The Forgotten Heroes
Devastation (Unnatural Woman)
by Libbylawrence
The library contained numerous volumes ranging from science to science fiction. The furniture was a bit worn but of good quality. The lab was the largest feature of the room. Various gleaming metal objects rested on shelves that lined two walls. Still, in spite of her keen eye for detail, all Joan Carter really cared about was the gentle touch of Bob Crane’s hand as he caressed her flowing auburn hair. His pleasant after-shave filled her senses as he held her. She idly noticed a run in her own hosiery as she danced slowly with her fiancé.
“Joan, being here with you like this makes me want to move up our wedding, since the security system indicates that someone is flying here from due east,” he said.
Joan sighed as her daydream faded to reveal the main laboratory at the Vumania Isle base of the Forgotten Heroes. She saw the computer as its electronic voice repeated the message that the tropical isle was receiving a visitor.
Elongating one metal arm to hit the switch that stopped the alert voice, she stood up and crossed the room to scan the skies above through the portals overhead. Unlike her image in the daydream, she had no auburn curls for any man to caress, nor was she wearing panty hose or high heels or anything. She didn’t need clothing since her entire body was made of metal. Oh, her femininity was certainly not in doubt. The artificial form Doc Magnus had created for her was attractive, even sexy in its silvery perfection. She even had platinum hair and a flawless metallic face, but it did not make her a woman. She felt as if she was no longer truly human. Her brain rested in the altered robotic body that could indeed perform wonders. Still, that same mind recalled the years in which she was a stunning socialite with a flirtatious manner and a love for looking pretty.
“Bob’s not even Bob anymore,” she said sadly. Her voice actually sounded sultry; Magnus could work miracles with his lab. Still, what could it matter if she spoke like a Southern belle if she looked more like the liberty bell?
She noticed the approach of a flying woman in white and purple — young, pretty, and powerful. Her light brown hair was long, and the breeze of her flight made it sweep back behind her as she flew. She flew by her own natural — or rather alien — power. She wore a purple cape and a white costume. Her birth name was Rena, and her heroic name was Volar. Volar was Tormanian for Champion, and she had indeed been the super-heroic defender of that rigidly paternalistic planet until her life had taken a drastic change.
“Robotgirl, nice to see you,” she said as she landed near Joan and looked around the complex. ”Where are the others?” she asked.
“Captain Comet is out saving the world again,” replied Robotgirl, “while Dolphin is on a date with Starman. I think the Golden Glider is doing a benefit ice show, and Mayflower is visiting her mother.” Joan reported on her team’s status, but her mind was preoccupied by other thoughts. She could not forget the feel of Bob Crane’s hand as he led her over the dance floor.
“I was stopping a flood on an isle miles from here,” said Volar. “It’s nice that these magna powers of mine can still make me useful even exiled here on earth. I’m sure you feel much the same.”
Robotgirl nodded absently. “Certainly. Our powers do made us perfect for protecting normal men and women.”
Volar frowned, and her brown eyes grew wide. “Robotgirl, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to suggest that you were anything but a heroine and a friend.”
“Forgive me, I’m not myself lately,” said Joan, rushing off toward another part of the compound and leaving Volar alone.
Volar sighed and brought her fist down on a table. It shattered to dust, and she reluctantly swept it aside. Temper tantrums with my level of magna power could bring down this whole building. I’ve got to keep my emotions in check. How I miss Daddy, she thought.
Her father had been both her mentor and her teacher back on Torma. She had followed his guidance as he had formulated the plan for her Volar career. She had obeyed him unquestioningly, because daughters always listened to their fathers, as did wives. Women were for service and decorative adornment on Torma and not for thinking or working or for fighting crime. Thus, Rena had been forced to disguise her very gender in order to effectively serve as champion. She had used her father’s remarkable science to employ a bio-mask that concealed her gender and cloaked her pretty face with handsome male features. Volar had become the beloved hero of Torma, much like Superman served as Earth’s noble defender.
The click of high heels echoed on the hallway as a blonde woman entered the room. She had shoulder length blonde hair and wore a black jacket with a pleated miniskirt and boots. Her name was Zinda Blake, but as the team’s expert pilot, she was known as Lady Blackhawk. She was a smart woman with a good perception of the foibles of her super-powered friends.
“Honey, you can’t expect it to happen overnight,” she said. “Acceptance takes time. It’s a gradual thing. In fact, self-acceptance can be even slower and more difficult to come by. The team works well together, and they accept you as a friend and a member. You just need to become comfortable with expressing your true self. You hid your femininity while in your Volar role for years. You can’t expect being allowed to be both woman and heroine for the first time in public to be an experience free of discomfort. Plus, Rena, this isn’t even your planet. Give yourself a break!”
Volar smiled and said, “Thanks Zinda. I knew all that, but hearing someone else say it means a lot. The Golden Glider is always difficult. She has her own ideas about what being a woman means.”
Zinda laughed. “Lisa Snart is not the average gal. She has problems all her own. Still, that’s good. You can’t expect any gender to be made with cookie-cutter exactness. We all have our individual quirks.”
The Vigilante ambled inside and said, “Sounds like the makin’s of a country song. Maybe I can come up with something.”
They laughed and greeted the amiable Greg Sanders as he entered. The cowboy hero had a personality that allowed him to make others feel at ease. That came from the entertainer in the man. It also was part of what drove him to be a hero.
While the friends laughed as Sanders went into his customary good-humored banter, Joan paced her room in frustration. She heard their laughter, and it made her feel worse than before. These artificial ears are more curse than blessing, she thought. I must deactivate them if I’m to have any peace. They are no different from any of my inhuman body features. I should have just died. Why did Chuck have to save my life at the cost of my humanity?
A seductive voice spoke to her out of thin air. She glanced at a sparkling energy beam that appeared in her room, and she instinctively knew that it was a hologram. There truly was no other person present. The woman before her was merely a projection of sight and sound.
“I think in time you may find humanity to be overrated,” said the woman, whose skin was ash gray, and her eyes flashed of red fire or malice given the hue. “It is nothing more than sentimental drivel of the type found on your earthly Hallmark cards. I revel in being so much more than human. Still, I am not devoid of emotions, and as a woman I can sympathize with your plight. If you serve me, I can do what neither Captain Comet nor Valor nor Magnus could do for you.”
“Who are you?” gasped Robotgirl.
“I am your friend. If you make me your mistress, I shall be your benefactor. Obey me, and I shall answer your prayers.” She smiled coldly.
Joan shuddered from the memory of human reaction, not from actual need, as she pleadingly said, “Do you mean…?”
“I will give you a real body,” said the woman named Pandora. “I shall make you a woman again.”
***
Back on Vumania, Starman and Dolphin emerged from warm waters off the coast of the tiny island. Will Payton smiled as he suddenly scooped the platinum blonde girl into his arms and soared skyward.
“We’ve traveled your way long enough. Now you’re flying Air Payton,” he said.
Dolphin kissed him and said, “I do like the benefits, now that you mention them. Jayne was so sweet. I loved meeting your family.”
Starman nodded. “Yep. I think I’ll keep them. They liked you, too, but then what’s not to like?” He frowned as his keen eyes spotted the burning entry of an object from space. ”That’s no comet or meteor. Looks like a person. Let me drop you off and try to intercept it.”
“No need,” said Dolphin. “I’m fine.” And she jumped out of his arms, perfectly cleaving the waters below as only one with her affinity for water could do.
Starman streaked forward, easily matching the descent of the falling being. “I need to match her velocity just right, or she could be hurt. Then again, considering how fast she’s falling, it will be miracle if anyone survived.”
He caught the woman, and using releases of stellar energy and his own considerable strength, he gently brought her to safely. He ignored the heat of her re-entry and recognized the injured features of the alien heroine.
“Tharka! That’s the Superwoman of Zor,” explained Dolphin as she caught up with him.
***
In the community called Zandar City on the planet Zor, an event of considerable strife was troubling the inhabitants. They gathered, as was their habit, in a type of alien town meeting to discuss the ramifications of a new arrival.
The wise Narkin addressed his peers as the visitor watched impassively. He was actually a rather nondescript type, wearing an unassuming outfit that equipped him for both travel and combat. Clearly, it was not the arrival of the man that plagued the council as much as it was what his arrival implied.
“My friends, it is known to us all that following our defeat in the war with the Calorians, we have been a humbled people,” said Narkin. “We have weighed our options with care and discernment, but now this arrival brings us to the point of crisis.”
“Please, good sir, tell us all once more why this man is such a danger,” requested a young member.
“Because he is widely known through space as a scavenger who only appears on a world that faces total doom. Is that not so, Zurnnulaxi-Vraxil?” he said.
Vraxil stood up, and with a slight smile he said, “I prefer to think of myself as nothing more than a shrewd man of commerce. Your world is doomed because of the actions of one who seeks nothing less than genocide. I merely act prior to her planned destruction of this world to offer to buy your natural resources. You may accept my offer and flee as wealthy men.”
Narkin frowned. “Vraxil has only been wrong about a world’s imminent demise once. I suggest we seek aid from the world whose destiny defied his words of doom. We must look to Earth.”
***
On a dark world of smoke and gloom, a sinister woman lounged across a divan, idly stroking the hair of the blonde woman who crouched humbly at her feet. “Mistress, why did you allow Tharka to escape? Surely letting her go free and not slaying the merchant of doom when he learned of your plans was risky,” said the beautiful blonde woman as she groveled at the gray woman’s feet, gazing at her with a mixture of adoration and fear.
Pandora, daughter of Darkseid, laughed with the sound of chains on bone and said, “You question me? What a bad pet you are, Gilotina! I will answer, since your doubt amuses me. The merchant of doom is of no consequence to us. He merely spreads panic as word of my coming should do. I allowed Tharka to escape, because she will seek help from Earth. My father has enemies on that pretty little globe, and I would enjoy doing them harm.”
Pandora twisted her fingers in the woman’s hair and drew her face upward toward her own. The blonde cried out in pain as her mistress wrenched her head upward. “Earth — such a pretty world. I think I’ll play with it some more,” she said madly.
***
On the isle of Vumania, Captain Comet turned to Dolphin, who examined the injured Tharka. The pretty platinum haired girl frowned and turned to look at Adam Blake while Starman, Robotgirl, and Volar watched from the sides. The Vigilante was absent manning the isle’s communications chamber.
“She’s badly injured,” said Dolphin. “Considering her super-strength, what could have harmed her? And just where did she go after we last saw her?”
Robotgirl said, “The computer says her flight path indicates that she came from a planet called Zor. It appears that there is a Zor in our universe, even though she came from Earth-Two’s Zor originally when Atoman brought most of us here during the Crisis!” She referred to the incident in which the Earth-Two villain Atoman used the opportunity of the Crisis on Infinite Earths to abduct several obscure heroes from various time periods on Earth-Two — Robotgirl, Tharka the Superwoman, Nadir the Man of Magic, Joannie Swift, the second Crimson Avenger, and Roh Kar the Manhunter from Mars — before Captain Comet and his Rehab Squad freed them from Atoman’s control. The last time they saw her, Tharka the Superwoman had left Earth in search of this universe’s version of her home planet of Zor. (*)
[(*) Editor's note: See Captain Comet’s Rehab Squad: Whatever Happened To…?]
Captain Comet nodded. “I hesitated to use a mind-probe to help us learn what caused her injuries, because I feared using my powers upon her because in her weakened state, and due to her alien mind, I could do her more harm than good by accident.”
Dolphin held Starman’s hand. “Thanks for staying. I barely knew Tharka, but I hate to see anyone in such a state. Will you help us help her?”
Starman smiled gently. “Of course. I’m glad to do my part. If Zor needs Starman, then I’m there.”
Captain Coomet placed both hands flatly against the injured woman’s head and concentrated. For long moments he remained in such a position, and then he turned gravely to face the others.
“This is serious indeed,” he said. “Her mind is full of images of bloody destruction and tragic loss. Some are drawn from her readings in the theology of her people. Some are taken merely from her imagining of such events. She obviously is obsessed with and troubled by the threat of a powerful force of evil.”
Starman said, “Does this threat have a name?”
Captain Comet nodded grimly. “She is spoken of in the theology of her people as the Devastator. That is the closest English word I can employ. She is One Who Brings Ruin. I have never heard of such a being. She is some goddess of wrath who purges a world of its people when they fail to please her. I can only guess how this applies to Zor. The planet is not known to me from my travels.”
“Her injuries seem so dire,” said Dolphin. “What caused them?”
“Well, they aren’t random,” said Robotgirl. “They form some pattern. I’d wager it was due to a ceremonial torture — the type used in a ritual.”
Comet agreed readily. “That much I can confirm. Her mind indicates the ritual is an ancient and long-abandoned act from the darkest origins of the Zorian culture. This act of bloodletting is designed to bring forth or invoke a being of power.”
“Someone hurt her deliberately and in such a way as to summon this Devastator?” asked Starman.
The Vigilante rushed in from the communications center and said, ”We just got word from Zor. They are sending out a distress signal. The JLA relayed it here, since most members are occupied, and Black Canary asked if we could help out. I heard ya’ll mention Zor while you were examining the pretty little lady.”
“Tell her we’ll go,” said Comet.
Starman stepped forward, glancing toward a nodding Captain Comet. “I’ll go, too. Tharka the Superwoman was sort of one of us, and I still want to help this team whenever I can.”
Chapter 2
The Cometeer, expertly piloted by Lady Blackhawk, soon orbited the planet Zor while its owner spoke quickly to his team.
“We need to help the Zorians stop this Devastator,” he explained. “They know we are coming and are appreciative, if a bit humbled by having to seek the help of a world they see as inferior. The modification I made to Potter’s pills will allow us all to breathe and move freely in the planet’s atmosphere.”
Lady Blackhawk said, “I’ll remain in the ship as you asked, although I’d love to explore.”
Captain Comet patted his cousin’s arm and said, “Maybe once we settle this crisis we can enjoy the sights a bit.”
“It’s odd,” said Volar, “but I feel uneasy being a champion and a woman in yet another alien society. I’d hoped my old inhibitions would fade with the change of location. I see women on the Council below — that means Zor is more enlightened than my home of Torma.”
“You’re doing just fine,” said Starman. “Don’t let the perceptions you grew up with color how you imagine others perceive you. Just do what comes naturally.”
Volar shrugged. “That’s my problem. I have to fight against years of rigidly maintained efforts to appear masculine while acting as Volar.”
“I found my own identity after years of questions,” said Dolphin. “Trust me — it is normal under your circumstances to feel like a fish out of water.”
Robotgirl looked impassive as she thought, It’s so easy for Dolphin to fit in despite her strange life. She is stunning. Men fall all over her, and she doesn’t even notice. Volar’s looks will work the same magic for her, too. Only I am forced to live in this cold metal shell.
Captain Comet pointed below and cried, “Great guns! I see it has already begun! The so-called merchant of death just departed in his own craft. That means the peril he predicted is beginning.”
He saw through the mist to where chaos reigned below. Buildings shattered and people fled screaming as a woman with deathly white skin and an ornate blue tunic rampaged through the city. She stood eight feet tall, and her features were like a typical Zorian, based on what little they knew of the race based on Tharka, but with a regal malice and inhumanity about them.
Starman said, “I think we just found our Devastator.”
Robotgirl heard Will Payton’s cry, but she also heard the seductive voice of Pandora. Since her first encounter with the hologram of Darkseid’s daughter, she had been plagued, even tormented by constant whispers within her audio receptors. The voice urged her to surrender her will and serve Pandora in exchange for a human body.
Joan Carter was not by nature an evil woman, but she had been both a beauty and an heiress, and as such she had enjoyed all the perks society gave to a woman who had both traits. Now she could no longer live in her altered state. She had tried valiantly to make a name for herself as a heroine on this Earth not her own, but recent events had broken her dreams and shown them to be mere illusions.
She followed her friends down to the city as Starman, Captain Comet, and Volar flew down at top speed. Joan flew as well via small boosters in her robotic body. She noticed Dolphin was in Volar’s arms while Starman shot in advance of the rest.
Starman had battled some heavy hitters in his career, but he knew this weird Zorian goddess was by far the strangest. He saw her casually slay all who fell in her path with no regard for their cries and no diminution in her apparent joy.
That witch is having a ball, he thought. She must think Zorian life is worth nothing. I guess if she is some weird goddess summoned from some limbo by the blood of one of her people, she wouldn’t care about their pain.
He generated a blast of stellar energy and saw it strike her directly in the chest. The attack did nothing beyond allowing her victims to escape while she turned toward Starman. Great Scott — she ignored my best effort! he thought.
Dolphin gasped as Volar set her down and they saw Starman fall beneath a blazing energy blast from the white-skinned creature’s eyes. ”He’s hurt! I didn’t know any energy could harm him,” she said.
Comet had conferred rapidly with Narkin and the other council members. The news he received had done little to comfort him. They are rebuilding and changing as a society, as would any defeated race, yet this sudden assault threatens to destroy these people before they ever yet attain their lost nobility, he thought.
The Devastator reached for the fallen Starman with a silent malice that was almost palpable. He twisted out of her path and slammed into her again, but she remained unhurt. Dolphin rushed forward to aid him as Captain Comet stood firmly in her path. He remained in place as the hulking goddess closed in on him. I doubt my strength can slow her, but perhaps I can stop her with a few tricks of my own, he mused.
Starman staggered in Dolphin’s arms. “That one blast wiped me out! It was unlike any energy I’ve ever encountered. It didn’t drain me of my own energy, but it almost smothered my very life force. I may be some human-slash-star hybrid, but that thing was more than a match for me!”
The Devastator drew closer as Captain Comet frowned and suddenly blasted away on his jet belt.
The nearby Zorian Council gasped as one. “The Earthman fled! He turned coward!”
Starman could not believe his eyes as he saw Captain Comet vanish in the distance. ”I won’t believe that Comet would flee from battle,” he mused. He swooped down and wrestled with the giantess who smiled in pleasure at the sight of another foe.
She overpowered him and held him even as he tried to break free with a variety of wrestling moves and energy blasts.
***
Meanwhile, as Volar charged toward a fallen wall and lifted it off of some wounded Zorians, Robotgirl faced her inner demons made manifest for all to see. Energy flashed, and Pandora transported to the surface with her blonde companion.
“Now, Joan Carter!” she hissed. “Act as I commanded, and I shall give you the body you dream of having!”
Robotgirl nodded and reached out to choke Volar from behind. Her metal fingers formed a tight weave across the girl’s throat as she twisted ever more tightly. ”I’m sorry — I can’t live like this any longer,” she said softly as she wrestled Volar to the ground.
The Tormaian champion’s eyes flashed, and ice formed across the robotic woman’s hands. Volar flexed and shattered the elongated fingers now made so brittle by her magna-vision.
“Robotgirl, I heard it all,” gasped Volar as she fought for breath. “Don’t listen to this witch! She seeks to use you!”
Pandora tossed her long gray mane and laughed. “I did seek to make you another of my elite guard like my pet Gilotina, here, but if you are too stubborn to admit defeat, then I’ll just have you fight to the death!”
Dolphin pointed at the blonde in the pink outfit, who rushed from Pandora’s side to pummel Volar with super-strong blows. ”That’s Gilotina of the Female Furies! She’s serving that psycho space witch,” he said.
Pandora nodded. “Indeed! Granny Goodness gave her to me body and soul to be my plaything. I hoped to add Volar to my ranks, but if she dies, she dies!”
Robotgirl emerged from the icy sheath Volar had cast around her and said, “What of me? I tried to defeat her! Please — grant me my body!”
Pandora sneered, “You called that pathetic effort service? You are not fit to stoke the fire pits of my homeland!” She slapped Robotgirl to the ground and kicked her down a slope.
***
Meanwhile, Starman was falling beneath the Devastator’s attack. Her expression is pure hatred. All she feels or knows is inflicting pain, he realized. ”I have to help the others!” said Starman to the others. “Get back to the ship and get the JLA!” he ordered.
Dolphin was torn between her desire to help her lover and practicality. In the end, the lovely blonde realized that she could better serve by obeying. She rushed off as frightened Zorians drew near her, leading her toward a means of returning to the ship above.
Starman surged forward with all of his flight momentum and managed to drive the Devastator over a sand dune. She fell out of sight as he rushed to help his friends.
Volar was super-strong and had long been her world’s greatest champion, but the same could be said for Gilotina, one of Granny Goodness’s trained warrior elite known as the Female Furies, who could use her dainty hands as lethal weapons. Volar brought both hands up and slapped them against Gilotina’s ears, punching her with a swift right hook. She tried to fly her upward while struggling to contain her.
“I’ll kill you!” screamed Gilotina. “My mistress demands it. She wants your service, but only I will live for Pandora’s every whim!”
Starman blasted an energy bolt toward Pandora, who fell aside and turned to face him.
“You are a handsome mortal!” she said with a sigh. “Daring, too! Still, I think I should murder you now. Enslavement would be nice, but I do have other worlds to conquer!”
“Listen, don’t rush into anything on my account,” said Starman. “Don’t let me keep your from your beautician. That skin tone will never get you on Cosmo.”
He dodged aside as her eyes flashed energy and twin bolts of power exploded toward him. Even though he streaked upward, they followed his path unerringly.
Robotgirl suddenly bounced off the sandy ground to intercept the blast, which shattered her body into broken fragments. As she lost awareness, she breathed a silent plea for forgiveness.
Starman caught her damaged head and said, “She absorbed that energy bolt, but it destroyed her body. But maybe Captain Comet can still save her brain. She turned on us but proved loyal at the end.”
Pandora stomped one booted foot in annoyance. “How trite. Nobility makes me want to retch!”
Captain Comet returned with a heavy device in his arms. “Then maybe this will really make you sick.” He activated the device, and a funnel of white light enveloped Pandora. As he swung it around, it caught the Devastator as she loomed over the sand dune.
She disappeared even as an erupting boom tube ripped Pandora to freedom before the light vanished, along with the captured Devastator.
Volar ducked under Giltotina’s slice and clipped her with a left cross. She said, “You can’t beat me. I’ve held back too long. I’m going to use my powers at their highest level and be proud of who I am from now on! I’ve been as much a slave to my own self-doubts as you’ve become to that monster.”
She shook her blonde foe and crashed to the ground with stunning impact. The fallen Gilotina vanished in a boom tube of her own.
Starman and Captain Comet joined Dolphin and Volar. Captain Comet said, “Darkseid reclaimed his servants. Imagine — all that effort and pain out of one woman’s desire to hurt others. She’s Darskeid’s daughter, all right. Superman warned me about her. But I never expected to meet her so soon.”
“You saved us all,” said Narkin of the Zorian Council. “We have lost many to her rampage, but thanks to you all, we shall survive. She might have eliminated the Zorian race if you had not stopped her.”
Starman said, “OK, I know you only ran off to get that weapon, but what is it and how’d you know about it?”
Captain Comet smiled and explained, “When I started to probe the Devastator’s mind, I was stopped by what I’d call static. I picked up the powerful but different hum of other disembodied minds all around the city. I drew from their minds images of the device that could trap her in the same limbo in which the minds that spoke to my own were at. I built the device, which magnified those mental signals to whoever was caught within the range of the energy. That made Devastator attuned to them. She entered their limbo through the mental connection they formed and sought to slay them all. Apparently, they were millions of disembodied Zorians from eons ago. Something robbed them of life eons ago, and their minds were more like hers. She wanted to go to them. Perhaps they were even her original worshippers. She opened the portal to them. All I did was make her aware of or sensitive to their mental signals.” He stopped for a moment and then added, “She had little mind beyond rage. Thus, I had to amplify her perceptions to the point in which she could detect what my advanced mind already had.”
Narkin said, “We have a legend that millions of Zorians died at the devices of a being called Starbreaker. They must linger here as wraiths. They saved this world by luring her to their cold realm.”
Dolphin and Lady Blackhawk rushed over and congratulated their friends, and Dolphin flung herself into Starman’s arms. ”Thank goodness you are all right,” she said.
Starman held her and said, “Captain Comet saved the day as usual. One question, Cap. What is to stop the Devastator from escaping from that limbo in which you lured her?”
“I can answer that,” said Narkin. “It is bloodshed that summons her, and in that realm all she will find are the minds or disembodied spirits of our ancient dead. There will be no blood to empower her. She will remain there forever. I cannot imagine a renewal of the sacrifice ritual would free her, since this time she will be alone and will soon be helpless with no one to empower her.”
Captain Comet nodded. “That was my hope as well.”
***
Later, the team returned to Zor after returning to Earth to bring Tharka back to this universe’s version of her home planet on Earth-Two.
Narkin carefully lifted Tharka and said, “Captain, I fear her ordeal has left her badly hurt.”
“Poor Tharka,” said Dolphin. “I recall Nadir said she had her super-powers only on Zor due to its lesser gravity and was actually powerless while on Earth-Two. It must have been some fluke in the crossing from one universe to another that caused her to gain super-powers that worked even on Earth. But what if we were wrong, and our universe proved to be toxic to her mind or body over time?”
Captain Comet and the rest entered the Zorian Science Council Hall and waited for hours as Zorian scientists worked to save the blonde heroine.
Volar paced restlessly. “I blame myself. Joan needed my understanding, and I was so wrapped up in my own problems that I ignored her. That drove her into Pandora’s clutches.”
“Listen, Rena, you did all you could do,” said Starman. “Don’t forget that above and beyond any gender issues you may have, you are still human.”
Narkin emerged from the medical wing and announced his success. ”Tharka is weak but alive. She will recover, but perhaps as some form of mental protection due to her suffering at the hands of Pandora, she is temporarily powerless.”
Captain Comet said, “We’ll help her find some way to live and recover. I have one other idea.”
Lady Blackhawk laughed. “When my cousin has an idea, it’s usually a big one.”
Comet smiled enigmatically. “We’ll see.”
***
Back on the isle of Vumania on Earth, the team greeted a thrilled and very lovely Joan Carter. She now was fully human and looked as young and lovely as she had before her accident. She hugged Captain Comet warmly.
“Adam, your idea saved me,” she gushed. “You took a cell sample from this world’s Joan Carter Crane, who is married to the Bob Crane of this world — although his mind resides in the body of the late Chuck Grayson — and had the Zorians clone a body from that cell.”
“A mindless body to house your brain,” added Dolphin. “Adam thought of the idea when you told him about your meeting with Bob and his wife. I know you were crushed that he had a spouse on our Earth.”
Comet said, “I chalk it up to the wonders of Zorian science.”
***
Meanwhile, on the planet Apokolips, Pandora stood before her solemn sire. His face was craggy, yet he was apparently pleased with his child’s report.
“I did initially plan to only unleash that white creature on the Zorians for genocide and giggles,” she said, “but when I detected those disembodied minds, I figured I could convince them to contact Comet and give him the idea to have the Devastator open the portal to their realm. I knew it would cost me her services, but she was such a mindless engine of destruction, anyway. So once Comet led her to open their realm up, I used dear Doctor Bedlam’s automatons to house all their precious vengeful minds. Now I have millions of Zorian minds housed in Bedlam’s silvery automatons, all waiting for my command.”
“You killed many of those on Zor,” said Darkseid. “You eliminated two of Captain Comet’s allies. You fooled him as well. I respect him, and thus I am very pleased with you.”
Pandora smiled coldly. “Anything for Daddy. Now, may I have Thanagar?”
Darkseid said, “I’ll consider it.”
