Adventures of Superguy

August 19, 2010 - The Tower of Fate

Falling Rapidly Into Certain Doom

20:38:27

NOT HAVING FLIGHT IS BULLSHIT!

A searing wind rose up against Connor as he plunged headfirst toward a hellish glow far below him. The pit around them was a rough stone cylinder, plunging directly into a perfectly matched pool of bubbling lava at the bottom. He tumbled through the air, briefly facing upwards and saw the rest of the team, all screaming as they fell. 

Am I screaming?

Yeah, probably screaming.

Once more, everything seemed to slow down and he felt a brief surge of hope and relief. He considered how to use a burst of super speed to save himself, then realized there was very little he could do with it while in freefall. But it did give him time to see Apollo also turn to face the top of the pit, drawing his hand crossbow from god knew where, and firing a grapnel line that sank into the wall in slow motion. Like an early action movie star, he swung as the grapnel line snapped taut and angled towards Kaldura, who had her limbs outstretched like a skydiver. Apollo caught her around the waist and they swung towards the wall of the pit about halfway down.

Connor watched as M’gann seemed to come to a sudden realization, and then she simply swooped away in mid air to catch Walli in a princess carry, though once she did, she dropped precipitously in altitude, three quarters of the way down. Relief flooded him as he saw his friends save themselves.

Wait, whose gonna save me?

Time seemed to speed back up as he considered his predicament and a wave of radiant heat grew hotter and hotter across his back. At that moment, he realized he was the one furthest down and the others would never reach him in time.

Oh shit, I gotta save me!

WIth desperate energy he spun himself around to face the pool again, and saw the pit did narrow a bit towards the bottom. Taking inspiration from Kaldura’s skydiving impression, he tucked himself into a tight diving form, arms at his side and flailed himself toward the wall of the pit while the lava pool bubbled ominously, enormous in his field of view. The crazed maneuver worked, though he wasn’t sure if it was because he was properly angled or simply because his super strength let him buck impossibly in mid air. 

He came screaming in at an angle towards the wall, just above the bubbling lava. With a cacophonous crash, he smashed face first into the wall and wildly scrambled with all four limbs to grab purchase on the rough stone wall while gravity pulled him towards a fiery end. But no convenient handholds appeared as he continued to fall, so with a feral energy he clawed his fingers right into the rock face, digging clawmarks down the side as stone instantly turned to powder. Finally he was slowing but the heat of the lava was incandescent against his back, like standing next to an open oven. He got his feet under him as he desperately scraped and kicked to bleed momentum.

The moment seemed to stretch forever as he dug his fingers in deeper, trying to brake his fall, but the stone kept disintegrating under his fingers and feet. He slowed more and more, and for a desperate moment he thought he was safe.

Then his feet plunged into burning agony and this time, he knew he screamed.

Panic filled him as his descent finally came to a stop, and he desperately clawed himself up and yanked his feet out of the inferno. He could smell something burning and horror filled him. His feet felt hot, wet and runny. Connor imagined with dread that what was running off was his flesh, and he was desperately climbing with only blackened bones beneath the ankles. After a mad scramble, he sank his fingers into the wall enough to hold himself in place, and braced his feet against the wall. With an anxious glance, he surveyed the damage to his feet.

Huh. I guess I really am invulnerable. 

His feet were apparently unharmed by their tectonic footbath, as little rivulets of lava dripped off of them, splattering back into the pool. They were reddened and bare halfway up his shins, but not damaged. Connor blew a massive sigh of relief. Then he realized something.

“Ah, those were my favorite sneakers.” He bemoaned. “Dr. Fate owes me a new pair of sneaks!” He vowed, and started climbing higher to get away from painful lava. A startled shout from above snapped his gaze toward M’gann and Walli. M’gann was in some distress, trying to hold onto Walli but continuing to slowly descend towards the lava.

“Having trouble… maintaining altitude!” She shouted breathlessly, one hand wiping away prodigious sweat running down her verdant face. “I am so hot!”

“Yeah, you sure are…” Connor said softly, surprising himself.

“What!?” Apollo shouted from the wall where he and Kaldura dangled. Kaldura had one arm over his shoulder, he one around her waist, while his other arm held the hand crossbow they dangled from, their feet braced against the stone.

“Nothing!” Connor shouted, glad the glow of the lava covered his blush.

That just slipped out… this is not the time!

Kaldura was also panting, and he could hear a faint sizzle as beads of sweat dripped from the others and exploded into steam as they hit the lava.

“My physiology and M’gann’s are susceptible to extreme heat. We must climb out quickly!” She ordered.

As if her command was a magic spell, the yawning hole above them began to refill. The flagstone pieces of the floor that had dropped out from under them flew back up and reassembled in a flash. Then they changed, and the lines between stones disappeared, leaving a rough stone ceiling to the cavern they were now trapped in. Once more, the change came suddenly and then seemed as if it had always been that way, just like how the Tower had first appeared. 

“Oh, come ON!” Walli screamed in frustration as she shook her fist at the trap that had ensnared them so effectively. She and M’gann continued to descend slowly towards the lava, their speed increasing as M’gann sagged under the heat more and more.

Fear electrified Connor as he saw them approach the lava, and he scrambled to think of something to help in that moment. Apollo and Kaldura were safe, at least as long as the archer could hold them up and Kaldura could endure the heat before she dried out like a fish left on the beach at low tide. Connor looked at his blackened fingernails and the furrows he had carved into the stone, and thought about innumerable Golden Age Superman feats. 

He smiled as he smashed his fist into the rock wall, shattering the brittle stone of what he realized was supposedly a lava tube. Then he jammed his hand into the hole and began clawing handfuls and then massive chunks of black basalt out of the wall. He started one handed, but as he swiftly excavated a niche, he crawled up into it and began ripping bigger chunks out with both hands. Heedless, he threw them over his shoulder to splash into the lava. A few droplets splattered against his back but he ignored them but for a slight hiss of pain. After a moment, he had rapidly dug out a niche barely big enough for the others.

Ducking back out, he saw M’gann’s eyelids were fluttering and there was a look of panic on Walli’s face as they kept dipping lower every time her eyelids shut. M’gann was dripping, and her white shirt was beginning to turn see through. Walli was desperately fanning her at super speed, but all it seemed to do was blow her hair back. The radiant heat from the lava was simply too much to possibly cool M’gann.

Connor leaned out of the niche he had dug out and sank the fingers of his left hand into the wall above it, while he braced his feet against the bottom of it and leaned as far out as he could to reach towards the two with his right. 

“Grab on!” He shouted, and Walli looked at him with relief. 

M’gann, however, didn’t seem to have heard him at all. She was still levitating, barely, and sinking towards the lava. Walli noticed at the same time as Connor; M’gann wasn’t aware enough to fly them to Connor. 

So Walli held tightly onto M’gann, and kicked her legs like she was swimming at super speed with a resonant hum. Hot air blew around the chamber again, but this time it hit the opposite wall and propelled them ponderously towards safety. WIth a desperate reach, Walli’s fingers reached Connor’s and he swiftly reeled his friends in. He stuffed them into the niche, and realized there was only sort of room for the two of them, crammed together. Walli now cradled M’gann, who began to rally now that she was out of the direct radiant heat. Connor scampered like a monkey to use his body to cover the entrance of the niche and try to block some of the heat. Walli, too, was now sweating profusely, and Connor realized someone with normal human durability couldn’t stand next to lava like this for long.

“What do we do?” Connor shouted up to Apollo and Kaldura, but the other two only looked at each other uncertainly. Fear crawled back into his guts as he considered their peril; they were stuck and he was the only one who could survive in this lava tube pit trap for long. As soon as the image of the others falling into the lava, one by one as their strength gave out, he squashed it down and refused to consider it any more.

He turned back to Walli and M’gann, but Walli looked about desperately, at a loss. 

M’gann’s head snapped up and her eyes widened, and she gasped.

“Hello, Megan!” She said drunkenly, slapping her forehead. “We never truly answered… the question.”

Connor and Walli stared at each other in confusion, then back at M’gann in worry. She was panting and swayed as she saw their incomprehension, and shook her head dismissively. M’gann looked up and shouted, as if the projection could still hear her.

“Black Canary sent us… to see if Mr. Nelson and helmet… were still safe!”

With a grind of stone on stone, a platform sprang from the sides of the pit and closed over the lava, instantly dropping the temperature by tens of degrees. M’gann breathed a sigh of relief, sagging, and Connor caught her as she fell out of the niche. She breathed heavily, but easier now, and looked up at him with her amber eyes. Connor’s breath caught in his throat as her eyes slowly focused on him, and he coughed as he awkwardly got her feet under her and stood her upon the platform. She straightened her clothes as he desperately tried not to look down at her now quite sheer shirt and the tantalizing green skin beneath.

Walli fell out of the niche with a groan and got to her feet. At the same time, Apollo lowered himself and Kaldura down on the grapnel line, detaching it once they alighted to the floor. Connor frowned down at his bare feet, already healed from their lava bath, and the burnt ends of his jeans that turned them into capri pants. 

Kaldura smelt down to the floor, laying her webbed hands against the tiled surface, the black heads of the eel tattoos twining around her arms visible on the backs of her hands. She patted the floor a few times experimentally, then looked up at them in wonder.

“This floor should be red hot, but it is cool to the touch.”

“Probably an advanced heat exchanger built into the walls. Otherwise it wouldn’t be any good at making you safe after you get dropped into the death trap.” Walli declared as she dusted herself off. Connor put a hand on the wall, and only felt traces of warmth there where he expected it to be as hot as a skillet. He turned to Walli and shook his head.

“I don’t think so…” 

To which she scoffed.

“Well, it could be-” 

“ENOUGH!” Walli began before Apollo interrupted her, striding forward and shoving her back, his anger evident. “Your little Doubting Thomas game nearly got us all barbecued!”

“When did this become my fault!?” Walli shouted back, getting in Apollo’s face.

Apollo’s tone grew calmer and colder as she spelled it out for Walli.

“When you lied to whatever it was up there, and called us ‘true believers’... because we all are but you, aren’t.” He said, crossing his arms and staring at Walli accusingly. His hand crossbow was still in one hand, Connor noted.

Walli’s face screwed up, and she looked around at the rest of the team for support. She found none in Kaldura, who simply raised an eyebrow, and M’gann looked disappointed. Walli’s eyes landed on Connor and she seized on the opportunity.

“Connor, you don’t believe this abra cadabra crap, do you?” She asked pleadingly.

His jaw fell open as he struggled to answer and his gaze fell to the floor where he contemplated whether he needed a pedicurist to clean the lava out of his toenails. 

…Do I?

Magic had suddenly moved from the theoretical to the very real in the last few hours, but even on that point, Connor berated himself. Kaldura was very open about the mystical nature of her abilities; while her physical power was something shared by all Atlanteans and an aspect of their biology, her hydrokinesis and electrokinesis were the result of her studies at the Conservatory. They were… magical.

I understand that intellectually. And that Terra operates by the logic of the comics, where gods, monsters and magic are all real things. I mean, Diana let me see the Lasso of Truth the other day. 

Good thing I didn’t try to touch it.

Inadvertently admitting his deception seemed like a bad idea at this point.

But this little house visit to Dr. Fate was freaking him out, he had to admit. Magic seemed like just another superpower, and seemed ‘normal’ but the Tower of Fate’s weirdness was on a whole different scale from Kaldura’s magic. The way this place seemingly twisted and changed what was real was unsettling on a wholly different level. 

There’s no way to deny this stuff is really happening. What that means in the greater context… bears some thinking about. But later.

Connor lifted his head to meet Walli’s gaze, and he felt a stab of regret when she recognized he wasn’t landing on her side this time.

“Sorry, Walli. I don’t understand any of this magic stuff, but I can’t say its not real.”

Walli rolled her eyes and threw up her hands. 

“Fine! Fine. Yes, I lied when I told the hologram I believed in magic.” Walli admitted. 

“But magic is the real lie! A whole load of lies. The Quicks have faced plenty of villains who pretended their tech was magic or psychic powers or blessings of gods. Everything can be explained by science.” She insisted, crossing her arms defensively and turning away.

Now it was Apollo’s turn to scoff, but it was Kaldura who replied.

“Then let us test that theory.” She stated as her fingers found a hidden catch, and with a click, a trap door appeared in the floor.

“Don’t open that! The radiant heat will roast us alive!” Walli shouted, but too late as Kaldura hauled the portal open.

Revealing snow, and a blast of arctic wind that swirled fat white snowflakes into the lava tube, to the wonder of M’gann.

“It’s snow!” She said with delight, and tried to catch a fluttering flake on her tongue.

Apollo turned to Walli, smiling smugly.

“Do you ever get tired of being wrong?” He asked, and Walli made a face back at him.

One at a time, they dropped through the hole into the arctic air. As Connor exited, he crashed down into the snow with an oof and scrambled to his feet, brushing snow off as he did. He looked up, confused, at the doorway they had exited from. 

They had dropped through the trap door, but the doorway was vertical here, hanging in mid air. He could see Walli’s feet and legs as she dropped through last and caught her before she could fall into the snow. As soon as Walli exited, the doorway hanging in mid air vanished with a flash of golden light. He stared for a second, then gently put Walli down. She looked down and then up at him.

“Aren’t your feet cold?” She asked, and he looked down at his bare feet in the deep snow.

Huh, don’t feel anything. Not numbness or cold… just doesn’t bother me. Weird.

He shook his head, and walli hugged herself for warmth. The wind blew fiercely around them as they looked about. It was nighttime here, wherever that was. Stars glittered overhead between grey cloud cover, and ice capped mountains surrounded them. Drifts of snow blew all around them while more flakes fell from the sky. Connor stared about in wonder, curious if they were actually somewhere outside the Tower, or if the Tower somehow contained this massive place.

Or maybe its an illusion? It certainly feels real, and the others are feeling the cold. Except M’gann, actually.

The Martian girl didn’t appear bothered by the cold at all. 

Walli looked around in confusion, turning in place, seemingly at a loss. Apollo didn’t miss the opportunity.

“Well?” He asked, waving a hand demonstratively at the terrain.

Walli looked around with consternation before she snapped back a reply.

“Ever heard of string theory?” She asked testily. “We’re in a pocket dimension.”

“UGH!” Apollo grunted in frustration and threw up his hands.

“Hey,” Connor said as he spotted something out of the ordinary, pointing behind the team. “What’s that?”

They all turned and saw what he meant. There was a familiar gold topped walking cane, glowing slightly and hovering in mid air above the snow, a few feet away.

How did I only just see that? Connor mused.

Duh, magic.

Magic’s ability to fool his super senses was really getting on his nerves at this point.

“Oh great, it’s probably Nelson’s magic wand.” Walli said dismissively, striding toward the cane. Connor, remembering how her flippancy had gotten them dropped into the lava, rushed forward to grab it first. But just as he reached it, so did Walli, and their hands touched around the shaft, his above hers. The cane, of its own volition, raised up a few feet so they were holding it above their heads. Surprised by the motion, Connor tried letting go, and came to the same conclusion as Walli at the same second.

“Uh, I can’t let go.”

“Uh, I can’t let go.”

Then with a sudden jerk and shouts of surprise from the both of them, the cane dragged them into the frigid night air where there was a bright flash of golden light, and the two of them (and the cane) were suddenly somewhere else.

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