InsaneJournal

It began with Artemis saving a scientist held captive by Blight, only to find out the scientist had already done as Blight wanted. The radioactive criminal had pieces of a dangerous android, and he forced the scientist to reassemble it for Blight to sell. This set off major warning flags for the Justice League as one thought came to mind.

Amazo.

A functioning Amazo, whether or not it came preloaded with the powers of the old Justice League, would be worth a great deal of money on the black market.

The Justice League have acted quickly to stop the sale.

Flash slides to a quick stop at a hill overlooking a private one of the harbor’s many, many docks. He sips the large drink he got at a convenience store on the way before asking, “So what have we got?”

Gorilla Guard drops from a nearby tree, where he has been keeping watch since tracking the truck here. He points a large finger at the one vessel in particular. It is a tiny thing, hardly comparable to the many cargo vessels commonly seen. “There. They have taken their purchase inside. These humans are not degenerates. They have training and discipline. They are efficient. Watchful!”

Lenses slide down from Gorilla Guard’s helmet, and he now points out to sea. “I suspect they will soon scurry to the larger vessel out there for the the true undertaking of their journey. They have planned this well. Have the females completed their tasks? We must act.”

Flash takes a noise drink from his large cup, squinting to try to see what Gorilla Guard sees out on the water. “Artemis and Happy Insect are still wrapping up Blight’s hired help in Ivy, and Green Lantern’s chasing down Blight. I guess we’ll do this without them.”

“Pah!” Gorilla Guard snorts. “They dawdle.”

“Redbird and Q aren’t coming either. They have their own things going on,” Flash says with a shrug. “I was hoping to go in as non-powered as possible in case we’re only dealing with a wiped Amazo. So much for that.”

“Gorilla females are more prompt,” Gorilla Guard mutters. “More pleasantly abundant body hair as well.”

“You said it.” Flash disappears for a fraction of a second, having discarded his empty drink cup. “We’ll intercept them on the big ship. That way the only people around are the bad guys. I’ll let Warhawk know, and we’ll keep Starman and Nightstar on standby until we know what we’re dealing with.”

------

“Markovians?!” Flash darts across the deck of the shipping vessel, dodging gunfire. “I was expecting maybe Irons or even the Russians. This is big for a little country. Blight must have been in a hurry to sell.”

Due to how heavily armed the crew of the vessel have proven to be, Nightstar and Starman have been teleported down from the Satellite to back Flash and Gorilla Guard up. After a few more minutes of fighting, Brainiac 5 lets Flash know that Artemis and Happy Insect are available as well. They teleport onto the ship seconds later.

“Hey, Artemis?” Flash intercepts a crew member about to fire a weapon, grabbing it and aiming it harmlessly into the air. “Could you track down there guys’ new toy and make sure we don’t lose track of it in all this?” He ducks as the Markovian man takes a swing at him and topples the guy over with a high-speed nudge. “Feel free to wreck it if you have to. I’ll make Brainy forgive you.”

As Flash bolts off for the control room, Artemis fires off an exploding energy arrow to cover her dash to the nearest door.

She makes her way cautiously but quickly deep into the ship, taking full advantage of her magnetic boots to cling to the walls as she proceeds deeper and deeper. She encounters no one along the way, which is not exactly comforting. That could -- and likely does -- mean she will catch up to some of the crew when she gets to where she’s going.

Artemis enters the ship’s cargo hold and finds it looking suspiciously empty. The crate she is looking for is just ahead of her, but rather than approach it, she moves slowly and carefully to the side. She has the strong suspicion that she isn’t the only person down here and no interest in rushing into a trap. The lenses of her visor cycles to infrared, allowing her to catch someone moving fast between some crates.

That person eats bow as she clotheslines him from behind one of the crates. He goes down hard, and she stops short of putting an energy arrow into him for good measure. The guy isn’t armed and wasn’t before she hit him either. He looks pretty rough as well, like his boat ride across the ocean was harder than everyone else she has seen so far.

Aiming an arrow at his head for good measure, she questions him and is told that he’s a stowaway named Will. He was a prisoner in Markovia and escaped.

While deciding whether to put an arrow in Will the Stowaway just to be sure, Artemis spots a man who looks much more like a crewmember tinkering with the android’s crate. Twisting her bow around quickly to switch her aim, she puts an arrow into his back just as he finishes whatever he was just doing.

------

“It’s days like this I really miss having Aquagirl on the team.” Flash rushes one of the crew, taking away his gun and strapping a life jacket to him with a second. The man is left stunned for a moment. “Safety,” Flash says right before shoving him over the railing into the water.

“Starman, Gorilla Guard -- let’s start roundin--” Flash is thrown off his feet mid-run when the deck bursts open. A tornado of ionized red air explodes forth from the hold below. The vessel rocks and buckles under the enormous strain, tossing around all hands. A figure rises from within the cyclone, coming into clearer view after a few seconds.

The assumption was wrong. Blight didn’t sell the Markovians an old Amazo android. He sold them an old Red Tornado body with operational powers.

Flash tumbles across the deck, finally coming to a stop on his back. A crew member slams into a wall nearby, remaining upright and sensible enough to point his gun at Flash. Flash quickly throws and bounces a bottle off his forehead. “Hold on to something while you’re down.” Flash runs -- or crawls on all fours at high speed -- over to where he sees Artemis rising from the hold along with some other guy, seeming to defy gravity and the red winds.

Pulling them clear of some of the debris that is whipping across what’s left of the deck, Flash skids to a stop and asks, “Hey. Who’s your friend?” Artemis introduces Flash to Will the Stowaway and explains about one of the crew turning the android on, which Flash kind of figured. A spiraling gust of red wind overtakes Will the Stowaway and blows him through the glass window in front of the ship’s control room.

“...He seemed nice. Different android, same plan. Do what you need to do. This boat’s going down soon.” Racing away from Artemis, Flash loses his footing and grabs onto the railing as he nearly goes sliding off the boat. A moment later, the crumbling boat steadies itself thanks to Starman’s magnetic hold. Since that will keep him occupied for the time being, Flash gestures at Nightstar for her to occupy Red Tornado.

------

“What? No! I am not teleporting you up to the Satellite with some unknown telekinetic,” Brainiac 5 says to Artemis via the Satellite’s communications system. “Oh, half-starved and possibly concussed? Excellent! A delirious, unknown telekinetic! Why not just send me a bomb?”

“...Oh, you would like that! Fortunately, I know you can’t even program your phone. Much less an explosive device.” Brainiac 5 rolls his eyes as walks into the teleport bay, listening to Artemis’ reply. “Fine! Let the consequences be on your head.”

Brainiac 5 mans the teleporter controls, locating Artemis’ transponder and grasping onto the adjacent biped with the targeting beam. Initiating the teleport, he looks to the teleport pad to watch Artemis materialize holding a slumped down haggardly looking human by the arm. Teleportation, as sometimes happens with the uninitiated, does not agree with the man’s already weakened state, leading him to vomit the mostly liquid contents of his digestive tract all over Artemis’ boots and the teleport pad.

Brainiac 5 simply looks at Artemis, completely maintaining his composure.

“...The consequences appear to be all over your boots instead.”

------

Back on the ship, the members of the Justice League continue to do their parts. Flash, Happy Insect and Gorilla Guard round up the Markovian crew members, securing them and evacuating them from the all but destroyed cargo vessel. Starman hovers in the air nearby, trying to hold what’s left of the ship together and afloat. Nightstar engages Red Tornado in the air, unable to do more than superficial damage to the android’s armored frame but at least keeping its simple, virtual intelligence focused on her.

Following the plan, Nightstar lures the Red Tornado higher into the air and away from so much flying debris. The intense red winds whip her around, though. Most of her effort goes into keeping herself in the air rather than gaining altitude.

Air currents eventually pitch Nightstar from the sky. Running on the water, Flash catches her before she makes a splashdown. Gorilla Guard and Happy Insect follow behind in a lifeboat holding the apprehended crew, while Starman finally starts to let the ship go in the background.

“How’s that shot coming?” Flash says through the team’s communicator.

A hole bursts open in Red Tornado’s chestplate all of a sudden, giving it a moment’s pause but nothing more. As it removes to wreak more havoc, its body shudders, strains and begins caving in on itself with the chest hole as the centerpoint.

Warhawk sits on a lawnchair at his perch on a cliff out on the coast, hefting up his large sniper rifle. “You guys might want to watch out. Just saying.”

After collapsing into a small ball, Red Tornado explodes. The concussion wave throws Starman down into the water and creates a wave that capsizes the lifeboat, washing the occupants onto the shore.

From his safe distance, Warhawk drinks from a straw in his large drink from a nearby convenience store. “Heh, nice. White dwarf bullet. Thank you, Ray Palmer.”