Trinity

She had remembered a night like this only once before.

Far back in her memory but always fresh when she remembered, she recalled how it felt to be broken and bleeding from being violated at the hands of men. Then left to ponder how it could have happened within the darkness of her cell. Her ears still rang from their laughter and derision, humiliated by their supreme confidence at having broken the mighty Amazon nation in the most despicable weapon at their disposal, their manhood. Chief among these had been the demi-god Herakles who used his serpent's tongue to charm Hippolyta, to inspire her to love him and then show her in the cruellest way possible how love could be a weapon of pain.

In the hours that followed, Menalippe like many other Amazons had remained in their chains, stunned and despairing at how they could have all been so easily deceived. A mistake that still stung on their pride as they wore the bracelets symbolic of the chains of that terrible night. Yet it was then, in their darkest hours, what the Amazon nation would call the Hour of Turning, they experienced both their worst moments also their greatest.

In their cells, they began to hear noises, blood curdling screams, sporadic and short.

They occurred like flashes of lightening, so fast and sudden that for a moment, it would have been considered imagination if not for the bodies left behind after. During that hour, they had waited, listening, praying for salvation, every Amazon in her cell.

That night the Queen of the Amazons proved why she was their leader, the queen who had broken free of demi-god and then proceeded to free her sisters from their bondage. That night had spawned a new dawn for the Amazon nation.

But in that hour when all was quiet and the violence was all they knew, the hope for that dawn seemed very distant indeed.

As it was now.

She had done all she could to combat the magic of Ares' daughter. Using all the healing knowledge at her disposal, Menalippe battled the malaise that had stricken the lover of the Patriarch's World champion. Lois Lane, whose spirit burned as bright as any Amazon had become their voice in this new world and now lay resting in her hospital bed while beyond its walls, Metropolis was a scene of chaos and horror.

The news reports that had all the hospital staff glued to the communal television set in the waiting room showed the rampage of the titan Ixion, undoubtedly unleashed upon the Patriarch's World by Ares, as he tore through the streets of Metropolis. What Menalippe knew that they did not, was that Ixion was coming here, coming for Lois Lane. The Champion of the Patriarch's World, a man not formed of Prometheus' clay, had power beyond imagination. Menalippe suspected that if he chose to wield it, not even Diana would be able to stand against him. She thanked the gods that the man had been raised by people of astonishing moral fibre who had instilled in him such goodness; he could have been Amazon in his upbringing.

Powerful he was in might but as anyone who loved, his vulnerability was his heart and his heart, was given to reporter who saw him as man first before god.

"I have rallied our sisters," Hippolyta said as she stood over Lois' bed, brushing a tender hand across the young woman's cheek. "They will be here soon to do battle with Ixion when he arrives. I doubt they will take our advice but the men of this world, need to know with what they are dealing with."

"Ixion can only be met by their champion or Diana," Menalippe pointed out as the sounds of sirens grew louder and the rumble beneath foot became more and more intense. Ixion's approach could be felt like a distant earthquake growing in rage as he closed in on them. "My queen, facing him may not be wise. He is powerful beyond measure, chained in Tartarus for an age and surely mad from his imprisonment."

"I will not allow a sister to fall to a titan," Hippolyta declared defiantly. "She has stood up for us in this world, given us a voice when we would have been dismissed. Also any harm to her and he will be broken. We will need Superman's aid to fight Ares."

Menalippe fell silent, accustomed to seeing her queen displaying such defiance. She would not be deterred from her course and so the healer surrendered without further protest, "Go with Gaea, your highness."

"Keep her safe Menalippe," Hippolyta instructed, lowering her lips to Lois' cheek and giving the girl a kiss of maternal affection.

"I will die before he harms her," Menalippe stated without hesitation and found herself surprised by how much she meant it.

****

Standing almost twenty five feet tall, his body covered with what was ancient Grecian armour, his misshaped features were hidden behind a full faced helmet. Ixion, prisoner of the wheel smashed a massive fist into the top of the police car that slammed into his side in an effort to stop the carnage he was causing in middle of the street. The metal buckled, killing instantly the two policemen inside, crushed in a moment of exquisite pain before everything went black. On either side of him, the mortals with their fire sticks, hurled their lead pellets at him and little to slow down the titan. The pellets bounced off his tough hide, grey from centuries of imprisonment in the sunless realms like rain. Growling at them in indignant range, he swatted them away like flies, watching with little emotion as their bodies slammed through the window of the building flanking him.

The screams of the frightened were music to his ears and he watched with delight as bystanders on the street, scattered in all directions, watching and pointing, scurrying into their homes, closing their doors as if that would help if he chose to pursue them, which he did not. The daughter of Ares had given him a mission and though the attack by these flea-like humans was entertaining, Ixion had a duty to carry out and that was to crush the skull of the champion's female between his fingers tips before the night was out.

The whump whump whump sound of air above him made Ixion look up into sky to see a flying chariot filled with mortals spying his progress through the street. Grinning, his inches long serrated teeth glistened as his lips whetted with anticipation at the bloodshed to come, caused screams to come from any who saw it. Bending over, he picked up an already upturned vehicle, crushed and twisted previously by him like it was paper and hurled into the air. Watching with bemusement, he saw the flying chariot attempted to retreat only to meet its fate when the collision turned the sky alive with colour from the resulting fire ball.

As the splendid rainfall of fire and debris teemed around him, he looked back and saw the carnage left behind and felt relish at being able to carry out the war god's work so effectively. Buildings burned, bodies crushed and rendered, the gruesome evidence of murder left in his wake and the sweet scent of destruction was so heady, he needed to take a breath as the smell rolled over him with a gust of wind.

Suddenly Ixion became aware of something else, the sound of a gale intensifying in its ferocity. Casting his gaze along the road, he saw something else approaching, its speed so swift that it left a whirlwind behind it traversed the distance between them. He had no more time to register this odd occurrence when he saw the humans emerging from the roof tops of their hopes, through the open windows, pointing at the sky, cheering and clapping as if salvation had come at last.

"Look its Superman!" A boy shouted, his eyes bright as he gaped at the blue, red streak approaching.

"Who is this...." He hadn't completed the sentence when he was struck so hard in the chest that Ixion was ripped from the ground and send sprawling through the air as if Zeus himself had designed to come down from Olympus to bear judgement upon him again. A roar of jubilation followed in the wake of the assault and Ixion felt rage and hatred as they clapped and cheered his attacker. It rose over the sound of rushing wind a moment earlier and he became aware before he landed of a man clad in red and blue.

Clark watched as the creature flew through the air and landed hard with enough momentum behind him to dig a groove through main Street Metropolis before he came to a stop, unearthing chunks of street and dirt. With the monster down, Clark didn't waste any time and resumed his assault, not wishing to give Ixion time enough to recover and launch his own attack. In the blink of an eye, he was standing over the fallen titan before he pulled back his fist and landed a hard right cross that slammed Ixion into deeper into the shattered concrete. Clark continued the barrage, hammering him into the ground relentlessly, determined to put an end to this creature's destructive reign of terror.

Even as he closed in to Metropolis, he saw what Ixion had done, the people he had murdered in the name of the war god that Clark had left Diana and Bruce to deal with. Knowing what Lois meant to him, Diana and Bruce had told him to go and while he had not refused, he was also determined to end this fight quickly so that he could get back in time to help them. It did not sit right with him that he had left them but Bruce was wise enough to know he'd be little use to them if he was worrying about this monster reaching Lois before he could.

Ixion took the blows, each one causing the ground to shudder, the punches thrown so fast that each one create a sonic boom until his ears were ringing with a sound akin to Zeus own thunderbolts being hurled to Earth from Olympus. However, he had been imprisoned for eons, chained to the wheel in the deepest pits of Tartarus. Pain was something he was inured to and he had already been the sport of the gods once, he would not surrender to it again. Ares had allowed him this reprieve to redeem himself, he would not waste it.

Lying in wait as the jackhammer blows continued, Ixion knew better than anyone else, how to be patient.

Clark only stopped punching when he saw Ixion had gone still. Pausing to see if the creature was done, Clark had plans of taking it to the middle of nowhere and leaving it there until he could decide what was to be done with it. He expected the Amazons might have some idea of how to chain this being permanently but for right not, his goal was to protect Metropolis and help Diana and Bruce fight the creature's master whose plan meant the fiery destruction of all life on the planet.

Distracted by his internal ruminations, he missed seeing the beast come suddenly to life to swing its thick fist in retaliation. Ixion moved faster than Clark would have credited the being and the blow that struck him, was delivered with deadly force and accuracy. It impacted against his chest, propelling him through the air like the artillery of a catapult, into the facade wall of an apartment building. Clark slammed into it like a wrecking ball, smashing through one wall and then another and yet another, drawing cries of shock and fear from the people living in the place and still kept going. Destroying home after home until he finally smashed through the ceiling and ended up on the other side of the building on top of parked car. The vehicle was pulverized into the crater he created by the impact.

As he lay there, dazed, Clark felt another sensation running through him, one that mingled with the taste of salt on his lips. Pain.

He felt pain. It took him a moment to register the feeling because it had been a while since he'd last experienced it. Magic, Clark thought to himself with a frown. Magic always made him vulnerable and Diana with her gods, definitely existed in that realm. Groaning slightly as he tried to sit up, he ignored it because right now, he couldn't let it slow him down. Wiping the blood from his split lip, Clark could only focus on one thing and that was stopping Ixion from harming anyone else. Using his x-ray vision, his eyes scanned the last place Ixion had been and felt a surge of concern when he saw the creature gone.

Fortunately, he did not have long to find out where it went.

Ixion landed on Clark like a falling boulder, with such tremendous force it was as if Clark had just had the Empire State Building dropped on his head. Beneath them, cracked bitumen and concrete heaved in protest before finally giving way abruptly, sending them both plunging through the newly created hole. Huge chunks of road and dirt followed them all the way down before the duo landed on subway tracks, raining debris over them in an uneven cascade. Scrambling to his knees, Clark shook his head, trying to gain his equilibrium when he saw the titan getting up to his feet first, his massive bulk barely fitting inside the subway tunnel, his monstrous head scraping against the roof

"Give up Son of Krypton," Ixion rumbled, his voice sounding as brutal as his action. "Bow to the will of Ares, let him have his war. Let what must be, take place. I have fought gods before and the outcome was not to my liking. Yield and I will make your end painless."

"Well I'm not fighting a god, just you," Clark hissed and shot forward, smashing both fists into Ixion's sternum, sending him flying up the length of the passage when suddenly he detected the sound of voices, of machinery moving fast and drawing closer, approaching from beyond where Ixion had landed. A subway train! His mind quickly deduced. Damn , he cursed his lack of foresight. I should have got him the hell out of here!

Knowing what kind of menace Ixion could cause to the unsuspecting occupants of that approaching train, Clark was already moving into action.

Unfortunately, Ixion was already anticipating how the champion would react. His weakness was the same as all heroes, Ixion decided, the need to save those who were weaker even when such actions placed themselves at a disadvantage. Ixion swung around at the last moment before the son of Krypton could reach him and grabbed the man by the cape to swing him in the path of the oncoming train. While it would do no damage to him personally, Ixion was certain the chariot rumbling towards them would not fare as well.

Clark's body hit the front of the train carriage, buckling the metal like it was paper and obliterating most of the front carriage occupied by the train conductor. Thankfully the man had seen what was coming at him and left the compartment in time to escape injury. As he sped forward, imbedded in the twisted wreckage of steel and glass, Clark caught sight of Ixion running up the tracks, back to the fissure they had created to enter the subway. Grinning wildly in triumph, Ixion leapt into the air and escaped the tunnel back to the surface.

Lois, he thought frantically, the bastard's going after Lois![i]

Clark fought back the urge to go after him because he had more immediate concerns. Thanks to him, the train was now a runaway. All the controls to bring it to a stop had been destroyed along with the conductor's carriage. Inside the carriage, he could hear terrified voices as people caught on to what was happening and how much danger they were in. Crushing the surge of emotions that threatened to overwhelm him every time Clark was confronted with the possibility of losing Lois, he focussed his errant thoughts on the job at hand.

Ignoring the ache in his limbs, Clark turned around and faced the carriage head on, before bracing both hands against the thick steel, feeling the rumble of its power engines beneath the surface. Hovering in the air momentarily, he lowered himself carefully onto the tracks, causing the wooden boards between the rails to snap when they touched his feet. Clark had more than enough strength to stop this train but if he acted hastily without thought by simply planting his feet on the ground and acting as a barrier, the train would jack knife and kill everyone on board. No, he had long ago learnt from Bruce and later from his training with Jor-El that might was not always the answer.

Controlling his flight so that he wasn't putting his full weight against the ground, he allowed himself to be slid across the gravel, his feet sparking from the abrasion while exerting just enough strength to offer the speeding wheels resistance. The friction created flames around his feet and a trail of smoke led the way as the train gradually began to slow. This was fortunate because Clark could see the painted signs on the walls of the subway tunnel that indicated the approach of a station platform.

"Superman!" The train conducted hollered, leaning out a window from the nearest car to be heard. "We're reaching the Centennial Park Station!" The man warned.

"I know!" Clark yelled back. "Make everyone get into crash position!"

"Right!" The man answered and scurried back into the carriage, ordering everyone to do just that.

Digging his heels in deeper, he felt the gravel under foot scratching around his ankles as he was driven deeper into the ground. Hard pebble dirt gave way to soft earth, creating a dark furrow through the tunnel floor, flanked by broken wood and rail. The locomotive's wheels were screeching in protest, unable to fight against the force of one determined Kryptonian. He could hear the groan of the engines, the whine of metal against metal, wheel against track, coupled with the voice of terrified bystanders who had been caught in the middle of his battle with Ixion. Clark grit his teeth, determined to see all these innocents delivered to safety until the wind rushing at him began to die along with the locomotive's forward momentum.

After what seemed to be an eternity, the train came to a stop just shy of the Centennial Park platform.

Applause broke out from the folk on the platform at the spectacle of Superman stopping a runaway train, with people craning their necks to see down the tunnel to get a better view of what was happening. Clark ignored the attention, his x-ray vision scanning the interior to see if there were any seriously injured. Behind him, paramedics and emergency service workers, alerted by the rail authority were hurrying onto the platform, ready to deal with the situation.

“Thank God you were here Superman,” the train conductor declared after the man had disembarked the carriage and began ushering out the people who were able to leave the carriage towards the platform on their own two feet. As they filed past him, Clark was greeted by a chorus of appreciation from the survivors.

[i]"Thank you Superman."



"God bless..."



"You saved us!"


The litany of gratitude would have continued if Clark had chosen to remain but he could not. He needed to get back to the surface and find Ixion . Ixion who was still out there and likely tearing a path of violence all the way to Lois.


"We'll take it from here Superman," one of the emergency crew's chief declared once Clark had ensured the train was not only stopped but safe. There had been a lot of damage to the mechanical works and Clark checked to make sure there were no leaks or ruptures that could ignite into a bigger problem.

"Thanks," he said quickly, meeting the man's gaze with a nod of thanks and once again feeling pride in the people of Metropolis who were more than capable of dealing with emergencies when he was not present.

Breaking into super speed as he flew away, those left behind were bathed in the gust of strong wind that always followed his departure. Clark flew up the length of the tunnel, above the halted train and sought out the fissure that he and Ixion had created to land in the subway to begin with. Emerging out of the fissure that cracked open the parking lot like an egg, Clark rose to street level and returned to the night air. Immediately, his super hearing sought out the tell tale cries of terror that would give away the monster's location.

He didn't have far to look and felt his jaw tighten in anger at the sight of the torn streets, the upturned cars and the trail of destruction left behind by Ixion's mindless violence. The path Ixion had taken looked like a battle field and Clark felt a surge of rage running through him at what this creature had done to his city. While not having the same gut wrenching connection to Gotham that Bruce had, Metropolis was Clark's home. It was really the place where Superman was born and to see his city in this state made enraged him.

Resolving to end this once and for all, Clark was a red and blue streak as he flew towards Ixion who was now surrounded by policemen who were attempting to stop the maniac from his acts of violence. The titan was in the process of hurling a bus full of people, no less, at the men who standing their ground in front of a beast they had no chance of defeating simply because it was their duty to. Clark was not going to let them pay the ultimate price for it, not them and certainly not the people in that bus, just like the people in the train earlier.

Speeding ahead faster than a speeding bullet (so the press liked to claim), Clark intercepted the vehicle amidst the screaming terror of those inside and caught the bus easily, keeping it from hitting the ground. Its occupants were probably going to take the brunt of the sudden stop but Clark couldn't help that. However, it was becoming increasingly clear that he needed to choose his battleground because there were too many other targets here for Ixion to use to distract him.

Clark set down the vehicle and shouted to the nearest cop when he lowered the bus onto its wheels and saw Ixion approaching for another assault. "Get everyone out of there!" He gestured to the bus, "and keep everyone away from us! He knows I won't let anyone be harmed."

"Gotcha Superman," the police officer answered, as he waved his comrades over to the bus. "You heard Superman! Clear the area."

With MPD mobilizing to evacuate the area behind him, Clark turned his attention back to Ixion who was moving on, laying waste to everything in his path as he continued towards Lois. Clark sucked in his breath and came to a realisation he had not wanted to reach but had little choice now. God help him he couldn't hold back. He'd gone through his life worrying about who he'd hurt with his strength but now, he had to lower those restraints and go against his conditioning because the titan had no such limitations. Rushing forward again, Clark overshot Ixion's present location in the middle of an intersection and stood in front of the monster, a proverbial line in the sand drawn to not let him any further.

"I will have her," Ixion rumbled in his direction before yanking out a traffic light post from the ground, trailing ripped cables dancing with energy and hurling it at the few bystanders who hadn't got clear yet. Clark deflected its path by a gust of super breath, sending the thing crashing into a wall, away from its intended victims, crumpling it out of shape and sending glass everywhere upon impact.

"You're having nothing!" Clark growled and flew at the titan, his cape trailing behind him as he gained speed. Closing the distance, he grabbed Ixion by the arm and kept going ahead, spiriting the creature away from the ground, limiting the menace he could cause. Ixion howled indignantly as he was swept off his feet and taken aloft, leaving rooftops beneath them as they soared into the air. The two combatants left behind the ruined street as Clark changed their battleground so no one else would get hurt.

“You cannot stop me Son of Krypton!!” Ixion bellowed as retaliated by battering Clark with multiple blows as they flew, his massive fist delivering a crushing assault on the Kryptonian’s ribs.

Clark felt every one of those punches and steeled himself against them as the landscape blurred beneath them. He ignored the pain, wanting nothing but to get the titan as far away from Lois and the rest of Metropolis as he could. Single minded in his determination, he ignored the blows, concentrating on maintaining flight when suddenly he caught a glint of something in his peripheral vision. He turned just in time to see Ixion brandishing what appeared to be a jagged piece of his armour.

He had barely time to react before the sharp piece of forged metal sank into the flesh beneath his ribs, through flesh and muscle. It was pain he had never experienced before and the cry that escaped him sounded almost alien. On reflex, he swatted away the titan and unwittingly lost his hold of the beast. As Clark reeled from the pain, he saw Ixion plunging through the clouds, hurtling towards the ground. However, at the moment Clark's own flight had gone askew as he clutched his side and felt warm blood running rivulets over his fingers.

His blood.


*****

From two streets away from Metropolis General Hospital, Hippolyta had paused with the rest of her Amazon sisters when she saw the Kryptonian flying across the sky with what looked to Ixion, the kin slayer. They had not progressed very far when something happened to halt them in mid flight. With the same shock and horror as her sisters, Hippolyta saw them falling to earth like dark stars. The son of Krypton had been harmed, this much she was able to ascertain from the way he was tumbling through the sky like a bird whose wing had been wounded. As it was, she knew from the panic in the city that the two had been battling fiercely, the children of two realms, the ancient ones of her beliefs and the new gods of the Earth. The ones who wore emblems such as Superman and lived mortal lives while bestowed with immortal power.

“He is hurt," Philipus observed beside her.

“Yes,” Hippolyta agreed, having watch Diana fly enough times in her youth to know when something was wrong even from this distance. “It is as I feared. Even if he were not made by Prometheus clay, he is vulnerable to an assault from a titan.”

“Should we go to him?” the Amazon general inquired, wanting to fight, disliking the notion of leaving the greatest battle of their age to the hands of others. “Perhaps he can tell us where Diana is.”

Hippolyta remained silent, trying not to be worry about her daughter who had vanished hours ago and the portents all indicated that something dark was afoot tonight, even if Ixion's presence weren't proof enough. This may well be the night of Ares’ end game and the final chance humanity had to prevent its complete annihilation. “We will go,” she nodded and started moving again, jogging at a brisk pace to the hotel where their weapons were waiting. The chaos created by Ixion had halted the city's usual means of travel throughout the city and Hippolyta found this was the most expedient way of getting anywhere quickly. "If the son of Krypton is truly fallen then it is up to us to stop Ixion.”

Philipus nodded, ready for the challenge, they all were. For three thousand years, the Amazons were the gate keepers to Doom’s Door on Themiscyra, keeping the evils of Tartarus from escaping into the world. A creature like the Kin slayer, they were more than accustomed to battling. “We will stop him or die trying.”



Hippolyta did not answer but it could well come to that.

******

Inside her, it grew like an inflating balloon, an overwhelming sense of dread and fear that nearly choked the breath from her lungs and made her drown in its thick, vile soup. She felt herself swimming against this dark tide, her limbs heavy from exhaustion. She couldn't see what was ahead, couldn't hear the sloshing that should have come with the movement through the viscous place and all the sensation in her world was the exhaustion that wanted to drag her to the depths of this abyss. It would be so easy to give up, so easy to let it sweep her down in the waiting arms of oblivion where she would feel nothing ever again.

However, Lois Lane seldom gave into anything that was easy.

In fact, easy bored her. Give in? It was beyond her to yield. Every molecule in her body was charged with defiance and sheer stubbornness. No, she would not give up, she would navigate this dark place and if there was no view for her to see, she would create one for herself. She had been born into this world fighting and she had sworn long ago, she would leave it the same way.

Ignoring the malaise that was clawing at her skin, Single minded that she was not finished, she forced herself to see the one thing in life was worth living for, that no matter what the obstacle, she had something waiting for her that she would not give up. That would not give up on her. Clark.

Even as she thought about him, the image of a flaming red S-shield drifted into view and Lois used that as her horizon.


No, she was not done. Not by a long shot.

*****

Lois Lane woke up with a start when she felt a tremendous shudder jolt her wake.

She sat upright fully alert, noting the objects still teetering on the shelves and some that had actually hit the linoleum with a loud crash. Blinking twice as her drowsy senses struggled with the sudden overload of information, she scanned the room and found herself faced with the white walls of a hospital ward and a dozen other beds lined up along it. Another second elapsed and Lois realised she knew the people in those beds.

Perry, Jimmy, even Cat, what the hell was going on here? What was wrong with them? More importantly, she thought when she realised that she was one of these patients, what was wrong with her?


"What's going on?" She demanded loudly before realising that Menalippe was in the room and coming quickly to her side.


"Calm yourself," Menalippe said gently, touching her shoulder the way one would soothe an excited horse. "You have been ill."


"What?" Lois blinked, trying to remember what had happened and finding her memories foggy. Ill, she had been ill? When did that happen? "What's wrong with everyone and what was that an earth quake a minute ago?" She demanded.


"No," Menalippe shook her head, her eyes filling with sorrow. "That was Superman."