DISCLAIMER: I do not own any of these characters; DC comics does. I'm not using them with permission. I'm not making any money off of this. Nothing I've written is intended in any way to infringe on DC's rights to these characters.


Monsters

A Tale of the Legion of Super-Heroes

by G'leep


...No more monsters...

I sit in what passed for my lab on this derelict craft and toy once more with a console. Screens wink in and out of static around me and once more I am filled with a dull anger at our condition. This isn't the way it is supposed to be. I'm supposed to be able to solve the problem for everyone. Slumping back in my chair, I stare sightlessly at the calculations scrolling over one of the monitors in the dim lighting.

...I don't want any more monsters, Brainiac...

I tried to comfort her. I am not used to being team leader. I am not used to having to take so active a role. If I were conducting a sociological survey of myself I would be forced to admit it scares me. But fear can only obscure the data, and I can't permit that right now. Shikari's failure has only proven they are dependent on me.

I tried to comfort her, but it is not something in which I have an overabundance of talent. She'd turned to me for a solution with her desperate need so dark in her eyes when we faced the Omniphagos. She'd depended on me. I was the leader.

...I don’t want any more monsters, Brainiac...

Late during ship-night, I went to see her again, and offer what solace I could. Her rooms were the deep velvet of space and the bare light I brought from the hallway barely penetrated. She lay asleep in a ball on her makeshift bed. I wondered if she were using her power unconsciously as a defense mechanism to protect her in her sleep.

I didn’t enter any further. I had no right to intrude. The door softly hissed shut and I leaned against it, looking at the ceiling. How does Imra do it? How does she know how to handle these things?

...Make them go away...

She'd wanted a solution, and asked me to provide it. All I'd been able to do was offer cold logic. I couldn't do what she'd asked of me. I couldn't make the monster go away. The best my science had to offer was to lock the monster back into its cage. As the leader, I failed her.

So now, the look in her eyes haunts me. Not the moment of her begging me to put the universe to rights again. But the moment of despair and shaken faith when I told her I couldn't.

...I don’t want any more monsters, Brainiac...

...Make them go away...