Kara accelerated her thoughts, her mind working as fast as she could make it, the world seeming to slow down until everywhere she looked. Everything seemed to be frozen, motes of dust unmoving in the air.

Even with enhanced vision, she couldn’t see inside the building, the walls were probably reinforced with lead since they were expecting her cousin, but the cameras on her drones didn’t have that weakness.

Kara had been thinking about this engagement for a long time. She wouldn’t cry if every single one of them ended up dead, and if there were innocent lives at risk, that’s what she’d do.

But she didn’t want to simply go there and kill them all in cold blood. Contrary to Batman, she was willing to kill criminals, but she also understood how easy it could become, it was a slippery slope Kara had no wish to experiment. Even after Felix Faust, she was glad that killing had remained a burden.

Of the six enemies, she felt three of them NEEDED to die. The Joker was someone that absolutely needed to go. Wotan was a centuries-old monster that, through history, was probably worse by the numbers than the clown. They wouldn’t change, they wouldn’t stop and they wouldn’t stay in jail even if she delivered them there gift-wrapped.

Rao, even if they somehow stayed in jail, Wotan wouldn’t die from old age. Kara wasn’t sure whether he could kill himself and reincarnate outside the prison, but that too was a possibility.

Ultra-Humanite didn’t have the same resume, but he was an utterly amoral scientist that Kara had no doubt experimented on humans. Every time Kara thought of the man occupying the gorilla's body, she couldn’t help wanting to burn him to ashes, preferably from orbit. Kara had read his psychological profile, he too wasn’t going to change.

Count Vertigo would live. She could use him as an offering to start diplomatic relationships with his niece, and she was fairly sure he’d stay in jail after it was all done. He was barely a threat anyway.

Atomic Skull was a brutal criminal but, like Ultra-Humanite, he didn’t have that long of a rap sheet and wasn’t inclined to experiment on innocent people, so he could go to jail too. Kara didn’t want to become too bloodthirsty.

Black Adam had been hard. In this reality, he was Theo Adams, once a normal man that got his hands on the ancient amulet containing the soul of Thet-Adam. He’d killed Billy Batson’s parents to acquire the artifact and drew power from the amulet to become Black Adam.

Unfortunately, Teth-Adam’s soul didn’t completely wake from his long slumber, so the current Black Adam was mostly Theo, with some influence from Teth’s warrior disposition. It made him a cruel criminal with a bloodthirst desire for battle, a murderer drunk on the power he has acquired, but far from the worst on the Injustice League’s roster.

Kara also wanted to give Billy closure, and she was certain the boy would wish for his parents’ killer to face justice. Without the amulet, Theo should spend a long time in jail, powerless. She felt the young boy deserved at least that much from her.

Feeling someone grabbing her hand, Kara looked aside and saw Kori’s armored form. The Tamaranean squeezed once and stepped back, giving her a small nod. Shaking her head, Kara re-focused on the visor of her armor, staring at Wotan and Black Adam, their hearts in the middle of a beat, then she pulled the trigger.

All her weapons fired, there was no big bright light, no loud noise, but 18 teleport guns fired, three for every member of the Injustice League —just to make sure— Nothing happened.

For a long, drawn-out moment, Kara kept her attention on them, ready for any reaction. She saw their hearts finish beating and start again, with no acceleration in movements, no change in breathing.

Such a pity, somehow, they had blocked teleportation inside the building, but at least her attack hadn’t been noticed.

“First attack failed,” she spoke out loud, informing everyone involved. “No reaction, preparing for physical attack.”

“Ready,” Minion 3 /  Green Arrow said, adjusting his sniper position.

“Damn, I knew it couldn’t be that easy,” Kite-Man said, getting an elbow from Catwoman.

“I am ready,” Kori said, stepping ahead of Kara and preparing to charge.

After experimenting on Captain Marvel, Kara had expected Black Adam to be immune, but she had hoped the others could be dealt with through space manipulation. She didn’t think the Light knew about the nature of her weapon even after her attack at infinity island…

Perhaps they had prepared for Zatara, blocking any teleportation was a useful preparation against the magician… or it was just a default protection for Wotan.

Pressing the trigger again, Kara shot the already primed railguns. This time, there was a loud explosion all around her, 18 guns releasing their ammunition, the air heating up around the muzzles.

The projectiles hit the building faster than any Earthly weapon, the surface rippling with protective magic for a single second before actually shattering under the force of their combined attack.

On her screen, she watched the Atomic Skull, Joker, Count Vertigo and Ultra-Humanite go down, through her ears, she heard their cries of pain as the bullets tore through their bodies.

Wotan only flinched, the projectiles hitting his body and making him stumble. Black Adam growled, his eyes flashing through the camera.

“Second team, GO!” Kara yelled.

“Be careful,” Selina said, getting ready to rescue Ivy.

“Hell-Yeah!” Kite-man said, nodding towards Catwoman.

The fight was on.

At her side, Kori leaned forward, putting a foot on the edge of the building and preparing to fly, a hand on the hilt of her magical sword. On a different rooftop, hidden under a holographic projector and lying on the ground, Kara heard Minion 3 taking a slow breath.

Kara only spared a VERY brief glance at the rescue team preparing to glide over to the building since the teleportation platform hadn’t worked, then refocused on the enemy.

Black Adam burst through a window almost as fast as Kara could move, his eyes glowing iridescent white with barely contained power. Without stopping, he continued to fly up while looking around, then he saw her and positioned himself. “Shaz—”

The bullet hit him in the chest, missing his heart by a few centimeters and piercing a lung. Black Adam’s eyes opened wide in disbelief as words failed him, floating back, he spit blood and started to fall.

Minion 3 reloaded fast, the empty capsule flying out of the giant sniper as he prepared himself. Wotan flew after Black Adam, a cloud of darkness billowing out from around him, eldritch red lightning flowing from inside it.

The second shot was perfectly aimed, passing straight through five magical barriers to hit the wizard in the chest right where his lung was, enough to stop him from casting verbal spells and allow Kara to attack. Then Wotan shattered. The magic that made the illusion came undone in contact with the Nth metal.

Kori exploded in motion, pushing against the building and flying toward the wizard, hand gripping the Sword of Beowulf tightly. 

Kara cursed, but she was already in motion as well, nanomachines creating a small railgun in her empty hand. Through her hearing, she located the magician inside the dark cloud and turned all 18 drones on him. Again, the teleportation didn’t work, but it didn’t matter.

After her fight with Faust, Kara drastically increased the strength and durability of her projectile weapons. It made aiming harder since she had to care about collateral damage, but the sight of the magical shields bursting made all that trajectory calculation worth it.

Wotan floated back among the dispersed cloud of smoke, his arm barely hanging from a thin strip of flesh, shoulder completely gone even as his body seemed to split into a dozen copies, his red eyes desperately glaring at his attackers.

Another wave of projectiles hit the Wotan from which the copies had been created, breaking through its shields to discover it was already another illusion. With a flick of her eye, she gave Minion 3 command over her drones and turned towards Black Adam.

She hoped to take Wotan fully out while she had the initiative, but he wasn’t her target after all.

The false divine champion man was gasping for air and coughing, blood leaking from the wound in his chest but, somehow, he managed to steady himself, even if his eyes no longer shone with the power of Aton.

Kori arrived first, sword leaving the scabbard and aiming straight for Adam’s neck. The man reacted fast, managing to use his reflexes to block with his golden armguards.

Kara took the opening, shooting the man right in the chest again, the heated projective connecting with his open wound and exploding. Unfortunately, the localized dimension-breaking effects on the bullet didn’t affect him like they had Lobo. Another aspect of the dimensional protections he had.

Black Adam still screamed in pain, Kori meanwhile twisted the sword, guiding his arm out of the way and stabbing at his eye. With a shout of rage, he dodged just enough that he got a new haircut, as well as a long scar on his scalp.

Even, wounded and weakened, he was fast, too fast. Lifting his other arm, he gripped Kori’s wrist, threw her straight up, and coughed. “Shazam,” then he moved, dodging the incoming lightning bolt.

Kara intercepted the bolt before it could hit Kori, using the remaining Nth metal in her right gauntlet to actually slap the lightning aside enough it missed her girlfriend.

The bolt struck a nearby house, the entire structure simply disintegrating from the sheer strength of the magical attack, the ground exploding and sending giant pieces of the foundation flying up, devastating the surroundings and leaving a scorched, 40 meters deep hole in the ground.

On her visor, her armor warned her the bolt had been at least five times stronger than anything Captain Marvel had used, including the bolts Mr. Mind had hit her with when he had stolen the power of Zeus.

Her armor was specially designed to endure electricity, but it would only block one such blast head-on before some of its defenses were fried. A second hit would probably partially bypass the armor while also frying every system it had.

Well, at least it WOULD block an attack, so that was a huge advantage.

Another flashing warning on her visor drew her attention back to Wotan, who had managed to regain control over the cloud of eldritch darkness, gathering it protectively around his illusions and blocking Minion 3’s vision.

A huge, scarlet spell mandala started to form all around the darkness, the effect clearly aimed at them.

“I’m afraid your opponent is me,” said an educated voice right beside Wotan, the dark cloud suddenly growing claws and striking every illusion before grabbing the magician and squeezing his body until he screamed. “Very poor choice of elements, I must say.”

“Forge, I require assistance!” Kori yelled.

Rao damn it, at least The Shade was dealing with Wotan!

Her brief distraction, necessary as it had been, still cost them. Black Adam, had managed to trade a few blows with Kori, using his bracers to defend against her sword. Kara saw him regaining his bearings and drawing upon Teth-Adam’s experience.

She had hoped to have dealt with him before he had recovered his mind and started to draw upon the ancient general’s skills. Now it was going to be so much harder!

Throwing Kori to the ground, Black Adam stomped, causing the entire street to shake and creating yet another crater. Kori rolled aside, kicking his legs out from under him. At the same time, a railgun lifted from her shoulder and shot him in the face.

Kara lifted her weapons and also shot him in the face, briefly blinding him and allowing Kori to strike again, a rising slash that left her floating in the air.

Unfortunately, even augmented, her projectiles weren’t doing more than causing him to flinch, so Kara changed the setting, turning them into sonic weapons. It wouldn’t cause as much direct damage but should mess with his balance.

Unable to see, Black Adam had thrown himself into the air, flying back and up almost faster than Kara could follow, but it had been too late, there was a large open gash on his chest from hip to shoulder, blood soaking his suit.

“Shazam!” he screamed again and twisted aside, the lightning bolt missing his back and aiming in a straight line toward them.

Kara couldn’t dodge, it was too powerful and was nearly horizontal, it would devastate several blocks before dissipating. While their immediate surroundings were empty of civilians, the attack would still reach civilians.

She lifted her Nth metal gauntlet. 

“HA!” Kori lifted the Sword of Beowulf above her head and slashed straight down, cutting the bolt in two and dispersing most of its power before the remains hit the ground around them and turned the asphalt into charcoal.

“You will pay for what you have done,” Black Adam said, the wound in his chest regenerating, slowly. Then he coughed blood again, the bullet wound still remaining. “What spell is this? I will not fall for such cheap ambushes!”

He was angry, furious even, and the gunshot wound wasn’t holding him back as much as they had hoped. Still, the two sides stared at each other, Black Adam waiting for his chest to regenerate and Kara taking the three seconds of calm to gather herself.

Regrettably, the wound wasn’t decisive, even if she attacked, it would only cause him some discomfort, there was no sense pushing things.

Damn, if only she had more time! Kara had managed to build a device capable of copying Amber’s ability to absorb Marvel’s lightning, but she hadn’t managed to make it work from a distance, requiring at least 30 seconds of contact with his body.

Slowly, she breathed out and let her mind calm. The adrenaline was getting to her and starting to affect her thoughts. Glancing at Kori, she felt her girlfriend’s confidence, as well as her dedication.

Slowly, the two of them floated up. Behind them, they saw blasts of scarlet spells illuminating the night, revealing giant tentacles of shadow enveloping Wotan, The Shade using his power from a sitting position, legs elegantly crossed.

Somehow, Kara felt less stressed than she had ever been. Kori stood protectively in front of her, a constant reminder she was not alone, a constant source of strength.

Shielding fully deployed, Kori’s armor glowed with red light. The Tamaranean floated in place, sword held in one hand, pointed at Black Adam, and tilted downwards in a ready stance, second hand in front of her chest, ready for blocking.

Rao, she looked so fucking hot like that.

Two thin limbs sprouted from Kara’s lower back and reached for her sonic weapons. She let them take them, freeing her hands to fight as the Armor’s AI took care of aiming.

“Together,” she whispered.

“Together,” Kori nodded.

Slowly, they started separating, trying to flank the villain, but he didn’t let them.

Black Adam was fast, with a sonic boom, he flew straight at Kara, trying to take her out first. Her weapons fired, but he dodged the effects without slowing.

Kara retreated, letting the punch miss her, then Kori was there and he couldn’t reply. Twisting around, he blocked the sword, parrying it away and attempted to grab Kori’s neck. 

Kara punched him in the kidney, sending him flying sideways with a cry of pain.

He turned on her, face a mask of rage. Kori used her other hand to punch him in the side of the head and followed with a return slash of the sword.

Moving faster than a normal human could follow, they traded blows, their flight taking them through a small three-story building and into the sky as Black Adam attempted to gain distance.

They didn’t let him, he had to worry about the sword the most, but that left him open to blows from Kara and, every time he turned to deal with her, Kori almost took off his head or made him pay for it in another way.

Kara wasn’t as experienced or skilled, but with Kori, she worked in perfect coordination, pummeling the villain through the sky until he completely gave up any attack, only protecting himself, his face one of sheer, dumbfounded disbelief.

Then Kori kneed his nose while Kara punched him right in the wounded lung and his rage and incredulity turned to pain.

Covering his head protectively, he managed to buy enough time to scream. “Shazam!”

The bolt of lightning came straight down in their position, her armor immediately warning it wouldn’t hit any civilian.

The duo retreated, Kara’s sonic weapons bombarding Black Adam and destabilizing his balance while distracting him. It was almost enough, almost. 

At the last possible moment, the villain managed to grit his teeth and dodge the bolt of power, letting the lightning slam on the ground and evaporate everything that sat in its way, creating a twenty meters wide hole Kara couldn’t immediately see the bottom of.

Still, the sonic blasts had destroyed his balance and, with all his wounds, he couldn’t recover in time to avoid their charge back.

Kori slashed downwards with all her power. Out of position, Adam still managed to lift his bracers but the attack blew straight through his block, sending his arms back and opening his chest for a thrust.

The Sword of Beowulf pierced through his collarbone and burst out from his back, making him lose control of his right arm and causing blood to cover his suit.

Kara arrived right after, kicking the back of his head with so much strength he spun twice in the air, sword still stuck to his body, preventing the regeneration of his muscles.

Dazed and in enormous pain, the villain could do nothing as Kori grabbed his working arm and dislocated it, then she put him into a chokehold, her armor’s lights growing brighter as the magical drain started working.

Covering Black Adam’s mouth with a hand, Kara prevented him from calling his power again, then laid the Nth metal gauntlet on his chest and tried to simply pry the amulet of Teth-Adam away from him.

In yet another piece of bad luck, it didn’t work, even Nth metal didn’t simply allow her to rip the artifact from him while transformed. Still, she engaged her own magical drains, feeling them start to draw the power of Aton from the criminal.

30 seconds. 30 seconds until he was back to being a mortal man. A quarter of the time their fight took.

Below her, The Shade stopped being wary of Wotan’s ritual and gathered his power, a thick pillar of shadow smashing through his defenses and driving the wizard to the ground.

It was almost over.