Generator

by Matt Nute

"Allahumma bald bayni wa bayena khatayaya kama..."

The prayer began from the rooftops, echoed in the streets of Jerusalem, providing a melodic counterpoint to the rising dawn. In the packed dirt streets and alleyways, reverent worshippers prostrated themselves on their prayer blankets, arms extended at shoulder height as they bowed slightly to the east, to the holy Mekkah.

"Aouzo billahi min al shaytai r ragim..."

Rich man and poor alike, from marble-posted balconies and refuse-strewn gutters, all began the morning prayer, joining in the recital of the age-old words. Man, woman, and child all supplicated themselves in devotion, praise, and tradition, both to beseech forgiveness and to re-enact the traditions of the first Prophet, Mohammad.

"Subhanak Allahumma Rabbana wa bi hamdika, Allahumma Ighfir liy."

As with one voice, the prayer reached its melodic crescendo, the ancient words ululating to the heavens, bringing the hopes of a people and culture closer, they hoped, to the ears of Allah.

"A'meen."

Each Muslim raised his or her eyes to the east, to the rising sun that was the glory of Allah, shining over his chosen city. From the Wailing Wall to Solomon's Collonade, the morning was peaceful and filled with awe and glory.

The basso explosion of brick and dust from the center of the city sent dozens of Muslims to their knees, ears bleeding from the concussion. Eyes and ears diverted from the morning ablutions to the unholy din. In a span of microseconds, the wave of superpressurized air sped from ground zero of the explosion, crushing stone, vaporizing flesh, and pulping bone in its passage.

Almost before the last note of morning prayer had faded in the air, the cascade of atomized debris and detritus had climbed above the clouds, billowing out in an almost graceful mushroom shape, raining fine radioactive ash over the remains of the Holy City.

Thousands of miles away, in the United Nations Security Council's "war room", Jackson King watched via satellite imagery as Jerusalem became a crater.

"Mister Secretary, how long ago did the Phoenix of Zion group post their demands over the internet?" his deep voice was nothing but a whisper.

"Fifteen minutes." was the only response from the Secretary-General. Jackson silently clenched his fists. Coffee cups, pencils, computer keyboards, and loose change all rattled ominously, the sign of his telekinesis barely restraining its fury.

"And we did nothing to evacuate the people of this city?" he growled. Silence was his only response.

"Jackson, we were in the middle of authenticating the threat," the CIA's Deputy Director (Intelligence) blurted. "For God's sake, there've been at least three separate groups claiming the name of the Phoenix of Zion and claiming responsibility for numerous anti-Muslim acts of terrorism in the last year." His Michigan accent cracked as he wiped his brow, refusing to look at the wall of video screens portraying the devastation.

"Christ, Jackson." he breathed. "They said one hour. We thought we had time."

Jackson King turned away from the pictures of the annihilated city. Coldly, he met the Director's eyes.

"We didn't."

With that, he walked calmly out of the war room. Making his way down the sterile grey corridors, he nodded nonchalantly and solemnly to dignitaries he passed, many only seconds away from hearing the awful news for themselves. Pivoting on his heel, he ducked into the first restroom he saw.

A few minutes later, after voiding the contents of his stomach into the nearest toilet, Jackson King, formerly Battalion of the UN special response team codenamed "Stormwatch", reached into his suit jacket for a cellular phone. He lifted it to his ear, pressing a speed-dial code.

"Christine." he sighed, voice cracking, "get me the Authority. This madness has to stop."

**********

"Right, listen up, children." Jenny Sparks punctuated each word with a jab of her constantly-lit cigarette. "Three hours ago, some nutcases turned Jerusalem into a steaming hole in the desert. Jackson and Christine have sent us all the intel they have on the 'Phoenix of Zion' movement, whatever the sodding hell THAT is." Jenny dropped an inch-thick dossier on the glass table in the center of the Carrier's "meeting room".

"Brilliant." droned the Midnighter. "We go down, crack heads, set the world right." He flexed his hands under black leather gloves.

"Back in time for coffee." replied Jack Hawksmoor, leaning against a bulkhead. His bare feet fidgeted on the semi-translucent floor, betraying his hesitation hidden behind false bravado. Jenny, however, stopped his swagger with a steely glare.

"The problem, BOYS, is that these Zionists aren't the problem." With a toss of her hand, she spread surveillance photos, news reports, and military documents across the table.

"Millennium fever, standard increase in terrorism?" Jenny asked rhetorically. "No. Look at the patterns here." She stabbed at the pile of paper with the unlit end of her smoldering cigarette.

A silvered hand swept over a slew of photographs. Behind chromed eyelids, Angela Spica's eyes darted, analyzing information. "Patterns, Jenny?" asked the Engineer quietly. "No offense, but this is still just wild terrorism. They're acting with abandon, like the turn-of-the-century rioters in London. Besides," she continued, "the Jews and the Muslims have been at this for hundreds of years."

"And there's the point." came the nasal reply from the far wall. Hands clasped behind his back, the Doctor peered out the full-wall window onto a pulsating blue landscape. His red hair flashed purple with the rhythmic beats of the mountains the Carrier passed, tacking through realities. He turned, his facial expression mysterious. His eyebrows raised over the crimson eye-lenses he wore.

"As the planet's Shaman, there's a lot of weird shit I'm in tune with," he drawled in his soft Dutch accent. "What does humanity have to separate it from animals, from barbarism? Culture. Progress. The ability to comprehend the abstract, to seek the infinite."

"You're babbling." accused Jenny, traces of a smirk edging her mouth. "Out with it."

The Doctor thumped a finger against the table. "Fine. You want answers, seek God."

The room was silent, until the Midnighter coughed.

"Well, that's just fine. If the Reverend here is done, I'll be in the Junction Room." Another glare from Jenny froze him in place as the Doctor continued.

"I'm serious. I can remember history first-hand. I'm the first Shaman, as well as the last. I can tell you about the Crusades. About the Inquisition. The pogroms in Poland and Eastern Europe." He ran a hand through his hair with a sigh. "Point to be this - if humanity's ability to believe in a God is what sets them apart from animals, how do you explain the atrocities committed in the name of religion over the years?"

The room was hushed. Finally, Apollo stood, his long white hair curling about his shoulders. "I'm not sure what the Doctor's getting at here," he intoned, "but if there's some mysterious source behind this, some weird attraction to this... evil," he seethed, "isn't it our responsibility to seek it out?"

"If not us, who?" the last reply came from Shen Li-Min, the winged woman called Swift. Her face mirrored the horror shown in the photographs. At a glance, the others could almost palpably feel her tension. They all knew of her upbringing in the prison camps of Tibet, watching her family, her countrymen killed by Chinese oppressors for no reason other than their nationality.

"Right." Jenny muttered, scraping her cigarette out against the table. "Junction Room in one hour, people."

The room emptied, leaving the Doctor alone, staring back out the window. Slowly, a smile crept over his face, and he let out a small chuckle.

"Game on."

**********

"You're being all quiet and brooding again."

"And you're being nosy and inquisitive."

"If I wasn't nosy and inquisitive, you'd complain about me being cold and distant."

"I would not. Don't be petty."

"But.. but..." Apollo sighed, falling a step behind the Midnighter, who continued stalking down the corridor of the Carrier, his black trenchcoat trailing like a cape behind him. Apollo blinked his sea-blue eyes, then shrugged and hurried to catch up.

"Something's bothering you, isn't it?" Apollo trotted ahead of his partner, walking backwards to look him in the eye. Midnighter, his face mostly concealed behind his cowl, simply set his mouth in a tight line.

"It's nothing we need to talk about."

Apollo extended a hand, stopping the shorter man in his tracks. "You said 'we'."

"I did."

"So it concerns you and I."

"... it does." The Midnighter glanced around, then sidestepped Apollo, continuing towards their chambers.

Apollo clenched his teeth. With little conscious thought, he rose into the air, accelerating past the man who had been by his side every day of the past five years. He sped ahead to the doorway of their suite, using his broad shoulders to block passage. The Midnighter walked nonchalantly towards him, stopping abruptly.

"You planning on moving?"

"Not until you tell me what's on your mind."

"What's on my mind? Right now, 270 pounds of artificially enhanced beefcake that's blocking my way to my room."

"Our room." Apollo corrected. "Is that what this is about?"

"Is what what this is about?"

"You. Me. Us." Apollo breathed, folding his arms across his broad chest. "About last month. About Albion, Norway. Me taking risks you weren't ready to accept."

"You're full of shit." Midnighter growled. "Now let me through."

"Or what?" Apollo replied, raising one white eyebrow. "You'll hit me?"

The Midnighter recoiled, as if his partner had unleashed his optic lasers on him. He blinked, then stared Apollo down.

"Don't say that." he hissed. "Don't EVER say that." He was trembling, even visible under the armor and coat..

"I... I didn't mean..." Apollo stepped forwards. The smaller man, garbed in black and grey armor, took a half-step backwards, but Apollo reached out, enveloping him with both arms.

"It's not you. It's... well, okay. It's you. And me. And us." the usually emotionless voice of the Midnighter cracked, a slight drawl creeping into his vowels. "I keep wondering how many times we're going to be split up on these missions, and when the time's going to come that I'll come back through the Door, and you won't be waiting."

Apollo grinned despite himself. "Don't be silly. I'll always be waiting."

His partner pulled back, looking up into his eyes. "Don't feed me that. I don't want to hear about your invulnerability, or your strength, or any of that bullshit. You and I both know you weren't in any shape to handle those shiftships, and you went anyway."

"I had to." the larger man whispered, a lock of white hair falling into his eyes. "No one else could."

"You could have DIED."

"What do you want to hear from me?" Apollo breathed. "You want to hear that I'll hang back from a fight, because I might get scratched up or worse? You want me to sit on my ass and let the next threat to the world waltz on by?" He shook his head. "I can't. All I can promise you is that I'll be there for you. I've always been there for you, I always WILL be there for you."

"But what if--?" Apollo silenced the Midnighter with a white-gloved hand over his mouth.

"Don't. Don't ask me what if's. You're the reason I bother waking up every morning. I'd walk through hell for you, and I know you'd pull me out, no matter what the risk. If that's not enough," Apollo sighed, "I don't know what I can tell you."

Both men were silent. Finally, the Midnighter leaned forward, embracing the taller man tightly enough to make Apollo's superhuman musculature ache.

"Tell me you'll be here."

"I'll be here."

The Midnighter pulled away slowly, then met his partner's eyes. "And you know, I'd never raise a hand to you. Ever."

"I know." replied Apollo. "I wouldn't hurt you, ever."

"As if you could."

"Don't tempt me."

"Shut up. You complain like a bitch."

With a chuckle, the two men entered the room, sealing the door behind them. Fifty minutes from now, they would walk through the teleportation doors in the Junction Room, to step once more into uncertain danger, risking their lives for the world.

Fifty minutes was not forever, but it would do.

**********

The Junction Room: twenty-five meters in diameter, with six large, shimmering portals lining the walls. As the Carrier moved through the higher dimensional realms, the Doors pointed at Earth.

Any place on Earth.

Every place on Earth.

Shen Li-Min stood in the center of the Junction Room, balancing on her left leg, bringing her right leg up, tucked until her right heel touched her left thigh. Leaning forward with the grace of a dancer, she extended her right leg fully over her head, tilting her upper body parallel to the floor. Her palms were pressed together in front of her, providing a focus for her breathing.

In a snap, she swung her leg down, spinning and cartwheeling through the air. She landed in a crouch, spinning and slapping both hands against her hips.

"Damn." she murmured. Fourteen months after leaving the life of Stormwatch Black behind her, and she STILL was too accustomed to carrying those damn guns.

She didn't need the guns now. She wasn't a soldier. She wasn't a superhero. Not anymore.

Now she was part of the Authority. She was an agent for change in the world. Not just to scrape at the surface, knocking away the symptoms of the world's problems. The Authority was bigger than that, dedicated to eliminating the cause of the problems, cutting off the sickness at the source.

Shen felt the rippling beneath her shoulder blades and smiled. She exhaled, rolling her arms forward. The familiar feel of her wings growing out of her skin always exhilarated her. She felt the hollow bones extend, wet feathers shaking fluid into the air as they unfurled. She flapped her wings a few times, letting her muscles become accustomed to the movements. Each time she grew the wings, her body compensated by shifting bone marrow around, allowing her to maintain an aerodynamic posture and weight.

She squinted, her eyes focusing on the shifting patterns of the nearest Door. Her eyesight was clearer than any living creature's, able to count the hairs on a mosquito's leg at one hundred meters. Her hearing was as acute. Even now, she heard the rhythmic sound of feet in the corridor to her left. One pair of bare feet, gliding nearly soundlessly over the deck, while the tap-taps of metal on metal syncopated neatly into rhythm.

Swift smiled to herself. Jack and Angie. With a beat of her wings, she flipped her legs over her head, feet clenching a beam on the ceiling. Another benefit of her cometary radiation-affected genetics was the ability to morph her hands and feet into avian talons, capable of ripping through most soft tissues with ease. Or, in this case, to provide a different position for her modified yoga exercises.

As if on cue, Jack Hawksmoor stepped into the Junction Room, closely followed by Angie, the Engineer. Nodding to Shen, they both slid onto one of the couches, stretching nervously.

"You saw where we're headed?" Angie queried Jack. He nodded, red eyes blinking. With a sigh, he cracked his knuckles and shrugged off his black sport coat.

"I saw. For once, I'm glad that the Carrier's technically not ON Earth. I've... I don't know what that would have done to me." He exhaled, perusing the backs of his hands, rolling up the sleeves of the collarless white dress shirt he wore. Angie and Shen said nothing, both knowing of Jack's uncanny mental and physical link with cities.

As a child, Jack had been abducted by extraterrestrials, and implanted with inhuman organs to allow him to survive only in the cities, and to thrive off them. He ingested pollution and breathed out clean air. He could see what the windows saw, feel what the concrete and asphalt felt, and could melt through the arteries of the city like blood through his own heart.

Both women could see the anguish on his face. Even though he had not felt the death of Jerusalem first-hand, they could see its effect on his psyche. He was connected to the cities in a way they couldn't even comprehend. To have one simply wiped out of existence...

Hawksmoor stood, steeling his jaw. "I'll go down there. I have to see it for myself, have to feel it."

"Jack, no." Angie said solemnly, "There's nothing down there to go TO. The city is gone, Jack."

"I have to go." his response wasn't so much a statement as a demand. Angie shook her head, metal braids swinging.

"Jack, you went into convulsions on Skywatch when they had you up there. The only reason you can survive on the Carrier is because it's bigger than most cities, most counties even." Which was true. The Carrier was longer than fifty miles, its towers stretching thirty-five miles high as it tacked across timespace.

Jack met Angie's gaze. "How did you feel when he died? The first Engineer?"

Angie gulped. She had met him once, the man who was the Engineer before she assumed the mantle. He had been a scientific genius, doing work in nanotechnology. He had developed the ability to grow anything, food, weapons, clothing, medicine; all from microscopic machine factories. He had found the answer to hunger, famine, and disease.

And the world's governments had rejected it. So he had used his technology on himself. He became the Engineer, part of a group dedicated to changing the world by force. And in a brutal military action by Stormwatch, he was murdered.

But not before transmitting everything he had ever known to Angela's home computer, every iota of knowledge and technical information. She had taken the technology he bestowed upon her, and transformed herself into the Engineer, replacing nine pints of her blood with liquid nanomachines, which could create anything she could conceive, as well as sheathing her in living metal armor.

Angie finally caught her breath. "I was shocked. He... he knew so much. And they killed him. But I guess part of me was... honored, really. He chose me to impart his knowledge to. He wanted me to carry on his work."

Jack nodded. "Just like they killed Jerusalem. And I want to know. To know what it knew. Someone has to know, to mourn for the city. The world mourns the lives lost." Jack closed his eyes and sighed. "But I know how the world has lost so much more."

Shen flipped down from the ceiling, walking over to put her head on Jack's shoulder. "I'm sorry, Jack. We didn't know."

"I understand." responded the Engineer. "But the first sign anyone sees of you crashing on us, and it's back through the door and into Rio or New York for you, got it?"

"Got it." Jack smiled. "Where's Jenny?"

"The cast-iron bitch has arrived." came the gravelly British accent, seemingly out of nowhere. As if emerging from a pond, Jennifer Sparks stepped through one of the Doors into the Junction Room.

"I've been talking to the UN people about the incident. They've already taken measures to curb radiation spread in the area. We can't tell what type of bomb the Zionists used, though. It's safe for us to check out." She cracked her knuckles, small jolts of electricity arcing between her fingers.

Nodding to the Midnighter and Apollo as they entered, Jenny lit a cigarette, placing it between her lips. "Where's the Doctor?" she growled. "I told him an hour, and if he's still in some trance, I'll have his bollocks pulled up past his--"

"I am here." the Doctor's sibilant voice echoed as he seemed to step out of the shadows. "I was... communing with the others." The others were silent. None of them were particularly at ease with the way that the Doctor could communicate with the spirits of the previous Doctors. He was the recipient of memories and shamanistic knowledge as old as humanity itself. All of which made him just a little... odd.

"Now children,." Jenny deadpanned. "everyone remember where we parked."

With that, the Authority walked through the door into a dead land.

**********

A cold wind blew across the desert. From a shimmering square of energy, seven figures emerged. The Door faded, leaving them standing alone on a silent sea of glass. The Engineer knelt, laying a palm against the ground.

"Look at this." she murmured. "The heat of the blast fused the sand completely." She stood, surveying the horizon. The metal ridges over her head shifted, blocking the sun from her eyes. "You can barely tell this was..."

The sound of sobbing distracted her. Angie turned with everyone else to see Jack crouched on his hands and knees, head pressed to the flat, featureless ground. Apollo was the first to his side.

"Jack?" he called, shaking the smaller man gently. "Are you all right?"

Jack Hawksmoor pulled away, tears flowing from his eyes. "No." his voice echoed off the ground below him. Red eyes stared into his own reflection, a mixture of rage, anguish, and loss twisting his face. "Never again." Shaking, he pulled himself to his feet.

"Jack, talk to me, mate." Jenny interrupted. "You going to be able to do this? Can you make it?" Hawksmoor wiped his eyes with the back of a hand.

"I can.. I can try." he coughed. "Oh God... Jenny..." he fell forward, throwing his arms around the slender woman's shoulders for support. "There's... nothing left. Nothing. It's so quiet..."

"Ah Jesus..." Jenny groaned. "Door!" Before them, the portal to the Junction Room opened. Jenny pulled Jack away, looking into his eyes.

"Jenny, I can do this, I can..."

"You're going back to the Carrier. I want you to run Mission Control for this." her voice was stern, but the undercurrent of concern drifted through. "I know you're hurting, but I'm asking you as your friend - don't put yourself through this."

Jack nodded, wiping his nose. Looking at his hand, he frowned at the traces of blood he saw. "Just as well." he moaned. "You keep me in touch. There's ruins, that way," he motioned with his hands. "But... they're nothing. It's all gone."

"We'll look. Now go put those magic guts of yours to use on the Carrier, Jack." Jenny ordered. Jack nodded, stepping backwards through the Door. As it closed, Jenny Sparks turned to the others. "Well, what're you sods waiting for?" she growled. "What's left of the city is that way, fan out and go. And for fuck's sake, keep in bloody contact."

As they moved out, Jenny flicked her cigarette over her shoulder, grinding it out with her heel against the glass.

**********

~Apollo to Jenny.~ The radiotelepathy call echoed in the back of Jenny's brain. Even mentally, Apollo's earnest voice conveyed an aura of calm.

~Speak to me, sunshine.~ she returned. ~Gimme good news.~

~Swift and I have found something.~ His "voice" was full of curiosity. Jenny looked to the side alley where the Engineer stood, nodding to her.

~Where?~ Angie asked, a luminescent display growing out of her forearm. Apollo described coordinates, as the Engineer pinpointed their position.

~Right.~ Jenny responded. ~Be there in one.~ With that, Sparks turned, placing her hands on what remained of a building wall.

"Come on..." she moaned. "There's got to be one usable line... just one..." Questing with her fingers, she sighed. She closed her eyes, letting the links between her body's electrons float free. In the blink of an eye, Jennifer Sparks changed from a creature of flesh and blood to a humanoid mass of crackling ions and light. She looked at the wall, not as a collection of stone and mortar, but in electric patterns. Finally, she found it - one continuous phone wire.

Jenny leaped. Traveling at incomprehensible speed through the wire, she could sense the burned insulation along its length, the odd tweaking that the electromagnetic pulse left. As she emerged, regaining human form beside Apollo, an idea came to her.

"Show me." was all she said. Swift pointed downward with her wings, indicating a crater burned in the street. The sides were blasted smooth, but at the bottom, unburned grass sprang, alive and green. Jenny slid down the side of the crater, examining it closely.

"It's photosynthesizing rapidly." Apollo murmured. Jenny paused, realizing that Apollo could see the reaction going on inside the plant.

"Mutant strain?" she asked. He shook his head.

"Nope." his expression was as puzzled as hers. "It looks like it's just taken root. Can't you feel it here?" he swept his arm around. "There's no radiation, not at all."

Jenny arched an eyebrow, and extended her awareness to the very air molecules around her. Their electron shells spun in their proper places, no ionization or disruption of ozone that was always present in a radioactive area.

"Bugger me sideways..." she gasped. "You mean to tell me... whatever did all this, just... faded?"

"That's nothing." remarked the Engineer from the top of the crater. "I think I've figured something out..."

~Midnighter to anyone. I've got it.~

Jenny sighed. One of these days, she swore to teach the man better timing. ~Go ahead, Midnighter.~

~Jenny, I can see the patterns of the blast. Or rather, the absolute lack of pattern.~

Jenny shook her head. "Bloody headache, you're all going to give me. I hate you all." In her mind, she calmed herself. ~Explain, Midnighter. What do ye MEAN, no pattern?~

~Exactly that.~ came the flat response. ~The blast pattern is complete chaos. No discernible radius. No even falloff. No blast ricochets or regular debris dispersal.~

Swift cocked her head. "What kind of nuke does that?"

~No kind.~ came the Doctor's odd echo in their brains. ~This was not a nuclear explosion.~

Jenny screamed silently. ~If you sods don't start making sense right goddamn now, I'll tie your necks together and drop you off in the Devachanic Realm. Now, spit it out!~

The Doctor's voice seemed tinged with amusement. ~It was War.~ The matter-of-fact manner in which he spoke left no room for interpretation. Jenny dropped her head into her hands.

"Good Christ, I'm going to need a drink before you explain this. Back to the Carrier, all." She shook her head.

"I'm too old for this shit. Door."

**********

Back on the Carrier, in what passed for the "bridge", Jack Hawksmoor stood overlooking a landscape of utter blackness, punctuated by occasional streaks of sentient rainbow light, reproducing in geometric patterns with beautiful precision. He touched his fingertips to the glass, consumed both in the wonder before him, and the mournful loss he had felt on the ruins of Jerusalem.

"Jack?" the light voice came from behind him.

"Doctor."

"That's okay, it's..." the Doctor's voice trailed off. Jack turned, seeing the Doctor, dressed down to a pair of worn jeans and a torn "Sex Pistols '82" T-shirt, scratching his head. His eyes, still hidden behind those elusive red lenses, seemed to be focused on something out of phase with reality.

"Doctor?" Jack leaned forward, shaking the younger man. The Doctor snapped his head up, coming back to reality.

"Odd thing. I've been the Doctor for months now. And I can't for the life of me, remember my own name. The name I was born with." He ran a hand through his carrot-hued hair.

Jack peered at him in amazement. "You can't..." The Doctor suddenly cut him off with a shake of the head.

"No matter. I came up to, well, to see if you were all right."

Jack's emotions were bouncing between disbelief, sympathy, annoyance, and curiosity. While the Doctor was as friendly as anyone he knew, he rarely showed a personal interest in Jack's welfare. "I'm... I'm okay, Doc."

"Doctor, please. I know it's kind of formal, but really, it's the only name I've got now. It's who I am, really. Not just me, you know. All of them. Me. Us." he shook his head, as if trying to clear cobwebs. "I swear, there are times it confuses the hell out of me."

"Well, there you're not alone." Jack replied with a grin. "I... well, I know what it's like. You feel alone, like no one understands what you've become." The Doctor nodded, but Jack was lost in reverie. "You try and explain it to them, but they can't listen. Maybe they're scared. Maybe they just can't comprehend it. You've become something more, and something less. But really, just something different." He looked into the Doctor's face, trying to find some trace of emotion in those lensed eyes.

"But in the end, what matters is that you're still human here." He tapped his chest with a fist. "No matter what alien heart's beating there, or how many voices you've got upstairs. You can't lose what makes you human."

The Doctor looked taken aback for a moment, then smiled. "Sometimes, being the Shaman of an entire planet, an entire civilization, it gets a bit self-important. I sometimes lose track of the fact that I'm one of these people too. A little more, a little less, but human after all."

Jack raised a small glass of water up in salute. "And that's what it's about, Doctor."

**********

Jenny stepped in front of the Midnighter, who sat tapping his fingertips on the meeting table. Leaning in front of him, she placed a red pen by his left hand, and a world map down by his right. Directly in front of his chest, she dropped a stack of paper.

"Reports from Interpol, Mossad, CIA, every international anti-terrorism unit there is. Everything on the Phoenix of Zion that's ever been compiled." She fanned them out before him.

"And you want me to..." the Midnighter asked, raising an eyebrow beneath his cowl. "What, take these down to the bad guys and paper cut them to death?"

Jenny snorted, then lunged forward, her nose almost touching his. Sparks darted from her eyes as she whispered. "I don't care what's up your arse, or what chip's on your shoulder, but this stops here and now. People fucking DIED down there, and we're going to get the bastards that claimed responsibility."

"Doctor said it wasn't a nuke." the Midnighter replied, chastened. Jenny moved away, turning to the wall. Her shoulders sagged under the thin white jacket she wore.

"Doctor says a lot of things. What we know for a fact is that these bastards, whether they did it or not, claimed they have. I want you to kick that damn tactical computer in your head into overdrive. Look at those reports. You can run a fight in your head from a million angles." She turned, pointing at the world map.

"Time to move the scale up a bit, mate."

The Midnighter blinked, then picked up the pen. With calm precision, he picked up the first report. His eyes flickered back and forth. With increasing speed, he ruffled papers through his hands, crossing out lines with the pen, circling paragraphs, and occasionally turning to mark the map.

Jenny shifted her sight into the electromagnetic spectrum, watching the neurons in his brain fire with inhuman accuracy and efficiency. ~This is what it's like to be him.~ she marveled. His brain had been augmented with a super-delta-grade tactical biocomputer, enabling him to predict the actions of an opponent with near perfect accuracy. Within milliseconds of observation, he could run literally thousands of combat scenarios, deciding on a quick and brutal course of action. The man was, in every meaning of the word, a combat machine.

Jenny planned to stretch the boundaries, to show him that the world wasn't all about punching someone's teeth in. He had the most powerful computer in the world in his head. ~Be a shame if he never used it.~ she thought.

The thump of his palms on the desk startled Jenny. He glanced up at her, brown eyes blinking in amazement. The papers were neatly stacked in two piles, one face-down, the other marked with red ink. On the map, an intricate spiral had been drawn, centering on a single point.

"Belfast." he breathed in amazement. "The bastards are working out of Belfast."

Jenny nodded. "Get ready, then. You, Jack, and Swift are going into Ireland, while the rest of us figure out what the Doctor's got up his sleeve." She reached over and placed her hand over his. "Good work, mate."

As she left, the Midnighter sat, stock-still, taking in the scene before him. He looked at his hands, then at the papers and the map before him. Slowly, a grin crept across his face.

"Wow."

*********

The Door opened in Ireland, depositing Jack, Swift, and the Midnighter atop a stone-and-tin warehouse. Instantly, they spread out, scanning the roof for threats. Jack stood for a moment, looking from horizon to horizon, taking in the city.

"Jack!" hissed Swift. "Earth to Jack!" Hawksmoor pivoted slowly to face her.

"The city's sick, Shen. It's eating its own."

Swift nodded. "I know, Jack. But that's not what we're here for now." Reluctantly, Jack nodded. "You ready?" she asked. Jack simply smiled and stepped off the side of the building. Swift turned, but the Midnighter was already gone.

"Boys." she sighed, gliding down to the front of the plant.

Inside, swarthy-skinned men stacked crates of ammunition and weaponry on the back of trucks, to be shipped to various cells of their organization across the globe. Others knelt over tables, soldering connections to firing devices that would set off bombs in airports, schoolyards, or embassies that their cause deemed to be 'of the Satan'.

When the steel door to the loading dock exploded off its rails from a fierce kick, Zionist loyalists reached for automatic weapons, fingers on triggers in an instant. Dust cleared, revealing the Midnighter standing before them.

"Move and you die!" spat a turbaned gunman, in heavily accented English.

"There are thirty-three of you," the Midnighter droned, a rictus grin beginning to twist his face. "Between six and fifteen meters of me. You're all armed with Soviet assault rifles, loaded with forty rounds of armor piercing ammunition apiece. You're trained killers, you think. You think your guns make you strong. You think I'm a dead man, standing here. "Let me show you where the dead men stand."

With that, he moved into action, stepping across lines of fire faster than an eyeblink. Carbon-laced tendons and muscles tensed and pulled as he rolled forward, bouncing off the splayed fingertips of one hand. Triggers pulled and bullets flew, but the Midnighter twisted his body out of the path of onrushing lead.

The Zionists cut each other down in their fanatic zeal, screams echoing in the loading dock. The Midnighter continued his cartwheel, dropping low and re-evaluating the situation before the first expended shell had even hit the floor.

~Three down, six wounded and falling. Close formation. Panicked. No superhumans among them.~ He smiled internally. ~Xianguang province gung fu, then.~

He rolled forward, springing up from a crouch to deliver a flurry of knife-hand blows to a pair of terrorists, reducing their ribs to sharp shards of bone, driven into their lungs. A mule kick snapped another's head around 180 degrees, allowing the Midnighter to continue the motion, pivoting his body upwards off the ground, seemingly faster than the bullets sailing toward him. More of his assailants were torn apart by friendly fire as he wheeled, trenchcoat billowing with his motion.

~Seven left.~

His arms whipped back gracefully, sending a handful of razor-sharp throwing spikes into the air. Two more men fell, fingers spasming on their triggers. A scything kick relieved another of his head, while two leather-gloved fingers to the face deprived another of sight, then of life. Using the closest man as a springboard, the Midnighter lunged forwards, the momentum of his leap adding to the force of his punch, pulping flesh and bone as he struck. A series of lightning-quick kicks and disabling nerve strikes later, he stood alone, surrounded by corpses still on their feet.

He exhaled finally, watching as the bodies fell. The sound of metal scraping alerted him to the position of another gunman, eight meters behind him. His superhuman senses could hear the creaking of tendons as an index finger tightened on the trigger.

The Midnighter was a black-and-grey blur as he spun, leaping through the air in a twisting flip, hand reaching out to grasp the barrel of the rifle as the firing pin struck the shell. In the amount of time between the powder burning, and the bullet beginning to move, the barrel had been moved from its original line of fire, to pressing under the gunman's chin.

Brain and bone splattered across the wall as the gunman unintentionally took his own life. The Midnighter spun once more, surveying the room.

Ten seconds had passed since he had kicked in the door. With a last look at his handiwork, he snorted derisively and moved further into the warehouse.

**********

Jack was angry.

Attempting to restrain his enhanced strength, he gripped the dark-haired Zionist by the back of the neck, pressing his thumb into the carotid artery as he bounced his head against the wooden desk.

"Again!" he followed the word with a fierce slap across the man's face. "Where-" another slap "-are-" a blow to the ear "-your-" forehead against the desk "-leaders?" The sentence was punctuated by a rough headbutt, sending the terrorist flying across the room. Jack wiped his face and strode over to him, bare feet slithering across concrete.

"Your leaders. The ones who ordered the bombing in Jerusalem. Where? Help me out, or I'm going to have to stop being so nice." Jack's voice was like silk over a razor blade. The terrorist's eyes rolled, then he focused. Scowling, he spit at Hawksmoor.

Without blinking, Jack wiped the spittle from his face. Lifting the man into the air by his shirt, Jack smiled.

"You had to be tough. Well, get ready for the ride of your life. Please keep hands and feet inside the vehicle until your beating has come to a full and complete stop. Thanks for playing." He drew back one fist, corded muscles unlike a normal human's leaping into sharp relief.

"Stop." the Arabic voice was panicked. Jack turned to see an older man, hair streaked with grey, leaning on a cane in the nearby hallway.

"I am he who you seek. I am the man who orders the Phoenix of Zion."

Jack smiled and dropped the thug he had been holding. "Excellent. Now, if you'll explain how you got the bomb into the center of Jerusalem, and exactly where you got that kind of tech, I'll leave you with most of your limbs. Who was it?" he continued, "Russian surplus? Gamorra? Kenyan sell you this stuff?"

"There's nothing, Jack." Swift's voice came from a nearby room. She emerged, computer disks in hand. "Aside from news reports, these people have nothing connected to Jerusalem."

"We are innocent." pleaded the old man. Jack refused to look him in the eye.

"You claimed you were responsible." he growled. "Why?"

The old man drew himself up straight, puffing out his chest. "The Phoenix of Zion will cleanse the Holy Land of its infidel occupants. God is with us, and he acts for us. As we do His work, our message grows."

"So you wanted to look like a bunch of nasty bad-asses, when you didn't even do this yourself." Swift accused. "But you know who did."

"Our message is universal." the Zionist leader coughed. "Our cause is just."

"Your cause," screamed Jack, "killed millions of people! Tell us who you got this tech from!" The Zionist smiled, producing a small box from behind his back.

"God wills me, and I act. I join him in Paradise, a hero."

"It's wired to the explosives downstairs." the Midnighter's voice came from behind the Zionist. "He's going to make himself a martyr." The old man shook in fear as the Midnighter reached down and calmly took the detonator away from him, then moving to Jack's side.

"The hours of the infidel are numbered!" the old man spat. "You cannot stop what has been set in motion. The Garden of Paradise provides all for our cause!"

"Paradise, huh?" Jack spat. "Jerusalem would say different." The Zionist was silent. Without a word, Jack turned and headed for the roof. Swift followed him, leaving the Midnighter to face down the elderly terrorist.

"Death will come for you." the old man hissed. "Armageddon on wings of light and fire."

"I'll tell that to Apollo." the Midnighter replied. "Should be worth a laugh."

As he joined Shen and Jack on the roof, they all looked back and forth. Jack stared out towards the city. He could feel the conflict, brother against brother. In his heart, a small stab of pain reached out in sympathy.

"We'll come back, I promise." he whispered to the buildings and streets. "Door."

He walked through the shimmering light, followed by Swift. The Midnighter took a step through, then leaned back. With a grin on his face, he pressed the button on the detonator.

Then the Door closed, and one more candle lit the Belfast sky.

**********

"You're familiar with Description Theory?" the Doctor began. He paced around the table, his iridescent purple coat bunched up around his forearms as he jammed his hands in his pockets. "Using Description Theory, Stormwatch created an engine that could punch through dimensions, looking for a power source. That's what gave them the first access to the Bleed, the arterial wall between dimensions."

Sitting across from him on the couch, Angie nodded, running a hand through her black hair. She shivered slightly, wrapped in a large flannel blanket. One of the side effects of having nine pints of liquid nanomachinery running through her veins was that rooms always seemed cold to her. Across from her, Jenny tried to look interested.

"Do try and find the point before my breasts start sagging, Doctor." she chided, taking a drag off her omnipresent cigarette. "Description Theory, right."

The Doctor continued, unchastened. "Description Theory allows us to access the 'operating system' of the universe, like a computer. We can peel back levels of reality, which is what lets the Carrier tack through dimensions as well."

Angie nodded. "Leifrantz and Corel devised the first Description Engine in 1992, that's what Stormwatch used to see into the Bleed, wasn't it?"

"Yes and no." the Doctor intoned. "Theirs was the model that was used on Skywatch. They weren't the first, though." Jenny and Angie both leaned forward. The Doctor smiled. "Yeah."

Angie exhaled slowly, the silver liquid of her nanoload flowing from her pores to coat her skin in chrome armor. "What're we talking about here? Some scientist in Israel developed an Engine years ago, and that's what blew up Jerusalem?"

The Doctor shook his head. "Not entirely true. In what is now Israel, yes. Is it responsible for the destruction we saw? Yes. Did a human invent it... no."

"Aliens?" asked Jenny. The Doctor shook his head, motioning up with his hands. Angie's eyes grew wide, while Jenny's narrowed. "Gods?" The Doctor nodded. "You MUST be joking." inisted Sparks. The Doctor shrugged.

"Remember, half my mind is as old as all human life on this planet. I remember seeing this thing directly, generations and generations ago. The third Shaman, in fact. Before there was even a term for what he did." He paused, cocking his head slightly. "It was called Ith-ur back then, the place. It was a desert oasis, where traveling caravans could meet, trade, do commerce. Two boys were playing in the city when they discovered it, buried beneath even that ancient city."

"What was it?" the Engineer asked, all her interest focused on the Doctor's recollection.

"The first Description Engine. Or what we would describe as one. All the major belief systems have had a name for it. The Norse called it Yggdrasil, the World-Ash. The Hindus called it Shiva, the primal force of destruction and creation. The Copts called it Yahweh Ria'ah, the God that Changes." He paused, reaching into a small pouch and withdrawing a long water bottle. Taking a pull, he cleared his throat and went on. "It's the Generator. The primal engine of evolution, progress, and advancement. As it runs, time marches on. Civilizations rise and fall by the cogs in its machinery." He sighed, sitting down on the edge of the table. "It's what powers the 'operating system' of the cosmos."

"All well and good, Theology Man." Jenny scoffed, "but this has to do with Jerusalem how?" The Doctor made as if to speak, then paused. He circled his palms in the air, lines of violet energy trailing behind them. As he weaved a pattern, images formed.

They saw before them a simple machine, yet too complex to describe. As its wheels turned, they watched a Neanderthal emerge from his cave, and carve the first wheel to move his kills from cave to cave. They saw men clad in simple cloth fell trees, and burn them into dugout canoes to make voyages across the rivers that seemed previously impassable.

And they saw nation rise up against nation. Famine and disease spread as progress spread unevenly, the strong grew corrupt while the weak suffered hunger and sickness. Apathy was as much a force as creativity, and the sickness was only spreading.

With a wave of the Doctor's hand, the images faded. "Now you see." Jenny nodded. In her hundred years of life, she had been witness to a great many marvels. But nothing on the scale that the Doctor spoke of. Technology that predated time itself, and drove the forces of progress and evolution.

"But - Jerusalem?" Angie queried. "How-?"

"As a by-product of its function," the Doctor explained, "the Generator exudes hatred. Dissidence. Greed. Avarice. Apathy. The detritus of a perfect society. These things ooze into the world, and take root. The more the Generator runs, the more they grow." He laced his fingers together, looking the Engineer directly in the eye. "And these days, progress is just speeding ahead of itself, isn't it?"

Angie gulped. "Then the closer the proximity to the actual machine-"

"The worse the effects." Jenny followed. "We're talking about the source of all the evil and pain in human nature. The original Tree of Knowledge, to coin a myth."

"Right." The Doctor's voice grew almost reverent. "And these seeds foster belief, a faith in something that humanity can't fully explain. But in that belief lies the intolerance inherent in the system. Getting back to the original point - you asked why Jerusalem?" He tapped a finger against the table. "Guess where it is?"

"Jesus Christ." gasped Jenny. "I was standing right above it." The Doctor nodded sagely. "Sodding hell..." she breathed. "And all that hostility bleeding off it.. All those years of war and death in the Middle East, just spreading."

"So what do we do about it?" Angie ventured.

~Swift to Jenny. We're back.~ the radiotelepathy message carried through the walls of the room. Jenny smiled. Taking a long drag off her cigarette, she stood.

"Two hours, people. Then we're back to Israel. Apollo!" she called, mentally broadcasting it as well, "the bridge in ten minutes. I've got something I need you to do."

The Engineer walked out of the room with the Doctor, discussing the specifics of the Generator. When she was alone, Jenny looked down at her hands. To her own chagrin, they were shaking like a frightened child's. The cigarette fell from her lips as she slumped to the couch, head in her hands.

"This is too damn big. Just too damn big."

**********

The sun was beginning to rise as the five figures ringed the crater in the center of Jerusalem. Swift, Jenny, the Engineer, the Doctor, and the Midnighter looked down, to where the newly-grown grass had already swarmed out of the ruined ground, covering at least an acre in lush, verdant foliage.

~Jack?~ Jenny sent telepathically. She knew the radiotelepathy 'microphones' would route the signal through a nanodoor to the Carrier. ~You tracking Apollo?~

~He's near the apex of his parabola, Jenny.~ Jack's mental voice reported from Mission Control, aboard the Carrier. ~Beginning his descent, I can see the wake he's leaving in the ionosphere...~

Back on the ground in Jerusalem, the rest of the Authority looked upwards. In the slowly-fading darkness, they saw a pinpoint of light begin to grow wider, increasing in brightness, as if the air around it was aflame.

Which it was, only what they saw was not a star.

It was Apollo, descending from a parabolic flight arc into low orbit, now careening directly for the ground at a speed high above that of sound. Sailing through the stratosphere, his superhumanly enhanced eyes were focused on the dead center of the crater. His arms extended before him, fists clenched, his body spiraling like a drill bit.

The Doctor smirked, taking a pull from a plastic water bottle. "Gonna hit like a ton of bricks." He smiled slyly, making arcane gestures with his fingers in the air. "Bricks build walls, bricks build houses. But bricks build doorways, too..."

Seconds later, Apollo impacted. The ground rippled with the force of the blow, sending fragments of earth flying out of the pit like bullets. The others instinctively flinched, then blinked as the shrapnel and debris faded to smoke in the air, as if willed out of existence.

Angie looked over to the Doctor, wide-eyed. He merely spread his hands innocently and shrugged. "Figured it'd keep this place clean." he jested. Jenny smirked across the crater at him, then looked down. The bottom of the pit had collapsed, extending downwards into inky blackness.

~Apollo?~ she called, worried. She'd convinced him to try this trick, trusting in his invulnerability to shield him from the immense stress of becoming a human meteor.

~Apollo?~ the second call, softer, came from the Midnighter, standing at Jenny's side. Tense moments passed, before...

~Guys?~ Apollo's mental call came. ~You have GOT to see this...~

**********

Hundreds of yards below the desert sands, a miracle of engineering was revealed. Above where the six superhumans stood, a 'sky' of silicon sand stretched as far as the eye could see. Around them were perfectly preserved structures - buildings, roads, wells, and towers.

"Ith-Ur..." breathed the Doctor. "It's exactly like it was."

"This is amazing..." the Engineer replied. "The weight of the sand compressed it into a dome, a perfect geometrical shape, like an archway. This is just... amazing. It's all exactly like it was..."

"When you tourists are done gawking," Jenny scolded, "we've got a machine to find." As the team spread out; Apollo and Swift taking to the air, the others on foot; Jenny stood alone in the packed-dirt street.

She tentatively extended her power, searching for a spark of electricity, any sign of a power source. She exhaled, letting her senses expand to the level where they could detect an electron wobbling unevenly in its orbit around an atomic nucleus.

She felt nothing. This city was dead. As dead as the era that spawned it, dead as its founders.

Walking slowly, Jennifer Sparks began to search the dust-caked streets of Ith-Ur.

Shen Li-Min spiraled up, wings beating in the still air. Without updrafts and natural wind currents, her muscles had to strain to keep aloft. Her eyesight, sharper than any human's or animal's, scanned the streets.

She shivered slightly, hearing no sounds other than the beating of her wings and the noises of her teammates in the streets. Swift swooped down, twisting through narrow alleyways, past doorways still covered with woven cloth. Alighting on a ledge, she peered inside one of the sandstone-and-wood buildings. Adobe bowls sat stacked on hardwood counters, rough-hewn furniture was arranged neatly along the walls. In a basin, water pooled, reflecting Shen's curious face. Tentatively, she dipped her fingers in the water, bringing them to her mouth.

"It's still fresh..." she murmured. The water was pure, no traces of chemicals or bacteria present in even "purified" water.

~Shen to Jenny~ she called.

~Yes?~ Jenny's mind-voice sounded weary.

~Relay this to the others. I don't think there's anything living here, anything at all.~ She knocked her knuckles on the wood, finding it hard and unyielding. ~Even the wood is petrified, inorganic. Nothing's decayed, nothing's corroded. It's like this entire city has been frozen in time.~

~Doctor here.~ his voice reverberated inside Swift's skull. ~Have you noticed something else missing? There are no signs of the people. Over five thousand people lived in Ith-Ur, with thousands more traveling through each day. We have seen no corpses, no bodies, not even bones.~

Swift calmed herself. The entire city around here seemed out-of-focus, though not in any way she could describe. No smells. No sounds. Nothing alive. As if the fundamental laws of entropy had suddenly ceased to exist. Everything was frozen, unchanging.

"The engine..." Swift breathed. Like a rocket, she took to flight, screaming through the streets. ~JENNY!~ she bellowed mentally. ~Get everyone the hell back!~

Jenny stopped in the street, Shen's mental cry momentarily stunning her. "What?" she asked, confused. Swift alighted beside her, the others coming running. Swift hunched over, breathing hard. The air tasted dry and sterile.

"This place... doesn't exist." she gasped. Beside her, the Midnighter furrowed his brow beneath his cowl.

"It doesn't? What, we're imagining it here? I'm not the metaphysical powerhouse of this team, obviously. Someone explain this to me." he growled. The Doctor stepped forward.

"Shen's right. Ith-Ur ceased to exist millenia ago. It still exists in physical space, but it has ceased to progress in time." He wiped dust off his crimson eyelenses, pausing in thought. "That is why the city is preserved. Nothing changes here. Nothing grows, nothing evolves. Nothing decays, nothing rusts..."

"Nothing changes." interrupted the Engineer. "If this Generator is working on manipulating the fundamental laws of the universe, it's obviously stopped entropy. Nothing changing means nothing developing to counteract it." Angie's face lit up with an epiphany. "It's not just an engine."

"It's a computer system. It has its own operating protocols, and its own directives. It exists to force progress, and change as a macrocosm. So around it, it projects this 'bubble', where entropy, and therefore time as we comprehend it, don't exist."

"So why're we still moving and breathing?" Apollo questioned. "If time doesn't move in here..."

"Because we're from the outside." Angela answered. "We're a foreign element in the system. Undoubtedly, it knows we're here."

Everyone mulled that over for a second before the Midnighter spoke. "And if it recognizes us as foreign, its likely response is going to be to protect itself."

"Anti-viral countermeasures." the Engineer nodded, her silver braids chiming. Everyone was silent for a moment, then they heard it. Like the first drops of rain on a stone roof, or the sounds of distant drums.

Footsteps. At first, slow and disjointed. Then closer, louder. Stronger. More.

Jenny whirled. From up and down the street, from every alleyway and doorway, figures were moving. Hunchbacked proto-humans shambled from the shadows, as bronze-garbed warriors strode out into the light. Neanderthals shared the space next to spear-wielding homo sapiens as they advanced.

"Countermeasures." Jenny breathed. "It knows we're here. And it wants us to leave."

"Are we leaving, then?" the Doctor riposted, worry crossing his face. Jenny looked at him, his eyes hidden behind those blank glass frames. She wondered for a moment what he knew, what he understood that they all didn't. She blinked once, then turned.

"Bollocks." she swore. "We're going through. These aren't people, mates. Just a program. A machine." She clenched her fists.

"We're going through."

*********

"Jenny?" Jack's hands danced over holographic display panels. "I can't quite get readings on you down there." The information being transmitted back to the Carrier was garbled, as if the transmission streams themselves were being physically restrained.

~Jack...~

"Jenny?" Jack demanded. "What's going on down there? Can you read me? What's going on?"

~Count**meas**es... ou**umbe*ed...~

"Jenny!" Jack pounded on the console in frustration. Clenching his fists, he paced the War Room floor. Again, he was forced to sit idly by while his friends went into danger. He felt fear and guilt mix in his gut, like gin and gasoline in a shaker. A feeling he hadn't experienced since the day he'd heard about the alien massacre on SkyWatch.

Again, Jack Hawksmoor's friends were going to die, his alien organs told him. And he would be helpless to stop it.

"No." Jack snarled. "Never helpless again."

Bare feet slapped against the metal floor as Jack bolted from the War Room.

**********

Apollo whirled in midair, firing beams of coherent laser light from his eyes. For every assailant he cut down, two more would take its place. Swift darted above him, wheeling acrobatically and raking with her talons. Jenny ducked behind the Engineer, who had morphed her nanotech armor into twin needle-guns, mowing a swath through the onrushing mob. The Doctor was ... dancing, it seemed, his feet moving sinuously as his hands traced arcane sigils, his mouth chanting in some forgotten tongue. Seeing as anything that approached him either burst into flame or instantly devolved into an amoeba, Apollo figured he could handle himself.

He glanced over his shoulder, to where the Midnighter defended his position. Apollo watched as his partner moved almost faster than even he could see, shattering flesh and bone with precisely-placed blows of elbow and knee, severing limbs with a chop of his trained hand. In the madness of the melee, their eyes met.

~I...~ Apollo choked.

~I know.~ The Midnighter's response was cold and calm. He jerked his helmeted head back, smashing the nose and face of a Cro-Magnon behind him, then spinning, lifting himself off the ground to perform a graceful lateral spin kick.

Pulling himself away, heaving through the mob, Apollo pushed forward. "Follow me!" he cried, opening the floodgates to his solar-charged power. Twin beams of devastating laser power lanced from his eyes as the throng before him was reduced to so much ash. He rushed forward like a linebacker, arms extended, tearing wildly at anything in his path.

Following his lead, Swift swooped overhead, snatching spear-throwers from ledges and rooftops, flinging them viciously at speed into hard, unyielding stone walls. She cried out, with the voice of a hunting eagle, sweeping her foot talons across the face of an armored archer, dragging him from his perch. She was Night's Winged Huntress, and she was in the fight of her life.

Angie ducked behind a cornice, breathing heavily. The lack of airborne particles made it difficult for her to create machinery using her nanites. Already, she felt weak and lethargic. Jenny crouched behind her, face contorted with anger.

"You all right?" the Engineer called over the din. Jenny Sparks shook her head.

"There's no electricity here, Angie." Jenny moaned. "I can't do a bloody thing." She held up shaking hands. "I've got nothing to work with here..." Angie met her eyes, then watched Jenny's face turn from frustration to horror.

"Behind you!" she called. The Engineer whirled to see a phalanx of armored troops rushing them. With a grimace, she extended an arm, small cannons 'growing' from her wrist. Bracing herself, she gritted her teeth, willing them to fire, burning her own body's reserves as fuel.The first few ranks fell, but so did the Engineer. Weakened, she glanced up at the coming onslaught. "Come on then, you bastards." she growled. Mentally, she started rearranging the nanomachines inside her body into a lethal configuration. If she was going to go out like this, she was taking as many of them with her as she could. The lead sentry stepped before her, his flat-bladed spear raised high.

Before it could fall, the sandstone wall next to him erupted in a spray of dust and debris. A bare foot lashed out, staving the soldier's ribs like a brine-soaked barrel. With inhuman speed and power, fists flew, turning a once-ordered military unit into walking slabs of meat in a grinder.

When the carnage momentarily ceased, Jack Hawksmoor stood, fists covered in gore, glaring around with his alien red eyes. He looked down, smiling at Angie and Jenny.

"Door's open to the Carrier, Jenny." he rasped. "You can draw a charge from there. I..." he blinked, wiping a forearm across his eyes. "I wasn't going to let you die."

"You can... you can be here?" Jenny whispered, already feeling the residual current from Jack's teleport flow through her. Jack nodded.

"It's... it's weird. I imagine it would be like living in London all your life, then being dropped into the middle of the rain forest. This is... magnificent." Jack breathed a deep breath.

"No time to enjoy it." Angie chided. "We've got to get to the others!" Jenny and Jack nodded, and they set off along the path that Apollo and Swift had cleared. They passed the Doctor, standing amidst an incongruous mess of ice statues, flower petals, and puddles of what seemed to resemble a spilled banana milkshake.

"Sorry about the mess." was all he would say. The Midnighter fell silently into step with them as they caught up with Apollo and Swift at the edge of what seemed to be a recessed amphitheater. From the bottom came a glow, emanating from what appeared to be a machine, but of no type that any of them recognized.

Geared wheels rotated slowly, lifting cams and pistons in what seemed to be a primitive engine. Below the structure, a flat disc, inscribed with runic symbols, rotated, supporting the entire device. The very air around the machine crackled with primitive energy and unspeakable force.

The Doctor exhaled forcefully, watching his breath fog in the warm air. "You see?" he exclaimed "Even the laws of physics are being warped here. Streams of time overlap, gravity and color merge in a symphony of texture and light. Electromagnetic harmonies, can't you hear them?" His face took on an evangelical look of rapture.

Jenny shook her head. "Why the world's Shaman had to be an ex-junkie, I'll never know."

The Midnighter cracked his knuckles. "Well, there it is." he remarked. "Let's break it, and stop this whole thing." He strode forwards, but Angie cut him off, extending an arm.

"You're... you're not serious? Destroy it?" her eyes were wide. "Do you know what something like this means?"

"It means as long as those wheels turn, the world gets more screwed up, every second." Swift retorted. "We have the power to stop it. We have the opportunity."

"But we don't have the right." interjected Jack. "Can we make that decision for an entire world?" The Midnighter looked down, then stepped around Angie.

"Say what you want, I'm --- - -

Time bent and twisted, as reality slid

S

I

D

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A

Y

S

...

Shen looked out through the bars that were her window. Snow had fallen in drifts from the rooftop, melting rivulets of ice-cold water down the stone walls of her room. She stood on tiptoe, feet braced against the foot of her straw bed. With the wide-eyed wonder of any six-year old child, she peered out into the courtyard. Uniformed Chinese soldiers marched back and forth, barking orders. She saw her parents step out into the center of the square, her father motioning, pleading. Her mother tugged at the hem of his shirt, begging for him to come inside. She could hear the words of her father, insisting that the troops leave their peaceful Tibetan village. His voice was full of command, and pride.

Shen Li-Min watched as the soldiers raised their rifles, and cut down her father and mother like targets on a range.

She was six years old, and her screams would never stop.

*****

Apollo turned his face away, vomiting into a corner. The rest of his team stagerred around, momentarily confused. Amaze lay in a pool of her own blood on the floor, the back of her head shattered, brain matter and fluid coalescing under her. "Apollo, look, goddammit!" He felt himself pulled away.

His eyes widened, as he saw the bio-reactor before him, a mass of human tissue, organs, limbs, pulsating with a life of its own. He saw a pair of seven-fingered hands push their way free, pulling a bifurcated mutant torso out of the reactor. Vestigial eyes blinked as a toothless mouth screamed. Legless and blind, the bio-engineered monstrosity flopped on the floor.

Then the gunshots continued, and there was fire. Apollo saw Crow Jane consumed by a blast from a flamethrower, Stalker rushing to her aid, only to find his half-Daemonite skin pierced by teflon-coated bullets.

He charged forward, but was dragged back by leather-gloved hands. Apollo howled, watching his friends die one by one. Along with his innocence. The world, he suddenly discovered, was more horrifying and sick than he had ever imagined.

And every time he closed his eyes, for the rest of his life, he would see their faces.

*****

He rolled around on the tile floor, fingers scrabbling around the rim of the toilet. "Just one... more..." he pleaded to no one in particular. Knocking over scientific magazines and books of classic literature, he pulled himself up to the mirror.

Slowly, he rested his weight on his hands. He ran a hand through his shaggy red hair, noting the specks of blood still caked under his fingernails. He hadn't meant to hit that old woman so hard, but he needed that purse. He needed that money.

He needed that hit.

His bloodshot eyes glanced down his arm, tracing the tracks of blackened veins. He ran his fingers over the rubber tube, tied around his bicep like a tourniquet. He looked down, seeing the empty needle, still inserted in his arm, the syringe beginning to fill with dirty blood.

He fell back against the wall, sliding down to the floor as the rush took away all the pain, and everything became numb. Morphine was his lover, his priest, his god. She could make all the pain go away.

But then he needed her again. And again. And again. And he knew she would never let him go.

*****

Jenny's hands shook. She saw Abel before her, large as life. And completely insane. If only those bikers hadn't goaded him into taking the drugs. If only she'd been able to stop him. If only...

Jenny reached out for the electricity in the massive speakers. Abel Eternity bellowed a challenge, his superhuman muscles bulging with power, his mind nearly destroyed by the drugs.

Jenny looked once more into the eyes of her friend. And let the power flow from her, using the behemoth of a man as a grounding rod. She cursed her powers, because they let her feel electricity, every subtlety of it.

She could feel the sizzle of ionized oxygen, feel the resistance of superhuman skin as cells popped and fried. She could sense every flare of nerves as they burst into flame under the lightning energy.

And she could feel Abel Eternity die, falling to the ground a charred, blackened husk. Jenny slumped to her knees, trying to speak, but the words would not come.

What do you say after you've just killed your best friend?

*****

The aliens had violated him. Modified him. Changed him. Made him something less than human. Made him a freak, a monster. Jack saw it in everyone's eyes.

But worse than the disdain, in a thirteen-year-old boy's mind, was the fact that no one believed. And so it was not the aliens that made Jack a monster. It was his own fault. His parents would not believe. His friends would not believe, who would? Such a fantastic story, obviously though up by a child deserving attention. Science and logic deemed such things impossible.

Science and logic did not keep young Jack Hawksmoor safe at night. Nor could they assuage the pain of being alone, totally alone.

*****

"Hey, spic!"

"Lookit her, little rich spic girl thinks she's too good for us now, eh?"

"Ain't nothing but a little rich puta, ain't no books gonna change that!"

Angela Spica ducked her head, walking past the bus stop in Jamaica, Queens. She held her books tight to her chest, as if they would shield her from the dirty looks, or worse. She was sixteen years old, and already eligible for advanced entry to Princeton, on a science scholarship. Despite the low-income neighborhood, Angie dreamed of stars and microbes and machinery. She had dreams, she was going to be someone.

But no dream was going to get her out of the barrio, she thought. No book learning would change the fact, that no matter where she went in life, she'd always be seen as just another little Hispanic girl from the projects. Not good enough for the "real" schools, "too good" for her neighborhood. It was what she had heard all her life. From her neighbors, from the gangs on the street, even from her own parents.

Ducking her head low, eyes to the ground, Angela Spica walked home, alone, refusing to let a tear fall from her blurry eyes.

*****

He ran, as far as the road would take him. He had known they would never understand, not them. In 1982, some parts of Alabama still had the "No Coloreds" signs posted on the freeway off-ramps. Trussville, Alabama was such a place, and he was going to get out.

If only he could make it to a bus station. Fifty dollars in his pocket would get him at least to Baton Rouge, where he had heard anyone could make it. Even a poor boy from the sticks. But he had to make it there, he had to get away.

The sound of the truck behind him was like the very hounds of hell nipping at his feet. He could hear the catcalls, heard the blaring of the horn. He could not run fast enough, never fast enough. From the voices, he knew it was the four of them. Duke and his friends. They had all been friends, once. But now he knew, he was different. And in Trussville, Alabama, they would never understand.

The first thrown beer bottle hit him in the back of the head, sending him sprawling in the gravel. He gasped for air as he heard the pickup screech to a stop. Outlined in the headlights, he struggled to his knees, blood seeping from abrasions on his arms. He raised his hands in supplication.

"Please... don't.." he gasped. He had come so far. He had risked so much, already been through too much for any seventeen-year-old boy, almost a man. But now so much less than a man in their eyes.

The first kick took his breath away, and he fell, vomiting. "Don't what?" came the calls. "Don't beat on the poor little faggot? Don't kick the filthy queer?" More blows came, each more painful than the last. The litanies continued, "Faggot", "homo", "queer", "fairy", each word hitting like a hammer blow.

Eternities passed before he opened his eyes, as much as he could, the blood beginning to clot them shut. Rolling over was like pushing knives into his ribs, but he tumbled into the high grass, staring blindly up at the full moon. The night always looked the same in Trussville, Alabama.

The night would never look the same to him again.

**********

And the Midnighter dropped to his knees, tumbling down the embankment. He struggled to regain his balance, eyes blinded by shame and rage. He lay there, feeling the cold structure of the wheel below him, hearing the hum of the machine. For moments, nothing else in the world existed, and he knew that he could stay here, frozen in this moment, until all time had passed away.

"No." he breathed, choking back a sob. "No." he steeled himself inside, willpower coalescing like a growing fire. He rose, turning, wiping tears from his eyes. When he opened his eyes, he saw Apollo's face before him, drawn in concern. Without a word, he fell into the larger man's chest.

"You never said..." Apollo stuttered, almost weeping. His partner shivered against him.

"I couldn't. Could never face that." He felt another hand on his shoulder, cool and metallic.

"None of us could." Angie whispered. "But all of us have. I think that's what this was about."

The Midnighter pulled back, looking into Apollo's eyes. The white-haired man nodded. "We've seen the hatred, the prejudice. We've seen the tragedy, all of us."

"Then we can stop it." replied Shen, staring into the bowels of the machine. "We can end it all, right here."

"And then what?" came the voice of the Doctor. Everyone turned, to see him standing outside the wheel, hands folded reverently. "We stop the cycle. We end it all. No more war. No more famine, no more greed and avarice. An end to hate, an end to violence. All of it." The Doctor steepled his fingers, continuing.

"If we halt it here, we end all that. But we also end progress. No more invention. No more creativity, no art, no music. Think of all we as a species have accomplished. Do we have the right to create this utopia, if it means total stagnation for the human race?"

Everyone paused. The air hung pregnant with possibility and determination. Every one of them knew that their next actions could determine the fate of the future. Finally, the Engineer stepped forward.

"We can't do it. We have to let it continue." She pointed at the machine. "This is only the force behind it all. We're the ones who live with it. We're the ones who focus this energy. It may be the engine," she exclaimed, "but we are the lens." "

So what can we do?" the Midnighter questioned. "Pretend everything's like it was before?"

"The hell we will." Jenny intoned, stepping up to the machine. She withdrew a cigarette, pressing the tip to a sparking electrode on the Generator, lighting it. Taking a long drag, she closed her eyes and exhaled.

"So we know where it all comes from. So bloody what?" she looked each of them in the eye. "We've got a sick world out there, people. We've got the remedy. We can fix it."

"Amen to that." Apollo sighed.

**********

Hours later, seven figures walked along the sands in the ruins of Jerusalem. Where once there had been a crater, now only unbroken sand remained. Laser-fused bedrock ensured that the Generator would run undisturbed until the end of time.

As they passed through the Door, back to their interdimensional base of operations, the Authority had done what they had come to do. The world, for tonight, was changed.

**********

"Jackson?"

The bearded man looked up from his paperwork. "Yes?"

"Call coming in. It's them." Christine Trelane pointed at the communications gear. "Want me to put it on speaker?" Jackson King nodded. Static crackled, then a calm voice came over the airwaves.

"This is Apollo, speaking for the Authority. The spirits of Jerusalem have been laid to rest. The world is a strange place, still. But tonight, I can promise you this, you can all rest easy. We're not going to leave you undefended.

"Sleep well."

**********

~FINIS~

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