2014.07.23 - All Will Be Well: Hope Burns Bright!

For weeks, the Entity of Hope known as Adara has been on Earth. And it has been busy. Damages have been undone, evils stopped, people in peril rescued, and a general sense of hope restored wherever the glowing blue bird goes. At it's side through the whole adventure has been the masked teen hero known as Axiom, tasked with protecting the Entity and guiding it while it's on Earth. Of course lately he's been serving as host for the weakened Entity, getting more proactive with the 'spreading hope' work even if he's sometimes clashing with the Entity over how far it goes. The general public is unaware of the combination for the most part, Axiom having been trying to keep it secret so as not to worry them but some have spotted him in action. Today, he's made another appearance.

Not too far from Central Park, a fire broke out in an apartment building. With the FDNY having great difficulty reaching the area, hope seemed lost. Until hope arrived with a hawk's cry and a flash of light. Floating in the air, Axiom made quick work of the flames and is currently working on restoring damages done to the building and healing those injured. It's hard to miss him floating there and there are some people that are definitely looking for him...

Not too far away, some people held up a convenience store and tried to get away. Their car is now sitting upside-down on one of the taller buildings in the area, with the robbers zip-tied around it. Zenith is soon flying away, only to spot Axiom dealing with the fire and flying over closer, "Everything going ok?"

As for Terry, he's out in his civilian disguise for the moment... in other words, it's an every day occurence for the shapeshifter, who's in the midst of work at the moment -- something made obvious by the cardboard tube slung across his back. He... had stopped to keep an eye on the situation, and to transmit the location of the problem to the rest of the team that would be more effective in such a situation than he is. Afterall, he might be a shapeshifter, but it's not of the helpful kind. It's of the punchy-mcsmash kind with no real wiggle room.

Fortunately, it looks like Axiom and Zenith have things more than covered through their own presence -- so for the moment, he's the dark spot in the crowd who's staying on reserve, just in case his particular talents come into play.

Thankfully Axiom was on the scene of the fire in time to save people, the news of the danger is posed spread to the teenaged master of the mystic Wiccan too late for him to be of any help. In the chaos of cleaning up after the fire the small flash of light, and the smell of ozone are unlikely to get noticed at all as the crimson cloaked hero teleports in just above a near by building scanning the area to make sure there is no need for him before dropping lightly onto his feet on the probably ignored roof top to watch Axiom finish the clean up.

Axiom tenses slightly as his friends arrive, fighting that urge to greet them. He's concentrating on the work at hand after all. The glowing blue power booster offers a smile to Zenith and a quick nod. Just as he's finished repairing the building, the situation gets a bit out of hand.

Anyone watching the sky will see a bright flash of yellow before a very large, glowing yellow spiked fist comes flying from behind some clouds and smashes Axiom right down into the pavement. Where'd that come from? Well there's a pair of alien figures surrounded by a yellow glow decending towards the street. One is thin, orange and bird-like while the other looks like a reject Frankenstein's monster. Each wears a yellow and black uniform and each wears the symbol of the Sinestro Corps.

That's not the only newcommer on the scene. No, an unmarked delivery truck has driven up but something seems off about it. It's edges are fuzzy and blurred...like it might not actually be there. The windows are tinted too, hiding the driver and for the moment...the truck remains motionless.

Zenith turns his eyes, suddenly glowing red with suppressed heat-vision, towards the aliens after Axiom is smashed into the building. "Hey!" In a blink he's flying at high speed, right towards the bird-like alien, fist leading the way.

Not being close to the others, and having a vantage point from on topof near by building Wiccan has perhaps a better chance at spotting that flash of yellow descending formt he sky than most. Unfortunetly he is not quite fast enough when it comes to realizing jsut what is about to happen. He is already chanting a spell by the time he takes to the air, one that is just forming a protective cocoon around Axiom when the spiked fist strikes only to be shattered before it can compleatly form. With luck at least it will have taken enough of the brunt of the attack to keep Axiom from being too injured. In a flash he is floating between the yellow glowing aliens and his felled friend. "I don't know who you guys think you are, but your not getting away with hurting my friend."

The two aliens don't seem all that intimidated. If anything, the glows around them grow brighter as people below scream and scatter. Zenith's approach is met with a glowing wall of spikes sent flying his way by the Franken-Reject. The bird-like alien meanwhile squawks out a laugh at Wiccan. "Out of the way, we're here to snuff out that light," he demands, firing a blast of energy at Wiccan.

Down below, the glowing fist melts away into nothingness. Axiom, facedown in the pavement seems more surprised than hurt thanks to a combination of Wiccan's spell and the energy around him. He starts to get up and as he does, that truck acts. The hologram of the back flickers off to reveal half a dozen exo-suits being piloted by AIM scientists. Two move into defensive positions while the remaining four suits hold up a rather strange and sci-fi looking device. It hums to life slowly. "Firing phase distorter!" one of the exo-suited bee-keepers declares before the machine fires. A brilliant green beam lances forth and impacts Axiom, creating a swirling vortex of green and blue around him and hiding him from sight. Whatever's going on down there probably isn't good.

Zenith barely manages to dodge the wall of spikes, but flies back, getting a little distance again. His glowing eyes flash as he shoots his heat vision at the aliens, though more to keep them on the defensive than with any expectation of actually hurting them, "That light is not going anywhere."

As the beam of energy is fired at him Wiccan's eyes glow and he holds out a hand, "Barrier, Barrier, Barrier!" He pours all his will power into creating a wall of bluish glowing energy between him and the bird like alien. He might normally dodge and test the strength of those blasts before trying to counter them, but floating where he was directly between Axiom and the Aliens he did not want to risk them using his dodging as a chance to fire on his friend again. "Nobody is snuffing out any light, not while I am around." The atempted abduction of Axiom on the ground goes compleatly missed by Wiccan, at least for now, given that he is concentrating entierly on the evil aliens with what look like Green Lantern powers, only yellow. Something about the whole thing is niggling at his fanboy senses but it is not leaping out at his concious mind, at least not yet.

The Franken-Reject creates a shield of out yellow light, defending against Zenith's heat vision and advancing on him. Big, meaty hands grab at the kryptonian once he gets close enough, the Sinestro Corpsman looking to get physical.

The blast from the orange bird crashes against Wiccan's barrier powerfully. Cracks form in it but it holds for the time being. The bird-alien meanwhile just laughs and keeps firing.

Down below, 'attempted' is the key word. The vortex has Axiom engulfed for a few moments but soon enough, it's shrinking and a blue beam is pushing back against the green one. Jaw clenched, Axiom's a little busy right now.

Zenith grins, perfectly happy to get physical with the Franken-Reject. He doesn't let himself get grabbed, though, using his smaller size and combat training to duck under the jab, getting close, however, to punch the Franken-Reject's belly.

As the orange bird of crankyness slams into his shield Wiccan pours more energy into it make those cracks start to heal. "Sorry, but your going to have to do better than that to get past me." There is a small grin on Wiccan's face as an idea comes to him. "How about a little Storm to liven things up?" There is a sudden crackle of energy around Wiccan, and the sky darkens a little as clouds form out of nowhere. "Tell you what Big Bird, lets go have a conversationw ith Oscar?" As he quips several lighting strike out of the clouds aimed at the bird like alien's back at Wiccan's command all angled to try and knock him not only out of the air, but into a dumpster sitting at the edge of a near by alley way if he can keep the villian from recovering enough to stop any fall.

Franken-Reject isn't as fast as Zenith, no. The punch impacts and there's a crack...but a pause. Franken-Reject is pretty solid and the ring-generated forcefield around him adds another layer of protection. That dull face spreads into a yellowed smile before the hulking alien slams an axe-handle blow down on top of Lor with strength to rival the average Kryptonian.

That's downside of fighting aliens. They don't understand the references. The first few lightning strikes hit the orange bird and disrupt the beam he's been firing. But unlike his partner, the bird is faster. It starts blocking the bolts, and dodging about. "So you're not boring," the bird whispers. "Let's have some fun!" he speaks up. It takes a deep breath and starts emitting a high-pitched screeching noise in Wiccan's direction while it's eyes glow bright red.

Zenith gets hit, knocked to the ground below and crushing a (thankfully empty) parked car. "Ow... sorry," he adds, in case the owner is somewhere nearby, as he picks himself out of the wreckage. Then, though, ripping the bumper off the car, he's flying into the air again, flying in a spiral to try to confuse Franken-Reject until he comes in for a Baseball-styled swing at the monster's head.

"Nope, not boring. I'm a whole bundle of fun." Wiccan says as he drops like a stone for about 20 feet before carching himself and zipping to his right. The instant he heard the loud screech start his first thought was that it is probably some kind of concussive blast, and given half the time he has to hear himself to get any complex magic working he does not want to be hit with something that is going to render him deaf for even a short period of time. "Muzzel it Birdo!" He calls out while gesturing at the alien with his middle and ring fingers pressed against his palms and his thumb, pointer, and pinkie fingers held out straight. With a small flash of light streamers of bright pink ribbons fly from his hands aimed at the Sinsestro Corps member's beak. Sure the alien does not get any of his refferences, but half the time his own team does not get most of them and that does not take any of hte fun away from it for Wiccan.

Confusing the creature definitely isn't hard. Franken-Reject isn't the brightest bulb in the Lantern corps...figuratively speaking. It tries to follow Zenith's movements but just ends up getting smacked in the head with a bumper. The bumper bends and warps and the creature's hair is knocked clean off. Yes...evil space alien wore a wig. Probably for a reason because it's scalp is a mass of scars and burn marks. The blow has dazed the creature for the time being so Lor has an opening.

There's more to the screeching than Wiccan realizes and he's about to find that out the hard way. The ribbons fly but the bird creature stops on it's own, lifting it's ring hand. A construct appears with a flash of golden light that knocks the ribbon off course. When the light clears there's a new figure there. A construct version of Wiccan...looking more like how he was while possessed by Chthon than himself. The construct Wiccan smiles before letting golden lightning arc at the real deal.

Zenith blinks at the flying wig, but his startlement lasts only a moment. The bumper may be bent and warped, but it's still pretty solid, so he continues to hit Franken-Reject with it for the moment, swinging from different angles in his attempt to disable the creature.

Wiccan blinks as he sees the duplicate of himself appear and remembering what it was like when he was possesed by Chthon just for a second has a spike of fear go through him at seeing what he looked like in the middle of that horror. Heart racing he ducks to the side as the evil replica of himself lets loose with a bolt of yellow lighting. Not good, not good, this is not the time for /him/ of all people to suddenly find a way to manifest again and attack Wiccan.

The blows keep coming in on Franken-Reject but it doesn't seem to move him much. The creature grunts several times before firing off a blast of energy to force Zenith away and melt the bumper.

The bird-alien floats backwards, letting the construct take the lead. As Wiccan dodges, the construct starts floating towards him. "Is that the best you can do?" it even speaks with his voice. "Perhaps your heart just isn't in it. Not like when you were with me. You enjoyed that. I could feel it. The pain, the suffering...deep down inside, you -crave- to inflict it more," the construct goes on, tossing a force blast at Wiccan. Zenith flies back quickly, the bumper melting away in his hands and says, "Well, worth a try." He shoots another blast of heat-vision at Franken-Reject's face and calls to Wiccan, "Wanna swap?"

Wiccan tries to dodge out of the way of the blast from the evil energy formof himself but manages to get clipped in the shoulder before being knocked into the side of a building. Fear keeps building in him from the words of his duplicate verging on panic till something strikes him. The construct is not quite right. The voice is how he sounded possesed sure but, there is a yellow tint to it not a red and black one, and the choice in words is not quite right. "No, your...your not him. Your jsut a pale copy..." He says the words as the realization comes to him. The construct is nothing more than a reflection of his own...his own fears. Wiccan pushes himself from the bulding in time to avoid the blasts from his duplicate and floats higher starting to glow. "I must not fear. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me." He starts to chant the Bene Gesserit litany against fear as he wraps power around himself as a force field. "Don't worry Zenith, I have this one..." He calls out in the middle of the chant. "Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain!" As he finishes there is a flash and everything he pulled around himself as a protective bubble burses forwards as a blast of energy focused at calming and dispelling fear.

The heat vision brings a loud, pained cry from the Franken-Reject as it's burnt. Shield go up after a moment and the creature reaches up to adjust it's hair...only to realize it's gone. The creature's dull expression slowly evolves into one of rage. The beast lets out a roar and flies at Zenith a lot faster. It's jaw stretches as it tries to bite at the young hero. And by the size of those jaws, it could probably swallow Zenith whole if he's not careful!

"Are you going to try your weak little spells again? A failed container like yourself has no hope of stopping me. I should have taken the other one I created. He wouldn't have been so pathetic," the construct goes on, almost bored. When Wiccan's spell goes of, the construct scowls and raises a glowing golden shield. The lantern behind it meanwhile looks shocked. He goes from watching with satisfaction to struggling to maintain the construct.

Down below, the beam struggle is continuing. AIM's beam is making it difficult for Axiom to maintain his connection to Adara and the scientists with poor fashion sense are quickly replacing power cells in their weapon. "They have endangered hope, we must destroy them," Adara's voice comes from Axiom's mouth.

"NO! We don't kill!" Axiom argues back. "If you do not act, your friends will perish. The weilders of fear's light are far more deadly than they are prepared for!"

"I told you, w-we can do this without killing and I'm not letting you control my body again!"

"You have no choice. I am sorry. All will be well."

The glow around Axiom grows brighter and the masked teen lets out a pained yell. Still maintaining the beam struggle, the glow gets brighter and brighter until..."Yes...I...DO!" Axiom unleashes a brighter blast, flooring the AIM agents and melting their gear into...yes...gumballs. Two objects form in the air in front of him and rush upwards as Axiom falls to his hands and knees.

Those objects? Rings. Rings that fly rapidly to Zenith and Wiccan, finding their way onto their fingers.

William Kaplan of Earth. You have the ability to instill great hope in others. Welcome to the Blue Lantern Corps. Lor-Zodd of the Phantom Zone. You have the ability to instill great hope in others. Welcome to the Blue Lantern Corps.

With those words, the two young heroes will find themselves flooded with power. Like getting boosted by Axiom after drinking a case of energy drinks. Along with it comes with a strong sense of hope an optimism...along with spiffy new Blue Lantern themed versions of their costumes.

Zenith's eyes widen and he zips back away from Franken-Reject, dodging left and right until he suddenly finds that ring on his finger. He blinks, but then smiles as the hope fills him. He says something in Kryptonian, likely translated something close to 'Awesome'. Glowing, he flies towards Franken-Reject again, dodging the jaws as he gives an enhanced punch at the creature's extended jaw from the side. "You won't win, give up."

Wiccan keeps chanting what he was focusing on disrupting the feelings of fear in the area working to banish the construct copy of himself that way when the ring appears on his finger. In an instant he feels the flood of power bursting through him and and the chant changes. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. In Fearful day, in Raging Night. With stronghearts full, our souls ignite, When all seems lost in the war of light, Look to the stars for Hope burns bright!" With the last said there is a bright glow of blue light and a lightning like bolt of pure blue energy shot from Wiccan's hand aimed for his double. When the glow drops to a level that it is possible to look at Wiccan without shielding eyes he is in a mostly white version of his costume with a blue cape instead of his normal red one with a symbol on his chest that looks almost like a simplified line drawing of a bird inside a circle with a blue background, his head peice is a gleaming silver peice with large wings framing his head and his foot ware have gone from sinsable shoes to pixie boots for some reason. Eyes glowing with blue energy Wiccan blinks a couple of times before saying, "Why do I get the sudden feeling I should be declairing myself Kwisatz Haderach?"

It's a bad day to be a Yellow Lantern. Even as Lor-Zodd gets upgraded, Franken-Reject is too dumb to realize it should give up. Until it's getting punched. Zenith's blow hits hard, knocking teeth out and sending Franken-Reject flying into that same wrecked car Lor did earlier.

The construct Wiccan and it's yellow lantern master continue to fight against the original, the lantern sweating and struggling. When Wiccan goes all shiny, the construct yells out an animalistic cry as it's shattered into motes of yellow light. The lanterntumbles a moment, shielding his eyes and snarling at Wiccan. "You'll die, ape!"

"That course of action would be most unwise!"

A new voice can be heard as two more alien figures appear. Both are glowing blue and sport the same symbol that Wiccan and Zenith now wear. One is a pale white male with a pleasant smile on his face. The other appears to be a large, humanoid elephant. They lower down until they're at Wiccan's side. "We would much rather noto fight you but we will if you persist," the elephant says calmly. Orange bird actually hisses, weighing his options before pointing down at Franken-Reject. Glowing yellos chains form around the beast complete with a muzzle. The alien bird makes a rather rude gesture before taking off into the sky, dragging the other yellow lantern with it.

Zenith turns towards the bird creature, but then watches as the two retreat. He looks back to the new arrivals, flying down to hover near them and Wiccan, and says, "Thank you for the help." Blue Lantern Wiccanis about to start a binding spell to trap the enraged orange birdman when the voice speaks out. Exactly what he would do with the trapped alien once he had him, he has no idea other than trying to find a Green Lantern to take them off to space jail or whatever it is they do but as the villians run he does not have to worry about that. After a second he turns so that he can face the new people and gives them a small smile and wave. "Welcome to Earth? Thank you for the help and...I think this is yours." The last is said as he reaches to his hand and pulls off the blue ring in order to offer it to them. When the ring comes off his costume returns to something closer to normal, although the big wings seem to be staying on his circlet for now and the black stripes along the side that support moving star patterns are noticbly more blue than black. "Or at least to the big bird inside my friend, but either way..."

Both aliens bow in the air to Wiccan and Zenith. "We thank you for your assistance today and apologize for not arriving sooner. I am Saint Walker," the smaller of the two speaks. "And this is Brother Warth," he gestures to the elephant. When Wiccan offers the ring, Warth reaches to take it only for the ring to fade right into thin air. Zenith's is fading as well, much to Warth's surprise. "Could you kindly direct us to Adara and your friend. We have been asked to escort Adara back to planet Odym," Saint Walker goes on.

Down below, Axiom is pushing to his feet. Again, a glowing blue sword appears in his hand and he starts walking towards the unconscious AIM soldiers. He only gets too steps before turning the sword around...and stabbing himself with it. "Get," Axiom lifts a hand, creating a lantern made of brilliant blue metal. "out of m-my head!" Axiom demands, pulling the sword back out and plunging it into the lantern. There's no wound or blood but there is a bird's cry and a bright flash of light. When it clears, Eddie's left leaning against the AIM truck and panting heavily.

He's back to his normal costume too. No longer glowing and no more sword. Just holding that glowing blue lantern. Zenith nods and starts to say something, but then blinks as he looks down to Axiom stabbing himself. He floats quickly down towards his friend, "Are you alright?" He does glance curiously to the lantern, but at that moment seems more concerned for his friend than Adara.

Wiccan blinks as the ring suddenly disapears as he offers it back to Brother Warth. That was...far from the oddest thing he has ever seen and that thought is either a little sad or heartening, he is not sure which yet. "You arrived just in time, I am Wiccan and Axiom and Adara are over..." He turns to point where Axiom had landed and for the first time sees the details of what happened just as his friend takes the blue sword and stabs himself. There is a gasp and then the bird cry happens and Adara appears to have left his friend. In a flash of energy Wiccan teleports to Axiom's side near Zenith. "E..Axiom ... " He is about to ask if he is ok but Zenith already beat him to the punch there. The Blue Lanterns are just going to have to wait a bit while the Young Allies make sure one of thier own is not badly injured before figuing our what happened to thier Bird God Entity thing.

Axiom smiles as Wiccan and Zenith come nearer. He starts to stand up fully...but ends up stumbling and leaning against Wiccan. Fighting a cosmic entity for control of your body take it out of a guy. "I'm f-f-fine. Had to kick Adara out...something that Kree weapon did hurt it b-b-badly. It needs time to recover," he says, holding up the lantern. The two aliens slowly lower down and land, waiting for the heroes to finish their conversation.

Zenith shakes his head as Axiom stumbles, "And now /you/ need to recover. Copy my powers, get some time in the sun, get your strength back." He offers his hand, even though he knows that Axiom can copy his power from a distance.

Wiccan nods and sighs a little. "If its not hte Kree it's the Skrull, or demons, or..." He stops and loosk at the group of people that Axiom had been dealing with. "Or the evil bee keepers association. I'd call it job security, but it is not like any of us get paid." There is a little shake of his head before he looks at the lantern Axiom has and then the Blue Lanterns guessing that it has what they came for. "I was gonna say bad movies and osme of Dad's snickerdoodles ...but that sounds like a pretty good idea too." Wiccan offers up after Zenith makes his sugestion.

"In a m-minute. And you guys have to come with me," Axiom says to Zenith. He gives Wiccan's shoulder a squeeze and then laughs a little. "We d-don't do this to get paid," he reminds his friend. "I'll b-b-be right with you guys," he says, walking over to the Blue Lanterns. He has a short conversation with them both, explaining that Adara needs to be healed and that he's done his best to keep it safe. Handing the Lantern to Saint Walker, the three bow to one another and Axiom turns to his friends as the Lanterns fly off. "Let's g-g-get in the air. I'll mimic you up there...then we c-can go back to the Terminal for bad movies and c-cookies."

Zenith watches as the Blue Lanterns fly off, and then he smiles back to Axiom and nods, "Sounds great." He lifts into the air again, though not flying too far from Axiom.

Wiccan grins at his friend glad to at least get a smile and a laugh out of him. He waits while Axiom gives the lantern over to Saint Walker and Brother Warth offering them a bow as well when they appear to be looking in his direction at any point near when they appear ready to leave. When Zenith lifts off Wiccan does too conjuring up a glowing platform for Axiom in case he wants to ride along instead of copying powers.

Axiom rides the platform into the clouds but once they're up there, he boosts and mimics Zenith just like he said he would. Tonight the light of hope burns bright.

Lightyears away, other lights are sparking. What they'll do or if the Earth will ever face their shining is a story for another time...