Global Protectors – All Fall Down

 

By Marcus Lycus

 

Special Double-Sized Final issue! 

This issue: EVERYBODY DIES!

(Well… sort of)

Legal Horrors – The Global Protectors and Dynamo are copyright, trademark etc. of Doctor Droid (www.superstories.org/droidzone) and are used with his permission.  Other characters and text are copyright Marcus Lycus.

This story is meant for people over the age of 18, please don’t read it if you are younger than that.  Any resemblance between characters in this story and any actual persons living or dead is purely coincidental of course.  

 

Marcus Lycus

(Marcus_Lycus@hotmail.com)

June 2007

 

Part 10 – Terminus

 

What has gone before…

Chapter One – A powerful alien invader named Lord Terminus arrived on the world of Gemma and proceeded to kill every single person on it (except for the super-powered Queen who he raped and left stranded on an asteroid).  He then set his sights on Earth.

Chapter Two – The media tycoon J. Buckley Wolfe Sr. was contacted by the mysterious Mr. Senior with a plan to destroy the Global Protectors.  First they blackmailed the Japanese heroine Rising Sun into becoming Wolfe’s slave.  After months of humiliations her will was crushed and she was possessed by Senior.

Chapter Three – Senior blackmailed the Irish heroine Shamrock into a series of abusive relationships.  She was fired from the Global Protectors and left an emotional wreck.

Chapter Four – The sex-demon known as the Incubus attempted to destroy the Argentine heroine La Sola.  But even the demon’s sexual appetite was no match for the Latin woman’s.  Defeated he was send into exile.

Chapter Five – The young Australian heroine Aussie Girl’s illicit relationship with the supervillain Dynamo turned ugly when he brainwashed her into becoming the villainous Thunder Girl.  She was recaptured by the Global Protectors but now is uncertain who she really is.

Chapter Six – The American heroine Star accepted a top-secret mission to abduct a scientist from Cuba.  After Mr. Senior revealed this, UN agents arrested and abused the arrogant American woman.  After she is found not-guilty she foolishly tried to get revenge but was beaten, disgraced and imprisoned, this time in Riker’s Island.

Chapter Seven – After months of clashes Tigress and the vampiric Dark Count met for a final battle.  The Count was destroyed but Tigress transformed into a vampire and disappeared into the night.

Chapter Eight – The icy Swede Valkyrie began to crack.  The team was at its limits with only four active members (Maple Leaf, Valkyrie, La Sola and Rising Sun) and their popularity in the toilet.  Things got even worse as Maple Leaf started selling their trophies to supervillains to pay the bills and hired a supervillain to cure Aussie Girl.  Finally the death of Star in prison drove her over the edge and into Rising Sun’s arms.  After a night of violent lovemaking she became Rising Sun’s pawn and was possessed by the real villain, Mr. Senior the 26^th Century version of J. Buckley Wolfe!

Chapter Nine – Maple Leaf, hoping for a relaxing night in her vibrator chair, instead has her memories restored by Valkyrie (possessed by Mr. Senior).  Tormented by years of defeats and humiliations at the hands of different villains she then listened to her best friend explain how she had destroyed the team.  Finally Val left Maple Leaf in a death trap while she went to watch the arrival of Terminus.

 

Leaving us with…

Valkyrie – Possessed

Tigress – A vampire

La Sola – Quit

Rising Sun – A slave  

Shamrock – A slut

Aussie Girl – Insane

Star – Dead

And Maple Leaf?  We’ll see.  Real soon…

***

Meanwhile in the Anti-verse…

Newton’s first law says that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.  He was talking about motion of course, but his words had far more truth than he could have ever suspected…

In parallel dimension there is a world that is strangely similar but opposite to our own.  A world where Angelo Joelie and Brenda Pitt cook and eat African orphans on live TV.  A world where Billie Gates begs by the side of the road, telling everyone how competitors stole all her ideas.  A world where the heroines of the Global Protectors are replaced by the villains of the Global Pillagers. 

It’s a pretty fucked up place. 

And the Global Pillagers are about the most fucked up people on it.

“Wow that Lady Primus sure was a push-over.”

“Yeah boss, she was all like ‘But I have come to remake this world’ and stuff and we were all like ‘bend over and make the pig noise bitch!’ too funny.  Hey remember when Aztec cut her stomach open and pulled out her guts!”

“Yeah Runt, I was there remember.”

“Oh right, of course Imperialist.  No offense, I mean, I was just saying how funny you are and all-”

“Hey Runt, SHADDAP!”  A back hand slap sent the Canadian villain flying into some ruins. 

“Gotta say Imperialist, it’s really cause of your leadership, these last few months the team’s been pulling together like never before.  It’s like all those petty problems we had, we’re just forgetting putting them aside for the larger mission of pillaging the world.”

“Thanks Aussie Con, that means a lot to me.  Course you’ve been great too, the way you helped out Hooligan after he swore off sex.  And the way you helped out Aztec after all those women dumped him.  These days practically everything is smooth sailing.”

“Cept for Cannibal and the Cheerful Countess, he has got to start tracking her down.  It’s like he doesn’t even care about her.”

“Yeah well I’m sure that will work out, cause the important thing is that we’re all friends!”  The Imperialist wrapped his arms around Aussie Con and Aussie Con returned the hug.  Runt crawled out from the bushes and hugged Imperialist’s leg.  “I love you guys!”  The Imperialist said with a sob.

***

And meanwhile in the year 2636…

Just outside the domed city of Megapolis sits the Gaea Teseract Nexus, the high-tech headquarters of the Legion of Galactic Protectors whose thousands of members protect Earth’s entire galaxy.  Inside one of their young members is showing around a very special visitor.

“I just wanted to say Mr. Penalizer you’re like totally my inspiration.”  Venus Girl cooed to the aging Vietnam vet.  “This one time I was fighting, like, these Space Pirates and I took along a Laser Uzi and I was all like ZAP! ZAP! ZAP! It was awesome!  I was just like you.  And that stuff you’ll do after you get crippled and start your own team, it’s so amazing.”

“Uh crippled?”

“Oh yeah, that hasn’t happened yet huh?”  She giggled and grabbed his crotch.  “Nope still there!  So don’t worry about it, ancient history.”

The grim Penalizer scowled but let it drop.  These kids were really getting on his nerves.  “So if I’m your inspiration how come you guys have a giant hologram of that Global Protector chick out front?”

“Oh her.  Did I tell you we met her this one time and she was like a total bitch.  But you’re totally cool.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Hey would you mind having old-style sex one more time before we send you back?”

The Penalizer felt the pouch on his web gear, there seemed to be a few viagras left.  “Yeah, I think I’m up for that.”

“Awesome!  I was telling my buddy Galaxy Girl about it and she totally wants to do a three-way with you!”

“Uh…” 

The 20^th century hero had no chance to reply as the floor suddenly shook.  He and the young heroine were tossed from side to side, when it ended, things were different.

“Who the fuck are you?”  The girl in front of him demanded.  She had the same face but instead of her brightly colored green and yellow costume she now wore a drab grey jacket and some sort of leather cat suit under it.  And the hallways, once silver and gleaming were now beige and stained with rot.  He glanced out a window and the Megapolis of the future he remembered was gone.  Instead of mile-high art-deco sky scrapers and monorails there were clouds of pollution and hulking bunkers.

“Venus Girl?  What was that?”  

“Venus Girl?  Who the fuck is Venus Girl?  I’m fucking Venix you old fart!”

“But… but you brought me here, you said I was your inspiration?”

“As IF!  We got a saying here in the future, SUCK IT GRANDPA!”  Her eyes turned a dangerous red and veins started to pop out in her forehead.  The Penalizer reached for his .44 but it was too late, the pain shooting through his nervous system brought him to his knees.  He couldn’t feel his arms or legs any more, he fell to his knees.  “Never… thought… it would… end… like… this…” he muttered as darkness closed in.

But then the ground shook again and Venix was gone.  The Penalizer was in a sterile palace made of crystal.  Another woman like Venus Girl, wearing some sort of jumpsuit with belt pouches looked at him.  Before she could say a word there was another disruption, he was in a mud tunnel, fearsome insects crawled towards him.  There was another disruption and the tunnel was gone.

So was the building.  And the city.  The Earth was a barren wasteland.

He choked on the foul air and climbed to his feet.  He saw a rainbow light in the distance.  He stumbled towards it.  He could make out three figures standing around an arcane machine.  “Please!”  He cried out.  “What’s going on?”

“It’s worse than I thought Frigga!  If we hadn’t been in the Time Square chamber when the disruption hit-“

“I know Amanoterasu.  We would be gone, just like the rest of them.  I think I have pin-pointed the source; there in 2006 AD.”

“2006?  Oh drat, was I even born then?  What’s that in GP years?”

“Sylvania, I don’t know how you forget these things.”

“Hee-hee I don’t know.  Hmm, why’s it so quiet now?”

“Let it go Amanoterasu, you know her condition.  Sylvania 2006 AD is the year 6 GP.  It was about 5 years after you received your powers.”

“Oh, OK then.”

The Penalizer stumbled closer and closer to the source of these strange words, getting weaker with each step.  And then they were gone in another flash of rainbow light. 

The gun-toting vigilante fell to the ground in a pile of fine dust that was once the heart of human civilization.  He started to cough.  In a few minutes he was dead from the foul air.  His corpse was covered in a layer of dust and the dead Earth was silent again.

***

And finally back in the 21^st Century…

Maple lay in the ruins of her house sobbing quietly.  It was over.  It was all over.  Six long years of effort, making the Global Protectors the greatest heroine team on Earth and it was all for nothing.  Hell, maybe the team was doomed from the beginning and Maple Leaf was just too dumb and too stubborn to see it.  Her whole life was just a pathetic joke and now innocent people would pay the price for her failure.

The titanium chair had saved her life.  It was build to hold even a super-strong heroine in the midst of an orgasm and managed to shield her from the worst of the explosion.  She’d been shot through the basement wall into her back garden but had suffered nothing worse than some burns and cuts. 

She crawled forward.  The sharp rocks hurt her bare knees; she could feel the heat from the burning house.  She barely had the strength to crawl.  After the physical and psychological blows she had endured, Maple Leaf’s powers had deserted her.  She looked at the pool ahead of her.  It would be so easy to just fall in and let the cool green waters claim her. 

She’d tried so hard. 

And got so far. 

But in the end, it doesn’t even matter.

There was a flash of rainbow light behind her and strangely distorted sounds. 

“Ereht feal elpam s’taht kinht I! Yurrh”

“tsujda nac I, enilemit siht htiw hcnys fo tuo er’ew”
“Sdrawkcab gnivom gnihtyreve s’yhw”

Maple Leaf paused.  “What the fuck…” she muttered.  She slowly started to turn.

“Wonk t’nod tusj I, wonk t’nod I”

“Gnirepmat taht pots ot emit ni ew era tub”

“Devirra ev’ew kniht I”

There was another flash of rainbow light, when it cleared there was nothing there.

There was another flash behind her.  Maple Leaf jumped to her feet and turned.

“Emitters tachyon the alternating try!”

“Jumpy pretty still are things!”

“It got I think I.”

And another flash.

“All right!  We made it!”

“Wow that was the worst time-jump I’ve ever had.”

“Yes the temporal distortions were uncommonly severe, we were fortunate to arrive here from 2636.”

Maple Leaf spun again, “Oh no” she muttered, “not those future brats…”

It wasn’t them.

Or at least any she had met before.

The first one was tall and willowy, her skin was the color of new leaves, her body was covered with a shimmering transparent gossamer gown.  From her back sprouted two gorgeous butterfly wings and a mane of autumn red hair crowned her head.

The second figure was golden-skinned and radiated light in all directions.  Maple Leaf had to squint to make out her features, she was an Asian woman dressed in a pure white kimono.

The third was just as astonishing.  She was 6’ tall, nude, hairless and seemed to be made of blue glass.  Holographic images floated around her displaying arcane information and data streams seemed to flow even inside her body.

“Wow it’s… oh what was her name?  Remember her?  Canada Girl!”

That’s when Maple Leaf passed out.

***

Meanwhile in the Avenging League of Justice’s orbiting satellite headquarters…

“Welcome La Sola, welcome to… The Avenging League of Justice!”

“Gracias senior Archer!”  The Latina heroine put on a smile.  Inside she was torn up about this decision, she hated to leave the Global Protectors but she had to be honest with herself.  There was little she could do; things had gotten so bad there really wasn’t a Global Protector team for La Sola to support.  Helping people was much more important, and the ALJ was the best place to do that.

“Come on, come on, I’ll show you everything later, but first we have to get to the conference room.”

They were all waiting for her there, the most famous and powerful heroes in the world.  They were sitting in a U shaped conference table all facing her.  In the center was their leader, the Greek sun god Apollo.  At his right hand was the ever smiling Colonel Liberty, the hero of World War II.  To his left the scowling dark vigilante Nightbat.  Then around the table were the others, the speedy Red Lightning, the Atlantian Sea King, the cosmic guardian Astro Man, and two recent additions, an unshaven feral mutant unimaginatively named Claw Guy and the teen hero the Amazing Arachnid. 

“When did they join?”  She whispered to Blue Archer. 

“A couple of months after the Disassembly Crisis.  They both have big movie deals so we figured they’d be good for the team’s image.”

“Welcome mighty La Sola!  It is an honor to welcome a fellow hero of the Sun to our mighty assemblage!”

La Sola cleared her throat and pushed away her doubts, she knew she still had to get on this team, and that meant charming these male heroes.  Shouldn’t be too hard.

“Gracias senior Apollo, but the honor is all mine.”

“As I am sure our comrade in arms the unerring Blue Archer has told you there shall be three trials before we may admit you to our August Assemblage.”

La Sola scowled at the bowman, he hadn’t mentioned anything about that.

“The first shall be the trial of the body-“

That’s about when the Avenging League of Justice Satellite exploded.

***

Far below, on the roof of the Gaea Building, Valkyrie’s improved eyes had no trouble spotting the exploding station.

“Ooo, good one.”  She reached down and picked up a remote.  “Terminus should be along any minute now.”

***

Maple Leaf felt her cares lifted from her.  She was safe at home in her bed.  Her team was united.  Her donors were happy.  Her investments were rising.  She was on the cover of Capes and Masks.  All was right in the world.

She stretched and opened her eyes.

“AH!”  She screamed.

The green-skinned, red-haired fairy was real!  Her house was in ruins!  And the world was ending!

“Hi!”  The bizarre figure said and waved like a school girl.  Maple Leaf pulled back.  She hunched into a fetal ball and tried to wish it all away.

“Sylvania, perhaps I should try.”  It was a voice like ice.  A hand like ice touched Maple Leaf’s bare shoulder.  She looked up at the blue woman; her eyes were just as cold. 

“Maple Leaf One/Jillian Havre” holographic images of Maple Leaf floated around the blue woman “we are here to help you, we are from the future.”

Maple Leaf started to laugh hysterically.  “No thanks!  Already got enough future people here!  Come back later!” 

The blue woman smacked her.  “We do not have time for emotional outbursts.  We have come to save your world and ours.  You must tell us what has happened.”

“Frigga, let me try, please.”  The golden woman knelt down and met Maple Leaf eye-to-eye.  Her eyes were white and glowing, Maple Leaf felt warmed and stronger just looking at them. 

“Jillian, do you understand me?  Are you OK?”

Maple Leaf raised her arm; miraculously the cuts and burns were gone.  Even her costume was back on.  She felt completely fit and rested.  How long had she been out? 

So she nodded.

“Jillian, my name is Amanoterasu, this is Frigga” she indicated the blue woman “and Sylvania” she indicated the green one.  The green woman waved.  “We’re members of the Legion of Galactic Protectors, we’re from the future, from the year 2636.”

“Oh so you are with those kids, Dynamo Dude and Venus Chick and all that… no thanks, I already had a taste of their ‘help’.”

“Yes and no.  Those kids you met are junior members, heroes in training who overstepped their boundaries.  We are senior members of the Legion.”

“Uh-huh.  And why should I trust you anyway?”

The golden woman smiled.  “Because you already know us.”

Maple Leaf looked at the three inhuman woman again and shook her head.  “Sorry Ammonia (or whatever your name is) I think I’d remember you guys if I’d seen you.”

“Look again, look with your heart, not just your eyes.”  Said that warm and caring voice. 

Maple Leaf rolled her eyes but looked again.  The kimono-clad woman was a bit familiar now that she thought about it, take away the glow, give her normal clothes and she’d look just like…

“Rising Sun?”

The golden woman let out a girlish squeal and hugged her.  “I haven’t been called that in more than 500 years Jillian.  It feels good to hear my old name from you.”

“Oh my God, oh my God, then you must be… Val?”

“Yes, I was known as Valkyrie from 2000 AD to 2148 AD before I first reincarnated my form.”

“And that’s not…”  The green woman had picked up a pigeon and was cooing to it.  “…Shamrock?”

“Huh?  Oh hi?  Are you feeling better?”

“How?  I mean you can’t be six hundred years old.  I remember those kids, they didn’t say anything about you guys… this is insane…”

“There is no time for this.”  Frigga said coldly.  “You must tell us what happened.”

“Wait, wait Frigga, she needs to understand.” 

“There is no time.”

“Frigga, we need Maple Leaf’s help.  And she needs information.  Why not do a data dump?  It will answer her questions and will only take a few seconds.”

“Fine.”

“Hey wait a sec, what’s a data dump and how come-“  But it was too late.  Frigga locked eyes with Maple Leaf and her blue eyes flashed white.  Maple Leaf’s world exploded.  And she saw how today should have happened. 

***

Maple Leaf was standing in the Global Protectors conference room; the team, all of them were there.  Even Star and Shamrock and Aussie Girl, all there, all looking happy and healthy.  They were wearing different costumes, Long sleeved spandex mid-riff tops cut low on the breasts and back.  Bikini briefs cut high on the hips.  Knee-high boots, communicator bracelets and GPS chokers completed the outfits.  Maple Leaf recognized the designs as something La Sola had been working on just before everything went to hell.  And there they were wearing them.  Maple Leaf glanced at the calendar, it was today!

She heard her own voice…

“OK guys, with Star’s new album taking off and Rising Sun’s new anime showing on the Cartoon Network our money problems are behind us, so I want to announce raises for all-“

She was cut off by alarms.  All of them.  Going off at once.

Time sped up for a second and now the team was in the monitor room all shouting and reading off different reports. Screens showed a black armored attacker in space and then an explosion in the center of Megapolis.  He was casually leveling buildings as he strolled through the burning city. 

Shamrock and Rising Sun were crying.   Star seemed to be in shock.  Val’s authoritative voice cut through the chatter. 

“The satellite images confirm it, the Avenging League of Justice is dead and the attacker is in Megapolis now.”  Another update popped up.  “He’s heading for us!”

There was more yelling and crying.  Star was hysterical, screaming they had no chance.  Even Tigress looked afraid.  But Maple Leaf heard her own voice above them.

“OK, guys I hate to say it but that guy just took out the whole ALJ by himself, we can’t handle him alone.  We’re going to need help.  I just got in touch with Professor Salvador in upstate New York.  He’s rallying all 38 of the Ex-Titan teams.  That’s close to 500 heroes and heroines.  Tigress take the team in the Globe Hopper and head for there.  I… I’ll catch up as soon as I take care of something.”

The Global Protectors hesitated.  Maple Leaf scowled and yelled “MOVE!”

They ran for the hanger, but Maple Leaf grabbed Valkyrie by the arm.  Tigress barked some orders and also stayed behind.

“Val… you remember that thing I asked you to set up after the battle with Red Jack?”

“Jillian you’re not serious, there are other-“

“Tigress, Val I need you to put your authorization codes into the computer.  I already entered mine.”

Tigress did not hesitate, she put her hand on the scanner and entered her 48 character password.  Val still hesitated.  “Jillian you don’t have to-“

“Val you saw the footage from space.  Do you really think anything else will work?  I’m the leader, it’s my call.”

“But-“

Tigress glanced at the radar display from NORAD.  “Val we have to go.”

“Tigress!  There has to be another way!  We can’t let her-”  Tigress slugged her across the face, put the unconscious woman’s hand on the scanner and inputted Val’s password.  “I saw her enter it once.”  Tigress explained.  The lights turned red, a countdown began.

“Tigress, Kanika, um…”

Tigress put a hand on Maple Leaf’s shoulder.  “It has been an honor Jillian.  Are you sure you don’t want me to-“

“Yeah, yeah, I’m sure.”  Maple Leaf wiped a tear from her eyes.  “Hey you know I never wanted to be a heroine anyway ay?  But, hey, I always said if I’m going to be one… I’m… I’m gonna go it right.”  She tried to laugh; it was more like a sob.  “Good luck Kanika, hopefully you won’t need it.  Just tell the others…”

“Jillian, we know.  We will not forget.”

“Um, yeah.  Thanks ay.”

Tigress threw Valkyrie over her shoulder and headed for the hanger too.  She more or less managed to stop crying before she reached the plane.

“Systems are ready Tigress!”  La Sola told her.  “Hey what happened to Val?”

“Overcome by emotion.”  Tigress replied curtly.  “Let’s go.”

“Where’s Maple Leaf? Will she catch up?”  Shamrock asked.

“Of course.”

The jet rose into the air and took off for New York.

Two minutes later Lord Terminus smashed through the front door of the Gaea Building.  Maple Leaf was waiting for him in the lobby.

“I’m sorry sir, do you have an appointment?”

“Funny girl, real funny.  You must be the head hero chick.”

“You can call me Maple Leaf.”

“Pleased to meet cha Naked Chief,  Now where’s your little playmates?  Those nice guys downtown said you wuz the hottest super chicks on this rock.  Always happy to meet some super chicks.  I wuz so grateful I killed them guys quick.”

“Oh they’re around somewhere, but for now I think I can keep you entertained.”

“Oh I’m sure of that.”

He darted forward but Maple Leaf flew up and smashed through the roof.  She shot straight up into the air.  Terminus followed climbing higher and higher until…

“OW!”

A dozen electro cannons locked on and fired at him, frying the villain with enough electricity to power a city.

“That tickles!” Terminus laughed.  He jerked his arms back reflecting the beams.  The cannons exploded.  Momentarily blinded by the sparks Maple Leaf couldn’t dodge him, his armored hand shot out and grabbed her ankle.  He pulled her from the air and threw her through one of the Gaea Building’s twin domes.

Maple Leaf smashed through the team’s mahogany meeting table and lay dazed.  In a second Terminus was with her.  He reached down and tore off her top with a quick motion.  “Not too shabby.  I can tell I’m gonna like it here.”

“Screw you!”

Terminus stomped on Maple Leaf’s chest, bruising her breasts and driving the breath from her body.

“That an offer?  Tell ya what.  I’ll give you the same deal I gave the big chief hero chick at my last stop; you be my slave, and I’ spare ole Mega City One over there.”  He pointed at Megapolis, its towers sparkling in the morning sun.  ”How bout it Naked Chief?”

“Go.  To.  HELL!”  As she said this Maple Leaf’s hand reached for a certain button on her communicator bracelet.  But Terminus was too fast.  With one blow he shattered the titanium bracelet and broke both of Maple Leaf’s arms.  The Canadian heroine screamed in undisguised pain, her shattered arms flapped uselessly. 

“Nice try Naked Chief, but no one’s coming to help you.  It’s just you and me, getting romantic.” 

Maple Leaf just howled in pain. 

“You see, I like you, you got spirit.  I just know we’re gonna have a short and fiery affair.”

The dark armor over Terminus’ crotch began to flow like water, reshaping itself into a foot long hideously barbed spike, a parody of a man’s instrument of pleasure.  Maple Leaf screamed again and cried.  Terminus pulled her off the ground by her brown hair and pulled her on top of himself.  Maple Leaf screamed once more as the barbed spike tore through her bikini briefs and plunged into her tender loins.  She gurgled a few times as it ploughed in and out of her, tearing flesh and drawing blood.  It began to heat up there was a crackling sound and the smell of burning meat.  Terminus thrust with his hips one last time and there was a flash.  Then he dropped Maple Leaf burnt body to the ground and laughed.  “Now that’s what I call a hot chick!”

Deep below the Gaea building computers detected that Maple Leaf’s vital signs had ceased.  The program she had activated had two triggers, one was manual from her communicator bracelets, the other automatic, in the event of her death.  Automatic systems followed their orders and turned off the cooling system in the Gaea Building’s fusion reactor.

Less than a second later Maple Leaf’s body, Terminus, the Gaea Building, and ten square miles of pristine woodland were vaporized in a thermonuclear explosion.

In Megapolis windows shattered, computers fired, people were blinded as the mini-nuke erupted just outside the city. 

“NO!”  The Global Protectors shouted as one.  Their plane was rocked by the shockwave and the electronics blinked out for a second as the EMP wave hit them.  The back-ups kicked in and the plane continued on its way.

And one thousand miles away a mountaintop above Denver, Colorado exploded as Terminus’ burnt body slammed into it.

The dust settled.

Then it stirred again.

And Terminus rose.

His armor was melted in places, and his arm hung uselessly at his side.  He took a few limping steps.  Then laughed again.

“Nice one Naked Chief.  I can tell this rock is going to be a challenge.”

He looked down at a small town in the valley below.  Rescue teams were already on their way to see what happened.

“Oh good.  Feeding time.”

Time passed.  The war continued.  Tokyo, Gotham, Los Angeles, Mexico City, London all fell.  Dozens of superheroes and countless innocents fell before Terminus. 

But still they fought on.  She saw Aussie Girl persuade Dynamo to join the heroes, she saw Tigress fighting alongside Villainy eXtreme, she watched Star rally the 82^nd Airborne at the Battle of Washington, she saw Ultra Woman crucified on the Washington Monument… She saw sacrifice, she saw heroism and cowardice, she saw humanity’s finest hours and our worst.

The war lasted five years and devastated the world.  But in the end Terminus was destroyed. Maple Leaf tried to see how, but it was just a blur.

Now she saw the terrible cost.  Maple Leaf saw the world in ruins. 

Washington, New York, Paris, Beijing… all gone. 

The governments of the world collapsed.  Chaos reigned.

Except in one city, Megapolis. 

The remaining heroes and heroines gathered there, in a burnt out Wal-Mart near the Gaea Building crater. 

A woman spoke and they listened.  They agreed.  And a new world order was born.

The world was rebuilt, but not as a collection of feuding nation-states, as a single world with a single government.  And the first leader was a familiar looking blonde.

“No way…”  Maple Leaf muttered.

Jenni Westin, better known as Star, became the first Chairwoman of the Global Protectorate.  She reigned for over a century, creating a new golden age for the human race.  When she was cut down by the Dark Queen the entire Solar System mourned.

Cities rose again.  Ruins were rebuilt.  Science advanced.

Maple Leaf caught familiar faces.  Rising Sun perfected fusion power and took the name Amanoterasu after the Japanese sun goddess.  She learned to duplicate the fusion process with her powers and became a sun goddess in fact as well as name.

La Sola traveled the world using the power of her hypnotic voice (and other body parts) to quell hatred in men’s hearts and replace it with love.  Thousands followed her, then millions.  Her home became a temple of love.  When she died of heart failure, millions of men and women swore themselves to celibacy.

Aussie Girl flew around the world delivering relief supplies and saving lives.  She increased her speed, flying faster and farther.  One day she shot off into space.  She returned years later with the secret of faster-than-light travel.  Soon after she disappeared again, no one would ever know where.

Shamrock traveled to the few remaining wild places on Earth, protecting them, nurturing them, learning to link her psychokinetic field with the energy of life itself.  She was forever changed, now linked to all living things.  Her powers of healing and growth repaired Earth’s shattered ecosystem but her communion shattered her mind.  She became Sylvania, the butterfly-winged fairy-like guardian of nature.

Valkyrie withdrew from society and from her teammates.  She developed new computer and data technology, new ways to activate the superhuman potential, new ways to use those powers.  She altered herself completely; her humanity seemed a small price to pay for such gains.  Her new name Frigga reflected her new role as the cold-hearted mother of gods.  Seven of the most powerful heroines became her handmaidens, the Valkyries.

Not all the changes were good, Maple Leaf saw Tigress confront the Dark Count in the ruins of Budapest.  After an entire night of battle she defeated him and then drank his blood.  She became the Dark Queen, mistress of vampires and nemesis of the Global Protectors.

But new heroes and heroines appeared, and under Star’s leadership they spread across the stars to new worlds. 

Finally she saw something familiar, in the distant future of 2636 the Galactic Protectorate was defended by an entire Legion of Galactic Protectors.  Some were descendents of the original team, others were newcomers, others were clones, but three were the originals.  Immortal and incredibly powerful; Amanoterasu, Sylvania and Frigga.  Three goddesses guiding the human race with wisdom and compassion for eternity.

It was awe-inspiring.

It was terrible.

***

“I’m going to die.”  Maple Leaf said without emotion.  “All those people are going to die.  And you’re here to make sure it happens.”

The golden woman nodded sadly.  “Yes Maple Leaf.  Some people are going to die.  But so many more will live!  I know it seems terrible but think of the alternatives?  Terminus is coming whether we like it or not.  Your team, your sacrifice, is what makes the difference between success and failure.  Unless things happen this way, everyone will die and Earth will become another dead world.  And Terminus will move on, destroying more worlds in his path.”

“I… I can’t…”  Maple Leaf thought of her battered body in the ruins of the Gaea Building.  Remembered the sick sound of her skin frying, her skull shattering.  But she also remembered the silver buildings and shinning monorails of the future.  The bright faces of the young heroes and heroines who would take her place someday.  Since she put on her costume she’d always known she might die.  And she’d never let it stop her before.  She took a deep breath.  “So how are you here?  If you still exist then things will work out right?  Right?”

“No.”  One of Frigga’s holograms repositioned itself in front of Maple Leaf.  It showed the shinning future she had once seen.  There was an interruption and the image returned, now showing a nightmarish future of pollution and decay.  There was another interruption and now there was nothing.  Just dust.

“Our future has been destroyed.  We three were the only survivors; we managed an emergency jump to here, to the critical day when history was disrupted beyond repair.  We must restore the proper flow of events before the time stream is completely disrupted.”

“But it’s impossible!”

“You have to.  You have to reunite your team, so that you can sacrifice yourself and restore our timeline.”

“No you don’t get it, I can’t reunite the team.”

“But- “

“You do know Star is dead right?”

“Impossible.”  Frigga cut in.  “She must go on to found the first Global Protectorate. “

“She died last week.  I saw the body.”

Holograms appeared around Frigga showing incomprehensible four-dimensional charts.  Amanoterasu watched over her shoulder, her face fell.

“He… he didn’t arrive here now, he’s been here for months… We’re too late to stop him.”

“Who?”

“Wolfe.”

“Wolfe?  You mean Buck Wolfe?  He’s been around for years; I know he has something to do with this but-”

“Not your Wolfe, our Wolfe.  The Global Protectors were not the only ones to change and evolve over time.  Technology kept his body alive for 150 years, and his mind for far longer.  And with each decade he hated us more.  He recruited allies, even whole armies and alien races to fight us.  He used robots, computer viruses even phase inverters.  Over the last six hundred years he’s killed over forty Protectors.  By our time Wolfe’s mind was stored on a quantum computer about the size of a golf ball.  That must be how he traveled back in time.”  Amano looked again at the glowing charts.  Frigga nodded.

“He has won.  With Star dead there’s no way to restore our timeline.  All hope is lost.”

“Frigga you can’t be serious!  Surely there is still a chance!”

“Amanoterasu our timeline was the creation of billions of individuals over six hundred years, By removing key elements from the base of that pyramid the whole structure collapses.”

“But we’re still here!” 

“Yes my quantum field is protecting us from the distortions but sooner or later they will become too great.  We have failed.  We are doomed”

***

“Well that was easy.”  Lord Terminus said casually.  He looked at the wreckage and corpses drifting around him.  He saw Astro Man start to twitch and blasted him down to a skeleton.  “If these were the best heroes this rock had to offer.  I’m gonna be pretty disappointed.”  He kicked Sea King’s body into deep space.  “Heh, frozen fish.”

Blue Archer’s frozen body drifted by. Terminus chuckled softly.  “A guy with a bow and some sharp sticks, what the hell were they thinking?”  La Sola’s body drifted by next and Terminus sounded almost sad.  “Now that’s a waste of a nice piece of ass.”

Distracted Terminus failed to notice one hero still lived.  Two beams of golden light shot out, engulfing Terminus and melting the scraps of steel around him.  “Ah, good to see one of you made it.”

“Die monster!”  Apollo yelled telepathically and charged forward wielding a scrap of titanium like a spear.  He thrust into the monster’s breastplate with all the power the son of Zeus had but the metal just crumpled like tin foil.   Before the solar avenger could react Terminus had him by the throat.  Apollo struggled; Terminus blasted him at zero range.  Apollo’s invulnerable flesh cooked, skin cracked, eyes melted.  But still the Greek god of the sun struggled.  He managed to get his ruined hands onto Terminus’ helmet and pried at it.  Terminus blasted him again and threw him away.

“You’re a tough cookie.  No question about that kid.  But you gotta ask yourself, is it worth it?  I know your type, damn near immortal.  You got millennia ahead.  Do you really want to piss it away fighting me? 

Apollo’s immortal body was already mending itself but the pain was unbearable!  Never in all his centuries had he felt anything like this.  Nothing!  Slowly his vision began to return.  In his pain-wracked mind he could hear the monster’s hollow laugh. 

“This isn’t what you signed up for was it kid?  You were just looking to have some kicks, and soak up a bit of hero-worship right?”

There was some truth in those words.  Apollo came to Earth in the 1960s because Olympus was too dull and Earth’s emerging superheroes seemed so entertaining.

“Go home kid, back to whatever dimension you came from, hook up with some nice babe, tell some tall tales, maybe find another world full of mortals to worship you.  They’re a dime a dozen you know.  What do you say?”

Apollo could imagine the cool waters of Elysium Fields washing over his ravaged body, the warm kisses of Nymphs and Sylphs on his wounds.  And hadn’t he grown weary of Earth in recent years?

“Or we can go on like this.”  Faster than Apollo could react Terminus was back on him pounding away blow by blow.  Bones snapped, the pain got worse.

“All Right!”  The self-proclaimed ‘lord of light’ screamed.  Terminus backed off.

“Now get going kid, before I change my mind.”

Terrified Apollo opened a dimensional gate back to the divine realms of Mount Olympus and disappeared.

Terminus just sighed.

“Damn that kid was tough.  Must have used half my power beating him.  If he’d had a bit more spine he might have been able to take me.  Oh well…”  He looked down at the blue world below him.  “May as well get started.”  He kicked some of the larger chunks of rubble down, directing them towards the largest city in North America.  Megapolis.

***

“So that’s it?”  Maple Leaf barked.  “You’re giving up?”

Amano’s glow had faded to almost nothing, she was weeping now.  To Maple Leaf’s eyes she looked just like Rising Sun.  Sylvania was talking to a butterfly, ignoring both of them.  Only Frigga bothered to answer.

“As I said, it is pointless to continue.  I will deactivate my quantum field and we will simply cease to exist.”

Maple Leaf rose to her feet and looked the blue crystal woman right in her glowing eyes.  “Fuck.  You.”  She jabbed her finger into the woman’s crystal breasts.  “Fuck you and all your future weirdoes.  You were willing to come back here and condemn me and millions of people to death so your fucking Epcot Center world could survive but now you’re not willing to lift a god damn finger.  You freaky girls say you’re my teammates, well I don’t know what happened to you over time but you sure don’t sound like Val or Kisume or Shannon.  I know they wouldn’t give up when the world needs them!”

Maple Leaf turned towards the Gaea Building, squinting she could see someone lounging on the roof staring at the sky.  Val.  Wolfe.  The architect of everything that had gone wrong. 

“Maybe I’m gonna die tonight but let me tell you, I’m going to die fighting.  First I’m going to find that fucker Wolfe and free my friend.  And then, somehow, we’re going to stop this Terminus guy.  You freaks can lie down and die if you want, but I know if you’re really who you say you are you’ll be fighting along side me.”

Maple Leaf shot into the air.

A minute later the three heroines from the future followed.

Miles away at the Gaea building Valkyrie saw a familiar golden glow and looked right at them. 

“Fuck me.  Look who’s here.”

Startled, Rising Sun looked up from between Val’s legs.  Val smiled at her.

***

“Uh!  Uh!  Uh!”  The red-headed girl tossed her hair and clutched at her modest breasts through the thin spandex suit.  She flexed her thighs rising and falling again and again.  She was so close, she could feel it building.  She a bit more.  She mauled her breasts harder.

In the back of her mind Shannon O’Sullivan tried to remember the name of the boy she was riding.  Justin?  Jonathan?  Jason?  Something like that.  She found him on alt.sex.fetish.globalprotectors.  He wanted her to wear a La Sola costume but that was OK.  As long as she felt like a heroine, as long as she could pretend for a little while.

It was one of those Global Protector costumes you could get from the adult stores, extra-thin, almost see-through, with the split crotches.  She had a set for the whole team now.  Of course almost no one ever wanted her to wear a Shamrock costume.  She was thinking of dying her hair blond.  Maybe then boys would like her more.  Maybe then someone would love her.

She felt his body jerk under her and the now-familiar sensation of warm fluid shooting up her birth canal.  NO!  It was too soon!  Not again!  Not again!  She felt his member deflate inside her.  The blissful feelings building within disappeared with it.

Jacob (or whatever his name was) opened his eyes.  “Was it good for you babe?”

Shannon wiped the tears from her eyes and got off him.  She’d been so close.  So close.  But so far.  She hadn’t had a good orgasm in weeks.  But even now she remembered her manners.  “Oh yes… I uh, I came twice.”

“Yeah, most girls do when they ride the old J-Train.”

“Um, could you maybe hold me… please?”

“Hey babe, I would love to cause the J-Train knows how important cuddling and stuff is but like I got a real early appointment tomorrow and stuff so I gotta give you a rain check.  Hey same time next week right?”

“Um… yeah, same time… I… I’ll wear the Aussie Girl costume, I know you like it.”

“Awesome!  Hey whatever happened to her anyway?”

Shannon remembered her missing friend, shuddering to think of what might have happened to the spunky Australian since she disappeared.  “Um, probably just taking a vacation or something.”

***

Thunder Girl raced through the underground corridor dodging lasers left and right.  “Almost there…” she hissed.  Soon she would be reunited with her beloved Dynamo, that Dominator pipsqueak promised!

Deep underground J. Buckley Wolfe Sr. ate a plate of baked beans and reread the August 1973 issue of Playboy for the hundredth time.  He thought he heard something from the passageway leading in but ignored it.  After weeks underground he couldn’t afford to start hallucinating. 

***

“Glad you guys can make it ay?”  Maple Leaf said. 

The golden heroine flew up next to her.  “You’re right Jillian.  We may be too late to save our future but we have to try.  Don’t worry; we’ll do whatever it takes.”

“Although our Wolfe has possessed my younger self’s body we should be able to defeat him.  I alone am far more powerful than she is.  The three of us should easily overwhelm him.  While Wolfe’s technology is formidable to you it is nothing compared to mine.”

“Did you hear that?”

“Sylvania you must focus.  We will need you to heal and damage done to my younger self-”

“She’s hurt!  She needs me!”  The heroine cried.  And without further explanation she turned and shot away towards the West Side.

“Sylvania stop!”  Frigga cried but the green-skinned heroine ignored her.  The blue crystal woman turned to follow but Amano took her arm.  “Let her go Frigga, you know she doesn’t always think the way we do.”

“That sounds like my Shamrock” Maple Leaf added lightly.

“But she always comes through in the end.”

“That doesn’t.  So uh, future Kisume, what is her problem?  I mean Shamrock was always a bit of a flake but nothing like this.”

“We’re not too sure about the details but after she disappeared during the Terminus war she formed a union with Earth’s biosphere and-“ 

The golden-skinned woman suddenly paused and gasped.  Hovering in midair she shuddered and grabbed her stomach.  Her glow started to blink, fading one second then becoming blinding.  Frigga and Maple Leaf rushed to her side.  Amano coughed blood and screamed in pain. 

Then she exploded.

Frigga and Maple Leaf were tossed miles through the air.  When they recovered and returned there was nothing left.

“What happened?”  Maple Leaf demanded.

Holographic displays appeared around Frigga and the blue woman closed her eyes in thought.

“She is gone.  Her timeline has been shattered.”

***

Miles away Valkyrie cleaned the blood off her hand.  The fragments of Rising Sun’s corpse were scattered across the rooftop.  Eliza and Kristen backed away suddenly afraid.  Val ignored them.  She squinted and could just make out Maple Leaf and Frigga in the distance looking shocked.  Val wondered what happened to future Shamrock, probably already wilted away.  Future Shamrock always was a fucking flake.

“Well, that was easy.”  She said with a smile.  “Two down, two to go.”

She rose into the air and confronted Frigga and Maple Leaf.  “So come on bitches.  Bring it!”

***

“Uh!  Uh!  Uh!”  The red-headed girl moaned with each impact on her burning buttocks.  She pulled against the handcuffs that locked her to the water pipe, forcing her to bend over a table.

Greasy Gene smacked her again with the spatula in his right hand.  His dick was in his left hand.  “Say it bitch!  Say it!  Say ‘I’m a worthless slutty heroine’ come on, say it!”

Greasy Gene was the only one who ever wanted to see Shannon in her Shamrock costume.  He’d come over right after Jason/Justin/Jackson left.  Shannon was glad to see him; she needed someone who loved her for being herself.

“Oh… oh yeah!  Roll over bitch!”  He grabbed her hip and flipped the Irish girl onto her back.  Then he let go.  Streams of sticky white cum shot over her stomach and breasts, soaking through the thin spandex of the Shamrock costume she’d gotten at the adult store.  “Oh yeah, who’s a worthless slut?  Who’s a worthless slut?”  Shannon sobbed a few times. “YEAH!”

Greasy Gene never wanted to fuck her.  Never.  He just wanted to cum on her breasts and stomach while shouting abuse. 

But other than that he was a really nice guy. 

When he was finished he zipped up and unlocked the cuffs.  He hugged the Irish girl warmly and whispered in her ear. 

“That was awesome Shannon.  It really felt like you were Shamrock.”

“T-thanks Gene, that… it means a lot to me.”

“Goddamn worthless slut heroines, dressing like whores, never even looking at guys like me… oh Shannon you don’t know what it’s like.”

“It’s OK Gene, it’s OK, you’re right, h-heroines deserve this.  They… they’re not nice.  They’re mean.”

“Oh Shannon, you’re the only one who understands me.”

That’s about when the wall exploded.

“Leave her alone!”   A melodic voice demanded.

“AH!”  Greasy Gene cried and wet his pants.  “A heroine!”

The woman looked like no heroine Shannon O’Sullivan had ever seen.  She was like some kind of Irish fairy come to life.  Tall and slender with light green skin vivid red hair and two glowing butterfly wings sprouting from her back.  She gestured and Greasy Gene shot backwards to the wall.  Shannon turned her head and saw the man was now wrapped up tightly in green vines that had sprung from her potted plants. 

“I didn’t mean-“  Greasy Gene started to yell but was silenced when a vine rammed itself down his throat.

The apparition turned towards Shannon.  The Irish girl thought about running but adopted a fighting pose.  She may not have much of her powers anymore but she was going to do her best to defend-

Then the fairy hugged her.

“Oh Shannon, you’ve suffered so.”

“I-“

“I can see it in your heart, so many scars, so much pain…  You don’t understand do you?   You don’t know how badly you’ve been hurt.  How much you’re capable of.  But don’t worry… I’m here to heal you.”

“Get, get away!”  Shannon shoved the fairy off of her and backed away.  Her heart was pounding like a kettledrum, she was suddenly very afraid.”

The fairy staggered and clutched her side; a brown spot appeared on her side, like wilt.  “We must hurry; I don’t have much time left.”

“But-“  Shannon started to say.  Then she looked into the fairy’s eyes and saw... something familiar.

“Wait, you?  You look like me!  Why do you look like me?”

“Oh yes Shannon, you can see it now, I am you, I am what you can become!”

Shannon took a few awkward steps back, waving her arms in front of her.  “But, but, I’m not a heroine, I’m not!  I’m not strong, or powerful or beautiful or anything!  Everyone says so!  It was a mistake; I never should have even tried!”

The fairy staggered again, more sickly brown spots appeared.

“Shannon, I know that’s how you feel now. But please try to remember, think of the lives you saved, remember fighting the Incubus, against the Human Dreadnaught, against Red Jack, you must remember Shannon, you must.”

Shannon just shook her head and retreated again, now she was up against the wall with no where else to run.  “N-no… no, I failed, I… I mean… I… I did save some people but… but… I’m just a girl… not a heroine… I’m afraid.”  She sobbed.

She tried to continue but the fairy put a finger over her lips.

“Unless you believe in me, I cannot exist.  Unless you believe in yourself I will never exist.”

The fairy looked into her eyes.  Her glowing emerald eyes locked with Shannon’s deep green ones.  She put her arms around Shannon’s trembling body; the Irish girl could feel the warmth of the fairy’s body through her semen stained outfit.  The fairy leaned in and kissed her deeply.  The girl struggled, then relaxed.

Now Shannon understood.

They both started to glow.

***

“It’s over Wolfe!”  Maple Leaf yelled.  “Give it up!”

The Gaea Building was in ruins.  Kristen and Emily were dead.  So was Kisume.  Both of them.  Maple Leaf stepped carefully so as not so to step Rising Sun’s corpse.  Frigga was on the ground, her crystal body wracked by seizures and disruptions.  Now Maple Leaf and the possessed Valkyrie squared off in the ruins.

“Like how I took down Frigga there?”  Val gestured to the gold ring on her finger.  “I just had this thing inject me with nano-viruses, programmed to go off in about 600 years.  So it’s just you and me kid.”

Maple Leaf grit her teeth.  “Bring it on you ass-“

There was blue and yellow blur.  Then Maple Leaf fell down, unconscious.

“Dumb bitch. You knew Val was faster and stronger than you.”  Val looked down at her communicator and checked the time.  “Almost threw me off schedule too.  But not quite.”  She wrapped Maple Leaf in some rebar and licked her cheek.  “Guess we’ll get to finish this later.  Heck, maybe I’ll keep you around as my lesbo sex-slave.”

She looked up at Megapolis.  Now she could see the debris from the ALJ Satellite streaking towards the defenseless city.  The explosions started.

“Terminus!  Right on time!”

***

Terminus hovered over the burning ruins of Siegel Square and waited impatiently. 

“Heh.  I thought this place was supposed to be where all the heroes hang out?  So where were they?  They got something more important to do?

Bored, he blasted the top twenty stories off the Shooter Building.

***

Across town Tigress picked up the body of Lieutenant Sharpe and let his blood run down her face, down her neck and between her breasts.  It felt good.  Good to finally repay this bastard cop who was always leering at her and her teammates.  Good to taste his blood in her throat.  The stream slowly stopped as the cop died and Tigress tossed him off the roof the old Harris Warehouse. 

“Too easy…”  She muttered.

Then she saw the explosions in Siegel Square.

She smiled.

***

Val found the remote in the ruins of the Gaea Building and hit the button.  Months of planning and preparation and now she was gonna take out Terminus in one shot.

“Time to save the world.”  She cooed.

***

“AH!”  Thunder Girl screamed as another 50 gigawatt laser burned her tan skin.  They hadn’t really injured her yet but they sure hurt.  They’d turned her indigo body-suit into a collection of rags that barely preserved her modesty.  But it wasn’t much further now!  She could see the door and once she smashed through it Dynamo would be there!  Her beloved Dynamo was waiting!  She just had to get through. 

She smashed the laser but three more lasers fired catching her in the stomach, shoulder and arm.  She fell to the floor of the tunnel slamming her head.  More lasers fired stunning her.  She screamed again.

Over her head the massive Anti-Matter cannon turned and aimed downwards.  The helpless girl watched the barrel of cannon glow with dark energy; she knew it was powerful enough to disintegrate even an invulnerable heroine like her.

Heroine?

“Wait a second.  Am I a heroine?”  She asked suddenly confused.

The cannon fired.

***

Inside the lab sirens started to wail.  Wolfe spilled his beans all over the Playboy.  The massive cannon in the middle of the lab started to turn, lights blinking all over it.  The lights dimmed as all power was diverted to the Tachyon Howitzer. 

***

A beam of white light shot from the mountains striking right in the center of Siegel Square engulfing Lord Terminus. 

***

The lasers stopped.  The Anti-Matter cannon fired nothing but smoke.  Aussie Girl blinked.

“What am I doing here?”  She shook her head.  She looked at the massive reinforced door in front of her.  She knew she had to get through it somehow.  She reached for its steel surface; it didn’t look much tougher than the vault doors she’d torn apart before.

***

Valkyrie landed in the ruins of Siegel Square just as the media was beginning to arrive.  The skyscrapers lining the Square were in flames and in the center of the square there was nothing but a smoking crater.  The Tachyon Howitzer had done its job.  Every atom in the blast radius had been impregnated with faster-than-light particles and sent shooting off into space in different directions.  Nothing could survive a hit from that.  Nothing.

With Terminus dead, along with most of Earth’s heroes Val was ready for the next step.  She turned to the cameras and smiled.

“Don’t worry people!  That Terminus bastard just killed the whole Avenging League of Justice and the Global Protectors but I got him.  He ain’t gonna give us any more trouble.”

The reporters were already shouting questions.  Val called on Francesca Flores with a smile.  In her possessed mind she could remember the tan reporter naked in bed.

“Valkyrie what happened here?  Who was that?  What was he?”

“Near as I can tell he was some kind of alien, feeds off of death energy.  He hit the ALJ satellite first, then the Gaea Building.  Lucky thing I’d been working on that new tachyon whatchamacallit huh?”

More shouts, more questions.

“Yeah pretty much.  Astroman, Sea King, that creepy spider kid, all them guys are dead.  Same with Rising Sun and Maple Leaf.  Yup.  I’m the only one left, Earth’s greatest hero.”  Wolfe had to remind himself not to smile when he said that.

More shouts, some guy from CNN pointed out the burning buildings all around them.

“Huh?  Oh, yeah.  Guess I better rescue those guys and stuff.”  Wolfe grumbled to himself, this sucked!  After beating Terminus he had better things to do than save some losers who make less money all year than he did in a day.  But if he was going to become Earth’s new hero…  Valkyrie started to rise into the air.

“Going somewhere bitch?”

“Huh?”

A black armored hand emerged from the crater.  Then an arm.  Then an armored helmet.  Valkyrie imagined she could see a smile inside its stygian darkness.  The reporters started to scream.

“But…”

“Tachyons huh?  Nasty stuff.  Could seriously hurt a guy.  Course people have been trying them against me for the last couple millennia.  Guy learns how to protect himself.”

“N-no…”

Terminus laughed, it sounded like a coffin hinge creaking.  “Yes.”  He reached for Val.  She shot away at four times the speed of sound.  Terminus laughed again.  He turned towards the reporters.  “At least there’s someone here to keep from getting bored.”

Flores was the first.

***

Shannon blinked.  And blinked again.

The fairy-like being was gone.  Only her gossamer gown remained in Shannon’s delicate fingers.  Even that was melting away like dew in the morning sun.  It was like she had never existed.

New sounds, new sensations echoed through Shannon’s head.  She could feel the flowers in her window box, the cats upstairs, the pigeons on her roof… More sensations came, squirrels outside, a dog in the alley, grass in the back yard, weeds forcing themselves through the concrete… Then the burning trees and screaming victims in Siegel Square.  She could feel Terminus (how did she know his name?) there, like a great empty hole in the life energies of the world.

She knew what she had to do.

And how she would do it.

She concentrated.

The thin spandex costume she wore glowed with emerald, pearl and amber energy. That hateful mockery of Shamrock’s costume disappeared and was replaced.  Shannon O’Sullivan was now dressed in a green, white and gold gown made of radiance, more like pure light than base matter.  Her hair burned with an inner fire, her skin alive with a pink glow.

Then and there she was the most beautiful thing Gene had ever seen.

She smiled at him.

“I’m really sorry I have to go.  I have to go save the world.”

Gene nodded, she flew away, then he passed out.

***

Terminus tossed the last of the women into a pyre.  ‘Well that was a waste.  Are all the chicks on this rock so weak?  I’m gonna need something a bit tougher if I’m gonna enjoy myself.  Wonder where that Valarie chick got to?”

“I think I can keep you entertained.”

“And who are you now?  You don’t look like a hero chick.  You look like you sleep in garbage.  Sorry babe but I got standards.”

“Standards?  Oh believe me, I’ll exceed them.”

The weeks had not been kind to Tigress.  Her once-proud costume was nothing more than a few spandex rags artfully arrayed across her magnificently muscled body.  Dried blood stained her chocolate skin in places and dyed her lips a vivid crimson.  Her hair was longer and thicker, braids lashing around her head like a head of snakes.  Her nails and canines were longer too, her eyes narrow and glowing yellow.  She looked like a feral beast.  

Terminus chuckled.  “Show me.”

A blast of destructive energy followed but Tigress was already in motion.  The blast struck a Nike® store instead, sending the entire building crashing to the ground.  Tigress didn’t even notice, she dodged and weaved, allowing other blasts to blow up cars, buses, buildings and civilians without regard.  But each move brought her closer to her prey.

Finally she struck, steel-hard claws raked the obsidian armor drawing sparks and leaving thin gashes.  Lord Terminus struck but Tigress was already dancing away.  He laughed.

“Not bad, not bad at all.  You’re a slippery little leach, I’ll give you that.  What do they call you guys here?  Slam-fires?  Something like that.  Keep at it; you’re in for a little surprise.” 

More blasts fired out, easily dodged by Tigress.  Terminus took to the air, heading for a still-populated area to continue the battle.  Unconcerned, flew after him as Terminus smashed through an apartment building.  It collapsed behind them.

She caught up with him over the tenements of Hyung’s Town; she did a MACH 4 fly-by that sent Terminus tumbling through a row of brownstones.  She turned on a dime and dove at him.  

All around them thousands of civilians ran for their lives.

***

Valkyrie flew into the mountains headed for the concealed entrance.  “It should have worked!”  She cursed.  “The damn thing should have worked!”  She would reset it, boost the power, hit him again.  It would work this time.  It had to. 

She got to the hatch.  It was open.  Torn open.  She swallowed hard and flew in.

The lasers were trashed, so was the anti-matter gun and the second hatch. 

Inside the lab was in shambles.  The robots, the huge punch-card computers, and the massive Tachyon Howitzer.  All of them were smashed.

Worst of all…

“Wolfe?  Wolfe?  What the fuck are you?  What the fuck happened here?  Fucking talk to me man!”

Nothing.

Young Wolfe, the Wolfe of the 21^st century was gone.

And if anything happened to him…

A few miles away Aussie Girl laughed, an unconscious Wolfe in her hands.

“Looks like I got you out just in time ay mate?”

*** 

Laughing Tigress tossed Terminus through the wall of a church.  She picked up a school bus and dropped it on his head.

This was the greatest!

Her battles with the Dark Count were nothing compared to this!  Nothing!  She never felt stronger, never felt more powerful than right now.  She looked for something else to hit her armored foe with-

A sudden blow to the face almost took her head off.  Now it was Tigress’ turn to tumble from the sky like a meteor.  She took out a Burger King when she hit.  Then Terminus was back on her exchanging blows.  She twisted to dodge another one but was too slow.  The impact launched her across the street through the front of a Safeway.  She tried to get up but Terminus was on her again, tossing her through the wall into a dry cleaners.  Tigress started to gasp.  She reached inward for more strength, more speed and found… nothing.  It was gone.  The power she had built up over weeks of feeding, the blood from the Dark Count himself… gone.  Used up in just a few minutes of battle.

Terminus was in front of her again.  “Had enough Leach Girl?”

Tigress scowled, rose to her feet and launched a clumsy blow.  Terminus greeted it with another hollow laugh.  “Yeah, you’re done.”  He smacked her across the face; she fell limply to the ground.

“Y’know Leach Girl you and me, we’re not too different.”

He picked her up, swung her by the legs and let go.  Tigress went flying through a tractor-trailer.  Before she could rise, Terminus was on her again, planting an armored boot on her breasts and pressing down.

“In fact, given a millennium or two, you might evolve into me.”  Terminus fired off another blast obliterating a van full of fleeing residents.  “We’re both feeding off the same thing, death.  Both using energy from the lives we take.  Course the difference is Leaches like you need something physical, blood, flesh, whatever.  Maybe you should’ve stopped off and eaten some of those civilians when you had the chance.  Me?  I can pull them in from miles away.  So you’re running dry while I’m still going strong.”

Tigress just growled and tried to wiggle free from his under his foot.  He reached down and picked her up by the shoulders.  Tigress landed kicks on his armor but the black-armored monster didn’t notice.  He held her closer.  She looked into the darkness behind the slit in his helmet; she imagined she could see the screaming souls within as they were burned for fuel.  Maybe Terminus expected her to be frightened.  Instead she was intrigued. 

“Thanks for the tip!”

Her head darted forward; she sank her teeth deep into his armored shoulder and started to suck.

And got nothing.

“Nice try Leach Lady but there’s nothing for you to suck on.  Like I said we’re both running on the same death energy.”

Tigress gasped and released him.  She felt so weak, so helpless.  This monster was too powerful, too strong.

“But seeing as we’re kissing cousins though, I’ll give you a little reward.” 

“Please…”  She said, that one little word hurting more than her wounds.

“Hmm?”

“Please, make me like you.  Make me stronger.”

Terminus laughed.  Not the usual hollow sounds of grim satisfaction but genuine booms of laughter.  Several windows shattered.

“Oh that’s funny, that’s funny.  Make you like me?  Leach Girl you got balls, I’ll give you that.  I had something else in mind.”

Between his legs his armor flowed again forming a spiked phallus.

“I’ll make it quick.”

Terminus rammed her down impaling her on the cruel instrument.  Tigress screamed.  Her mind raced.  “Help me…”  She muttered “Maple Leaf, Val, please… help me…”

But her teammates didn’t come.  The pain between her legs became even worse, she smelled burning meat. 

“I’m sorry…”  She whispered.  Then her body burst into flame and dissolved into ash.

“Yeah, I’m sorry too.  That way things are going you might be the best tussle I get out of this mud ball.  Maybe I should’ve saved you for last.”

Terminus took to the air above the burning city.  He noted the clogged highways filled with people trying to flee.  He’d get to them in a minute.  He raised his voice.  He psychically amplified knowing that everyone in this hemisphere would hear it.  And have nightmares for the rest of their lives.

“Come on Planet Dirt!  Is that the best you’ve got?  Is that the fucking best you’ve got?”

No one answered.  He shook his head, shrugged his armored shoulders, and swooped towards the highway.

***

“Got it!”  Maple Leaf struggled free from the last twisted rebar and gasped for breath.  She ran to the blue crystal woman still convulsing on the ground.

“Come on future Val, come on, you can do it.”  She smacked Frigga’s cold crystal head a few times, the time traveler’s eyes sparked to life.

“Jillian?  Jillian, I cannot %ERROR% Jillian, it’s too late.  The timeline…”

Maple Leaf tired not to let her fear show.  “Yeah, we’ve taken some lumps but there’s still hope ay?”  She looked at the burning city behind her.  “I mean we can turn this around right?”

Frigga slowly got to her feet.  Her crystal body was cracked and fractured.  The data streams inside her now looked more like short circuits.  The holographic displays dancing around her showed only static and Blue Screens of Death.  “I’m sorry Jillian, I’m so sorry, we %ERROR% failed you.”

“No Val, no, come on, pull it together, we can still do this.”

“Terminus is here, you alone cannot %ERROR% stop him.”

“But you know how to stop him ay?  How did you beat him last time?  If I know-“

“%ERROR-FILE NOT FOUND% Jillian, no one knows how Terminus was stopped.”

“But-“

“Look”

***

It was their darkest hour.

After five years most of the great cities were all gone.  And the great heroes.  The resistance was scattered, running and hiding when Terminus came.  Trying to save lives and keep out of his way.

For the last few months he’d turned his attention to South America.  In Brasilia he killed the Birds of Paradise and Super Samba.  He turned his gaze north towards the remaining population of Venezuela and Columbia.

But he never arrived.

Weeks passed before any of the remaining heroes and heroines were willing to look for Terminus.  It was Val and Aussie Girl who found the crater in the middle of the Amazon.  It was three miles across and in the center they found nothing but a few fragments of dark armor.

And a naked woman.

It took weeks for the woman to recover and even when she did she was completely insane. 

Years passed.  The world was rebuilt.  Reunited under the Global Protectorate.  And the girl, the sole witness to Terminus’ defeat began to change. 

Like a caterpillar coming out of her cocoon.

Sylvania.

***

“Shamrock!?  Shamrock beats him?”

“Unknown.  No data.  Subject Shannon O’Sullivan/Shamrock/Sylvania was present but her power was insufficient, could not have beaten Terminus, impossible, impossible.  Subject  Shannon O’Sullivan/Shamrock/Sylvania could not recall events leading to Terminus’ defeat, No data.  %ERROR% %ERROR% %ERROR% “

“Crap, come on future Val, hold it together.”  The crystal woman staggered, more cracks appeared.  Maple Leaf caught her and helped her back to the ground.

“I’m sorry Jillian, I’m sorry.  I thought we could save things but Amano is gone, Sylvania gone, now Wolfe’s virus, the timeline changes, I can’t maintain myself any longer, it’s too late, too late.”

The holograms and the data steams winked out.  Frigga’s voice became more human.  “I just want you to know Jillian…  I love you, I’m sorry I never said anything… sorry we were never lovers…”

“Um yeah, Val, um, me too.”

“Thank you Jillian, thank you…”

The crystal body convulsed and then crumbled into fine blue sand.  Then the grains themselves disappeared like melting ice. 

And Maple Leaf was alone.

“Well that was creepy.”  She said to no one in particular.

Looking towards the city Maple Leaf saw the fires and explosions.  “Guess it’s up to me then.  As usual.”

She took to the air.

“Still… gotta wonder where Shannon is now.”

***

“Stop.”

“Well, well, you must be my new playmate.  How many super chicks has this mud ball got anyway?”

“Your killing stops now.”

“Yeah, sure it does.  Who’s gonna stop it?  You?”

“Yes.”

The dark armored defiler of worlds paused.  There was usually some fear, some anger when the local hero chicks confronted him.  But this one.  She sounded like she was admiring some flowers.  Probably just nuts.

“Whatever.”  His red blasts stabbed out again, he’d just finish this one off fast.  Something about her was creeping him out.

But the blasts stopped just short of her disappearing in a green glow, not a force field, just like some kind of no-go zone.  She reached out towards him, not with fists, but with open hands.

“Hey!  None of that- AHHHHH!”

Terminus screamed.  The sound of it shattered the minds of people around the world.  He tore loose and did something amazing.

He fled.

And Shamrock followed.  Streamers of green, white and gold light followed behind her.  As she passed the wounded felt a sudden strength.  Fires died out.  People felt hope.

Terminus fled faster, not caring where, only caring about the glowing girl close on his heels.

“So you’re the guy who’s supposed to kill me ay?”  The blow from the Canadian heroine dented his helmet and sent Terminus tumbling from the skies again.  She was gratified to see him land in the already ruined Siegel Square, causing no new damage.

Maple Leaf looked up at Shamrock.  After everything she had seen today Shannon O’Sullivan’s glowing costume and streamers of light didn’t even make Maple Leaf blink.

“Hey Shannon.  Nice costume.  Sorry about firing you ay?”

“It’s OK Maple Leaf; I was being a bit of a ditz.”

“Tell you what, let’s finish this and I’ll hire you back, with a raise.”

Shamrock laughed musically.  “Thanks, but I’ll have to think about that Maple Leaf.” 

They dove after him together.

Terminus looked up and fired off more bolts of red energy.  Maple Leaf avoided them, Shamrock just dispelled them.  He looked around for move victims, more fuel, there was nothing.  The ones who weren’t dead had fled.  He took to the air.  Maple Leaf’s punch knocked him back down.  He landed on his back shattering the concrete.  And then the redhead was on him with her terrible green glow.  Terminus screamed again.

Maple Leaf fell to the ground clutching her bleeding ears but Shamrock didn’t move.  She focused her new-found powers on Terminus, within Terminus.

The black armor began to crack.  A golden light shot out from a crack ascending towards the heavens.  More and more cracks appeared, more golden beams shot out of Terminus’ armor.  Still Shamrock poured it on; the green glow grew stronger and stronger.

It was the life energy Sylvania had given her.  In her mind Shannon O’Sullivan saw her future self wounded and exhausted lost somewhere in the Amazon, finding… something.  A woman, but more.  A spirit of the jungle, an avatar of the world’s life energy.  For lack of a better word, a literal fairy.  It taught her things, about the true nature of the world, about the energies of life.  It changed her.  And it gave her the power to stop the forces of death.

Ten more golden beams shot out of Terminus’ armor like bullets.  Shamrock’s healing powers touched the souls imprisoned inside him, giving them the power to break free.  Terminus screamed again.  His helmet shattered.

“All right!  I give up OK!  I give up!  Take me to jail or whatever you hero chicks do!  Come on!  This ain’t funny!”

Shamrock hesitated a second.  She looked at Maple Leaf.  Maple Leaf just smiled.  Through the cracks in the ancient ebony armor they could see Terminus’ true form, a withered mummified corpse, sustained for far too long by the suffering and deaths of others.  His head was shriveled, almost too small for the shattered helmet, covered in leathery skin.  His eyes were now yellow and afraid.  He did not look frightening.  He looked pathetic.

“Shannon, kill this bastard.”

Shamrock nodded and her hands glowed green one last time.

And Terminus, a millennia-old necrovore, a monster who had destroyed countless worlds with his own hands, Terminus exploded in golden light.

***

Flying in from the mountains Aussie Girl saw the latest explosion and swerved to get herself and Wolfe under cover behind a hill.  The shockwave shook the ground like an earthquake.

“Strewth, what the fuck was that?”

***

Maple Leaf blinked a few times and her vision slowly cleared.  She’d been shot through several buildings before coming to rest against a steel-reinforced concrete parking garage.  She looked up.

Downtown Megapolis was gone.

A few of the stronger buildings still stood, barely.  But the rest was just ash and rubble.

“Oh yeah.  Three mile crater.  Crap.  Maybe I should have thought about that before I told her to kill him.  At least the city was evacuated.  Mostly.  I think.  Crap.  But we got him.  Better this than letting him kill off the whole world ay?”

No one answered.

Maple Leaf looked herself over.  She seemed in pretty good shape all things considered.  Even her red and white Canadian flag costume was intact, and that never happened.

In the distance she saw a green and gold glow.  She flew towards it.  Shamrock was lying in a small depression, the glow around her flickering feebly.  The girl stirred weakly when Maple Leaf landed.

“Jillian?  Oh good, I managed to protect you…”

“Yeah Shannon, I’m OK, you did good kid.  You got him.  You really got him.”

“I know, he’s gone.  Oh Jillian, he killed so many people, so many… I could feel them when I was fighting him.  Whole worlds.  And I… I killed so many just now… I didn’t mean… I didn’t know… it hurt.”

“It’s OK Shannon, it’s OK.  We got him ay?  Why don’t you take a rest, then we can find Aussie, go after future Wolfe, free Val and… and… start over I guess.”

“That’s a nice idea… Sorry Jillian I’m really tired now… I told her I’m not that strong…”

Shannon’s head slumped forward and the glow around her began to die.

“Shannon no!  Come on kid, come on, you can do this, you’re gonna be OK ay?  I mean, we won right?  We won?”

She shook Shamrock but there was no reply, she felt Shannon’s wrist then her neck.  No pulse.  No breath.

“Shit.  Shit.  I’m sorry Shannon.  I’m sorry.  Don’t worry, I… I’ll make sure everyone knows you saved the world, I’ll tell them you really were…” 

Maple Leaf just sobbed a few times.

The city was so quiet now.  The fires and explosions had stopped, there was noting left to burn.  Even the wind was still.  Maple Leaf could hear her own heart beating softly.  I would be so easy to just lie down now and take a rest.  Just like Shannon.

“Hey Maple Leaf!  I made it!  What did I miss?”

Aussie Girl landed a few feet away and put down the unconscious Wolfe.

Maple Leaf looked up at her, ran over and gave her hug.

***

In the mountain lab, Val finally found a working TV and managed to get Wolfe’s own WIN network.  She didn’t recognize the reporter (what happened to Flores?) but he was talking about Megapolis being completely destroyed, satellite photos showing Terminus was dead.    Reports were still coming in but people were saying the attacker was destroyed by a redheaded woman in a green white and gold costume.  It didn’t take them too long for someone to raise Shamrock’s name.  Now the whole world was praising that dumb slut.

“Fucking useless bitch.  I should have killed her when I had the chance.  But no, I had to be all clever and shit and humiliate her.  And I didn’t even get to screw the bitch.  Fuck me.”

“Yeah Wolfe.  Fuck you.”

Wolfe-in-Val’s-body turned, Maple Leaf the proudest most stuck up Global Protector of them all was there, hovering over his head.

“You’re another one I should have killed when I had the chance.  Here for another beating?”

The bitch just smiled and flew straight up.  Wolfe/Val followed screaming abuse.

The Canadian heroine was waiting for him, hovering with her hands on her hips, her legs spread and a shit-eating grin on her face. 

“That was pretty nasty how you took down future Val and future Rising Sun.”

“Liked that huh?  Well it’s nothing compared to what I’m gonna do to you.”

“Oh Wolfe, always underestimating us.  What’s that you like to call us ‘brain dead bimbos’?”

“Brain dead sluts.”

“Well guess what Wolfe, unlike you we don’t keep our brains in our dicks, and we learn from our mistakes.”  She gestured and Wolfe/Val followed.  On another mountain, a few miles away his improved vision could make out Aussie Girl, with his younger self in her arms.  His blazer was torn up into straps pinning his arms and legs, his mouth gagged with his tie.

“One word from me, one false step from you and young Wolfe dies.  And you just fade away like a bad dream.”

Wolfe/Val just stared, nose wrinkling, fists clenching and unclenching.  “So why wait bitch?  Why not just do it now?”

“Why?  Because we’re heroines Wolfe.  Young Wolfe over there is a bastard but he doesn’t deserve to die just so we can stop you.  So we’ll give you a chance.  Let Val go, retreat back into your little techno-ring and we’ll let you live.”

“As a trophy in your little whore house?”

“Thanks to you we really don’t anywhere to show it right now, so I was just going to drop it in the ocean.  It’s a computer right?  So you can do a whole virtual reality thing in there, live out all your sick fantasies and never hurt anyone again.” 

“Well fuck.  Looks like you got me Jillian.  And such a generous offer too.  I get to spend the next thousand years reliving that night young Wolfe fucked you on your office floor.  Or that night he got you drunk and fucked you in the ass.  Or the time-“

“I’m a heroine Wolfe, not a saint.  Let Val go now or so help me I’ll kill you.”

“Oooo, Maple Leaf Girl is scary now, I just got one thing to say bitch, and I hope you’re listening” Wolfe turned towards Aussie and shouted “– HEY THUNDER GIRL!  WHAT’S YOUR NAME?”

“NO!  Crap!”  Maple Leaf lowered her arm and made a chopping gesture.

His cry echoed through the mountains.  Across the valley Aussie Girl suddenly hesitated and dropped the younger Wolfe.  “I’m… Thun… No!  I’m Aussie Girl!  I AM AUSSIE GI-“

But by then it was too late.  Wolfe was there and just one of Val’s mighty punches was enough to smash the confused girl’s head.  Aussie’s body fell to the ground.  “So you finally got that straight in your head huh?  Just about three seconds too late.”  Wolfe-in-Val’s body turned to his younger self lying on the ground.

“SHE’SNOTTHEONLYONETOOLATE!”  Wolfe heard as a red and white blur passed by seizing his younger self.  Maple Leaf pulled up and paused in mid-air younger Wolfe firmly in her hands.  “Aussie get up, I-“  Then she looked down and saw Aussie’s body, clearly dead.

Wolfe used her second of shock to take to the air.  “OK!  OK!  You got me!”

Maple Leaf’s eyes filled with tears.  She put a hand on young Wolfe’s temple, ready to shatter his skull.  “Oh I got you, I fucking got you, no more talk you’re-“

“WAIT!  Wait!  There’s something you need to know!”  Wolfe flashed his gold ring at Maple Leaf’s eyes and suddenly…

***

Maple Leaf saw a windowless lab in some basement at Mega University.  The Sports Illustrated 365 Day Bathing Beauty calendar said it was July 7, 1997.  Sitting at the table, staring at his Apple i-book was a familiar figure, Dr. Boyd. 

That date meant something… Boyd always said it was the day he had the brainstorm for his psychokinetic activation process, the process he used to create the Global Protectors!  He always took them out to dinner on July 7^th to celebrate their ‘conceptual birthday’. 

He looked frustrated.  Very frustrated.

Behind him Maple Leaf saw a gold ball appear in a flash of rainbow colored light.  The obsessed doctor didn’t notice.  The ball slowly moved into his field of view, as soon as he looked up a beam of light shot right into his brain.  Then the ball disappeared.  Boyd blinked a few times, then started typing furiously.

***

“What the fuck…”  Maple Leaf began.  She was back in the smoke-filled skies over Megapolis, young Wolfe still in her hands, Val still hovering in front of her.

“Tell me Jillian, ever wonder why it is Boyd could make his process work but could never explain how it worked?  Or why none of those other super-smart guys in the world could copy it?  Or why it never quite worked the same way twice?”

“What does that have to do with-“

“Y’see the science behind his process won’t even be discovered till the 22^nd century, there’s no one alive who can make it work, not without some help from the future.”

“Are you saying you helped Boyd?  Without you we’d never exist?”

Wolfe smiled.  “Yep.  That’s my last laugh.  I spent decades studying you bimbos, years trying to figure out how you could exist then it hit me.  You couldn’t.  So once I got my hands on a time machine it was easy to go back and download the information into Boyd’s mind and put up a quantum interference field to keep anyone else from seeing me do it.  So Boyd’s theories stayed a mystery.  So got it now bimbo?  You kill young me and I never exist.  If I never exist, you never exist.  No Galactic Protectorate, no Gaea Building, no Global Protectors, no Maple Leaf.  Jillian Havre bleeds to death on the courthouse steps in 1999.  A bunch of other people you saved over the years die.  Then Terminus arrives in 2006 and, without you bimbos to stop him, destroys the world.  Kill younger me and you kill all your bimbo buddies, all the people you saved and you let Terminus destroy the world.  Still want to go through with it?”

“I…”

“Or… you put young me down.  You and me fly back to the city and tell them a story about how we saved the whole fucking world.  I still have that info y’know, about how the process works.  I can crank out new Global Protectors like that.  Then make myself a new body, a guy this time, and let you lesbo friend here go.  Hell I might even be able to put blondie down there back together.  How about it Jillian?  You and me, working together.  You’d be richer, more famous than ever.”

Maple Leaf’s face hardened.  She looked at the ruined city, her ruined headquarters, her dead friend lying below.

“You still don’t get it do you Wolfe?  Yeah, we made some mistakes over the years but the Global Protectors was never about getting famous, getting rich.  It was about helping people, protecting them.  Protecting them from people like you!”

“Hey you’d be doing that, don’t forget you kill younger me and-“

“You say without you we’d never get out powers.  Maybe that’s true, maybe that’s another lie.  But something I know is that it was never the costumes or the powers that made us heroines, that came from within!  And whatever happens I know that somehow, someway the Global Protectors will exist and we WILL SAVE THE WORLD!”

“Hey-“

“This ends NOW!”

Maple Leaf felt Wolfe’s skull shatter in her hands.  Suddenly there was burst of rainbow light…

And then there was nothing.

 

 

Nothing at all.

 

 

For a little while…

 

 

Epilogue 1

 

July 7, 2007…

“It’s been almost a year since Terminus’ attack on Megapolis, one of the worst supervillain attacks in history.  A battle that was only won thanks to the appearance of a new superheroine team, the Global Protectors!  We’ll be talking to Lioness, Min Hae, Princess Persia, Sistah Ska, Marianne and of course their leader Maple Leaf about their new headquarters, their new costumes and of course their new movie in an exclusive interview tomorrow.  This is Francesca Flores for Wolfe International News…”

Wolfe angrily clicked off his expensive flat-screen TV.  Something about those damn bimbos really touched a nerve in him.  It wasn’t just the French chick’s stuck up attitude, or the Jamaican girl’s dirty mouth, it was like he hated them before he even saw them.

His son Wolfe Jr. was totally into them of course.  He’d even slept with the Korean bitch.  Yeah he has his old man’s libido but none of his good taste.

Wolfe stomped out of the room.  Flores was coming over for dinner; he’d have to talk to her about digging up some dirt on these chicks.

 

Epilogue 2

 

Time unknown…

Maple Leaf slowly pulled her head out of the muddy puddle she had landed in and looked around.  She was in a steamy jungle, God only knows where.  She looked around surprised to see some familiar-looking faces, all alive, all OK.  It was impossible, it was wonderful, it was real!

“Val?  Tigress?  Are you guys… I mean… what just happened?”

Valkyrie shook her head a few times.  Tigress stretched like a cat and grunted.  Looking around the clearing Maple Leaf could see all her teammates.  La Sola, Star, Rising Sun, Aussie Girl and Shamrock were all lying unconscious in the mud.  All of them back in costume, unhurt, lying peacefully.  Nasty looking insects buzzed around them.

“Look, Val, Tigress, I don’t know about you but-“

Val nodded.  “Yes Jillian, me too.  I remember it all.”

Tigress looked at them sadly.  “Jillian, Val, I’m so sorry, I-“

Maple Leaf gave her teammate a hug.  “It’s OK Kanika, it’s OK.  We all did things we’re not proud of.  But what happened?  Was Wolfe lying after all?  I guess not or you guys would all be… y’know…”

Val looked around again.  “Obviously there was some sort of temporal realignment, I can only guess that in the new universe there was no room for us, so we were thrust aside.”

“Like getting pushed out of crowded bar?”

“Something like that.  But how far were we knocked and where did we land I don’t-“

“Shh.”  Tigress whispered.  “Do you hear that thumping noise?  It’s getting closer.”

“It doesn’t sound like a truck or a car.”

“Actually it sounds like-“

The jungle burst open.  A ten-ton Tyrannosaurus Rex smashed through the trees.  Two more of the huge dinosaurs were right behind it.

Tigress took to the air.  

Val pulled her unconscious teammates out of the way.

Maple Leaf just started to laugh…

 

Afterword

 

So I wrote my first Global Protectors story, the Seduction of Shamrock in November of 2003.  And my last one in July of 2007.  Almost 4 years, 13 stories, probably close to 1000 pages of text.  Looking back at that first story, it’s amazing.  I started the GP’s saga in the middle, they were already established, had a reputation, a headquarters, old foes, past adventures you name it.  Then bit by bit I filled in the back story of where they came from and how they got there. 

All credit for that has to go to Doctor Droid’s poser art, which besides being beautiful and well-done also told a story, I always felt like I was seeing a page from a comic book that’s published in some alternate reality, a much better one!  I didn’t feel like I was inventing a back story for the heroines, I felt like it was already there and I was just retelling it. 

Of course Shamrock is named Shannon O’Sullivan; it’s a perfect alliterative comic book name.  Of course the team lives in the Gaea Building with its evocative twin domes.  And of course Valkyrie is a repressed lesbian, just look at her!

Not that any of this was necessarily what Doctor Droid had in mind but that’s what I saw.

The weird thing is, this story was the third GP story I outlined.  That’s one reason the villain is a future version Wolfe, a character from my second story.  But then I had some ideas, and then some other ideas and they led to more … and well, three years and ten stories later I finally finished this. 

One reason for the ‘cosmic reboot’ ending is Doctor Droid rebooted the Global Protectors on his site.  For a while he was cranking out new GP covers, stories and characters, starting again at the beginning, we also tossed around some ideas for new Protectors in his Yahoo group.  So my story ends with the creation of Mk II Global Protectors. 

The team is going on the shelf for a long time.  I’m not planning to do anything with the New Global Protectors and don’t expect anything to come from the second epilogue for a while if ever.  The Global Protectors – Lost in Time is very, very, far down on my list.  But feel free to let your imaginations roam.  The Global Protectors vs. the Spanish Inquisition sounds like a good start.

Near the top of my list is a project I started a year ago called Stella and Minx.  The 70s versions of Supergirl and Batgirl suddenly find themselves as the world’s greatest heroes when their male mentors disappear.  Hilarity, bondage, sex, blackmail and parodies of 70s comics ensue.

 

Special thanks to all the readers who wrote in with suggestions and feedback, to Doctor Droid for creating the characters and most of all to the countless comic writers and artists whose work continues to entertain and inspire me.

 

As always, comments, suggestions, feedback and requests are welcome and eagerly sought.  So please let me know what you think.

 

Marcus

(Marcus_Lycus@hotmail.com)

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