2. Lost in the Dark
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He awoke again after another stretch of time seemed to have passed. He was still in the pod, but now he could actually move compared to his previous immobile state. Gone was the weakness that was infused throughout his body, in its place was…power. A strength beyond him on his best days and energy seemingly radiating out of him. His muscles ached, not from over-exertion, but from a growing need to be used.

Looking out the glass he saw two new faces, a shorter bespectacled man with a round face and a taller fair-skinned woman with her hair in a bun. Similar to the men he remembered previously, they were both taking notes and speaking amongst themselves. The difference this time was he could hear them.

“No discomfort from the gauging fluid, and remarkable bone structure. If it wasn’t for the tail and injections being proven effective, I would believe he was Kryptonian.” the taller woman stated.

“Every reading barely diverges from a human besides regenerative capabilities. Yet he exhibited superhuman strength without any adverse effects to his body. Truly remarkable!” the man exclaimed. Seemingly enraptured by the data in front of him he started to pace around the pod. "Imagine the uses! If we can unravel the method for this we can have agents who exhibit no outward metahuman physique and all the added benefits!"

He had continued to listen in on their conversation while digesting their words.

A tail? Kryptonian? Metahuman? Are they both crazy? That sounds like...

The man continued to rant and rave while he thought about what was going on. Every logical scenario he had in his mind went against the current line of thought their comments put him on. Either he was delirious, or the people below him were insane.

“It is going to be difficult to get any truly conclusive readings without a proper sample. We must push harder for more invasive tests! We are sitting on a goldmine of knowledge and its small-minded fear holding it back!”

His body tensed at the mention of invasive tests. Moving beyond his confusion he reached to touch the glass in front of him and completely shattered it. Shards rained down on the pair as he quickly landed on his feet, his body effortlessly placing him in front of the pair, towering over the man and easily standing over the woman.

For a moment all three of them stood there stunned, the woman recovered quickly pressing a button on one of the neighboring consoles. Alarms screamed into life as the two people in front of him quickly scrambled to the side of the room. Just as suddenly people started to fill the room, each of them carrying what appeared to him as a rifle from a b-grade sci-fi movie, but he barely paid attention to them. His mind still going over the glass in his hands, a simple tap and it evaporated into nothing in his hands. Closing them they gave a satisfying crunch as the small pebble-like shards were ground into a fine powder. In his mind swirled a new instinct, one urging him to push through the people that suddenly entered. To remove the men who would point weapons at him and rip the answers out of them.

His eyes finally turned towards the men in front of him, all of them wearing black shirts and pants adorned in body armor and fitted gloves. Some wore helmets while others wore simple wool caps. The similarity that stood out the most to him at the moment was their eyes. Every single person looked at him with some look of apprehension crossed with fear and against every other version of himself in the past, he seemed to have expected it.

“Where are we?” he said. The power he felt bolstering his body giving him confidence that didn't sit right with the logical side of himself. In any other situation, he knew that having guns pointed at themselves was a quick way to shut most people up, himself included. Whatever was flowing through him made the threat they should have posed to him mute.

“Down on the ground now!” one of the men bellowed the command at him. “Do it now or get taken down!”

He didn’t even miss a moment before taking another step forward.


They slowly made their way down one of the many hallways, his arrows at the ready as he trailed behind his blond-haired companion. So far they only ran into a few men on patrol, nothing to worry about, but they came frequent enough.

“How many have we ran into so far Arrow?”

“I counted what forty so far? Seems to be more than enough for your typical base.” He quickly released an arrow as they rounded a corner, its flat metal tip striking the jaw of a man, sending him sprawling on the ground below. “Forty-one,” he amended.

“Meaning whatever they have here is as much of a liability to them as much as they want to keep it contained here,” She continued on. Two more men rounded a corner and she sprung into action. Closing the distance in seconds she quickly kicked out the legs of one, disarming him with a punch to the stomach in the process. Before the other man could react she punched twice, one to the man's liver and another to the side of his jaw before delivering a swift kick to the side of his head. Quickly checking their bodies she produced one silver keycard that she stored in her blue jacket and continued on.

“If that's the case, be prepared for anything. I expect to run into more from here.” Saying so she patted him on the shoulder. “ No missing from here on out ok?” 

“Now that you’ve said that how could I Songbird? Can’t have my claim to glory look bad right?” At those words, a red glow dyed the walls of the hallway. Dozens of the doors they had passed had sealed themselves. They both spun around prepared for multiple assailants only to find none. Looking around quickly he spotted a door on their left that was currently sealed.

“Canary, card!” She tossed him the card and he quickly swiped the access pad tied to the door.

“Access not allowed for this user,” the lock chimed. “Please report your need to logistics to be issued the correct credentials.”

“Course’ it's the wrong card!”  Slamming the end of his bow on the lock he forced his way into the room. Canary quickly shut the door behind him and they waited. Soon dozens of men were running past, armed with rifles and an assortment of tech he couldn’t place. They both stood hesitantly at opposite sides of the door. When it was clear none of the soldiers were interested in the room they began their search.

“That seems more like it, though looking at the direction it has nothing to do with us,” he said. “Fortunate timing for us, or unfortunate depending…”

“Whatever they have stored here is giving them trouble. I’ll phone it in, you see what you can find around here,” she replied.

“Got it.”

Looking around he noticed the room housed multiple desktops with accompanying monitors. It was most likely a security room, empty while all the personnel responded to whatever had happened further in. Moving in front of one of them he took out another one of his specialty arrows.

“Report.” a deep voice spoke over Canary’s communicator.

“Your hunch was right, nothing linking him here, but we found what most likely made the crater.”

“And did you find what was inside?” the voice asked.

“Not yet, most likely alien. And whatever it is seems to be out of their control. Should we keep a distance and monitor the situation or push to-”

“Covert ops are unnecessary, move in to intercept. Flash and Lantern are two minutes out. Secure it for now, we can tie him to the facility later.” he relayed quickly. “ The timeline has been moved up, I’ll be joining you shortly as well.”

“If you’re worried he’s related to Big Blue don’t be.” with a flick, Green Arrow moved what was showing on the screen in front of him to one of the many screens mounted to the wall. Canary quickly cycled the view on her communicator giving the person on the line a full view of it.

On the screen was a direct feed from one of the lower floors. What appeared to be a teen with long dark hair was seen pushing through everything and everyone in his path, if the bullets did anything in the way of hurting him he gave no indication. Seemingly annoyed with the constant stream of people, he chose a wall and ran directly through it and then kept going, A long brown tail trailing behind him as the camera lost sight of him past the streams of armed men trailing behind him.

“Besides the tail, he’s doing a good imitation though. But he’s young...” Arrow added. “ Meaning the disappearances were just part of this whole mess. Experimentation using foreign technology always leaves a bad taste in my mouth.”

“Arrow, Canary catch up and identify. I’ll be there shortly.” With that, the line was cut and the two of them focussed on pressing forward to catch whoever was currently smashing through every wall in the base.

Hi again! Here's another chapter, wrote it out then fully flipped the order of things and it felt much better! Started to get a flow down and seeing where I want things to go. Let me know what you think and feel free to comment!

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