Countdown (37 page)

“He’s telling the truth!” he confirmed. Glowing atomic orbitals whirled around him as he rapidly assumed his ‘normal stature. ‘The entire universe is in terrible danger!” A look of relief came over Donna’s face. “Ray! You have no idea how glad I am to see that you’re still okay.” She rushed to see him. “But where did Solomon take you? What did you learn?”

“You may trade tales of your exploits later,” the Monitor interrupted. “For now, there is nothing more to be accomplished here. It is time to return you to Earth for the final chapter of this cosmic drama.”

‘Thank God!” Holly exclaimed. “I have no idea who you are or what you’re talking about, but, boy, am I ready to get off this stinking planet!”

“Are you sure?” Harley asked. “We haven’t really seen all the sights yet....”

Holly kicked the other girl in the shins.

“Wait a second,” Jimmy protested. “I’m not going anywhere.” His freckled face took on a more serious expression. “Forager and I came here for a reason. I’m not going anywhere until I find out what’s happening to me—even if that means confronting Darkseid himself.”

Donna stared at him in shock. “Confront Darkseid?

You can’t be serious!” She was obviously horrified by the very idea. “That’s suicide, Jimmy!”

“No one is asking you to join me, Donna.” His
min
d seemed made up. “I have to do this.”

“But, Jimmy,” Donna persisted, “you ... against Darkseid? That’s madness. You can’t face him alone!”

“He shall not be alone!” Forager stood beside Jimmy defiantly. “Go your own way if you must.
We
have a war to finish and a god to kill!”

Mary was impressed by the insect-woman’s loyalty, but couldn’t help thinking that Donna had a point. “Think about what you’re doing, Jimmy.”

“You haven’t been around,” he replied. “You don’t know what I’ve been through.” His arms were crossed over his chest. “Darkseid is the answer.... I know it.” “You are correct, James Olsen,” Solomon declared. •“But Darkseid is not the only one who knows what part you play in his plans.” Lifting off from the fire escape, he floated down to the floor of the alley to join the humans, who backed away apprehensively. Jason and Holly kept the dour alien in their sights. Forager shielded Jimmy with her body. “I too have the answers you are searching for.” Donna stepped forward to confront the Monitor. There was obviously bad blood between them. “Talk fast, Solomon.”

“I have no reason to do otherwise.” He pointed at Jimmy. “Olsen is the reservoir, the one place in the Multi-verse, where Darkseid knew he could store certain... energies.”

“The souls of the New Gods,” Jimmy guessed.
“Darkseid
put them in me?”

The Monitor nodded. “He allowed them to be hidden inside you ... until a time of his choosing when he will reclaim the souls for his own purposes.”

“And my powers?” Jimmy asked.

“A precaution,” Solomon explained, “to preserve your existence until Darkseid has need of you. Activated only when your life is in immediate jeopardy.”

emglEKTDOt'HI 218

Jimmy ran his hand through his hair, overwhelmed by everything the Monitor was telling him. “Okay. I guess that makes sense—in a freaky sort of way. But why me?” The Monitor frowned irritably. “Think, dolt! You are Superman’s best friend. What better guarantee of protection against random dangers or the interference of other celestial entities? No doubt Darkseid took perverse amusement in the fact that Superman himself w'ould be the unwitting guardian of his most precious pawn.”

Jimmy’s face paled as the truth sank in. “Because he knew Superman wouldn’t let anything happen to me?” “Indeed,” the Monitor confirmed. “And when the New Gods are dead, and all their power resides in a single vessel, then Darkseid shall confiscate the power—and leave you lifeless!”

That sounds like Darkseid, all right,
Mary thought.

' She took a certain comfort from finding out that she and the would-be Amazons on Paradise Island weren’t the only ones who had been manipulated by Darkseid and his duplicitous minions lately. Apokolips’s scheming ruler seemed to have a lot of irons in the fire these days.
All part of one vast master plan?

She looked at Jimmy. “So, you still want to take on Darkseid, tough guy?”

“Confronting him is no longer an option,” Solomon declared. “He is too close to his goal.” He glowered at Jimmy. “If you try, I will personally destroy you to deprive Darkseid of the power contained within your pathetic mortal frame.”

“You mean you’ll try!” Jason snapped. He tried to rally the other heroes. “All right, folks. We’ve got the info we wanted. Let’s off this backstabbing son of a bitch!” “Okay!” Harley said cheerfully. She ran toward the Monitor, swinging her mallet. “Dibs on his skull!”

Donna yanked the hammer from Harley’s grip. “Everybody, back off!” She appealed to reason. “I don’t like Solomon any more than the rest of you, but we need to think this through!”

“Since when, Wonder Clone?” Harley grappled with Donna, like a kid groping for a favorite toy. “Gimme back my mallet!”

“You shortsighted apes!” the Monitor railed in exasperation. “The Fourth World is dying and Olsen is Darkseid’s key to survival, to total domination.” He shook his fist at Jimmy. “I cannot allow him to have you!”

Jimmy gulped. “Now, hold on a second,...”

“Gimme! Gimme!” Harley squealed.

The Monitor lost his temper completely, “Damnable humans! Extinction looms and still you bicker endlessly! Exactly like my fellow Monitors, who dither while the Multiverse trembles on the brink of annihilation. Do you not see? Inaction is death!” His gauntlets flared brightly and golden spheres formed around Mary and the others. “You deserve extinction, in my view, but you shall have one last chance to avoid that fate.” He shouted at the fearsome citadel towering in the distance. “Darkseid, bear witness to my final move!”

“Wait!” Mary shouted. “What are you doing?”

“Ooh!” Harley momentarily forgot about her purloined hammer. “Pretty lights!”

The humans disappeared from sight.

8 AND CODNTING.

METROPOLIS. > EARTH-ONE.

“Dhmigosh!” Jimmy blurted. “We’re home!”

He and his new companions suddenly found themselves atop the Daily Planet Building, right back where he and Forager had started out weeks ago. They scrambled to keep their footing atop the huge, slowly spinning bronze globe. Forager grabbed on to Jimmy’s hand to keep him from slipping on the inclined surface beneath their feet. A magnificent view of Metropolis was spread out before them beneath a clear blue sky. A crisp winter breeze rustled Jimmy’s hair. Compared to the fetid alleys and smoggy miasma of Apokolips, the sunlit city looked like heaven on Earth.

“That all-knowing bastard!” Jason Todd cursed the Monitor. “Who does that guy think he is, just zapping us around the Multiverse like this?” He braced himself against the back of the huge steel I in the
Daily Planet
logo girding the globe. “I’m sick of this crap!”

Jimmy barely knew Jason, but he had already figured out that the embittered vigilante had a real chip on his shoulder. Still, he wasn’t sure he disagreed with Jason on this point. “I don’t understand,” Jimmy said. “Why explain what’s happened to me, what I’ve become, only to dump us right back at the beginning?”

“Lesson I’ve learned in this show,” Donna advised him. “Never trust a Monitor.”

“Or a goddess!” Harley griped. She looked back and forth between herself and Holly in dismay. Her jester’s helmet had disappeared, along with her monster-sized hammer. Both women were now clad in armored breastplates and leather skirts straight out of ancient Greece, so that they looked like extras from some cheesy female gladiator movie. “Those sneaky Olympians took our powers back!”

“Looks like it,” Holly agreed. No longer feline in appearance, she was now just a tough-looking redhead with a thick Gotham accent. She balanced nimbly atop the rotating globe. “Guess the gods figure they got what they wanted.”

Harley scowled. “Drag. That giganto hammer they gave me made me look totally cool.”

“It was a mallet,” Holly corrected her. “And it made you look like a melon-squashing comedian.”

Harley shrugged her shoulders like she didn’t think that was such a bad thing. “You say tomato; I say giganto....” Mary Marvel ignored the other girls’ banter. She looked worriedly at the Atom, who was gazing dolefully out at the familiar skyline before them. His troubled expression was obvious even through his blue cowl. He didn’t seem all that happy to be home. “Ray ... are you gonna be okay?” “How about I get back to you on that?” he replied. Jason seemed unconcerned with the Atom’s state of mind, “So, is that it? Is this stupid wild-goose chase over yet?” He peeled his domino mask from his face. “We can start getting back to our lives now, right?”

“Um, hello?” Jimmy tapped his own chest. “Did we all forget the Darkseid bait dangling inside me?”

“Holy Moley!” Mary exclaimed. “That’s right.” She pouted, sounding almost as fed up as Jason. Although he didn’t know the details, Jimmy got the impression that this adventure had been unusually hard on her. “Is this nightmare ever going to end?”

“Gods, I hope so,” Donna said.

The Atom shook himself out of his dolor. “Okay, if we’re going to do something about Jimmy, standing around on top of the Daily Planet all day won’t be much help. I say we take him straight to the Justice League.” He looked over the motley crew of sidekicks and hangers-on. “No offense to anyone here, but, from what I heard on Apokolips, we’re in the big leagues now.”

“None taken,” Donna assured him. “Sounds like a plan to me.” She turned toward Holly and Harley. “If you girls want to opt out of this, no one will fault you.”

“Thanks,” Holly replied. “To be honest, I’m not sure how much help we’d be now that the gods have revoked our powers. This whole thing is getting way too cosmic for me.” She grabbed Harley by the hand and led her toward a maintenance hatch hidden behind the P in Planet. “C’mon, Harley. We’re outta here.”

Jimmy was kind of glad to see them go. He hadn’t forgotten, although Harley apparently had, that the pigtailed blonde had once stalked him back during her loopy super-villain days.
I’ll bet she doesn’t want to get anywhere near Batman and the rest of the Justice League.

“Tootle-loo, kiddies!” Harley waved good-bye as she and Holly disappeared down the hatch. “Don’t forget to write!”

Good riddance,
Jimmy thought.

“You know,” Mary said, somewhat sheepishly, “I hope you don’t think I’m deserting you too, but I desperately need to know what happened after I left Paradise Island.” She lifted off the roof and floated upward into the sky. “Plus, I really want to check in with my family.”

It dawned on Jimmy that nobody had seen Captain Marvel or Captain Marvel Jr. since that big fight with

Black Adam several months ago. He wondered what had become of them. “Yeah, of course,” he called out to Mary. “Don’t sweat it.”

“Thanks, Jimmy!” Mary said. “Catch up with you later!”

She zipped away, quickly disappearing from sight.
Funny,
he mused,
I thought Paradise Island was the other direction.

In any event, he hoped she found what she was looking for.

FAWCETT CITY.

Mary Batson,
she scolded herself.
You are such a liar.

The rent on the small apartment had been paid forward for at least a year. Billy’s doing, no doubt. Mary pulled on a clean sweater as she headed to the fridge and helped herself to a can of soda. A hot bubble bath had helped put the stench of Apokolips behind her. A pop album played softly on her stereo.

Paradise Island. Yeah, right.
The way she figured it, Hippolyta surely had everything under control on Themy-scira now that Granny Goodness was dead meat. She didn’t need Mary’s help to straighten out a bunch of confused, powerless Amazon wannabes.
But I couldn’t exactly tell Jimmy and the rest that I just needed a break from everyone else’s problems.

A twinge of guilt pricked her conscience.
Is this some leftover Eclipso or something?
she fretted.
Am I being selfish?

“Nah,” she assured herself. As far as she was concerned, she had paid her dues, and atoned for her dip into the dark side, by freeing the gods, helping to liberate Paradise Island, and getting Holly and Harley back to Earth alive. Let the Justice League deal with Darkseid from now on. “I just need a little ‘me time’ to relax and recharge my batteries.”

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m

“Is that what you call it?” an impossibly deep voice said in amusement.

Mary recognized the voice at once. The can of soda slipped from her fingertips, falling unnoticed onto the kitchen floor, as she turned in shock toward the open doorway behind her. Beyond the threshold, a startling sight greeted her eyes.

Darkseid w'as sitting in her living room, reclining comfortably in the comfy faux-leather easy chair she had picked up at Goodwill a few years back. The TV remote was sitting on the coffee table in front of him, as though he had just settled in to watch something on cable. The sheer incongruity of the image left her flabbergasted.

“Hello, Mary,” he said calmly. “You didn’t think I had forgotten about you, did you?”

Overcoming her shock, she reacted quickly. “Shazam!” Thunder boomed and a mystic lightning bolt smashed through the window. Arms akimbo, Mary Marvel faced her unwelcome visitor defiantly. Smoke rose from the scorched carpet at her feet.

“In my home? How dare you?”

Her dramatic transformation did not rattle him one bit. “Darkseid dares all.”

“What are you doing here?” she demanded.

“A simple matter, really.” He leaned forward. “In your final battle with Eclipso, you left a little something behind.” He held out his hand, and Mary braced herself for an attack, but then she spied the tiny black sphere, no larger than a pearl, gripped between his thick fingers. A pulsating dark radiance emanated from the sphere, which appeared to be composed entirely of roiling black energy. The presence of the sphere made Mary’s skin tingle. She felt drawn to it.