Showcase: The Bushrangers

Call the Dogs of War

by Addar Norton

Prologue: Time for Heroes and Villains Australia

Maddy Tains stood on the TLC Building in Brisbane, looking out towards the river and on to the next bank, where they were starting to build the site for World Expo ’88. They said it would put Brisbane on the map for world events, and of course that would bring out the worst in people for making a statement.

Bloody Hell, what am I doing here? she thought. During the Crisis on Infinite Earths, Australia didn’t fare too well in it; people were lost or dead, and huge parts of cities disappeared. Sydney would never be the same again — they had to rebuild the Opera House nearly the ground up — but that was in the past.

She looked down on the city. From here she could see most of the City Business District; the TLC Building wasn’t the tallest, but it would do for now. Her father was having a meeting, and she was left to amuse herself. Suddenly, she heard a police siren, and she spotted a car racing through the streets with the police following close behind.

“Well, it’s now or never,” she said and stood on the ledge and stepped off. She fell fast, but just as suddenly as it began, she stopped, her long blonde hair falling around her and her jeans and T-shirt changing to a tight-fitting costume of green and gold; a mask also formed around her face. She heard yelling and screaming from people below her, but they suddenly stopped when she changed. She adjusted her flight to race after the speeding cars.

“Well, that is one way to make a entrance for Austar,” she said with a smile and went off.

Chapter 1

Brisbane Australia, one of the lesser known cities of Australia was not up to par with Sydney or Melbourne. But with the World Expo 1988 coming to this city, it would change how the world and, of course, how Australians would see this city.

Maddie Chambers sat in a board meeting with her father, David Chambers. He wanted her here but for God knows what. She was bored as hell.

Bloody hell! she thought. Damn, I could be somewhere else but here! Maddie looked out the window to the clear blue skies. She wondered how it would be if she suddenly changed to Austar and jumped out of the window to escape. Sighing, she knew that wouldn’t work, so she resigned herself in being in this boring as hell meeting. She spied a newspaper on the table and began to read it.

The front page was about her debut as Austar, stopping those crooks and also about another mystery-man stopping a crime in Sydney with the museum there. There was also a story about another heroine in Melbourne breaking up a drug deal. The one in Sydney was calling himself The Roo, and the Melbourne mystery-woman was calling herself Reef.

Interesting, she thought, about time too.

She didn’t want to be the only super hero in Australia. It would be too much for her. There was also a story about the sighting of the Green Lantern in Western Australia stopping someone.

Suddenly, the building began to shake, and the people began to scream. Maddie’s father looked at her and ducked under the table. Typical, she thought. From the corner of her eye, she spotted something out the window. Making her way to the window, she looked up and saw a ship floating above Brisbane CBD.

“Bloody hell! Now this is just wonderful” Maddie whispered

Maddie ran to the stairs and went up to the roof. Her father, she knew, wouldn’t worry about her. He was too worried about saving his own skin than to worry about his daughter.

She looked up and saw the ship. “Mmmm now, that is one big ship! If this wasn’t real, it would make one good story for a movie!” she said.

Maddie jumped off the roof and changed to Austar, flying up to the ship. She was surprised that it didn’t do anything. She flew around the ship; it was pretty big. “Why does this happen to Australia every bloody time? Is it enough we have had problems a while ago being cut off from the outside world with that other alien crap?” Austar was getting pissed off with how aliens thought that Australia was a soft target.

Austar went to what she thought would be the front door or the front of the ship. She stopped and knocked on it. “Knock, knock. Avon calling! Can I speak to the woman of the house?” she said

The door opened, and suddenly something shot at her with a energy weapon. The blast sent her flying back to the ground.

“Ouch! Now that going to leave a mark!” Austar got up from the hole she made in the middle of the street.

The local people were indoors where it was safe, but some were cheering her on to go up and butt kick those aliens back to space.

“Wish it was that easy,” she said. This maybe was just a touch out of her league.

“Mmmmm, wonder how I can contact those other mystery-men in Sydney and Melbourne, and do they have ships like this there?” she mustered to herself.

Meanwhile, the ship just hung over the city. And in Sydney and Melbourne, the same type of ship was hanging over there, just as Austar thought it would be.

Australia was once again being used as a foothold to Earth, and Austar and the people of Australia didn’t like it one little bit.

Location:- Sydney, Australia, New South Wales, The Rocks

Danny Call was in his house on the historical site of the Rocks, where the first settlement began for Australia. Further on was the site where Captain Cook set foot on Australia and proclaimed this site for the English Empire. Little did he know how far this country would go within the world.

Danny was in his basement working on some equipment for his role as the hero called the Roo. His uniform hung behind him, a dark red suit with a hood and a black jacket. His basement, if you wanted to call it that, was actually an underground cavern he discovered a few years ago that spread under the district of the Rocks. He found some 18th Century items, so he wasn’t the only one that knew about this cavern. And, by the records he found in the city archive, the city didn’t know about this. So he took full advantage of it for his own use.

Danny had a TV on behind him for some sound in this quiet place as he worked on his equipment. A news bulletin came on which told of giant ships floating over Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne. He quickly put on his Roo uniform and made his was out of the cavern to the street. He looked up and saw the ship silently hovering over Sydney.

“Well, this is bloody wonderful! If it isn’t one thing, it is another! Why do they think that Australia is a soft target?” the Roo said.

People were gathering below him and just looking up towards the ship. By their tone, they were thinking the same thing as him. Like the Roo and Austar, the people of Australia were fed up with some two bit hoods or aliens trying to take over Australia. They wouldn’t take this, and the government of Australia surprisingly felt the same way as the people. The problem was: what could be done?

The Roo thought about this and decided to contact the Brisbane hero, Austar, to see what both of them could do. Someone could contact the Melbourne hero, Reef.

With that decision, he made his way back towards his cavern and put his plan into action.

Location:- Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

The person called Reef stood on the top of the tallest building in Melbourne. Like nearly every day here in Melbourne, it was raining. She knew it would stop soon and be hot as hell, just like Melbourne to have all four seasons in one day. She watched the ships float towards Melbourne and settled over the city. Somehow she didn’t think they are here just to ask for a cup of sugar.

She judged the distance from where she was and the ship. She jumped and landed on the hull of the ship and made her way towards what looked like a air vent. She pulled it open and skimmed her way through the ship. Reef didn’t know where she came from or who she really was when the last time aliens came to Australia. She woke up just as she was now, with no memory of her past. Her skin, it seemed, was strong. She could jump huge distances, and her strength was above normal. And the name Reef, well, just sounded good at the time. But one thing she did know was she had a great feeling towards this country and the people.

Reef made it through the ship. She was surprised that nobody had discovered her yet, or maybe they just thought no one would be dumb enough to try this stunt. She made it to what she thought was the control room and looked through the grate of the air vents.

She saw movement beneath her, and voices funny enough they were speaking in English and with an Australian accent.

“Well, is it all done?” the first voice asked.

“Yes, sir, all done. Tthe ships are in place, and it seems in Brisbane the local hero is trying to make her mark on the ship,” the second voice answered.

“Well, if our plans go ahead, the people of Australia will think it is another Alien Invasion. They will be like sheep to us, and the government will do anything we ask! So say I, Captain Thunderbolt!” the first voice, calling himself Captain Thunderbolt, said.

Bloody hell, this bloke is a few stubbies short of a carton, Reef thought to herself. She followed them through the air vents.

Captain Thunderbolt and the other man entered another huge room. Right in the middle of the room was a figure of a man, but he looked odd to Reef. The man walked in the visible light. Bloody hell, he’s decked in armor, Reef thought but some how it look familiar to her. She just couldn’t place where she had seen a suit of armor like that.

“Well?” the armored man asked.

“Everything is in place,” Captain Thunderbolt answered.

“Good, it is time for us to have revenge on the people and the government! Over 100 years ago, they called our ancestors criminals and strung them up. But now, we, the sons and daughters of thoses brave men, will have revenge!” the armored man announced.

“Call the Dogs of War! We are ready for battle!” Captain Thunderbolt yelled.

Reef knew she had to get out and warn the government and the people. She thought about the other heroes. She heard about Austar and the Roo; she had to get in contact with them.

“Kelly! Sir, we are ready!” a voice announced in the darkness of the room.

It hit Reef now where she had seen a suit of armor like that. It was an updated version of Ned Kelly’s suit of armor that he used in his last stand, before being captured by the Troopers nearly 100 years ago. This idiot thought himself a modern day Ned Kelly. And another question: where the hell did they get these ships?

Reef made her way through the maze of the Air vents and escaped outside. She jumped down to the building she first started from, made her way down the building and out to the streets to figure how to contact the other heroes of Australia.

The ships still hung over the cities of Australia. By now the heroes knew who was controlling the ships, which was surprising considering the total amount of intelligence in the ships could fill the shell of a walnut. An ant has more intelligence then these guys. Who ever gave these ships to these people was either a criminal mastermind or had the most warped sense of humor ever. The jury was still out on that one.

Austar was in the middle of King George Square in Brisbane, floating about ten meters off the ground. She was just looking at the ships. The hero who called himself the Roo contacted her awhile ago through the police and told her that the Melbourne hero, Reef, actually got into one of the ships. Reef found out that the people in there were calling themselves so called offspring of the 1800′s Bushrangers: Ned Kelly, Captain Thunderbolt and the likes.

Well, can’t say this gig is boring, she thought to herself. Somehow they had to get these ships out of the Australian skies. There was talk of the Australian Military shooting them down, but they suddenly realized that the fallout would rain on the civilians. Of course, that was typical of the Military: if they don’t understand it they just blow it out of existence, and then figure out who or what it was later.

Austar sighed. She had only been at this super hero gig for a while, and now she had a spaceship over her city. She wondered if Superman or Batman had days like this.

The Roo looked up at the ships; he had just finished talking to Austar in Brisbane and would be talking to Reef later on. There was something strange about the ships he didn’t notice before. That and what Reef told him about the ships inside had him curious.

He pulled out a pair of high powered binoculars and looked closely at the ship above Sydney. There was something nagging at him about all this. It was too simple, and the so called offspring of the old Bushrangers, by the sounds of it, didn’t have enough brains to build some space ships and fly them. He noticed something and looked closely. It was a bird flying near the ships. Suddenly, it disappeared and suddenly reappeared on the other side of the ship.

“Well, well,” the Roo said. “It would seem that the ships are not real at all. There is something up there, but not what I see before me.” He was wondering how the Reef got to he middle of the ship so quickly; she said she wasn’t in there for too long. It must be a solid hologram! Only humans recognized certain things, but birds and the like just ignore it.

Roo jumped down from the building and found a cop. He asked the cop to patch him through to Brisbane and Melbourne. If they, the three heroes, were going to beat this, they have to do it together.

Austar heard one of the police officers yelling to her. She looked down at him; he was holding up one of those new mobile phones to her. It looked more like a brick phone than a mobile one. Austar floated back down to the ground. It was the Roo from Sydney. She listened to his explanation. She also heard about Reef’s encounter with the Ship. It does explain a lot of things, she thought to herself.

Roo told of his idea to the two women, and both of them agreed it might work. But they had to do it together to get the best results. If it worked, the so called offspring would be defenseless, and then the local enforcement agencies could deal with those yahoos.

So Austar handed the mobile back to the cop and floated back up to the ship.

Meanwhile in Sydney and Melbourne, the Roo and Reef were doing the same thing.

Austar got as near to it as she could and raised her hands towards the ship. She gathered her energy and forced it towards the ship.

In Melbourne, Reef jumped on the ship, causing it to wobble and flicker.

Roo, on the other hand, went a more technological route. He held up a device and turned it on. It omitted a special white noise frequency, one that wouldn’t interfere with any other technology. The goal was to effect only the so called ship.

On the Brisbane ship, the Offspring were running around like headless chickens. They didn’t know what was happening to their hologram, but it was starting to short out! The ship’s holograms were interconnected to each other, so what happened on one happened on the others. While the members of the Offspring thought this was an interesting design point, the aliens who built it considered it just cost cutting.

The Melbourne ship was spinning out of control like a giant top in the sky. Reef was having the time of her life with it. For the civilians on the ground, it was a good excuse to have a party; to any Australian any excuse to have a party was a good one. Ned Kelly screamed for a bucket as he was going to throw up; it wasn’t a good look for the leader to get sick in front of his gang.

Sydney’s ship started to glow suddenly with a bright light. Then the hologram disappeared, and in it place was a rather small ship. It didn’t look nearly as impressive as the hologram ship before. As the Sydney ship’s hologram gave out, the others in the other cities did also.

Austar looked at the small ship. “You have to be kidding me,” she whispered. The ship looked like it was a collection of other ships. Not much of an invasion force at all.

Reef forced the small ship to land; the local police force and military swarmed around it immediately. Reef ripped off the door of the ship and went in. She followed the same path as before and ended up in the control center. There, many of the Offspring were green in the face; Ned Kelly had a bucket to his face and a sickening sound came from him. They didn’t object to being arrested.

Austar forced her ship down near the site of next year’s World Expo ’88. She ripped off the door and found the crew ready to give up without a fight.

In Sydney, it was another story. Before the army could get the ship to land, it shot off into space. The Roo watched the ship disappear. Somehow he knew this wasn’t over. Something was happening, and, whatever it was, it going to be big.

The ship flew past the orbit of Jupiter. The aliens inside it looked at one another. “Well, that didn’t go to well, my brother,” one of them said.

“No, it didn’t! We shouldn’t have given the ships to those fools! But, at the time, they were handy to see what force is in that small country!” the other answered.

“Yes, it would have been good to have a base already there for what is going to happen soon, my brother,” the first one said. “Soon, the Earth will belong to us and our allies!” The ship disappeared from the solar system.

In Australia, Reef, the Roo and Austar got together and decided to form a team for the land down under. They decided to call themselves the Bushrangers.