Elements #2

Everybody thought they knew Sapphire Stagg, but they didn’t really. Sure they’d read about her in the papers, and some had been lucky enough to see her in person, and that superhero guy with the white face who was marrying her in a few days thought he understood her, but only one person really knew her. That person was her best friend, Kate Kane, who was currently holding a party at Gotham City, in stately Kane Manor, where the richest girls in all the world were gathered for the bridal shower to end all bridal showers. However that party had just hit a lull so the richest of those girls, and the one who the party was being held for, was thinking of going.

Kate, seeing that her friend was bored, broke off from her current conversation and headed on over. “So, Saph, enjoying the party?”

“It’s great,” Sapphire lied, looking at her full glass.

“But you’re worried about Rex?” Kate guessed. “He’s not going to get kidnapped on the eve of your wedding two years in a row. That’s just careless.”

“No, of course not,” she replied. “It’s just… I guess I’m not the party animal I used to be.”

“Things changes,” Kate said. “Remember the good old days, drinking until dawn. We’d wake up the next afternoon in a foreign country, couldn’t remember anything. Your father put together a CSI team just to retrace your steps, and then he got you the world’s most expensive bodyguard. What was his name?”

“Oh, you mean Slade,” Sapphire said. “He wasn’t that bad, usually turned a blind eye, but it was impossible to get boyfriends who weren’t either scared of him or mysteriously disappearing after our first meeting. That was until Rex came along. Then, once I’d found what I was looking for, I pretty much gave up the wild child thing.”

“Yeah, ain’t true love wonderful,” Kate said, her words swimming in sarcasm.

“Don’t tell me you’re jealous,” Sapphire joked to her Maid of Honor. “Poor Kate, always the bridesmaid, never the bride.”

“Jealous, me?” Kate said. “No, I’ve got better things to do with my life. Had this great idea I was working on but some redhead in Las Vegas beat me to it.”

“Those are the breaks,” Sapphire said, distracted by some nearby chat. “What is it with these millionairesses and billionairesses anyway? Do they go to special schools for inane chatter? Surely we were never that bad.”

“You keep telling yourself that, Saph,” Kate said, helping herself to her friend’s untouched drink.

“I mean, I know I can be an airhead,” Sapphire continued, “but those two, they were arguing about whether the Pope’s catholic.”

“Who cares?” Kate said. “Just as long as he turns up on Saturday to read the vows.”

“Exactly,” Saph said. “Anyway, I better be going. Sneak away inconspicuously. I’ll see you Saturday, at the cathedral.” She looked at her friend. “You okay?”

“Yeah, sure, couldn’t be happier. You just scoot off home.”

“I understand,” Sapphire said, seeing the tears in her friend’s eyes. “You’re happy for me. Well, pull yourself together, Kate,” Sapphire ordered, smiling at her friend. “You’re the host, remember. I realize my leaving will create a big me-shaped vacuum, but you’ll fill it somehow.”

“I hope so,” her friend replied, as Sapphire started to head off.

“Bye, Kate.”

“Goodbye, Sapphire.”

As Kate looked down into her glass of champagne, Sapphire, in her sapphire-colored gown, walked out of the door, crossed the red carpet that had been laid over the grassy courtyard and climbed into her car. A minute later, the sapphire-colored stretch limousine emerged through the main gates to be illuminated by the flashes of cameras outside. Normally Sapphire would find the paparazzi intrusive, but not tonight; nothing could dent her happiness. She’d just been to her bridal shower and it was only a few days until her wedding to Rex Mason.

She looked through the limo’s darkened windows as they zoomed past the people outside. Normally she’d envy them and their anonymity - she tried to be inconspicuous but could never quite pull it off, whereas these people seemed to excel at it - but tonight she pitied them, and the rest of the world for that matter, for none of them were her and she was, to put it obviously, the happiest girl in the world.

Still, she couldn’t help but have a lingering doubt that there was a cloud accompanying the silver lining, as she once again remembered last year, and a night just like tonight, when, as she’d celebrated, her husband-to-be had been kidnapped by Cadmus during his bachelor party.

No, she was being silly. Lightning didn’t strike twice, and Rex would no doubt still be enjoying himself in Vegas. She turned on the 50’’ screen in the back of the car, and saw a newsflash showing a bar in Las Vegas that had been invaded by Cadmus agents.

As the news continued, Sapphire, her face turning as white as her hair, frantically dialed home. There was no answer, and so she tried to remember who Rex’s best man was. After the last time, she’d insisted Rex had given him the best man’s number; she scrolled through to Lucas Carr on her phone and pressed the dial button.



In Las Vegas, Snapper Carr was watching the same newsflash when he heard his cell phone going off.

“Hello,” he began. “Oh, hi, Ms. Stagg,” he said, stunned to have someone as famous as Sapphire Stagg shouting at him. “Yes, I know I’m supposed to be Rex’s best man and I’m responsible for him.”

“So, where is he?” Sapphire demanded at the other end of the line.

Snapper stopped for a few seconds, considering his answer, and finally decided honesty was the best policy. “Well... I sort of... left him.”

“You left him?! Where?!”

“At the bar... the one that those Cadmus guys attacked, but I’m sure he’ll be okay. He had that caveman guy with him.”

“Java!” Sapphire exclaimed.

“Yeah, that’s ri-” began Snapper, but then realized that Sapphire had hung up.



Sapphire desperately scrolled through to Java’s number, dialed it and waited... and waited.

She looked at her phone, wanting to fling it to the floor, wanting to just admit defeat and call her father; he’d put everything right. No, she had to fight her own battles, she thought, then phoned her father anyway, only to get no answer.

Think, Sapphire, think. She took deep breaths, trying to calm herself. Rex had promised he’d just disappear into the air if there was any sign of trouble. He’d probably be back at the mansion now, just not answering the phone, that’s all... Wait! The mansion!

Sapphire remembered the mansion’s security system, and looked back at the screen, pulling footage from the security camera there. With relief she saw Metamorpho and Java arriving at the mansion an hour earlier, and then saw Java wheeling a giant cake in.

She looked at the cake, which could have been bigger, and then saw the bride on the top of the cake starting to move.

Something wasn’t right. Who was that girl?



Meanwhile, outside an airport, that same girl was saying goodbye to her car.

“You’ll be okay without me?” asked the car, which answered to the name of KAT.

“Sure. It’s a no-brainer - Fly to Egypt, get past a large army, obtain a sample of that meteor that only Simon Stagg currently has a part of. No problem,” said the girl, currently known as Urania Blackwell. “You just have fun with those scientists, get a new ejector seat, and see if they’ve got any fun new weapons for you. I’ll see you when I get back.”

“Well, you take care,” KAT said, her engine starting to hum.

“Hey, what’s the worst that can happen?”

“Remember, expect the unexpected,” KAT said. “Goodbye, Urania.”

And with that, KAT drove away.

“You worry too much,” Urania whispered, so quietly that only her car could hear her, and headed into the airport.



Sapphire watched the security camera footage of the mysterious girl fighting Java. Don’t say Cadmus had backup. She directed the security system to identify the intruder.

As she saw numerous faces flashing on the screen before her, the computer attempting to match the mystery girl, she saw the girl run off and then a new person entering.

“Looks like she’s got help,” reasoned Sapphire. “Identify him,” she commanded the system.

She looked over at the female faces flashing before her and then saw the words NO MATCH appear. Stunned, because she knew how many civil liberties her father had trampled over to make sure he’d got records on everybody, she then looked over at the male faces flashing on the other side of the screen and her heart started to sink realizing this search was also no doubt doomed to failure.

Then, just as she picked up her phone again, she noticed that the screen now just showed one face and the words MATCH FOUND.

“Element?” she said.



“Hi, Lucas, this is Sapphire again.”

The man forced a smile, as he heard the icy voice on the other end of his phone. “Hello, Ms. Stagg. By the way, all my friends call me, Snapper.”

“Thanks for sharing that, Lucas,” came the reply. “Now, I need the number for Batman.”

“You want to talk to Batman?” asked Snapper incredulously. “Why?”

“Well, Rex got back home tonight, but then some strange woman came in, followed shortly after by someone calling himself Element. The security system said he used to be a member of the Teen Titans, so I want to check with Batman, see if he’s a danger to my Rex.”

“But Nightwing’s the leader of the Titans, not Batman.”

“I don’t want to talk to Nightwing, I want to talk to Batman. I was there when that Darkseid tried his corporate takeover of Earth, and I know it’s Batman who’s in charge of all the heroes. I want to talk to the monkey, Lucas, not the organ grinder.”

Snapper knew better than to correct her. “But you’re a millionairess. Surely you have other people you can call?”

There was an icy silence at the other end of the phone. “First of all, Mister Carr, I’m actually an heiress. but I’m in line to be a billionairess, so please don’t say millionairess, it makes me sound cheap. Secondly, stop making that snapping sound with your fingers; it’s an annoying habit and, if you wish to continue, I’m perfectly willing to employ a team of people to snap them for you, full time. Finally, I need a hero, and apart from my husband-to-be, the nearest things to heroes that move in my circles are The Green Team. Needless to say, I don’t need a millionaire, I need Batman.”

Snapper, concentrating on no longer snapping his fingers, asked, “But what makes you think I know how to contact The Batman?”

“Well, don’t you know his daughter, Batgirl? Didn’t she and her friends help you and Rex that time?” And then, the obvious question leapt to her mind, “Couldn’t I hire them?”

“You want to hire The New Outsiders?” asked an incredulous Snapper.

“Well, they’ve got to be cheaper than someone famous like Batman, and they helped Rex last time, and Batman doesn’t even seem to have any head for business. No e-mail address, not even a hotline, just a big torch from what I gather, and where will the down-trodden and crime-riddled find one of those in a hurry?”

Snapper Carr listened in amazement. “You want to hire The New Outsiders? But they’re not the A-Team... Sure, they’ve got a John Smith, and some have bad attitude, and some are howling mad. Well, maybe they are like the A-Team, albeit more droolworthy,” Snapper admitted, “but you can’t just hire them. Besides, I’m sure Rex can more than handle himself.”

“It doesn’t matter,” came the emotionless voice on the other end of the phone. “It’s over now.”

And then the line went dead.



The screen in Sapphire’s car was showing the events of half an hour ago, when security guards swarmed in to surround the Stagg Mansion and the girl ran out and escaped in a flying car. Normally Sapphire’s first thought would be why, with all her father’s money, she didn’t possess such a flying car, but now her thoughts were with Rex and why he wasn’t giving chase. Afraid to fast forward, she watched the screen as the security guards dispersed, wondering when Rex would appear.

Of course, at that time, Rex’s mind was elsewhere, looking at his flesh-colored hand.

“You... you can fix me?” he said, startled, almost in a whisper, and then he started laughing, as he looked into the almost-smiling face of the young man facing him. “You can fix me!” he yelled.

“Yes, but not yet,” said Element. “Regretfully, I need the help of Metamorpho... not of Rex Mason.”

“But... but you can change me back for the wedding,” reasoned Rex, “and then after...”

“No, that is not possible,” Element said. “I can restore your elements back to where they want to go. Not to where they are now.”

“But... but I can’t let Sapphire down again.”

“Can you not delay it a few weeks?”

“You don’t understand how much organization goes into a wedding, do you, kid? Plus, you think we wait a year between weddings for the fun of it? This Saturday would have been the birthday of Sapphire’s mother.”

Although he didsn’t remember his parents, Element understood how much a parent could mean. “In that case, I will fix you, and then be gone.”

“But you need my help?” said a confused Metamorpho.

“Yes, but I am a hero,” replied Yu. “I help people,” he said, reaching out for Metamorpho’s other hand.

“Yeah, well I’m a hero, and so do I,” replied Rex, pulling his hand away. “I’ll never be able to repay you as Rex, so I’m gonna have to do it as Metamorpho.”

“Thank you,” said Yu, and then a phone started to ring.

“That’ll be for me,” said Rex, looking over at a nearby phone in the hallway. “The security system will have redirected it.”

And with that his arm stretched out, but suddenly Rex noticed his ‘fixed’ hand was turning back to orange.

“I’m sorry,” Element said, as Rex stopped in his tracks. “I should have told you not to use your powers so soon. It can disrupt the changes I made.”

“Kinda figured that,” Rex said, and then realized the phone had stopped ringing. “Hey, I better ring Saph, let her know what’s going on.”

As Rex’s hand stretched once more, and picked up the telephone, Element looked at Simon Stagg’s Orb of Ra, the small piece of the meteor that he hoped would give him some answers.

“No answer,” said Rex, interrupting his thoughts. “Line’s busy. Still, I’m in no rush to tell her, so I guess it can wait till she gets back.”

Yu just nodded, not being big on small talk, unlike his friend Woodchucker, who’d only talk when he had nothing to say; at least that had been the case back in the days when he could talk.

“Guess you could do with a rest after your journey here?”

Yu nodded again.

“Great,” said Metamorpho, realizing Yu might not be the greatest of traveling companions, and led him out of the door, back to his apartment.

On the way, they heard a noise, and followed it to find Java still lying in wedding cake. Boom boom acka-lacka lacka boom was the ringtone coming from his outsize cell phone.

“That’s the ringtone he uses for Saph,” realized Metamorpho and grabbed for the cell phone, but an unconscious Java instinctively brushed him away, just as the phone went silent.

“Guess it’ll wait,” said Rex. “And guess you’re hungrier than you look,” he added, looking back at Yu, now tucking into the wedding cake.

As Yu nodded once again, Rex heard the sound of engines high above and turned his head upwards to see an airplane high above. Just like the one he’d be on soon with Yu, he thought, and then he shook his head, wondering just how he was going to explain things to Sapphire.



Meanwhile, in the airplane overhead, the spy they called Urania Blackwell was relaxing in her seat, listening to the iPod attached to her belt, on her long journey to Egypt.

Well, relaxing was probably overstating it. In fact Urania hated plane journeys for all sorts of reasons - the boredom, the dull non-spy passengers, having to listen to the same old safety talk yet again from the stewardess. However, to be fair, the passengers this time around were a uniformly quiet bunch, and she hadn’t seen the stewardess in a while. Then she felt something biting into her neck, and as she was pulled back in her seat she looked up to see the air stewardess was trying to garrotte her. That was yet another thing Urania hated about flying - homicidal stewardesses.

She gasped for breath, her hands automatically grabbing for the two ends of the special cable connecting her earphones to her iPod; a cable that ran under the wire currently slicing into her neck. She pulled on the cable, pulling the wire away from her neck, but the stewardess, with her fixed smile, just pulled it back again.

She was strong, thought Urania, wrapping the two ends of the cable around her fist and pulling as hard as she could. Too strong, she realized as the stewardess pulled harder and the wire around her neck got tighter and tighter.

While she continued pulling with one hand, trying to prevent herself from being decapitated with the wire, her other hand reached for the seat control, and the seat suddenly reclined, moving her neck away from under the wire just long enough for her to maneuver out from beneath it, leaving herself in the perfect position to kick the stewardess in the head.

As the stewardess was pushed away by the blow, Urania rolled off her seat straight into a fighting stance, and saw the stewardess once again coming toward her.

Urania’s foot once more lashed out at her attacker, but the stewardess, apart from being pushed slightly back, just shrugged it off and continued to advance.

Urania looked at her opponent and groaned, while dodging one of her blows. With that strength and resilience, she had to be a meta. She’d battled ninja stewardesses and vampire stewardesses before; she should be able to handle a meta.

As the stewardess kept swinging at her, Urania backed up, noticing that the other passengers were watching, too stunned to panic.

“That’s right, folks,” she said, looking around for a weapon. “Stay calm, just spy stuff. Be over with soon.”

And with that, she ran at the stewardess, and somersaulted over her. Before her opponent could turn around, Urania got her arm around her neck, and grabbed hold of her hair. “Now it’s my turn,” she said, pulling the hair, only to find the hair and the face coming off in her hand. “It’s a mask!” she gasped, stating the obvious, as the stewardess’s head revolved 180 degrees to look at her. “Long time, no see,” said a shocked Urania, looking at the familiar face of Barbie.

Barbie didn’t reply, just thrusting her head toward Urania to headbutt her off.

The next thing Urania knew she lyng on the floor and Barbie, walking backwards, was approaching her.

“So, you’re not a meta,” reasoned Urania crawling backwards, “just a big toy. Don’t tell me Cadmus have Schott working for them, Or is it just Ivo or Morrow stealing his ideas?”

The lifesize toy kept advancing on her, silent but no doubt deadly, and one of her arms span around on its axis and a fist came flying toward Urania.

“They could have made your reflexes better,” criticized Urania, rolling away from the punch, and grabbing her opponent’s arm, swinging her over. Then, as her opponent lay on the floor, face up but body down, Urania, still holding the arm, dragged her into a toilet cubicle. By this time her opponent had managed to right herself somewhat, and started to pull back, but by then Urania was in the room and kicked the toilet door shut, connecting with Barbie’s shoulder, causing a dent in it. As the door bounced back, Urania kicked it shut again and again. Barbie managed to pull away, back into the plane’s aisle, but rotating her head around so that it was in line with the rest of her body, she noticed something missing.

“That’s right,” said Urania, emerging through the door, brandishing Barbie’s limb, “I’ve got a weapon now and you’re armless.” And then, swinging the arm, she smashed it against Barbie’s face again and again, as the stewardess tried to back away, until finally she stopped moving and with one last swing of the arm, her head flew off.

Urania just stood there exhausted, still holding the arm. “That’s it, folks. Show’s over,” she said, and then looking at the passengers, locked on her every word, she decided to continue, “ That’s the problem with being a spy: whenever you beat a bad guy he’ll eventually send someone after you. That’s why I always try and kill the henchman as well. Anyway, looks like Cadmus sent this crazed fembot after me, but it looks like they underestimated me yet again.”

At which point, the other passengers all grabbed at their faces, ripping them off to show their plastic faces beneath.

“Kens? Barbies? Possible offsprings of Ken and Barbie? There has to be some sort of copyright infringement here,” she said, slowly backing away. “Okay, maybe they didn’t underestimate me,” she considered, as she came across Barbie’s severed head and back kicked it into the toilet, and followed closely thereafter, locking the door behind her.

Trying to ignore the sound of Kens and Barbies smashing against the door, she turned her attention to the robotic head, carefully peeling back the synthetic plastic skin to reveal its inner working. Seconds later, she was taking her iPod from her belt, and flicking through its menu, putting it into spyPod mode, activating the special software she’d got installed on it. Once that was activated she waved the iPod over the robotic head, scanning in its details. At that moment the door broke open and Urania turned to see the army of outsize dolls standing before her.

While Urania might have found seeing the mass of action figures with their large smiling plastic faces kind of surreal, the dolls themselves had no such emotion as they stared into the face of the girl standing there; a girl with the face of Barbie.

While the dolls, as one, tipped their heads to the side in confusion, looking at her with her borrowed face, Urania decided that even their intelligence would see through her ruse shortly, so she looked again at her iPod and smiled. The details of the robot stewardess would have already been forwarded to spyQ, the league of extraordinary boffins who, working in a distorted time field, could usually provide solutions before they’d been given the question, and the iPod screen confirmed this, saying they’d come up with a way to disable any other such robots.

Without further ado, Urania pushed a button on the device and suddenly all the Barbies standing before her fell to the ground, as a signal was sent to them on a specific frequency, deactivating them. Fortunately for her, the robot children were also on the same frequency, however the same didn’t seem to be true of the Kens.

“Guess you must use a different frequency,” figured Urania. “Well, that sucks.” And with that, she flung her iPod against the ceiling, where it lodged itself, and, as the Kens rushed towards her, she was winched up over their heads by the earphone cable.

Swinging over them, she landed on the ground, the iPod then zooming back into her hand. Discarding her Barbie mask, she rushed next to the emergency exit, and struggled to try and open it. “Hey, looks like you can’t open it at this altitude. Must be the pressure in here. Can any of you guys help?” she asks, although the Kens are already trampling over the fallen Barbies to get to her.

“Terrific! A battering ram!” she said, as they rushed towards her, and she waited until the last minute to dive out of the way. As the mass of Kens smashed a hole in the side of the airplane, she reached out for a chair, and almost managed to reach one before being sucked through the emergency exit.

Terrific, she’d beaten the Mattel Men, and now she was going to plunge to her doom. She saw the formation of Kens plummeting beneath her, but she threw her iPod at the wing of the plane and it magnetically attached, leaving her hanging below by the cable. Struggling to hold on in the cold, she was winched up by the cable, and climbed onto the wing. Just as she thought things couldn’t get any worse, there was a clap of thunder and she was suddenly caught in a storm.

“Talk about a nightmare at 20.000 feet,” she said, just as there was a flash of lightning and she stared in through the window to see a Ken still sitting there, watching her. He moved toward the window, his fist smashing through it, and then having punched a further exit around the window so he could fit through, he strided out onto the wing.

“Real clever, Dollboy... coming out here. You should have just left me to die. As it is, the cold will freeze your mechanical parts, I doubt if your gyroscopes can keep you balanced in this wind, and being made of metal you’re bound to get...”

At which point a bolt of lightning struck Ken, sending him falling off the wing.

“Hate to say... I told you so,” said Urania, who then carefully detached her iPod from the wing, and flung it into the opening in the side of the plane, where it attached to the ground, and then, still holding onto the cable, she crawled back into the plane.

Short of breath, she reached for an oxygen mask, and just then she heard the pilot’s voice: “This is your captain speaking. We hope you’re enjoying this flight to Egypt and we apologize for any turbulence you might be experiencing. We will soon be passing over Gotham, at which point, I will kill you. In the meantime, please enjoy your in-flight movie, Toy Story.”

Urania sighed, realizing she recognized the voice. “Okay, G.I. Joe, this means war.”



Sapphire watched the screen avidly as nothing much happened on it, when her phone suddenly started to ring. She saw that it was a phone call from the mansion and was almost afraid to pick it up for fear that it was someone telling her that some terrible fate had befallen Rex.

Finally curiosity and good manners won out over her fear, and she answered the phone. Instantly recognizing the voice on the other side of the line, she yelled “Rex,” just as on the screen she saw Element and Metamorpho suddenly appearing half an hour earlier.

“Yeah, I’m fine, Rex honey,” she said, not wanting to reveal how she over-reacted. “What? Worried? Me? No, I’ve had a great time at my bridal shower. What’s that? Why did I phone Java?” she said, as she saw Rex on screen picking up Java’s phone. “Oh, I just wanted to ask him something. Anyway, who did you phone on his phone?”

She listened for his answer but he just came back with a question.

“How did I know you phoned somebody on his phone? Just a lucky guess. Call it women’s intuition... You’ve a favor to ask? Yeah, whatever you want, honey. What it is?... Okay, it’ll wait ‘til I get home? See you there then. Love you lots, hon’, but now I’ve got to get around to checking out my gifts from the shower. Bye.”

Sapphire hung up the phone, and wondered how she could have been so stupid and insecure, thinking that their wedding day could be in jeopardy again. She quickly phoned Snapper to begrudgingly apologize for the way she’d spoken to him earlier, and to beg him not to mention anything about it to Rex. That being done, she started to look over her haul of presents, and was disappointed that all of her rich friends apparently stayed rich by not buying extravagant gifts; Kate didn’t even include the batteries with hers. Then again, after the presents she was used to from her father, any gifts would pale by comparison. As she looked at the bottle of champagne she’s been given which she’d been considering downing in one earlier in the evening when she’d thought Rex had been kidnapped, she suddenly heard a clap of thunder and then something large bouncing off the car.

“What’s happening?” she asked the driver.

“It’s... raining,” said the driver.

“Raining?” said Sapphire and wound her window down to see figures falling from the sky, their heads smashing into the ground. Just when she thought the night couldn’t get any weirder, she looked over and recognizes the broken faces, all the same, staring back at her.

“It’s raining Ken.”



Meanwhile, up in the sky, the plane was coming up to Gotham. The plane’s captain, having now taken off his captain’s uniform and face, looked down at the instrument panel and took the plane off automatic pilot. He then turned to his co-pilot and pulls the dog tag away from his own throat, a string coming out after it.

“Find her,” came the voi€ce from his torso, as the piece of string receded back into his throat.

His co-pilot, who looked just like him, but sadly wasn’t the talking version, just nodded, and then cautiously left the flight cabin, walking carefully into the passenger section, only to find Buzz Lightyear being projected onto him.

He looked over at the side of the plane and saw that the torn movie screen, wrapped around various inert Barbies, had been used to plug the gaps in the side of the plane. Looking around further, surrounded by another wall of Barbies, he saw a hole in the floor, and then Urania Blackwell emerged from it.

“You know where I’ve just been?” she asked.

The co-pilot just stood there, staring at her.

“Don’t any of you guys talk? I’m sick of hearing the sound of my own voice.”

Then the co-pilot reached out to grab her, but she just stepped back, disappearing once again into the hole in the floor.

“Well, if you really want to know, I’ve just been to the luggage compartment,” came the voice from the hole.

The co-pilot ignored the voice. His only mission was to find her, and so he lowered himself down into the hole, and his infra-red eyes spotted Urania standing there.

“Anyway,” she continued, diving out of his way as he lunged at her, “I thought I could pick up my luggage here, that contains all the cool, concealed weapons of mass destruction us spy-types get to carry about.” She dodged again, running to the other side of the empty cargo hold. “Now, I’m a reasonable girl, and I don’t mind you trying to kill me, or even looking like giant dolls - although, if you don’t mind some feedback, I think teddy bears might have been a bit cooler and more surreal - and will you stop attacking me so I can just finish what I’m saying,” she said, dodging once again. “Anyway, I don’t mind all that, but losing my luggage, which contains some of my favorite designer outfits and lethal weapons, well, that just makes me angry.”

And with that she charged at him as quickly as she could, and, at the last second leapt into the air, grabbing onto the side of the hole, and started to haul herself out. Suddenly, she felt his hands, gripping the bottom of her legs, but she ignored it and just pulled herself up, letting the skin come off the bottom of her legs.

Looking down into the darkness, she could make out G.I. Joe looking up, holding a pair of legs. “Don’t worry about me, Joe. I peeled those off one of the Barbies. Anyway, now I guess you’ve fallen into my trap, so I’ll be on my way. Hope you enjoy the barbeque.”

The G.I. Joe reached up to haul himself out, only the find the wall of Barbies he saw earlier around the hole now falling down on him.

“Oops, meant Barbie-queue,” mumbled Urania, but her amusement at the awfulness of her joke suddenly disappeared as she heard Woody’s words in the movie and suddenly realized that the plane was no longer flying but falling with style.

She rushed to the front of the plane, and pushed open the flight cabin door, only to have a big plastic fist hit her in the face. Falling onto the ground, she blacked out for a second and then awoke to pain as she felt her hair being almost pulled out as G.I. Joe dragged her along the floor to the flight cabin.

As she struggled to get to her feet, G.I. Joe let go of her hair, picked her up in his strong arms and dropped her into the pilot’s seat, where she saw the clouds part as the plane nosedived towards Gotham City. And then she saw it more closely, as Joe grabbed the back of her head and smashed her face against the window in front of her.

“I suppo-” she started, as he smashed her face against the window once again. As she looked at the window, saw the blood trickling down it, she wants to yell for KAT, but instead she wiped her brow with her hand, and brought it back, covered in blood.

“Any last requests?” asked Joe, pulling his dog tag, and as his dog tag returned to his neck, her hand was over his left eye, smearing blood over it. As he grabbed at her, she pushed the throttle and the plane went into a steeper dive, causing Joe to fall forwards onto the control panel.

She leapt onto him, smearing her blood over his other eye, as his gripping hands reach for her neck, but, before they did, she kicked his head against the window, and kicked it, and kicked it, and kicked it.

“Any... last words?” gasped Urania, now wiping the blood out of her own eyes, as she grabbed Joe’s dog tag and pulled it and pulled it and pulled it, Joe giving out a scream until the string finally snapped.

“Haven’t got time... to play with toys,” said Urania, as she saw the ground looming and gave one last kick, smashing Joe’s head off. Quickly she pulled back on the throttle as Gotham got closer and closer and at the last minute the plane pulled out of its dive, as Urania soared back up into the air, momentarily blinded as she flew through a light in the sky, a bat symbol in the middle of it. As much as she admired Batman, identified with him even - a human hero in a world of metas, and all those wonderful toys - she sometimes thought he went overboard with the product placement.

As the plane went back up through the clouds, she looked around the cockpit, cursing that she hadn’t got a mirror to check that her looks were still intact, then, having leveled the plane out, she switched to automatic pilot, lay back and decided that now would be a good time to pass out.



Sapphire Stagg’s limousine, having now made its way past the outsize action figures that had been raining from the sky, was finally back at the mansion.

With a sigh of relief, and eager to see Rex, Sapphire leaped out of the car, leaving her bridal shower plunder behind on the backseat, figuring that Java could bring it in later. As she ran along, she saw the remains of what was once a giant wedding cake, and there, lying unconscious in the remains, was her father’s manservant.

“Java,” she yelled, and ran across to him, getting the bottom of her dress covered in cake, “are you okay?”

Java’s eyes remained closed and so she shook him, and suddenly his eyes opened, and saw the person he was just dreaming about standing in front of him. Dazed and confused, his vision still blurry, he remembered the girl who looked like Sapphire fighting him earlier and his hands grabbed her around her neck.

“Bad Java!” gasped Sapphire, trying to pull his hands away, and as he regained his senses and realized this was the real Sapphire, he also pulled his hands away, horrified that he had might have destroyed the person that gave his universe meaning.

“I’m sorry,” said a shaken Java, moving away from her, looking down accusingly at the hands that had seconds ago been strangling his beloved. “I thought-”

“It’s... it’s okay,” interrupted Sapphire, “I... I saw what happened earlier on the security footage. Let’s just forget about this, okay? It’s been a long night.”

Java looked up into her eyes stunned. “You... you forgive me?” he asked, amazed at how she could forgive him, when he couldn’t even forgive himself for what he’d just done.

“Sure I do,” she said, looking at his cake-covered face, remembering how he’d been constantly there, by her side, last year after Rex had been kidnapped by Cadmus. She smiled at him. “Besides I could use some help.”

As her smile filled him with happiness, he nodded. “Whatever you want. Do you want me to wake up the dry cleaners to have that cake removed from your dress? Maybe I could clean your limousine?”

“That’s sweet, Java,” she said, with a smile that could light up a thousand caves, “but I need your strength and stamina.”

Java nodded, unconsciously flexing his muscles beneath his restraining modern day clothes. “Anything.”

Her smile grew wider - so wide that there was no way he’d be able to resist her request. “Can you take care of my booty?”

A big grin crossed Java’s face as his mind flashed back to the dream he’d just been having. “Pardon?” he said, just to check that he still wasn’t dreaming.

“All the presents I got from my bridal shower,” explained Sapphire. “They’re over there in my limo, so could you bring them in.”

“Yes, Sapphire,” said Java, his grin subsiding, as realization dawned and he started to traipse off toward the limousine to pick up the gifts, leaving cake footmarks in his wake.

“Great,” said Sapphire, who rushed in to see Rex, knowing that her day could only get better now.



Urania Blackwell was woken up by bright sunlight falling on her face. Slowly she opened her eyes, looked down from the pilot’s seat she was sat at to G.I. Joe’s headless body lying on the floor, and remembered where she was and what she was doing. Her head still throbbing from its earlier pounding against the window, she checked the instruments, looked down at the coast below, and then left the cockpit to see if she could find some first aid equipment.

After a quick check that the other G.I. Joe was still buried under the Barbie mountain, she went and located a box of medical equipment, and then, back in the toilet cubicle she was in earlier, she checked the damage to her head in front of the mirror. Phew, she still had her looks.

She cleaned her wounds, and then, staggering slightly, made her way back to the cockpit.

“Still got a mission to complete,” she said, to no one in particular, although she hoped that KAT was listening. “So, the plan was to stay in Egypt and then, under cover of darkness, to use all my gadgets to sneak into that guarded pyramid. Still, I’ve lost my luggage, my money, my gadgets, and I probably won’t be able to talk my way in, so I guess it’s time to improvise.”

And with that, Urania started checking the maps, and then flicked off the autopilot. “Besides no point in landing at the airport; too many questions to answer,” she said, turning the plane so that it was heading to the correct longitude and latitude.

“Guess this could take some time,” she realized, as she saw sand and more sand beneath her. As boredom set in, she wished she still had her iPod, as she started singing, “A thousand bottles of beer on the wall, a thousand bottles of beer...”

Twenty verses later, Urania was now both bored and thirsty, when suddenly she realized her target was near. Starting to descend, she could see the soldiers, like ants, in the distance, guarding the pyramid, and, since the plane made stealth a tad tricky, she decided on a more direct approach, as she pointed the plane towards the pyramid, and the guards.

As she got closer, she could see the little guards running around in their panic, shooting at her, but that didn’t worry her; well, not compared to the fact that she’d never landed a plane before. Still, there was a first time for everything. She lowered the wheels, and slowed down the engines, keeping the aircraft parallel with the ground.

Through the sandstorm the plane was creating, she saw the soldiers scurrying away, and then she felt a bump as the plane hit the ground, and then the sand was slowing it down, engulfing it, and then everything was silent.

No time to waste. She rushed into the cabin, and opened an emergency exit, climbing out onto a mountain of sand. Looking over from the plane, a pyramid loomed over her. She jumped to the ground and started sneaking over toward it, hoping that this was the side with the secret entrance.

Suddenly she saw some soldiers coming around the corner, and one spotted her. As they raised their rifles, she ran, and then some sand blew in front of them, obscuring their vision, and by the time it cleared away again, she was gone.

Inside the pyramid, Urania stopped to grab a breath and saw a glow coming from a nearby room. It must have been her lucky day.

Outside the pyramid, the soldiers who’d spotted her a moment ago didn’t even attempt to chase after her. They knew of the pyramid and its curse; they’d seen what it could do. All they could do now was wait... wait for the men from Cadmus to come and collect what would be left of her corpse.



Element had been sitting there, across from Rex Mason, building up his strength for the quest to come. Occasionally he’d look up from the food that had kindly been provided, to the white-faced hero opposite him, and wondered if he was doing the right thing, tearing this man away from his wedding, about to drag him halfway around the world, and all to try and restore his friend. Was he was being selfish? Then again, he would also be restoring Rex Mason, and surely there was nothing more Rex or his bride-to-be could want.

It was during these thoughts that, as if on cue, Sapphire Stagg came through the door, carrying a bottle of champagne.

“Rex, so glad to see you,” she said, rushing over to him.

“Hi, honey,” he said, and his gaseous hand floated over in the direction of Element, “allow me to introduce...”

“Yu,” she interrupted, “the hero known as Element. He was with the Teen Titans for just over a year.”

Yu smiled, pleased at how widespread his fame was. “Hello, Miss Stagg.”

“Hello, Yu,” Sapphire said, smiling back. “Has Rex asked you to the wedding?”

“Well, actually, Saph,” began Metamorpho hesitantly, “you remember that favor I mentioned... well, it looks like we’ll have to delay the wedding.”

Sapphire looked at Rex, then over at Yu, her smile still fixed firmly in place. “That’s... interesting. Rex, maybe we should talk. In private!” she said, as her finger pointed to the adjoining room.

And with that, Sapphire marched off into the next room, Rex hovering behind her, and then the door slammed shut behind them.



Sapphire, now alone with Rex, lost the composure she’d managed to retain previously in front of their visitor.

“Please tell me you’re kidding,” she pleaded. “I’m used to Cadmus stealing you away from marrying me, but if you were to go AWOL voluntarily...”

“It’s Yu,” began Rex.

“What have I done?” she asked desperately. “Tell me. I can change.”

“No, it’s not you,” he explained. “It’s Yu, that kid in there. It’s me he can change.”

“But I like you the way you are,” Sapphire said.

“No, you don’t understand,” Rex said, hugging Sapphire. “He can restore me. Make me human again. I’ve just got to take him back to that pyramid where we got the Orb of Ra.”

“But that pyramid almost killed you,” she protested.

“I’ll be okay, Sapphire,” he said. “I’ll be careful.”

“Famous last words,” she replied, clinging onto him, realizing that he was slowly becoming less and less solid.

“I’m doing this for both of us.”

“You know you don’t need to do it for me,” she said, tears welling in her eyes; showing her weakness - her father Simon wouldn’t approve. “I’ll love you no matter what you are.”

“I know,” he said, finally becoming fully immaterial and drifting out of her arms.

“Then you better go,” she whispered, and then looked around the room. “Good job you’re in a gaseous state.”

“Why’s that?” Metamorpho asked, just before the first plate got thrown through him. “Saph, are you okay?”

“Sure, I’m okay,” she said, flinging another plate toward him, and waiting till it smashed on the wall before continuing, “Just got a reputation to maintain. Besides, if that kid’s going to be looking after you, I want him to be feeling sorry for you, rather than looking down on you because you walked out on me.” She flung a few more plates. “Believe it or not, this is a PR exercise.”

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Rex asked again, as a plate passed through his head.

“Yeah, I’ll be hunky dory. Now just get out of here now, let me get used to being alone again... please.”

As Metamorpho floated away under the door, Sapphire walked over and locked it, then leaned back against it and slumped to the floor.

“Poor me, never the bride,” she said, as she reached over and grabbed the champagne, remembering how she used to be in the past. Once upon a time, she’d have put her foot down, told him that he couldn’t go, put her feelings before his, but somewhere along the line Rex had made her a better person. Sure, she loved him for it, but at times like this she also hated him for it, or so she kept telling herself.

Though being honest, it wasn’t as Rex he’d made her a better person. When she’d first met him, he was a fame-hungry soldier of fortune, almost as self-obsessed as she was; it wasn’t until he’d become Metamorpho that he’d really needed her, shown her his vulnerable side, told her his feelings. That pyramid had changed both their lives, built the bond between them, but now it looked like she’d lose her Element Man.

Still, she was a Stagg. She should forget the past and concentrate on the future, she told herself, and with that she opened the champagne bottle and wondered whether she could obliterate all memory of tonight... at least until she looked at the security tapes tomorrow and found herself having to remember it all again.

She looked at the security camera and raised a bottle to her future self. “Cheers,” she said and then drank like she hadn’t drunk in a long time.



Urania Blackwell walked through the labyrinthine corridors of the pyramid, when all of a sudden she heard the familiar purr of an engine coming from ahead.

“KAT,” she yelled, as her walk quickened to a run, and she headed towards the sound of the engine. Finally, she came across the silver Jaguar parked next to a glowing meteor.

“So, you finally got here,” KAT said. “Actually you’re kind of early.”

“Flight took a bit of a detour,” Urania explained, smiling at her companion. “Wasn’t expecting to see you here.”

“Well, I figured you might need some help.”

“Thanks,” Urania said, “but I’d have found my way through those corridors eventually.”

“Well, it isn’t just a matter of getting a piece of the meteor,” explained KAT.

“What? Is it booby-trapped?”

“No, Anton just didn’t tell you your full mission. You remember those twisted bodies you saw?”

“Transformed by this meteor,” she replied, her smile turning to a frown. “Yeah, I couldn’t forget those.”

“Well, the problem with those bodies were they weren’t a good genetic match, plus they stayed awake throughout the process, and even if they’d have survived there’s the psychology to consider. If you looked like that Metamorpho guy, you might decide that living was over-rated.”

“Where exactly are we going here?” asked Urania, slowly backing away.

“You’re the latest attempt,” explained KAT, her engine purring once more. “Anton thinks you’re ready.”

“You seriously expect me to risk my life?”

“Sorry, Urania. This is just what I was built to do,” said KAT, and then the car started accelerating straight toward Urania, who managed to dive to the side.

“Knew I should have read the owner’s manual,” mumbled Urania, as she rolled on the floor, and saw the car swerving back towards her.

“I don’t enjoy hurting you,” KAT reassured Urania as her hood smashed into her mistress’s waist, sending her flying through the air like a broken rag doll.

Suddenly everything turned into slow motion for Urania as she fell onto the sandy ground, and saw KAT’s headlights staring down at her. She knows that she had to stay awake, she knows what the meteor could do, but as she failed to push herself up, she slowly felt her consciousness ebbing away.

Urania Blackwell was never a religious person, but, with her last thoughts, she wondered if there was anything waiting for her after this life finished. She really hoped there was; she wanted to ask for a refund.

To Be Continued!


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