Justice League of America - Batman: The Stone King (22 page)

"Refracted light waves," Batman said quietly. "The thing's invisible until you're in front of it."

J'onn's feet left the ground, and he hovered in the air above the grass. He was able to fly using his telekinetic abilities, the power of his mind alone carrying him through the air.

"Going up?" he asked.

Batman shook his head. "I'll climb, thanks."

Like Cassandra, who had been taught by her grandmother, Batman had an incredible eye for detail. On the previous trip to the pyramid, he had committed as much of its layout and setting to memory as he could. He wanted to confirm that knowledge now and get his bearings, before rushing into confrontation with their dangerous foe.

"The hidden chamber was on the fifth course," he told J'onn as he began to clamber up the pyramid's side, the Martian hovering close to him. Here and there tufts of parched grass grew between the stones. "We should check it out before we do anything else."

"I can use my telepathy," J'onn suggested, "to probe the Stone King's mind. If he's here, that is. It might give us an insight into how to tackle him."

"Too risky." Batman clambered onto the third course, springing over the flat-packed stone to reach the next part of the upward climb. "If he realizes what's going on, it'll alert him to our presence. Judging by what happened last time, he's likely to come out on top in any confrontation. Best if we keep the element of surprise on our side."

The words were hardly out of Batman's mouth when he realized that the element of surprise had already been lost. Even as he reached out for a handhold to haul himself up onto the pyramid's next ledge, something was forming in the air above him. A patch of what he'd taken to be night mist began to swirl and take on solid shape.

Batman caught a glimpse of scaly, lizardlike skin, a pair of eyes glowing like fiery coals, and a long, thick tail surmounted by a spiked knob.

Then the thing was diving at him, and he was falling back in an attempt to cushion its assault. He heard Manhunter's exclamation of surprise and guessed mat he, too, had come under attack.

Before they had time to react, the world became a madhouse of flashing claws and jagged, ripping teeth.

The shaman stood in the hidden chamber, his head thrown back and his arms outstretched as a symphony of colored lights flashed from his fingertips. They danced in the air like living things, red and blue and gold swooping and swirling, coalescing and breaking up again into individual patterns. They played around the heads of the captured heroes, lighting them up in grotesque caricature, draining them of their incredible powers.

Peter Glaston felt unaccountably stronger. He'd made several tentative attempts to approach his possessor's mind, to get inside it and learn its strengths and weaknesses. What he found there was the history of an evil man.

Five thousand years ago, the Stone King reigned supreme over a sprawling empire in what is now considered North America. He had been brought up as one of the elite astronomer-priests, an interpreter of cosmic omens, the human link between the gods above and the people below. It was his sacred duty to maintain the balance between what his human subjects needed and what the earth could provide for them.

The Stone King was well-versed in the paths of power. He'd been taught how to control the potent energies mat swept through the earth and lay hidden in the secret depths of the stones. He knew secrets it had taken his ancestors tens of thousands of years to accumulate.

When his training was done, he should have taken his place as the people's champion, the bridge between the stones and the stars. His was the task of guiding his far-flung tribes, of ensuring that the rituals and practices they had kept for millennia would continue unchanged.

But the Stone King had other plans. The power he wielded had seduced him, corrupting the ideals implanted in him by his priestly teachers. Instead of being his people's servant, he would be their master through power and pain and torture.

As if in a vision, Peter saw a horde of warriors swarming like worker ants to construct the Stone King's Pyramid of Power. He saw the shaman stand atop it, surrounded by a blazing aura as the earth energies coursed around and through his body. The people bowed their heads and made obeisance. Lacking rational consciousness, their impressionable minds accepted everything at face value.

This man in the bull mask was their master; they had no choice but to serve him, to follow his every command.

Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

The Stone King's demands increased. He took the tribe's healthiest, most fertile women and locked them in a hidden compound to which only he had access. He executed the tribal elders to prevent any action they might take against him. He sent his warrior bands to raid rival tribes, slaughtering the men and stealing their women for himself and their children for grisly human sacrifice.

Then came the drought. The rains ceased and the sun grew hotter, until the rivers themselves dried up. It was the shaman's age-old task to help his people, to ease their suffering, to tell them why the gods were angry and make the appropriate sacrifice to propitiate them.

But the Stone King's tyranny knew no bounds. He began to demand the tribe's own children, intending to sacrifice them in appeasement.

It was a step too far.

Peter saw a group of warriors creeping up the pyramid on a moonless night. Stone axes rose and fell. A poison-tipped spear impaled the shaman's chest even as he struggled and showered them with vile curses. He died with vengeance on his lips and a burning black hatred in his heart.

They burned his body on the altar in the secret chamber. They buried the ax head–the symbol of the Stone King's power–in the chamber floor. Then they closed up the entrance with heavy stone slabs and turned their backs on the pyramid and the traditions of ten thousand years. Then the whole tribe abandoned the area to seek water elsewhere.

So . . . at least he can be beaten,
Peter thought, contemplating all he had gleaned.

The knowledge gave him fresh heart. He knew it was now or never. The Stone King intended to annihilate every man, woman, and child on earth . . . and somehow, he seemed to have the power to do it.

"Screw your courage to the sticking-place."

The line from a Shakespeare play he'd read in first-year English Literature came back to him. But Peter's courage was already screwed to the sticking-place . . . and he felt as if it was indeed
stuck.
He couldn't go any further.

No!
his mind protested.
You have to do it! Just don't be beaten by your own fear.

He wavered, his mind running through all the options, dreading what might happen to him. If he failed, the Stone King might torture him forever. Or wipe him out as if he never existed. Or drive him mad, an insane captive in a mind that was no longer his own. Or . . .

If he succeeded, perhaps everything would be restored to the way it had been.

But how to do it? This was Peter's mind; surely he could choose the arena of battle? Or, the thought occurred to him, maybe even create it!

Peter had been a member of the university fencing team for a couple of semesters, until archaeology claimed his interest full-time. He hadn't been very good at it, but at least he knew how to hold a blade, how to wield it and avoid getting hurt by his opponent.

He imagined himself a hero, like Superman or Batman, tall and proud and strong. As if in answer, somehow, a burnished sword of justice appeared, flaming, in his hand. There was a bright metal shield strapped to his left forearm.

He saw his foe dad in skins, his bull's head and horns held high. Peter no longer saw him as a fiend from hell, only a man, an evil man whose power was awesome but not total.

Peter took a deep, metaphorical breath . . . and charged.

"You don't really expect me to drop everything and drive out of town with someone I don't even know?"

There was incredulity in Jenny Ayles's voice. She stood in the half-open doorway of the apartment she shared with two other young women, staring at the stranger whose windswept platinum hair tangled around her pretty face.

Cassandra had expected to be greeted this way. She herself would have reacted no differently. She sought for the words to convince Jenny of the rightness of her cause.

Within an hour of emerging from her coma, Cassandra had walked out of the hospital, Dr. Clay Valerian's dire warnings ringing in her ears.

"We haven't finished your tests," he protested. "There could be something serious!"

But Cassandra felt fine, at least physically. Inside, she was deeply afraid of what she knew she had to do. But she forced herself to sign the treatment waiver the nurse held in front of her, reclaimed her own clothing, and hurried out into the street.

She had just enough money in her pocketbook to cover the cab fare to her apartment. Her thoughts raced urgently as the taxi driver sped through the streets. People were already starting to gather for the street party; it wasn't dark yet, and their masquerade costumes made them stand out like sore thumbs.

Halloween,
she thought, feeling a stab of pity for the would-be partygoers,
the day the Stone King will destroy the world! And I might be the only person who can stop him. . . .

The solution had come to her in those confused minutes that followed her awakening. The Stone King was really Peter Glaston, possessed by a spirit stronger than himself. But if Glaston's mind still survived, it should be possible to make contact and urge him to throw off the mental shackles that bound him.

And what better person to do it than the girl Peter loved?

Batman had told her and the commissioner about Jenny Ayles, the possessed man's girlfriend. Cassandra had no idea where Batman might be. And no doubt Commissioner Gordon would have his hands full with policing the street party. This was something Cassandra would have to do alone.

She had found Jenny's address in the telephone directory and decided to have a quick shower and change of clothing before heading over there. She'd switched on her radio and stood soaping herself in the shower's stinging jets as she listened to the news of the mayhem that had befallen the world.

From Ohio's Serpent Mound to Uluru, Ayers Rock, in the middle of the Australian outback, the same horrifying picture was presented. Strange energies had erupted from every sacred site, bringing death and destruction to the immediate vicinity. Emergency and military teams had been despatched to back up the two dozen or so Justice League heroes who, thanks to Batman's warning, were already directing rescue and damage control exercises.

After the first violent outpourings, the energy levels seemed to have stabilized.

At least it's not getting any worse,
Cassandra thought, then added,
Yet.

She'd called another cab, then barely had time to towel-dry her hair before she heard the driver honking his horn down on the street.

Her driver was a young eastern European immigrant who seemed to speak little English but who kept up a deprecatory commentary on the journey in his own language. Cassandra was surprised to see the growing crowds, many in fancy dress or scary Halloween masks. Didn't they listen to the news? Didn't they know the world was facing a crisis and the Justice League's most powerful members were missing in action? How could they even think of partying when they, and the planet itself, were skirting so close to doom?

Perhaps it was because the thought of impending disaster was so hard to accept. The street party filled some psychological need–as if it was easier for people to bury their heads in the sand, to pretend that if they acted normally, then everything would soon return to normal.

Cassandra was one of the few who knew that wasn't the case. She breathed a heartfelt sigh of relief when she discovered Jenny at home.

A sea mist had poured into Marlbuck Point overnight, and failed to lift in the morning. Jenny and Jamie Stewart had sat around for hours twiddling their thumbs before Hamish had sent them home rather than muddy up the dig. Besides, it would save him the expense of an afternoon's wages.

Jenny started to close the door–she'd had enough from the press, from strangers badgering her. The last thing she needed was to head off who knows where with a woman she didn't know, someone who wasn't even making any sense.

"It's Peter," Cassandra said with grim finality.

It was the last thing she'd wanted to say. She knew exactly how Jenny would react: shock, grief, a blade cutting at an open wound. Cassandra could literally feel the chill that swept through the girl.

"Peter?" Jenny whispered.

Cassandra apologized for her bluntness, but there really had been no other way to make Jenny listen. She started to give a hurried explanation of what had happened, but Jenny stopped her almost at once.

"You're saying Peter didn't kill Professor Mills?" The relief in the girl's voice was unmistakeable. "It was this . . . spirit that's possessed him?"

"That's what the Batman told me. And as far as I can judge, he's right." Cassandra glanced at her wrist, at the elegant, old-fashioned watch that had once belonged to her grandmother. "We don't have much time. Do you think we can talk while we travel? I have a cab waiting."

Jenny pulled a leather jacket from the hall-stand inside the door. "My car's not very passenger friendly," she confessed, "but it gets me to Marlbuck and back each day. I'd rather drive myself."

Cassandra paid off her driver, and minutes later Jenny's fifteen-year-old Nissan compact was heading for the city limits. The springs in the passenger seat had worn out years ago, and Cassandra squirmed uncomfortably as they raced toward the freeway on-ramp at almost double the speed limit.

The flaming sword arced downward, with all of Peter's strength behind it.

Taken unaware, his bull-headed foe had no time to react. The gleaming blade sliced through the animal skins, biting deep into the shaman's flesh, sending him toppling to the sandy floor of Peter's imagined arena.