Chapter 63

Watchtower

"This bites," Supergirl complained, as she held the outer casing of a computer up for Ben, now as Grey Matter, "they don't have to go to prison; they're the good guys!"

"I don't like it either, Kara," Grey Matter said as he worked, "but people are already scared of us right now; this'll help ease some of the pressure off us."

"Nobody really believes we did this."

Grey Matter sighed. "Sorry, gotta disagree with you there; plenty of people are thinking we're about to invade. But as soon as the Watchtower is fixed, we've got sixty superheroes ready to find out who's really behind this."

Supergirl was frustrated; she knew that he was right, but she still wasn't happy.

"I'm worried about them, Ben; I'm worried about my cousin."

"Don't be." Grey Matter jumped to the ground, then slapped Ultimatrix dial, turning back to normal. "This will work out; we'll find out who did this, we'll stop them, and we'll go back to saving the world, just like before."

Supergirl smiled. "How are you always so confident?"

Ben placed his hand on top of hers. "Having a great girlfriend who makes sure I don't screw up certainly helps."

The moment was ruined, however, when STRIPE stepped forward.

"You guys see that?" he asked in a synthesized voice, while pointing out the window.

Supergirl and Ben followed STRIPE's finger, and saw mass of rocket engines propelling many somethings toward them.

"Something comin' up from planetside," STRIPE continued, "Javelins, maybe?"

Supergirl narrowed her eyes, trying to see what they were. "Not Javelins; they almost look like…" then it hit her. "Missiles!"

STRIPE checked the sensors in his armor. "I'm counting two-dozen Damocles-class missiles! That's LexCorp tech!"

Ben rushed to the intercom. "Battle stations! Prepare for impact!"

Across the Watchtower, Leaguers and technicians belted themselves in where they could, or otherwise found a place to brace themselves. As the missiles got closer, the warheads folded back, revealing a large drill. When the missiles hit the station, they didn't explode; rather, they tunneled a path. With their defenses down, the Watchtower was soon riddled with intruding missiles.

Several missiles hit the observation deck. The Leaguers prepared for the worst, getting into position and readying weapons or powers. Ben activated the Ultimatrix, selected an alien and slammed down the dial.

"EYE GUY!" this alien was tall and muscular, with yellow skin and pointed fingers and toes. Two large ears stuck out from his head, which had no other features save for a fanged mouth. His eyes were scattered all over his body. The Ultimatrix symbol was part of a belt that supported a pair of black pants.

Supergirl flew up to one of the missiles, only for it to explosively detach and nearly collide with her. She dodged it, only to be smacked into the ground by a giant fist. All of Eye Guy's eyes widened when he saw wave after wave of Ultimen copies emerge from each missile, attacking anyone in their way. A Shifter ran towards him, turning into a tiger, but Eye Guy sent her flying with an energy-blast from the eye on his shoulder.

In moments, the entire deck became a super-powered brawl.

"Ben!" Dr. Fate flew up next to him, blasting away a Wind Dragon with his magic. "Something has been done to these Ultimen."

"Yeah, I noticed that there are a lot of them, Doc." Eye Guy said, as three of the eyes on his arm merged into one, and fired a blue bolt that froze a Juice solid.

"Not that," said Fate, "I have tried to scan their minds, but they aren't there."

"What are you talking about?"

"Their minds and souls have somehow been erased; these creatures are no more than organic robots."

Eye Guy frowned. "Are you absolutely sure?" Fate nodded; Eye Guy ran over to the intercom. "Everyone, listen; these guys aren't real, so you don't have to hold back. Take 'em down hard!"

With a roar, the Justice League went into battle.

…

In a lower part of the Watchtower, a single figure strode out of a missile. She put a finger to the silver strip on her forehead.

"Ultimen, keep the League off of me," said Galatea, "and sanitize the Watchtower." Then she flew off to complete her objective.

Destroy the Watchtower.

…

Cadmus Headquarters

Amanda Waller and General Eiling stood in the main conference room, watching a digital readout of the Watchtower as their forces attacked. Waller let no emotion cross her face, while Eiling had a grim smile as he drank his coffee. The General was about to say something, when the grate to the air vent above them broke, and Batman landed in front of them.

"We've got business, Waller." Batman barely even glanced at Eiling as he knocked a pistol out of the man's hand with a batarang. The General tried to rush the Dark Knight, but he was knocked over the table and into unconsciousness in a single blow.

Batman stood directly in front of Waller. "You told me once that you were a patriot; well, it's time to step up." Waller quickly pressed a button on the remote behind her back, dismissing the digital readout. "You have to know that the Justice League would never have fired that weapon at you."

Waller scoffed. "Sure you would; it was retaliation for kidnapping The Question."

"And yet, you weren't home." Batman stared at her as he continued. "We've had you under surveillance for months; you don't think we didn't see you evacuate your offices?"

"A warning shot, then."

"Don't be dense." Batman couldn't believe how blind this woman was. "Someone took over our Fusion Cannon by remote control. There are maybe three people on Earth who're smart enough to pull that off; two of them were already on the Watchtower. And that leaves…"

"Luthor." Waller looked skeptical. "That's where you're trying to lead me, right?"

"You're too smart to trust him."

"Who says I do?" Waller figured one little admission wouldn't hurt. "He provides off-the-books funding for Cadmus; as far as I'm concerned, that's all he's good for."

"Then you must know he has his own agenda." Batman hoped that Waller was a little more curious about Luthor's motives.

"He wants to be President; that's agenda enough for anyone."

Then again, maybe she wasn't. "Almost anyone. If I were you, I'd start looking at him. Hard."

Waller was about to respond, when she heard a groan behind her. She turned to see Eiling pull himself up. When she turned back to face Batman, he was already gone.

I wonder if Gotham PD hates that as much as I do.

…

Watchtower

The battle for the Watchtower had become slightly more organized; the Leaguers might have been outnumbered, but they had fought together as teammates for over a year. They knew what they were doing.

Eye Guy had also come up with some rough battle-plans; he had Captain Marvel lead some of the more mobile heroes as a quick-reaction force, constantly moving to support anyone who needed help. He had Dr. Fate teleport anyone that was too badly injured to his tower; that way, they would be safe, and other Leaguers wouldn't have to worry about fallen friends.

Since discovering that the Ultimen clones weren't really alive, the League found themselves venting all of their anger over the last day at their opponents. Fallen Ultimen littered the floor, but more still came.

Eye Guy found himself surrounded by Downpours and Shifters. The latter he could handle as Eye Guy, but Downpour could be tricky, so he tapped the Ultimatrix dial on his belt. In his place stood what looked like a six-foot tall, walking oven. He was bulky and other than the green Ultimatrix symbol on his chest, the only color on him that wasn't grey was an orange light coming from the vent on his face.

"NRG!" the alien cried out in a Russian accent.

The Downpours turned into water and flowed towards him, but NRG simply charged up his superheated radiation and fired it through the vent. In a flash of orange light, all of the water was vaporized. One of the Shifters turned into a Tyrannosaurus, but even that mighty dinosaur's teeth couldn't break NRG's metal hide. NRG swung his heavy fist into the dinosaur's eye, which made her reflexively open her mouth. The alien swung around to finish the Shifter off, but Supergirl, traveling at super-fast speed, knocked her off the platform.

"Thanks!" NRG said.

"You need any more help?" Supergirl asked.

"No, I'm good." To prove his point, NRG took down the rest of the Shifters with several blasts of radiation. He was about to rush back into the fray, when the Ultimatrix dial began to blink, and a voice rang out.

"Ship ship!"

"Ship?" NRG asked, "What's going on?"

"Ship ship sh…" Ship's voice cut out.

"Something is wrong in the reactor!" NRG looked up at Supergirl. "I'm going to go help Ship!"

Supergirl nodded. "Okay, we can handle the rest of these guys."

NRG slapped the Ultimatrix dial again. "FASTTRACK!"

In a blur, Fasttrack ran through the station, occasionally throwing a punch at a clone as he ran. In a few seconds, he made it to the reactor room. His eyes went wide when he saw The Atom, shrunk down to only a few inches tall and covered in wounds, lying next to…

"Ship!" Fasttrack gently picked up the little injured alien. "Come on, little buddy, say something!"

To his relief, Ship weakly raised his head. "Sh-ship…"

"Okay Ship, I'll take care of it; you just rest." He placed both Ship and Atom in a corner, then raced to the inner workings of the reactor, a massive half-sphere studded with cables that weakly glowed.

"Quite an impressive sight, isn't it?"

Fasttrack looked up and barely dodged the punch that Galatea threw.

"You're alive?" then Fasttrack smirked. "What, that beat-down Supergirl and I gave you the last time wasn't enough?"

Galatea scowled. "This won't be like the last time. This time, I'll kill you, then her."

Fasttrack's eyes narrowed. "Not gonna happen." He slapped the Ultimatrix dial.

"BLITZWOLFER!"

The two aliens eyed each other for a moment, then charged.