imagine also the tiniest sounds in the distance. Would you not head toward them? And then imagine reaching those voices and finding children, lost and afraid, each desperately alone, silent to one another. You could barely see them, just through a little peep hole, but you knew the way to lead them out of their darkness. What would you do?*

Bruce stayed silent, knowing that J'onn knew the answer, and hating that he knew it. He would try to help. He would have to.

*They didn't understand the possible costs of their intentions. They cannot even see you as minds - save through me.*

*But they know now,* Bruce objected. *They called me a rock.*

*Yes. And even now they are working to repair their damage as they withdraw from Earth.*

*So you can come home.*

*I am home.*

The great voice felt nearer, the silence around Bruce palpably diminishing. *Why must I let them have you?* Bruce demanded, knowing his mind's cry was like a sob.

*So that the gods and the great voice might know peace.* J'onn's voice sounded distant, peaceful. Calmly explaining. *When I join the great voice, then it will be as promised for Mars - the god and great voice will unite, will become joined as a whole, the healed spirit of Mars.*

The silence was growing claustrophobically small, and staying within it was becoming an act of will for Bruce. J'onn's voice continued, musing, far away.

*My mother told me once that she had had a vision of a dark future in which our people would need a champion. 'Someone who would embody the very best aspects of our race.' She claimed that champion was me. For years, I have borne the burden of failing her prophecy, of not saving
my people. Now I can.*

*J'onn-* Bruce gasped, feeling the silence expel him into the tumultuous song of the great voice, watching as it shrunk down, down, smaller and smaller...

"J'ONN!" he screamed desperately, realizing only as the sound left his throat that he was back in his body, wrapped protectively by Ace and Zo'ok, collapsed onto the cold ground beside the still corpse of his lover.

(21)

"... security ... plans for ... imperative ..."

The words were echoing through a strange feeling of detachment, but something told Wally he should focus on them.

"... time of crisis ... great bond ... mobilized several divisions ..."

The voice was familiar. Who-?

"... worked with the UN ... global leaders have agreed ... including members of the Justice League and ..."

Lex! Wally stiffened, suddenly realizing who was speaking. What was going on? Where was he? And why was Lex Luthor-?

"Wally?"

Linda? What - he felt her take up his hand.

"Wally, can you hear me?"

"... all non-essential industries have been asked to ..."

Wally swallowed. "Linda?" he croaked through a dry throat. "What's -"

"Oh, Wally, thank god!" Linda interrupted, and he finally forced his eyes open in confusion. It took him a moment to focus, and when he did, he saw only his wife's face, her eyes red-rimmed and blood shot, her skin blotchy. "Doctor!" she was calling. "Doctor!"

"Linda," he tried again. "What's going on? Why-"

"Shhh," she cut him off. "It's okay now. Everything's going to be okay."

"What's going to be okay? What-?"

"Ah, Mr. West. You've decided to rejoin us," a not unkindly voice remarked, and Wally turned to see a familiar lab-coated physician on the side of the bed opposite Linda.

"STAR Labs?" he asked, recognizing the place he had seen the woman more than he was able to put a name to her face. "Why am I at -?"

"Hold your horses for a moment, young man," the doctor directed sternly as she lifted his arm to take his pulse. "I'm sure your wife will be happy to explain once I give her permission to take you home. Which I won't do unless you promise to take it easy and not immediately start running off to help the recovery efforts."

"Recovery efforts? What happened?"

"It's a long story, Wally," Linda said with a sigh. "How is he, doctor?"

"Eh, a little worse for wear, but certainly better for the rest. Although I'd imagine you're feeling pretty hungry."

Wally paused, aware suddenly of his stomach. "Uh, yeah, now that you mention it-"

"Good, good. So here's what we're going to do. Linda here will be witness to this. Your solemn word, Mr. West - no heroics for at least 72 hours."

"Seventy-two hours? But -" he gestured toward the TV screen from which Lex Luthor's voice still projected, "they need me. There's-"

"Oh, Wally," Linda protested, but there was happiness in her tone.

"Mr. West, you were brought here almost 30 hours ago suffering from severe exhaustion complicated by dehydration and malnutrition. You have numerous muscle tears and other assorted tissue damage which will undoubtedly make itself felt when I allow you to get off this bed and accompany your lovely wife to the cafeteria. As our esteemed President is explaining to the public, the weird alien mood control which has been affecting the planet has - for reasons not yet determined - abated. Any 'bad guys' your sort would normally go after have apparently been neutralized already, and quite frankly, even if they hadn't been, I would refuse to allow you to go out and fight, no matter what your hero code demands. Leave the recovery effort in the hands of
the healers, Mr. West, and give me cause to sleep easier at night knowing that you will be going into whatever the next battle is fully recovered."

Wally blinked at the serious expression on the doctor's face, then turned to Linda. "30 hours?"

Linda nodded, squeezing his hand again. "You thought it was the Speed Force, but it wasn't. Just this alien thing."

Wally's eyes widened in sudden memory. "Max? Jesse?" he asked urgently.

"We sent Ms. Quick home with the rest of the Titans about an hour ago. Mr. Mercury is presently attending the bedside of his young charge, who I suspect will also be waking soon."

"Bart?"

"He went down, too, honey. All the speedsters did. And then the Atom - that's when we realized what was going on wasn't the Speed Force."

"They'll be okay, right?" Wally asked anxiously.

"I imagine Mr. Garrick will have a slightly longer recovery time, which will hopefully serve to remind him not to ignore his teammate's medical advice," the doctor remarked dryly, "but yes, it looks as if you all can expect full and relatively speedy recoveries. Now, your word, Mr. West, so we can unhook this IV and get you fed and on the way home?"

Wally looked at Linda's tired face and saw the pleading in her eyes. 30 hours! And an entire mission completely missed, by the sounds of things. But ... the doctor had a point. And Linda - he felt a pang of guilt for the worry lines that marred her face. Sleep would ease them, but he'd give her cause to worry again. He squeezed her hand and answered the doctor without releasing Linda's eyes. "I promise."

"Very good, then," the doctor pronounced efficiently, busying herself with extracting the IV and applying a bandaid to his arm. "There. Now take it slow," she advised. "Holler for a nurse if you need help."

"We will, doctor," Linda promised, already helping Wally to sit up.

"Whoa - headrush," he complained as his feet swung free of the bed. "Hold up a second."

Linda stopped, letting her arm supporting his shoulders shift into a more embracing move and pressing her lips high on his cheek. "I was so worried, Wally," she confessed in a whisper.

"I know," he acknowledged, running a hand through her hair. "I'm going to need to sit here a minute," he stated, suddenly aware of how very heavy his limbs felt. He almost resented the accuracy of the doctor's prediction.

She nodded and scooted up onto the bed beside him. They leaned together for a moment, and Wally breathed in the scent of her, faintly grubby and musky and travel-stained. Thirty hours and she probably had been here the whole time. He pulled her still closer, remembering again how much he loved her. "So it was aliens?" he asked.

She nodded. "They think so. Something telepathic from what Pieter was telling me."

"Pieter?"

"Doctor Mid-Nite," she clarified.

"Right. Telepathic?"

"Breaking down the mind-body connection. All of us were feeling it, ignoring our health in favor of our passions, our work, whatever. It got you faster because, well-"

"I live faster," he finished for her, unable to keep a hint of regret out of his voice.

"No, don't get sad about it," she admonished, offering him another kiss on the cheek. "I love your crazy speed, even when it drives me nuts."

He smiled faintly and met her lips. When they separated, she breathed, "But I do like it when you kiss me slowly."

He chuckled and gave her shoulders a squeeze. "So something got inside our heads," he prompted.

"Yeah. You missed a rough time of it," she noted. "There was this sudden moment when everyone just crashed - all the stress of weeks suddenly caught up. And when we woke up -" She paused, her eyes glassy and distant. "It was so horrible."

They were silent a moment. Then Wally blurted out, "J'onn!"

Linda's expression grew wary. "What about J'onn?"

"He was trying to tell us - I remember, right before I collapsed. He figured it out, didn't he?"

Linda sighed.

"Didn't he?"

"We think so."

"Wait. Think so?"

She lowered her voice. "He's gone. So is Batman. I don't think I'm supposed to know, but I overheard -"

Wally surged to his feet. "Then they-" he began, then found himself gripping the bed for balance.

Linda was up at his side, tucking herself under his arm. "No heroics," she scolded. "You promised."

"But if they're missing -" Wally protested weakly.

"There's nothing you can do about it."

Wally straightened up and stared at her for a moment. In the background, a reporter had replaced Lex Luthor on the television. "... three day global cease fire as the UN declared this a period of
recovery. Volunteers from Themyscira are coordinating military medical personnel around the planet to..."

"I know," Wally finally said, taking up Linda's hand. He grimaced faintly. "I'm going to count myself lucky if I make it to the lunch wagon before I start digesting myself."

Linda smiled at the joke. "C'mon, Flash," she ordered, moving ahead of him and tugging on his hand. "Let's get you refueled. Then maybe I'll race you home?"

He snorted. "You'd win." But he followed her pull, settling in beside her, and the couple walked slowly out of the room and down the hall as the television droned on.

"Again, the President assures us that the danger is past, and it is now our task to band together and support one another as we weather the days ahead..."

(22)

Eight years old, awash in tears. Somehow too wise already to beg the cooling corpses to rise, to be his parents again, whole, unbroken. He had known they were gone, and he had cried what he had thought were his last tears. Wept dry. Empty.

Like that hollow place he had almost religiously held for them. The part of his heart that he pushed people away from when they got too close. As if protecting the old hurt would immunize him to later pain, would make it somehow more bearable. Hurt so deeply once, all other hurts could only be pale echoes.

He had been wrong. They could be perfect echoes, or deeper ones.

He couldn't even gather J'onn's body to him. Mars had claimed him, anchored his flesh firmly in its soil. It wasn't content just to take his soul, it had to have all of him.

Bruce Wayne hated Mars.

As he knelt, forehead pressed against J'onn's shoulder, tears running unchecked down his cheeks, he hated Mars with a visceral quality that drove out almost all other thought. How dare they? How could they force such a choice on J'onn - knowing as they must have what J'onn would choose? And damn him for being so noble! The safety and well-being of two worlds in exchange for one man's heart and one Martian's life. A veritable bargain - and damn him anyway for doing the right thing!

Bruce snaked one arm beneath J'onn's head and wrapped the other around J'onn's torso, pulling himself down to the body he could not lift from the Martian bedrock. He buried his face in the crook of J'onn's neck, willing Ace to allow skin to skin contact even though J'onn's flesh was
already freezing in the Martian cold. Bruce's tears trailed down J'onn's chest to solidify into icicles as they journeyed.

Why had he been so foolish as to love him? Love always hurt him, in the end. Always. As soon as the fates thought he might flirt with the possibility of happiness - he tightened his grip on J'onn's body, more tears impossibly welling from his eyes. He should go home, he knew, back where he was needed, but somehow he couldn't make himself let go of J'onn's body, couldn't make the tears stop falling. Like before. Like with his parents.

He closed his eyes, and their bodies were there again, oozing blood into the alley - but somehow that image was preferable to the cold green flesh against his cheeks. Yet even the familiar pain of old death couldn't begin to mute the searing of his soul in this moment.

He didn't notice as he wept that the tear icicles now dripping down to the surface of the planet were rising and moving. Even his highly attuned senses did not feel the waterspout that rose around his body, tangling around his chest and legs, until suddenly he was lifted away from J'onn.

"NO!" he protested, struggling futilely against coils of water that yielded only to reform around him.

*wasting not?* a burbling voice queried. *pain water - the rock makes water for loss. like our lost child did.*

"You killed him!" Bruce accused, recognizing that this was one of the gods and struggling against it with more determined blows. If the god felt his strikes, it gave no sign.

*shhhh. he is mars, and mars is always living. and you-* the water shifted its hold on him, petting him awkwardly. *the rock loves?*

*Not a rock, S'luvani,* H'ronmeer's voice suddenly intervened. *Human.*

Bruce twisted against the water, turning so he could at least see J'onn. H'ronmeer was looming over the broken body, its flames licking dangerously close to the corpse. "Stop," Bruce pleaded. "H'ronmeer, for us..." His voice broke, and more tears fell to be drawn into the water god around him. He felt it touching his face, accepting his tears and trying to soothe.

*It does love!* Another voice remarked, and Bruce thought he recognized it as the voice of the sand. *Where is R'sala?*

*Hhheeerrree,* the wind breathed, and Bruce felt a breeze touch his cheeks even through the protective shield of Ace. *SSSoooo ssstraaanggge,* it commented. *Iiit ssseeeemmmss yourrr chiiilllld, Ssss'luuuvvvaannniii, wiiiith iiiitsss waaaaaaterrrr. Buuut iiit iiisss huuuurrrtinnnng, nnnooot heeeeealllllinnnng.*

*And it is not your child, R'sala? It loves!* the sand voice put in, its tone encouraging.

*Nnnnnooooo,* the wind breathed. *Iiiiiitsss llllloooovvvvvve iiiissss ffffiiiirrrrrrre.*

*H'ronmeer?* the sand voice ventured.

Bruce renewed his struggle. "I am not. Your. CHILD!"

The water pulled away from him as if burned, dumping him unceremoniously to the ground - which rose in a wave to cushion his fall. Around him he could hear the gods' voices rising again. *What is it? What is it?*

Bruce struggled to reach for J'onn again, but the sand encumbered him, swirling up to his knees and trapping him, despite his efforts to step free. "Let me go!" he demanded, frustrated that there was no assailant to throw off, no logic of movement that would free him.

*Human.* That was H'ronmeer again, still paused over J'onn's body. A flaming tendril reached out - not towards J'onn, but towards Bruce. He could feel its heat, not close enough to singe, but hot enough to be felt through Ace's protective cocoon. For a moment it looked as if H'ronmeer might offer him something, but then the sand spoke.

*Your child?*

H'ronmeer withdrew. *No. No more than any of those he represents.* It leaned down towards J'onn.

Bruce felt a slight give in the sand around his legs and he took the moment. "NO!" he cried, flinging his body forward with all his strength to fall across J'onn's.

H'ronmeer retreated slightly, projecting a sense of bemusement. *There is in these humans a spirit,* it observed.

*YES,* a new voice boomed, and Bruce felt an impenetrable shadow loom forward, an absence of light.

*K'ergaard!* the sand exclaimed. *You have returned!*

The darkness knelt down, and Bruce felt it raising his face, studying him appraisingly. *You know me, human,* it murmured, and Bruce recognized loss and heartache, felt new tears falling as the echo of his heart's grief resounded in the dark.

*Yes,* Bruce confessed.

*K'eeeerrrrrgaaaarrrrrd,* the wind breathed. *Hhhhaaalffff ooooffff mmmmyyyy whhhhoooollllle...* The shadow swirled in the touch of the breeze, but did not dissipate.

*Yes, R'sala, my whole of love and change. Join with me and feel what I know.*

Bruce watched, mesmerized, as the wind tangled through the shadow, causing the darkness to sliver and twist in a dance of loss and love and resolve and change that resonated in his bones.

*Iiiii ssssseeeeee nnnnnoooooowwww,* the wind gasped, swirling free of the darkness. *Aaaaassss iiiiinnnnnffffaaaannnnntssss.*

*Yes,* K'ergaard agreed, and the shadow brushed at Bruce's tears.

*EXPLAIN!* the sand demanded, and its cry was echoed by the voices of the other gods, hammering at Bruce's skull. He gasped, feeling himself choking, drowning, battered on all sides. He pressed his face against J'onn's flesh, wanting to force his soul from his body, to find the
silence that had been J'onn.

And then the cries grew muffled as darkness descended - not the darkness of unconsciouness, but of the Martian god K'ergaard, the one he recognized as loss and resolution and loneliness because it seemed to speak to his soul with its shadow. *Be quiet, my siblings,* the shadow urged, *and I will tell you of my wandering on Earth, and of the spirit there - not our great voice, but akin. New and learning, built not on our dualities but on a wholly other blend of understandings. T'jorsham, my sibling of old wisdom, as you know me to be the inspiration of such wisdom, release our last child.*

Bruce started as he felt the ground seem to heave, and the shadow around him lifted him - and J'onn, whom he held so tightly. Suddenly they both were cradled in darkness, hovering over red sands on a cushion of shadow. Around them he could feel the Martian gods quieting, settling down around the darkness - all save for H'ronmeer, who hovered near, its heat the only thing penetrating the shadow.

*These humans,* K'ergaard began, rocking Bruce and J'onn together within its embrace, *they felt me as I walked among them. I did not speak or try to touch their minds as we promised our child we would no longer do, but still they felt me. And I felt there another presence, older and larger than the universe itself - of such stuff as we are.*

Murmurs rose among the gods, but in the shadow Bruce could not make them out.

*This child-* Bruce felt the darkness gently freeing J'onn's body from his grip, sensed rather than saw the way it reverentially folded J'onn's arms over his chest and curled him into its protective embrace. *This child, our last,* K'ergaard continued, *is wiser than we. He sacrifices for them, for love, and offers us a peace until we should rise to join this other presence. But he is also still a child, and understands the universe as a child would.

*I touched the presence on Earth, and it reminded me of plans greater than a child could understand. It reminded me of teaching, and of the truth that teaching is impossible - there is only opening the paths of learning. There is strength in offering aid, but there is greater strength in knowing when such aid will only hurt, despite its intentions.*

Now Bruce felt himself enfolded more firmly in the shadow, turned outward as if to display to the gods, although he could see nothing but the dark. *It is this that our child sacrifices himself for - not for us so much as for the love of what we were too blind to see. See it now.*

The darkness did not fade, but Bruce could feel the touches of sand and water and rock and a million other sensations which defied his ability to understand, blended into feelings he could not separate into meaningful terms.

*H'ronmeer?* K'ergaard said quietly.

Then the darkness was pierced by the dancing of flame, scarcely more than a candle flicker before Bruce's eyes. The flame parted, and Bruce's heart leapt. Within it rested a little silence, tiny, but there. J'onn. He started to reach for it, but his hands were held back.

*A moment,* K'ergaard admonished. *Know what you do. What is demanded of this little soul, should it be severed from the great voice.*

A rush of information poured into Bruce's mind, of J'onn, living always as a link to these gods, the means to their understanding of other presences of the universe. Outliving Bruce, outliving all he loved, traveling to other corners of the universe, always ending alone so that his people, his gods, would grow in their wisdom. He felt K'ergaard's restraint loosen, giving him leave to reach forward, to rejoin with J'onn, to bring him back.

He bowed his head, tears coming again as he understood the magnitude of the choice offered him. "I cannot."

Around him he could sense the gasping sighs of a million million voices.

*What you cannot, we must,* K'ergaard said quietly, and the little silence in front of him began to grow. *But your choice is proof of your soul.*

The silence had pushed away the flame, was beginning to stretch tendrils forward.

"No," Bruce objected softly, his heart aching.

*Sleep now, little human,* K'ergaard whispered in his mind. *Sleep and forget what you have learned here. It is not for children to know such wisdom.*

"But-" Bruce began, but his eyelids were growing heavy, and the silence and darkness eased him to the ground. And as the last vestiges of consciousness escaped him, he felt a familiar caress across his mind and a sudden sense of peace.

(23)

Amy Rohrbach picked the two styrofoam cups of coffee off the roof of the cruiser and slid into the driver's seat. "Grayson," she grunted, handing one of the cups over to him.

"Hm? Thanks, Amy," he replied, offering her a half-hearted version of the patented Grayson smile and wincing as he took a small sip of the scalding liquid.

"De nada," she answered, pulling her door shut and fastening her seatbelt. They remained silent as she started the engine and pulled the car out of the vacant lot where the relief station had been set up. "Who'd have thought they'd park one of those relief wagons into the Moores?" she remarked.

"Only took a global crisis," Grayson commented ironically, his eyes staring out his window.

She glanced at him as she turned down Ryedale. Her partner had seemed lost in thought all shift, although his eyes scanned the streets with perfect alertness. Not that there had been any action. The streets weren't quiet, but the only suspicious activity they'd investigated had proven more heartening than threatening. There'd been the group in the park, working to organize the community to make sure everyone had food in their pantries to see them through the three days of business closings mandated by the President. The graffiti artists they'd caught proved to be painting a mural for peace - a quick phone call to the owner of the building they were "defacing" had resulted in the same owner calling a friend at a hardware store to provide the youngsters
with more paint. The known gang-bangers assembling in contested turf were negotiating the terms of their own local cease-fire. "Hey, copper," one had protested, "I don't wanna be feelin' the way I felt this mornin' again anytime soon."

She sighed; the silence was beginning to get to her. "Two hours left," she noted.

She saw Grayson's eyes flick to the dashboard clock. "Yeah," he said, an odd tension in his tone.

"You okay, Grayson?"

Now he actually looked at her. "Yeah. Just -"

"I know. Normally I'd count a six-hour shift as a blessing, but now I'm wishing Luthor had put it at four." It had been an odd decree, every law enforcement officer obliged to six hours a day during the recovery period. There'd been no grumbling - even among the cops whose vacations had been cancelled or the forces used to 24 on, 48 off.

"How about you?" Grayson asked.

"I'm hanging in. Any plans for after work?"

"Figured I'd head to Gotham," he answered, seeming to sense her desire for conversation. "Spend some time with my family."

She nodded. "I hear that. I figure me and Jim will take the kids for a picnic tomorrow before I gotta come back to work."

"That sounds nice. How're they doing?"

She snorted. "Better than the rest of us - or maybe just more normal than the rest of us. Had to take Justin to the ER this morning."

"Oh, no! Nothing serious, I take it."

"No - it would almost be funny. It was when - you know."

"Yeah," he said softly. No one was going to forget that horrible feeling of grief that had descended in the early hours of the day.

"Anyway, Emma thought me and Jim needed cheering up, so she put on a magic show. The final touch was supposed to be that she'd make a dime disappear and then reappear out of Justin's ear."

"And she really put the dime in his ear," Dick groaned in sudden understanding.

"Yep. God knows how she got it wedged in there, but it wasn't coming out."

"Hence the ER."

"Yeah. They were real nice about it - the place was pretty quiet by then. We actually had one of those Amazons take care of him."

"Really? I didn't think they'd stick one of them here."

"Guess they did. She was real nice, too - to me and Emma, anyway. She didn't have the time of day for Jim."

"I bet. But she was okay with Justin."

"I don't think kids qualify as men or something," Amy dismissed. "She had him calmed down and the dime out lickety split. But when she found out I was a cop she kinda sat and talked to me a bit."

"What about?"

"Oh, you know. This and that. She had this whole warrior idea, and I guess the cop thing fit in with it. She was interesting."

"How so?"

"I dunno. She was explaining about how her culture works without men. About her gods and where babies come from and-"

"Where do their babies come from?" Grayson interrupted.

"Sworn to secrecy, partner," Amy grinned. "But the god thing was interesting. She talked about them like they just sort of showed up from time to time, hung out with them. Can you imagine? 'I'm going to dinner with God, here, catch you later?'"

Grayson laughed a little. "That would be weird. Huh." His expression turned thoughtful.

"What?"

"Nothing, I was just imagining." He glanced at the clock again. "Hey, Amy, you mind if we find a phone? I gotta make a call."

"We could get dispatch to patch over the radio," she suggested.

He actually blushed a little. "It's kind of - private."

"Ohhhh," she teased. "I see. Hold on, there's a public phone on Watson."

"Great."

He lapsed again into silence, and she decided not to needle him. After a couple of turns, she pulled over. "Right there," she nodded.

"Got it. Back in a jif."

"I'm timing you," she shot back as he hopped out and shut the door behind him. She put the cruiser in park and settled back with a sigh, watching the evening sky darken.

*

Robin scowled at the computer screen. He'd taken over from Oracle on unscrambling the teleporter coordinates that Batman had used, and he'd hit another dead end. At least Batcomputer was protected against the worm built into the encryption program - something that had not been
true of Oracle's equipment. Fortunately, Babs hadn't gotten far enough to trigger the worm, but Tim had hit it twice, getting himself kicked out of the mainframe and forcing him to reboot the system.

"No luck, Master Tim?" Alfred asked as he set a tray of sandwiches at Robin's elbow.

"No. And Green Lantern called in ten minutes ago. He did a sweep of Mars with the ring - no trace of them."

"Well, they are both rather adept at escaping detection," Alfred reassured, although Tim sensed that the reassurance was as much for himself as for Robin.

"It'd be easier if we could at least isolate an area of the planet surface - then we could get a team in there and-"

The ringing of a phone interrupted him. Alfred reached for the receiver. "Wayne Manor," he answered smoothly. "Oh, good evening, Master Dick."

Tim looked up from the computer.

"Yes, he's here. No, no further word, I'm afraid... Very well, sir."

Alfred mutely held the phone out to Tim. "Yes?" Tim said into the receiver.

"Hey, Tim. I was just talking to Amy and I had a thought."

"Go ahead."

"What do we know about the Martian gods?"

Tim glanced up at Alfred. "Martian gods? Hold on, I'll see what we've got. You're thinking that there's a link?"

"I'm not sure," Dick replied. "But Amy was explaining how the Amazon gods are so involved in their affairs, and its the first thing aside from the fact they've got no men that anyone's mentioned that makes them different from anyone else."

A list of files showed up on the monitor. "We've got a bunch of stuff on H'ronmeer, and one tiny file on the rest of them. So you think maybe when the rest of us were all whacked out, the Martian gods were respecting the Amazon gods' turf?"

"Maybe. Listen, I gotta go - I'm still on duty. I'll come up there as soon as I get off."

"I'll be here," Tim replied. "Bye."

He handed the phone back to Alfred and stared at the computer. After a moment, he asked, "Alfred, Batman has faced down gods before, right?"

Alfred only set his hand on Robin's shoulder.

*

Grayson came back with a pensive look on his face. "Everything okay, partner?" Amy asked.

He pulled his seatbelt on and rescued his half-cooled coffee from the dash, drinking a long swallow. She waited, watching him closely. "Partner?" she asked again.

He sighed. "I hope so."

She studied him a moment longer, than put the cruiser in drive. "Hour and a half," she said. "We'll make it."

If he heard her, he gave no indication. Instead, he stared steadily out the window, his eyes turned faintly skyward.

(24)

J'onn J'onzz floated protectively near the sleeping form of his lover despite the knowledge that any danger was past, that Bruce would eventually wake. The gods had been almost solicitous when they brought them here, the assembly temple. They'd soothed J'onn's panic, if not answered his questions, encouraging him to open a link to Bruce to show that indeed, he was unharmed, only asleep. And they'd carried both of them with a gentleness bordering on reverence when they'd installed them here, in a space that tasted of Earth, the atmosphere and temperature adjusted accordingly. There were even soft mosses springing from the ground to cushion Bruce's body as he slept. Ace, relieved of its responsibility, had retreated tremblingly to its place in Batman's belt, and Zo'ok now clung to J'onn in a way that implied his fractured memories were correct - he had died. He let it cuddle him in the apparel of his office, although such signs of status and position were normally shed in Martian trueform.

Two tiers below and at some distance from them, a large well of souls sat silent, although his mind filled it with the great voice as he looked down upon it. Like a phantom limb to a human, he thought - a part removed but its removal unrecognized by the brain. Even the echoes of it that had soothed him in the months he had spent with Bruce were gone, and his heart knew he had heard it sing strongly in the recent past, had nearly joined it...

Bruce stirred, and he drifted closer to him, letting one hand brush an exposed cheek. Batman's mask was marred by white rivulets over his cheeks and nose and around his eyes. Salt, J'onn knew - from tears. He would put back the cowl for him, but that seemed like a violation somehow, and he resisted. The salt still pained him, though, triggering memories of how J'onn had hardened himself to Bruce's pleas, had done what he said he would not do and abandoned him.

*He let you go, Son of Mars,* a quiet voice interrupted his thoughts, and he looked down to see flame rising from the well of souls.

*H'ronmeer.*

The god seemed to nod, rising nearer although maintaining a respectful distance. *He was willing to accept losing you for your sake.*

J'onn glanced down at the quiet face, wondering again what had transpired. *He is noble,* he projected.

*Yes. I would not have believed it, but for you.*

*The other gods?* J'onn asked.

*Returned to their slumber, although they sleep more lightly than before. They will not threaten Earth again.*

*They didn't mean harm,* J'onn defended.

*No,* H'ronmeer agreed.

*But you do not join them?*

*And abandon you? Or him? No.*

J'onn looked sharply at the flaming god. *You care for him?*

*He is not our child, son of Mars, but his heart has learned our language. And he is the beginning of a new understanding, of a future to come.*

*You talk in riddles,* J'onn objected. *But I am glad not all of Mars is closed to me.* There was a sadness in his tone.

*Never, son of Mars. And when your wanderings are ended and your soul is too weary to go on, you will be welcomed home. Be sure of it so that you may face the times ahead.*

Bruce shifted again, mumbling a little.

*He will wake soon,* H'ronmeer noted. *And so I must leave you. Be well, son of Mars.*

H'ronmeer disappeared, and Bruce began to toss in his sleep, his subconscious kicking up images of J'onn's broken body. J'onn broadened his telepathic link, reaching into Bruce's dream to animate his own corpse and ease him from the brink of nightmare. *I'm here,* he soothed.

"J'onn!" Bruce cried, sitting bolt upright in a panic.

J'onn drew in closer, wrapping his arms around him, urging Bruce to lean on his shoulder. "Shhh," he whispered. "It's okay. Everything's okay."

For a moment, Bruce resisted him, remaining rigidly upright. Then the tension in his body began to bleed away. He broke J'onn's hold to reach up to his mask and push back the cowl, and J'onn felt the urge that motivated it - to look at J'onn with his naked eyes, to assure himself that yes, J'onn lived.

J'onn released him, waiting patiently as those blue eyes turned to him, hollow with fear and tear-burned. They were not the eyes of Batman, nor of the Bruce Wayne he knew, but of the little boy he knew lurked deep beneath the surface of the hero.

J'onn wanted to comfort him, but instead he watched, meeting Bruce's eyes calmly. After a moment, the fear and desperation faded to be replaced by a cold fury. "Damn you," Bruce snarled, launching himself at J'onn with fists and grappling holds.

J'onn rolled with the assault, rising to a defensive stance. He let several of Bruce's blows land solidly, defending only enough that Bruce could not accuse him of refusing to fight. Finally he flipped Bruce forward with enough force that it took two rolls for Batman to find his feet. "Enough, Bruce," he said.

Bruce paused, holding his ground and breathing raggedly. "You left me," he accused, and J'onn could feel the hurt and confusion in his mind.

"Yes," J'onn acknowledged, taking a slow step forward. "And you told me you would not allow me to close myself off from those I loved again."

Bruce watched warily as J'onn took another step forward, Bruce's hands reaching up for the cowl that still flopped down his back.

J'onn stopped, listening intently as the confused impressions in Bruce's mind began to sort themselves into rational memory. Bruce didn't draw his mask back on, but slowly, his face began to take on the hard lines of the Bat.

"Yes," he finally said. "And you did what you had to to save the world." His tone was coldly approving, and his mental energy was calculating. And somewhere beneath the stoic expression, Bruce was berating himself, embarrassed, hurt, and in an emotional tailspin.

J'onn took another step forward. "You brought me back, Bruce." He wanted to reach out with his mind, to speak telepathically where honesty was more certain and communication easier, but he sensed he would be rebuffed if he tried.

"The League does not abandon its own," Batman replied automatically, disowning deeper motives.

J'onn moved forward a little more, stopping at arm's length from Bruce. He studied the impassive expression on the man's face. He could sense the Bat readying for a battle of wits, preparing every argument at his disposal to protect Bruce Wayne, remembering that it was their love that had prompted the crisis in the first place. J'onn could counter that it was also their love that ended the crisis, but ... he didn't want to hear Batman - Bruce - say aloud how love had endangered the
world. Star-crossed lovers, he mused, realizing with a start that the thought was Bruce's more than his own. He bowed his head and stepped back. "I am sorry."

He felt Batman's mask slip, surprised at this move.

"If you would like to return to the Watchtower alone, I will follow later." He looked up, forcing his face to smile a little. "It was perhaps too much for us to hope for."

"No," Batman growled, and now he stepped forward.

"It's okay, Bruce," he assured, managing to keep his voice steady. "It was - sweet. A thing to be remembered fondly. I cannot ask more of you than that."

"J'onn-" Batman put a hand to J'onn's arm, but he seemed at a loss for words. At length, he let his hand fall.

"You see? We must go on - as teammates - for the world depends upon us. But that is all. I understand that, why it must be so." He reached a hand to Bruce's cheek. "You are a rare soul, Bruce Wayne. I feel honored to have known you so well." He wanted to kiss him, but knew if he did, he would lose his resolve. Instead he turned and walked back toward the bed of moss where Bruce had slept, settling on the ground to wait for Batman to leave. As he waited, he slowly,
gently, began to withdraw from Bruce's mind.

Batman stared at him. J'onn felt his eyes, but refused to meet them. He sensed it when Batman finally drew up his cowl, covering his face. He caught Batman's motion to his belt out of the corner of his eye, and he steeled himself for the teleporter beam to take him away, intending to sever his telepathic link to Bruce entirely in that moment.

But Batman didn't 'port out. Instead he stood there, poised to leave, his eyes fixed on J'onn. And beneath the will of the Bat, Bruce Wayne unexpectedly grabbed at the departing link between them.

J'onn looked up with a frown. "Bruce-" He would make this harder than it was already, and if it had to be, J'onn wanted it over with. He wanted his solitude, to make his peace with it.

But Bruce would not relinquish his grip, holding the link between them tightly enough that J'onn could not sever it without causing him pain. That he would not do. They were both hurt enough.

J'onn glanced at Batman and saw that his hand had left his belt, that he stood still, regarding J'onn from behind the lenses in his mask, his expression unreadable. And then, quietly, Bruce Wayne's voice traveled along the tenuous link between them: *Don't leave me.*

J'onn rose uncertainly to his feet, turning to face Batman. *Bruce?*

Batman's hands went again to his mask, again pushed back the salt-streaked cowl, revealing troubled eyes. "Please," he whispered.

"Bruce?" he asked again. "You don't have to - I know this is a risk you don't want, that you could lose me. And I understand. I do. Better to leave on your own terms than to have what you love ripped away. It hurts too much."

"No," Bruce disagreed. "I won't do this again. I won't deny myself love out of fear. I've done that too much."

A single tear escaped one blue eye, and J'onn could no longer stay distant. He crossed the space between them swiftly, wrapping his arms around Bruce in a desperate embrace. He kissed away the tear and stroked his fingers through Bruce's hair as Bruce clung to him, his mind projecting a steady mantra: *I love you I love you I love...* J'onn let those words roll over his consciousness, returning the sentiment as he met Bruce's lips with his own.

Their lovemaking had a desperate, almost violent, quality as they rolled together in the gathering temple. Bruce bit and clawed, hands and mouth scrambling over Martian flesh as if to mark it, to leave no inch of it unclaimed. J'onn for his part plunged more of himself than he had ever dared into Bruce's willing body, stretched thin through capillaries and beaten by his heart, fired along nerves and expelled from lungs to meet again the hungry mouth and roaming hands in more solid form. Stones bruised their flesh and at one point they fell heavily - painfully - upon the discarded Batsuit, but the bruises were only proof, testaments to a more scarring battle that only they could
understand. The tensions of their bodies somehow made what they had gone through real, and when release came, it seemed to take with it the taint of near-loss.

They collapsed, spent, into the springy moss, still entwined, almost more one body than two. They cradled each other face to face, withdrawing from each other slowly, reluctantly, and with many gentle kisses. Finally Bruce lay cushioned against J'onn's shoulder, his leg across J'onn's hips as J'onn rested back, his eyes on the ceiling. He almost missed it when Bruce gestured toward the well of souls.

"They are gone?" he asked, and there was genuine sadness in his tone.

"No," J'onn said. "Just quieted. Waiting for their time."

"But you can't hear it anymore. The great voice."

"No, I can't," J'onn replied.

Bruce buried his face in J'onn's neck, kissing him. "J'onn, I'm so sorry." His mind projected genuine grief for J'onn's loss with a hint of self-chastisement for his own selfishness.

"It's okay," J'onn reassured, kissing his forehead. "I will miss it, but you are teaching me to hear other voices."

He felt Bruce smile against his neck. "Hey," he grumbled teasingly, "don't go and start hearing voices on me. We've got enough personality issues in this family."

J'onn laughed and pulled Bruce more tightly to him, relishing the humor that for a rare, unguarded moment, flowed easily. They would have to go home, soon, he knew - and marveled for a moment that he meant Earth when he thought of home.

*Of course you think that,* Bruce whispered in his thoughts. *That's where I am.*

*Yes,* J'onn agreed, *it is.*

(25)

Superman floated in the darkened monitor womb, staring at the monitor which showed one freeze-frame moment. Batman and the Martian Manhunter, caught in a last embrace, a final kiss... He scowled at his own line of thinking, but he understood what Nightwing meant, now, when he described it as a good-bye.

And the image was haunting him. He'd never seen them kiss before; in fact, he would be hard pressed to identify anything they had done in the past several months that would indicate the changed nature of their relationship. He knew they had been spending more time together, but
that was in their other lives, away from the Watchtower.

They blended together easily on the screen, though. J'onn leaning down slightly to meet Bruce's upturned lips, one of Batman's gauntletted hands pulling the Martian's face closer. There was a hint of moisture visible in the corner of Bruce's eye - Superman had overlooked it before, but now his eyes were drawn to it. And J'onn's arm at Bruce's waist showed how tightly he was pulling Bruce to him, as if he didn't want to let go. He tried not to think about the information Robin had
called in hours earlier - that they had reason to believe J'onn had gone to face the Martian gods, and that he had succeeded at cost to himself, and that Bruce had sent himself as a one-man rescue force. It made sense. It explained why J'onn's name had even prompted a hint of tears from Luthor during the grief spell that had hit the planet. Superman had not missed it, nor had he missed his teammates' struggle to share information without bringing J'onn up.

But Batman had gone for him, and Batman did not do hopeless missions. *But have you ever seen Bruce in love before?* a little voice nagged at him. He silenced it angrily, bringing back Batman's words of another time, when the missing person had been Lois: <You can't do... what I do ... and see people. Not while the case is open. Never... because if they are ... I can't see anything else.> He'd watched Batman then, thinking clues, not victim, finding Lois. If J'onn could be found,
Batman would find him and bring him home.

He forced himself to close the image on the monitor. Looking at it felt too much like mourning, and there was nothing to mourn yet. Even if Green Lantern had been unable to find a trace of either of them. And Oracle's technology had been no more helpful. And no one had yet decoded the exact coordinates where they had teleported. And with 12 hours separating them from the last wave of telepathically induced emotion, the earth seemed safely out of danger, likely because of Bruce and J'onn, but they still hadn't come back.

He almost wished something would happen on the planet below to give him something else to think about. But the monitors only showed peaceful scenes, and the feared attack of some supervillian on the weakened planet looked increasingly unlikely. He wanted to go home, to curl up
with Lois, but someone had to watch the monitors, and the others were either helping planetside or catching up on much needed sleep.

He did a slow circuit of the monitor womb, taking time to focus on the scenes hanging on the walls rather than merely scanning them quickly for signs of danger. In daylight zones, people were gathering, spending time together, involved in various community activities. Where it was night, it was unusually quiet. Big city skylines were a touch darker than usual - no one was working late except essential service personnel, and they were on dictated schedules. In a way, he was glad for the Martian gods - if that was truly who was behind this whole situation. They had changed things, and it looked to be for the better.

A soft alert sounded, and he shot a startled glance down at the communications console. Then his eyes widened, and he was at the teleporter before the tubes stopped glowing. Tubes - two. He held a hopeful breath as he waited for the tube doors to open, releasing it only when J'onn and Batman stepped out. "Oh, thank god!" he exclaimed, unable to hide his relief.

Batman only grunted, and J'onn said, "Kal," softly in a tone that might have been a greeting or an admonishment. He moved closer to Batman, not quite touching him, but clearly wanting the nearness.

Superman stepped back, regarding them a moment. They looked awful. Batman's cowl was marred and battered looking, his cape frayed enough to reveal some of its layers of construction at the edges. His mouth looked puffily bruised, and Superman wondered what other damage lay
beneath the armor. Or for that matter, beneath J'onn's apparently unmarked exterior. The Martian moved as if under a heavy weight, although he bore no sign of injury.

"Let's get this debrief over with," Batman suddenly growled, striding purposefully away from the teleporters.

"Of course," Superman agreed, swinging into step beside him. "Shall I call-"

"No." J'onn's interruption caused both Superman and Batman to turn. "Just us. Please."

Batman nodded, reaching out to briefly brush J'onn's shoulder, and Superman was at a loss to interpret the look that passed between them.

"That's fine," Superman decreed. "Just us. Crash room?"

By way of answer, Batman turned and headed in that direction, J'onn trailing only a step behind. Superman again caught their stride, and they moved silently through the Watchtower to the small alcove sandwiched between the library and a couple of lesser conference rooms. As they reached the entrance, Batman paused. "Is there someone else here watching monitors?"

Superman shook his head and tapped his ear significantly. "Superhearing," he pointed out.

Batman stiffened. "We should-"

"Bruce." J'onn's voice was quiet, but it was enough. Batman hesitated, then nodded curtly and claimed one of the crash room couches. J'onn settled beside him.

Superman took the chair across from them, noting they were again almost touching. Their expressions were guarded, and he had a feeling there were things that had happened that were not going to be revealed in this debrief. He almost felt guilty for asking the question, "So, was it the Martian gods?"

Batman actually found J'onn's hand at that question, giving it a squeeze and continuing to hold it. "Did Barbara figure it out, or one of the boys?"

It wasn't meant as a dig, although it felt like one. Of course it would have to have been one of Batman's people who pieced it together. "From what Robin told me, it was Dick," Superman replied, "although they were all working on it."

Batman nodded to himself, then said, "Yes, it was the Martian gods." He didn't seem inclined to elaborate.

"And -?" Superman prompted.

"They were made to understand that humans aren't Martians. They won't bother Earth again."

"You're sure."

Batman's hand seemed to tighten around J'onn's. "Yes."

Another awkward silence reigned. "Umm," Superman began uncomfortably, "what happened? I mean, we know they were behind this, and that they're not doing whatever it was they were doing any more, but -" He trailed off, uncertain how to demand more answers.

"They woke up," J'onn said softly. "They didn't know our people were gone - they believed that they had forgotten our ways."

"So they reached out to humans, thinking they were lost Martians," Batman continued, and Superman was struck by how protective he seemed.

"That's a bit of a leap," Superman remarked. "No offense, J'onn."

J'onn inclined his head in acknowledgment.

"But not a surprising one," Batman put in, "given that Earth offered them the only sign of life they could recognize."

"J'onn?" Superman speculated, watching as his teammate hung his head and feeling immediately guilty for the question. He felt Batman's eyes hard on him, and he refused to engage in the staredown.

"Yes," J'onn admitted. "I drew their attention here."

"And were prepared to die for us," Batman pointed out, his tone challenging Superman to make something of it.

Superman changed his tack. "What woke them?"

It seemed the wrong question. J'onn's eyes jerked up to meet Batman's, and they shared another unfathomable look. J'onn opened his mouth as if to speak, but Batman cut him off.

"Fate? The alignment of the stars? It's not important." His tone was brusque, inviting no question.

"But if we're to defend-"

"They won't do it again," Batman said flatly, his expression closed.

"Batman is correct, Kal," J'onn added more gently. "They've returned to their slumber."

"So that's it? You just convinced them to go to sleep and leave well enough alone? I'm sorry, but you two look like hell. And the people down there-"

"Will eventually be back to normal. And if we do offer an explanation, what guarantee is there that they won't take some sort of retaliatory action?"

J'onn started at this as if it were an idea he had not considered, and Superman sat back, unable to argue against Batman's point. After a moment he asked, "So what do we tell them?"

Batman spoke in monotone, as if he'd rehearsed his answer. "An alien force, misunderstanding the nature of humans, sought to give us world peace. A Justice League strike team made contact with the aliens, neutralized the threat, and sent them back where they came from. The truth."

"After a fashion," Superman rebutted, unable to keep a hint of irritation from his voice. Again he felt a stab of guilt when J'onn raised his eyes to meet his.

"Please," J'onn whispered.

Superman thought of Wally, ready to run into the Speed Force. Of Kyle, fighting exhaustion and grief to find a way to shield the planet. Of Diana, begging a boon of her sisters that would cost them in the eyes of their culture. Of Lois, tearfully telling him to go. Somehow he knew that whatever they had suffered, J'onn had sacrificed something more. He acquiesced. "At least you can tell me?" he pleaded.

A look of uncertainty flitted across Batman's face, and J'onn once again lowered his eyes. And suddenly, Superman didn't want to know.

He cleared his throat to break the new silence, rising to his feet. "Things are under control here," he stated. "Why don't you two take some recovery time? I will let the rest of the League know of your safe return."

J'onn nodded gratefully and also rose, subtly cupping Batman's elbow to urge him to do the same. "Thank you, Kal," J'onn acknowledged, his voice stronger than it had been since his return. "Perhaps you will see us off?"

Superman nodded, leading the way toward the teleporters. He arrived well ahead of the other two, but hesitated before setting any coordinates. When Batman and J'onn finally caught up, he asked, "The Cave? I know Nightwing is waiting for you."

This earned a weary nod from Batman, who seemed curiously deflated now that the debriefing was over. But J'onn hesitated. "Bruce," he said softly.

Batman turned to face him, his mouth hardening. "Bruce," J'onn said again, putting his hands on the other man's shoulders, "I need to go to the Gobi, just for a bit." He leaned his head forward to rest his forehead against Batman's. His next words were so quiet that Superman felt he was eavesdropping to hear them. "I'll still be with you." His posture suggested he added more telepathically.

Finally, Batman stepped back. "I'll be waiting," he promised, his voice slightly broken. But when he spoke to Superman, he was firmly in control. "'Port me down to the Cave. I'll turn my signaler on in case you need me."

*I won't,* Superman thought to himself, but he nodded anyway as he set the coordinates. "Tell Nightwing he did you proud."

A faint flush of - pride? - crossed Batman's face as he stepped into the tube. "I will," he stated, and then he was gone.

J'onn was smiling faintly when Superman turned to him. "He needed to hear that," J'onn commented.

"So does Nightwing," Superman replied.

J'onn's smile faded. "He knows. Don't be too hard on him, Kal."

"He's difficult," Superman defended himself, not really sure why he felt so aggrieved.

J'onn sighed and looked to the now vacant tube, his eyes seeming to recreate Bruce's presence there. He seemed to reach some decision, but he did not change his gaze. Instead he said, "I died today, Kal."

Superman took in a gasp of air. "Nearly died," he corrected.

"No," J'onn said sadly. "Did die. My soul was with my people."

"Oh, J'onn."

Now J'onn did look over at him, one corner of his mouth turned up in a sad kind of smile. "It took Batman to see there was another way. His mind and -" he laid one of his hands across his chest - "his heart."

Clark felt a lump growing in his throat as he read the sincerity on J'onn's face. He thought again of Lois, and then of Bruce - not Batman, but Bruce - facing the loss of yet another person who'd been allowed beneath the Bat's defenses.

"The rest of the League doesn't need to know."

"No," Clark agreed hoarsely, watching as J'onn ascended onto the teleport platform and stepped into the waiting tube. "Where am I sending you?" he asked.

"The coordinates are in your mind. I'll make my way from there."

Clark looked down at the console and found it was true, he knew how to program the equipment. He swiftly typed in the code, but hesitated over the send command. "We're still here for you, J'onn. Both of you."

"We know," J'onn answered. "Thank you, Kal."

Clark entered the final order and watched as J'onn dematerialized. "Thank *you*," he whispered, uncertain if he'd been heard. He stayed by the teleporter for a moment, digesting what he'd been told. Then he returned to the monitor womb to create a sound glitch in the system, and to watch a planet briefly at peace spin its way into a new day.

Waking, epilogue 1

Dick started awake, angry enough at himself for dozing that it took him a moment to realize what had wakened him: the hum of the teleporter. He blinked at the fading light and then surged to his feet, taking two steps forward before pausing to wait for Batman to step down. Better to give him space, he thought, fighting the urge to run up and grab him in relief. "Bruce," he greeted more calmly than he felt.

Batman moved slowly, turning to meet Dick's eyes. His cowl was battered and streaked with white, and his cape looked almost sandblasted.

"Are you all right?" Dick asked carefully. A fair question, he considered, sounding solicitous enough without being overly concerned. Of course he would need to know if there were injuries to be attended.

Batman looked at him a moment longer, then answered, "Physically, yes."

It took Dick half a second to process that he had modified his answer. It was almost an invitation, but he hesitated anyway before asking, "J'onn?"

"He had to go to his place in the Gobi," Batman answered, and Dick felt some of the tension leave his body.

"But he's okay?"

"Yes."

They stood silently regarding one another for a moment, then Dick asked, "Do you want to talk about it?"

It was a tentative offer, and he steeled himself for a curt no. But Batman instead put down his cowl, revealing the tired face of Bruce Wayne. "I don't know," he confessed. "I-"

"Master Bruce!" Alfred, tea tray in hand, hurried down the staircase. He set the tea tray down and rushed to Batman's side. Bruce did not resist as Alfred guided him down from the teleport platform. "Are you injured?" Alfred asked anxiously. "Do you need me to-"

"I'm all right, Alfred," Bruce reassured, pulling away from him to settle into his chair in front of the Batcomputer. "Just tired."

Alfred looked at him sharply. "And Master J'onn? Shall I expect him?" Dick gave Alfred credit for barreling through as if they had never entertained the option that J'onn - or Bruce - might not come back.

"Later," Bruce replied, and another bit of tension Dick hadn't realized he was feeling left Dick's body. "He doesn't want anyone to wait up."

"Hmph!" Alfred fussed, sounding appropriately affronted. "Well, given he's just come back from a mission, I might abide his wishes - provided you do. But he needs a firm reminder of who runs this household!"

Alfred's slightly overplayed indignation actually prompted a weary smile on Bruce's face, one which Dick echoed. Once again, Alfred was coming through with exactly what was needed.

"Now, Master Bruce, I must insist you eat something and let me bring you some more civilized attire. You, too, Master Dick. I presume you are staying the night?"

"Yes, Alfred," Dick answered dutifully, already plucking a sandwich from the tea tray. Bruce simply nodded.

"Very good. I will return shortly."

Without further ado, Alfred headed for the stairs. Dick munched on his sandwich, watching Bruce.

He sat for a long moment, and finally rose heavily from his chair. With careful, deliberate gestures, he unfastened his cape and cowl, pulling both around to study them.

"I think that one's seen better days," Dick noted gently.

"Yes," Bruce agreed. He stood regarding it a moment longer, and Dick waited quietly, leaning against the lab table that the tea tray sat on. "I think I'll retire this one."

Dick raised an eyebrow a bit, but stayed silent. Retire. Not discard. Not refurbish.

Bruce continued to examine the cape and cowl, brushing his fingers across their disfigured surface. He seemed to pull something from them, rubbing whatever it was experimentally between his thumb and fingers. "Yes," he said again, turning finally to drape the battered
armor over the back of his chair. Then he slowly stripped off his gauntlets, letting them fall on the seat. He paused a moment longer before finally reaching for a sandwich. He took a bite and chewed it mechanically.

"Was it Mars?" Dick asked.

Bruce nodded, reaching his free hand down to his belt as he ate. Dick thought he was going to unclasp it, but instead he opened one of the pouches and held his hand palm up beside it. A small tentacled shape twined through his fingers and wound its way up his hand to his wrist.

The zo'ok, Dick realized suddenly, wondering if that was the explanation for how Bruce was able to teleport to an inhospitable planet so woefully underequipped.

As if in answer to his unvoiced wondering, Bruce said, "Poor little thing had its work cut out for it today." His tone was uncharacteristically regretful.

"I think we all did," Dick remarked, pouring glasses of juice for both himself and Bruce.

"Yes," Bruce agreed absently. He sat back down carefully on the edge of his chair, sliding back enough to be comfortable but not bothering to move the bits of his uniform so he could truly relax. He took a final bite of sandwich, then lifted his free hand palm up. The zo'ok flowed liquidly into his cupped palm, and he studied it.

Dick stepped forward to hand him a glass of juice, looking at the little creature as he did so. It pooled bluely in Bruce's hand, although for all its liquidity didn't seem likely to spill.

"Can you tell me about it?" Dick asked, his eyes rising to Bruce's face as he took a sip of his own juice.

"J'onn gave it to me," Bruce explained absently, letting his thumb stroke across its smooth surface. At the touch, the zo'ok shifted shape, becoming more like a tightly furled flower bud. "This is its
natural form."

"A flower?" This hadn't really been what Dick had been asking about, but it felt important to let Bruce talk.

"Yes. Symbiotic." The zo'ok stretched itself, again entwining Bruce's fingers. A faint hint of a smile crossed Bruce's face, and Dick marveled at it.

"With humans, too?" Dick wondered.

"Not perfectly. It feeds on thought patterns, emotional well-being - or as near as I can figure. J'onn doesn't really know - the bond is so seamless between Martians and zo'ok."

Bruce had the half-distracted air of someone returning to a favorite puzzle, and Dick found himself impressed by the appropriateness of this gift. An infinitely useful creature that seemed to require well-being to bond with humans and which was imperfectly understood? It spoke to how well J'onn knew Bruce that he would entrust this little bit of Mars to him. "So J'onn has one, too?"

Bruce glanced up at this question. "His clothes," he explained. "I have to remind him to dust his wardrobe in Denver and make a show of doing laundry once in a while, since zo'ok is all he ever wears. Well, mostly, anyway." There was fondness in Bruce's voice.

"Well, that explains a lot," Dick remarked, finishing his juice in a long swallow. There was a sound on the stairs, and the zo'ok zipped up Bruce's sleeve faster than thought. "Shy?" Dick asked.

Bruce shook his head. "Just - defensive. It already knows you."

"All right, sirs, fresh pajamas and slippers for you both." Alfred glanced at the tea tray with approval as he set the stack of clothing down on the lab table. "Shall I bring more sandwiches?"

"No, Alfred," Bruce replied, rising to his feet and claiming his pajamas. "I'm going to hit the shower. Dick, make sure Superman has called Oracle."

"On it," Dick answered, crossing to the computer and opening a comlink as Bruce disappeared into the locker room. He noticed Alfred moving to deal with the discarded armor on the chair behind him and stopped him. "Just wait on that a second, Alfred," he directed as Oracle's mask came on screen.

"Oracle," the electronic voice identified.

"Hey, Babs, it's me," Dick said, immediately prompting the screen to shift to Barbara Gordon's face. "Bruce just asked -"

"So he is back then," Barbara interrupted. "Superman broadcast that they'd returned on the JLA hotline, but-"

"Yeah, he's back."

"And J'onn?"

"I haven't seen him yet, but Bruce says he's okay."

Barbara gave a relieved sigh. "Not that I doubted Superman, but-"

"I know," Dick said softly.

"Do we know what happened?"

Dick shook his head, aware that Alfred was also listening acutely. "No. And I don't think we should press."

"Understood. You'll get some sleep?"

Dick nodded.

"You, too, Alfred," Barbara added.

"The sentiment goes both ways, Miss Barbara."

She smiled ruefully. "Yeah, I suppose it should. But do call if you need me."

"I will," Dick promised. Then, because he felt he needed to say it, "I love you."

"I love you, too," Barbara answered. "Oracle out."

The screen winked out, and Dick stared at it for a moment before shaking himself and meeting Alfred's gaze. "I think we should leave that," he said, nodding toward the battered cape under Alfred's hand.

Alfred studied Dick's face, then acquiesced. "Very good, Master Dick." A beat, then, "He didn't talk about it?"

Dick pursed his lips, thinking. "I don't think he knows how," he decided. "Or at least, not how to start. But they're both back."

Alfred stroked the cape on the back of the chair. "Yes."

There was a rustle from the direction of the locker room, and Bruce emerged, a robe over his pajamas.

"That was quick," Dick remarked.

Bruce shrugged. "Just not feeling the need for a long shower."

There seemed to be something more underlying the explanation, but Dick let it pass, scooping up his own pajamas. "Well, *I* am," he declared. "So if you've already crashed before I get done, have a good sleep."

He moved toward the locker room, but Bruce caught his arm as he passed. "Dick."

He froze uncertainly.

"Superman told me you did a good job up there."

A grateful smile blossomed on Dick's face, and he ducked his head a bit. "I had a good teacher."

"No," Bruce contradicted. "You're a good leader."

Dick found himself blinking against unexpected tears, too tired to really understand his emotion. He managed - just - to keep his composure. "Thanks." He met Bruce's eyes, noting they were unguarded and impossibly weary. "Bruce?"

"Yes?"

"I'm glad you're back. Both of you."

Pleased surprise radiated back at him. "Me, too," Bruce replied. "Me, too."

Dick gave his arm a little squeeze and then slipped by him toward the longed-for shower and sleep.

Waking, epilogue 2

J'onn brushed his fingers across the surface of the crystalline stalagmites, their surfaces still rosily warm from his thoughts. He'd needed to do this, to set down everything he remembered - not so much for himself as for an imagined future. Only a telepath could read these histories, and as for actually getting into this transplanted Martian dwelling? Someday, someone might, and might also be able to read the mental resonances captured in these quartz-like pillars. That imagined someone would likely have need of information on the Martian gods, and he suspected that the memory would not remain in the great voice.

And so he had recorded everything - even what he hadn't shared with Bruce. H'ronmeer's final confidence - Bruce had let him go. For J'onn's sake.

Whatever had prompted that decision was no longer in Bruce's memory. He'd checked, uncertain what had transpired after his own memory of what had happened ended - after that moment when he had forced Bruce's soul from his own, wishing he had time to let him accept what he was losing but knowing that had he allowed Bruce to stay longer, Bruce would have joined him in death. Bruce's mind held only confused impressions of his discussion with the gods, and no hint of anything past meeting K'ergaard.

J'onn sighed and stroked the crystal again. Poor Bruce. He would've reconciled himself to a life without J'onn in time - had already been acknowledging the rightness of J'onn's decision. But his final cry as J'onn severed their soul-bond - he shuddered. He could never wish such pain on anyone. Had he even suspected he would cause it for Bruce, he would never have pursued their relationship. A part of him almost wished he could take it all back, could step back in time and tell his past self - but no. It was done. For better or worse, they truly were bound now.

*Half of my whole, whole of my half,* J'onn thought to himself, the Martian phrase capturing a truth he had not realized until faced with the possibility that Bruce - Batman - could not withstand such a bond.

But they'd weathered it. Not easily or well, but the crisis was past - and suddenly J'onn could not bear his lonely retreat any longer.

He could feel Bruce's mind still as he phased through the walls of his Martian home and flew invisibly up through the atmosphere to a height where his speed would not be restrained by respect of the sound barrier. It was a passive link, one he had felt Bruce reach for more than once in the hours since they had parted company in the Watchtower. Not so much to contact J'onn as to reassure himself that J'onn truly was still there. Now he could feel Bruce's restless slumber as he shot almost half-way around the world to join him.

It was like a homing beacon, halting J'onn exactly over Bristol despite the difficulties of pinpointing a site from the troposphere. He didn't resist it, letting his body drop down toward the Earth's surface, taking only enough care to be sure he would not burn up on re-entry. Down he traveled, phasing into intangibility as he reached the darkened Wayne Estate and passed through the Manor, heading to the lower levels where he knew Bruce to be.

Something, though, made him divert his course ever so slightly, so his feet finally touched down not in the sleeping quarters of the cave, but in front of the massive Batcomputer.

There was, as always, a faint light shining on Batman's primary work area - although for once it was not meticulously tidy. Batman's cape and cowl hung derelict on the back of the big chair, neither put - nor thrown - away. The cowl hung limply, its shape vaguely maintained by the armor within it, and its crazy angle projecting a mournful feeling. J'onn touched it now as he had resisted earlier, letting his fingers taste the salt that streaked its surface. Such tears! An ocean wept from a man who rarely allowed even smaller emotions to crack his veneer. Again J'onn suffered a pang of regret - he had known for a long time about the little boy in Bruce, still trapped in his grief. He'd hoped that in time, he could comfort that soul, ease his suffering. Instead he had compounded it.

He stepped back from the chair, intending to go now to Bruce, but something else caught his eye. One of Alfred's tea trays sat on the lab table, a silver dome protecting whatever sat upon it and a note propped on its top. A note bearing his name.

Curious, he picked up the little folded card, but there was nothing else written on it. Then he lifted the cover and felt his face smile. Chocos - undoubtedly from Alfred. He took two of the cookies and replaced the lid, warmed by the gesture.

He ate the cookies as he made his way to the various sleeping quarters in the Cave. He knew Bruce was here, rather than upstairs in the big bed. *Here where it's safe,* J'onn thought, easily finding the room where his lover slept.

He phased through the door rather than opening it, unwilling to wake Bruce just yet. The bedroom was pitch dark, but his eyes adjusted quickly to reveal Bruce curled fetally on his side, tension faintly screaming from his body even as he slept. Further inspection revealed Ace curled against its master's hand in the shape of a furry it had assumed on that night J'onn had given Bruce the little creature. As he neared the bed, J'onn realized Ace was purring, trying to soothe Bruce.

He smiled a little and petted the little zo'ok as he lowered his weight onto the edge of the bed. At the shift of the springs, Bruce's eyelids fluttered open.

"Shh," J'onn whispered, running one hand across Bruce's cheek. "It's just me."

"J'onn," Bruce sighed, reaching out to grasp the stroking hand.

J'onn returned the squeeze Bruce gave to his fingers, leaning over to kiss Bruce's forehead. "Yes," he replied, and he could feel some of the tension leave Bruce's body. He already seemed to be drifting back toward sleep.

*Dick and Alfred were worried about you.* The projected thought startled J'onn, more for its clarity than for its content - at least at first. Then he felt the emotion behind what Bruce was trying to tell him, and the realization left him near to tears. That Dick and Alfred had not just worried for Bruce, or worried for what losing J'onn might do to Bruce, but were genuinely worried for *J'onn.*

Bruce seemed to sense his confusion, reaching to claim both his hands, shifting over as he pulled J'onn down toward him on the bed. J'onn let himself be drawn down, willing his cape and harness away as he settled on his side. Bruce spooned behind him, one arm wrapped possessively around his chest. He began to morph into his Alana shape, but Bruce stopped him.

"No." The arm over his chest tightened with a force that would have hurt if J'onn had been human. Then the thought, *I need *you* here tonight.*

J'onn reached up to rest his own arm on top of Bruce's, letting their fingers interlace. Bruce pressed a soft kiss into J'onn's back, drowsily nuzzling the green flesh. J'onn relaxed into the sensation, feeling Bruce's weariness bleeding into his own mind, suddenly as ready to sleep as his lover was. He felt one more gentle kiss, then the muscles in Bruce's arm began to relax and his breathing deepen. One final stray thought crossed from Bruce's mind: *Half of my whole, whole of my half...*

In Martian.

J'onn gave Bruce's hand a final squeeze as he gave into his own weariness, surrounded by the warmth and love of family.

end