3246/War of the Worlds Finale: Meanwhile, In Orbit

War of the Worlds Finale: Meanwhile, In Orbit
Date of Scene:	05 September 2020
Location:	Earth orbit
Synopsis:	The Titans (and friends) implement the other half of the plan to deal with the Warzoon invasion. While forces battle the invaders on earth, a desperate plan goes into effect to force War World itself to retreat. The great battle station is infiltrated and Brainiac technology used to undermine it, while a fight takes place on the surface of War World itself to take out the shield generators. The mission is a success and War World flees - but not all the Titans return.
Cast of Characters:	Donna Troy, Caitlin Fairchild, America Chavez, Gar Logan, Angelica Jones, Kate Bishop, Karolina Dean, Dick Grayson, Terry O'Neil, Kian, Nadia Pym-van Dyne, Siobhan Smythe, Rachel Roth

---

Donna Troy has posed:
     Previously on War of the Worlds:

    Less than twenty-four hours ago, long-range scans had detected the presence of an alien fleet amassing in Jupiter orbit. At the heart of this fleet is War World, a giant space battle station, the size of a small moon.

    A quickly assembled band of Avengers, Titans and Leaguers engaged the fleet in Jupiter orbit, and found that War World was charging up a massive world-busting weapon from Jupiter's atmosphere. The heroes were able to use the powerful electrical fields of Jupiter against War World, channeling a vast lightning bolt into the station and disabling the canon. With some time bought, the heroes returned to Earth to warn of the impending invasion.

    Led by Mongul and General Zod, Warzoon forces from the War World descended on Metropolis, to be met by many of Earth's defenders. Battle continued in Earth Orbit against the Warzoon fleet, and most of War World's escort vessels were destroyed - though one of the three great dreadnoughts was boarded by a force of Titans, and captured. Ursa-Zod, captaining the dreadnought, was last seen falling to Earth after an epic showdown with Supergirl.

    In Metropolis groups of heroes battled hard against the invading forces, slowly driving them from the city, and destroying a great ground-based supergun being constructed just outside the city. Superman and a small collection of heavy-hitters battled Zod across the city, while other heroes engaged, and captured Mongul.

    The enemy fleet is scattered, but countless small fighter craft still fill the skies. Warzoon forces continue to fight through the city, attempting to free Mongul, but they are being slowly beaten back, and the Millennium Bridge has been secured as an evacuation route for civilians.

    In orbit, the Titans have hatched a desperate plan to use the captured Dreadnought to force War World into retreat, but they need more time. The destructive battle with Zod continues unabated, and Superman seeks another approach, to use the bottle-city of Kandor as bait. Ursa remains unaccounted for.

Donna Troy has posed:
    This part of Metropolis has been evacuated - anyone remaining is there to attack, or defend. A platoon of Warzoon advance, towards a small knot of heroes: Nightwing, Beast Boy, Kian, and Vorpal of the Titans, and Angelica, who has met up with them. Under Dick's expert guidance, the group has been fighting fiercely and providing the Warzoon forces in the area with a major headache, which they plan to eliminate. The ground shakes as behind them a mighty battle tank rumbles onward and readies its canons.

    The air is filled with a roaring as the Titan's T-Jet comes in to hover over the defenders. A pair of missiles roar out across the street and the tank and infantry platoon disappear in a cloud of dust. The jet drifts lower, blasts of air from the powerful vertical jets blowing out across the street. The rear cargo door lowers and Donna Troy leans out, waving the last members of the team to go into space on. "Get in! The mission is go!"

    It's crowded in the back of the T-jet; exhausted, sweaty heroes who have fought the invasion tooth and nail and are being asked for one final exertion - one great roll of the dice, a David vs. Goliath attempt to take on War World itself. In the cockpit, Caitlin pilots the craft up through the clouds. In the passenger section, America, Karolina, Kate, Siobhan, Raven, Dawn and Nadia are taking a rare opportunity to catch their breaths.

    As tired-looking as any there, battered and covered in blood, Donna Troy addresses the group as the T-Jet blasts into orbit, to rendezvous with the captured Dreadnought. "We're going into space. Check the seats behind you, you'll find an assortment of space suits, breathers and so on. It's a bit haphazard. Make the best of it. We will be rendezvousing with the captured dreadnought in five minutes. We are going to drive back War World. We cannot do that by direct assault, it's simply too big and too powerful. We are going to use trickery. We have sent dozens of damaged Warzoon fighters to dock in War World, each packed with explosives. We are going to need to send a team to infiltrate War World itself, to get a software package onto their ship's systems. We're going to need to engage the immediate defenses of War World to buy time, and get the infiltration team on board. We need to take out the force shield projector arrays, which are in four spots on the surface of the ship. Get suited up, and if anyone has any questions, now is the time to ask."

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
"From the flight deck, this is your pilot Captain Fairchild," says the redhead over the internal comms. "Our in-flight entertainment tonight is a great speech from Troia, Princessiest of the Amazons. If you look behind your seats you'll find your emergency kits along with appropriate gear for a spacewalk. Please bear in mind that your space gear is not meant for prolonged use and should be used only for emergencies, like the one we're barreling into."

Caitlin reaches up and flips switches overhead, then focuses on the task of taking the T-jet through a narrow magnetic gap that should disguise their hull ionization from sensors. "In the event of a water landing, everyone please remember to blame Garth for not being here if you cannot swim, and no, I cannot be used as a flotation device. If you're hungry, there are snacky shakes in the gear locker. Next dining stop will be on Earth, hopefully. We know you have a choice in superhero teams, and if you have any last minute regrets about joining the Titans, please file your complaints with Nightwing or Donna and we'll get to them in the order received. Thank you for flying Titan Airlines."

America Chavez has posed:
America grabs a breather - just in case. She's never flown around in space before, and she's uncertain if her unique physique could withstand the different pressure and breathing or not. Now isn't the time to test that.

She might be tired, but she's got a -lot- of fight left in her. "Team Distraction," she says. Because that's where the -real- fight will be, in her mind. "I'll leave the infiltration to others better suited for it."

She rolls her shoulders, "Besides. It's not everday I get to punch a spaceship," she says, making the most out of the situation despite the seriousness of it all. "Let's all watch each other's asses, and kick some alien ass. We got a planet to protect." That, afterall, is why she's here. And, despite her good spirits, there's an -intensity- about America that most of her teammates have only glimpsed at before, but never really seen come full out.

This, afterall, is the closest fight she's ever had that's anything remotely close to what she went through at home, before she left, that she's only talked about in vague references. "We got this."

Gar Logan has posed:
"Cool, so this is kind of like Independence Day, just more real," Beast Boy quips, in spite of his uniform being torn in places, in spite of blood dotting his body here and there, most of it not his. "Women, children, and Beast Boys on first!" he adds, amid a quick glance toward Vorpal to see how he's holding up.

The battle has already been a major one, and now they're going to be tasked with doing even more to help save the world again. It's not just the Titans doing it, either. While digging up one of the spacesuits, checking it for size, he asks the feline, in a quieter tone, "You holding up okay? I've got your back, dude." Then he reaches out, clutches something. "And I've got your tail." Afterward, he calls out, "Stewardess! I require a pillow, a martini, and a bag of no more than four mini pretzels!"

Angelica Jones has posed:
Do. Not. Hyperventilate.

Angelica, in her brand spanking new Fantastic Four get-up, isn't wearing her mask. Not among all of these folks. The outfit got her attention, even if she isn't really a member, and the fact that she was throwing bolts of explosion at robotic or armoured targets got her onto the team.

"What am I doing up HERE?" she asks herself, trying to keep from panicking. It's a gamble, an untested thing, but someone had a feeling, and she got shunted onto the space group on that hunch.

She might be an ace in the hole, or she might be a walking target. She's new, so it's not a certainty either way. So she gets a space suit and takes any help she can get.

"Firestar," she says softly. "Somebody help me make sure this is on right? Please?" Oh great. She's a rookie.

Kate Bishop has posed:
Kate is breathing heavily, thanking everything that her ribs are pretty much healed and fine at this point from the Ice Dragon Incident. <tm>

"You know.. I would be .. very excited if we could go six months at least at this point without an alien invasion. I mean seriously... what the hell is the deal about this... we did not need this on the heels of Brainiac fam."

She looks behind her seat. "Ooh.. okay... and here I thought the whole danger room zero gravity sim would never actually get used... if I live to write a memoire it will be fantastic... and I will not let Vorpal and Terry write it because it will be published on the same day that sea serpents attack and sink San Francisco or something.. maybe Godzilla emerges and eats New York..."

Probably too soon, poor Terry. Still Kate can't help the sass. It is innate.

She starts to go through the geat and finds stuff that works for her and starts suiting up. "God I hope we have atmo in whatever we are doing or I am going to be doing a whole lot of stabbing and bludgeoning because arrows do not work without air..."

"I'm game for infiltrating more."

Karolina Dean has posed:
    "We... never... had... to do... this much... in California..." Karolina takes long breaths, looking dusty and worn out, leaning back in her seat, slowly rotating the bracelet on her wrist. She's not glowing, not right now, but she still has a tired smile on her face. "But we weren't quite dealing with massive threats to Earth either... such a simple time..." she muses, smoothing out her clothes and leaning around to grab space gear.

    She looks around, getting her gear situated as best she can as well, climbing into the space suit. "It really does feel like our little blue dot in space is a magnet for things like this happening..." she gives a lopsided smile now, too, and casts a gentle look towards Angelica. "That makes two of us? I've never used something like this before. I've never been into space! I mean, I'm... not human but... I've only been on commercial airliners..."

    There's an absent amount of nervous gushing as she's coping with the combination of the wonder of going into space, the sheer terror of facing down an earth-threatening Not-A-Death-Star, and the tiredness of near non-stop fighting during this invasion. The junior Titan is, most certainly, dealing with a huge mix of feelings right now.

Dick Grayson has posed:
Nightwing had been able to help coordinate the defenses on the ground. He might have some stuff from the Bat Cave to help with this, but it is not the right time for the nuclear options, yet. The first Robin has held his own so far, working with his fellow Titans and others on the ground. Fortunately, the cavalry arrives and makes this a bit easier.

"All aboard going aboard," Nightwing says, gesturing to those on the ground, including Firestar. He makes a note to get his own space suit on before assisting others and stretches his neck, and attaches his utility belt and sticks outside of it. "Remember, fight smarter, not harder. And as always, as has been noted, I am the complaint department. Downside, due to backlogs there might be a slow turnaround." He smirks and nods to the others. Dick notes Firestar's comments and says, "You'll be fine. Looks like you got it on right, as long as it made the pop noise.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"Suuuure, rub it in my face, Hawkette," Vorpal says. He was clearly ticked off at the fact that there was an alien invasin going on. But still. Did they REALLY have to attack on the day his article, his magnum opus, the thing he had been working on for five months, came out?

Speaking of tails, the space suits didn't quite have an accomodation for one. He smirks at Gar, "Wanna hold on to my tail until I'm out of this?" he jokes, and stuffs himself into the space suit, curling his tail around one leg in a position that was very, very uncomfortable. He reaches over and squeezes Gar's hand with a grin, "I've got your back too. You don't want to lose it, otherwise where would you keep your backpack?"

He leans forward and sneaks a quick kiss on Gar's cheek before looking at the rest of the team. He gives America and Carolina a thumbs up, "You'll be awesome. We'll be absolutely fantabulous and we'll come back to get pizza, Nightwing's treat."

He moves over to help Firestar with her suit, and nods at Nightwing's assessment. "Looks fine. And also, remember: If you need a duck-out or an escape route, I'm literally a mini-wormhole generator, the same way that Cait is a snacky shake generator."

Kian has posed:
    Kían is not happy with the crowded conditions on the T-Jet, and *definitely* looks askance at the spacesuits, none of which look like what he's used to.  "Are you sure we are goin' to need these?" he asks dubiously.  "I've never need to suit up on a spaceship before.  Or does that thin' /leak/?"
    He shakes his head, and finds a place to sit, a little isolated, trying to get his mental bearings.
    As if he has anything to relate all this to.
    The only thing he can think of that he can do is shutting down inconvenient power sources, like those attached to shield generators and unnecessarily large weapons... what he doesn't know is if he can do that from the ship, or if he has to infiltrate with the rest.
    He doesn't look unhappy, but he does look pensive.

Nadia Pym-van Dyne has posed:
Nadia touches a button on her suit and there are whooshing sounds as the material tightens and seals, a clear piece coming down to cover the space where her mouth is normally visible as full environmental functions are activated, that apparently includes the vacuum of space, because of course it does this is Nadia.

She grins at Caitlin's announcement from where she sits strapped in, maybe it's just manic energy but even a full on alien invasion does not seem to be enough to dampen this girl's spirits. Opposite of that really, the sheer exhilaration of being in SPACE about to board a GIANT ARTIFICIAL SPACE BATTLE PLANET is fueling her to brand new heights of enthusiasm, "Regrets?! This is the coolest thing ever!"

Siobhan Smythe has posed:
Looking at the suits, Siohbhan takes one and starts to put it on before saying, "I'm not so sure dis is a good idea or even how dis'll work but alright." She states and then considers, "If I'm able to make sound in the suit den..." Her mind already starts to hurt on the idea of how a banshee's scream even works in space or if it does ta all. She shakes her head and then looks over at Nadia before looking forward and sitting down.

"At least someone is going to have a good time." She settles in before gesturing to Donna, "Can ya breathe on War World or is it a no breathin' zone? Kinda important information if ya ask me. Do I even need to breath? We really need to run more tests." She states simply enough before looking forward, "Tests I never t'ought we'd need to run but I prefer more tests."

Rachel Roth has posed:
    As this goes on, Raven looks more and more otherworldly. The others are battered and bruised, beaten, cut, and bathed in ex-alien.

    Raven is still pristine, and yet despite this, there is something unnatural about that fact. Her feet have not touched the ground in the past hour. Throughout the battle, the shadows have not stopped moving.

    She has not blinked in thirty minutes.

    Instead, her eyes are covered in a paradoxically shining darkness, like a second set of eyelids, each orb jet black yeah rimmed with a corona of perfect white, seemingly unable to return to normal, just like the rest of her.

    To any of the uninitiated, it would be... Eerie. A presence more alien and unknowable than the unknowable aliens. Others might be covered in gore, but Raven is the one that's unsettling just to look at.

    "Resistance remains." Her voice echoes through the Jet, as if coming from the walls and ceiling. "But they do not expect what we will bring."

Gar Logan has posed:
"Pumbaa, not in front of the kids." Beast Boy does a spot-on impression of the line just after Vorpal's given him a little smooch, but he returns the gesture anyway. "Times like this make me glad I don't have a tail by default, but these spacesuits, cool as they are, could complicate a few things." It's also not the first time he's worn one, given his prior acting resume. That, of course, was just pretendy times.

After finishing getting ready, he rubs his hands together. "I don't have any idea what I'm doing yet, but I'm ready to go save the world! That's what we do!" Of course, others here are going to have varying levels of enthusiasm when it comes to that.

Donna Troy has posed:
    Donna stops by Angelica, joining Nightwing and Vorpal in checking over her space suit and giving her a thumbs-up as the pair declare her safely suited - at least as safe as anything gets, in these circumstances. "Hey there," She says with a wearied smile. "I'm Donna. You seem to have been dragged along. If you want out, just say so, but we can use all the help we can get. "

    She crouches down for a moment by Karolina, looking the newest (and she is so very new!) Titan in the eyes. "You okay? This is kind of a baptism of fire, huh? I'd hoped we'd have time to get you on a little quiet training first but... hey. All good. Stay safe, okay? We've got your back." Donna gives Karolina's shoulder a quick pat and stands again, looking around.

    "Kian?" Donna calls out. "Suit up please. The T-Jet doesn't leak, unless it's hit with missiles or something, which might happen. But we're going to have to open the doors several times as some of us will be leaving into vacuum. Gar, you're not completely wrong about the Independence Day thing, and Hawkeye, you're wrong that we didn't need this on the heels of Brainiac, 'cos it turns out that's the ideal time. Vorp, Rae, we're going to have a lot of call on your teleporting abilities on this mission"

    Donna makes her way through the crowded bay to where Raven is, and stands facing her for a moment. She breaths deep, then lets out a long sigh, then smiles tiredly at the sorceress. Donna at least is not phased by the eeriness - she's used to it, by now. Her hand reaches out to clasp Ravens for a moment, squeezing and then letting go. Donna turns back to the crowd.

    The T-jet draws up alongside the battered Dreadnought, and slows to a halt, the two ships drifting together."Okay folks, listen up!" Donna calls out. "As you know, Brainiac kindly left us with some very smart software. The hardest part was breaking into a weird bit of self-replicating, mutating code that carries the Brainiac personality through the network. We never could figure out how to defeat that, so we got around it by filling it with empty code, a kind of blank DNA. It runs on its own virtual machine, and Cyborg has managed to get that ported over to the codebase the Dreadnought runs on, which we're hoping is compatible with Warworld's systems. Nightwing and Raven will lead an infiltration team onto War World itself and find a way to upload the code. Hawkeye, Nadia, Gar and Dawn, you are with them. As soon as you have the code uploaded, Raven will bring you back to the T-Jet."

    "Caitlin and I will be heading up the team to go to the surface of War World and take out the shields. She's got details of where the four shield projector units are. They'll take some heavy damage and need to be hit close in, under their own shield projection. Vorp, you'll get people under those shields to hit them. We expect heavy incoming defenses against that team. America, Angelica, Karolina, Kian and Sio will be with us. There will likely be troops sent out to intercept you and fighters attacking from above. Everyone clear?"

    Donna's T-com pings and she listens intently for a few moments, then makes her way forwards to the cockpit, staring through the window.

    "Okay, small change of plan. Cyborg has picked up a Warzoon assault squad in space suits heading towards the Dreadnought." Donna bites her lip in thought. "I'll stay to deal with them. We can't spare more people. Cait, shield mission is yours. Ready yourselves everyone!"

America Chavez has posed:
America looks over to Rachel, nods, soberly. She vows, "Hell know they won't. We're the Titans." She slams her fist into her open palm; an outline of a star pulses in white light like a ripple from a stone thrown into a lake when she does this. "We're going to make them regret ever coming here."

There is a nod given to Vorpal, "Good to know," about his mini-wormholes, that is. She looks back to Rachel, then nods again. That makes a couple of them on the team, but each with their own take, and facets to their traveling abilities.

A glance to Kate, and Dick as they choose the infiltration team. "Don't worry. We'll keep their eyes all on us," she promises. "But if what we're doing isn't big enough, let me know. I got a few ideas to pull out in case of an emergency." That look of intensity hasn't left her yet. And probably won't, until the end of it all.

"Looks good," she says to Firestar, regarding her suit. "But, I'm no expert on spacesuits," she also admits.

Then, Donna is talking, and America is listening. She only gives one nod to Donna, before moving to join Donna, "Ready to go kick some ass," she says, with absolute certainty. She looks over to measure the rest of those going with them, Donna she knows well enough, but she hadn't really worked with the others. Especially the newest member, Karolina. "Time to punch some ships, and some shields. Let's go." She moves to exit out the vaccum, then, and battle. No hesitation from this latina.

Kian has posed:
    "Missiles?"  It comes out as half a squeak, and Kían whitens visibly.  This is WAY outside his realm of experience.  Still, he gears up as best as he can manage.
    No one at home would believe a word of this.

Nadia Pym-van Dyne has posed:
Nadia begins the process of integrating a repulsor pack with her suit since it doesn't have that functionality, yet, and wings are not the most effective things in zero gravity.

She listens carefully to Donna's briefing taking mental notes, before finally asking "Is this a stealth sneaky infiltration or a fighting noisy infiltration like Brainiac's ship?"

Even as she asks she is checking through her various miniturized equipment, it is truly amazing how many things you can carry when it can all be made super tiny. "And will we be sticking together or splitting up based on ...unique skills?" It is certainly different from a Red Room briefing, but there is something about the banter and chaos that is kind of nice. The Red Room was never nice.

Angelica Jones has posed:
The help, and the kindness, from many people has Angelica's face beaming inside of her helmet. She looks good, she looks safe..she looks like she might throw up, but she gives a thumbs-up to Donna and Nightwing. They seem professional, and she needed that support right now. Though Donna's open heart makes her smile.

To Karo, she offers a hand. The girl looks more worried than I do! She's being quiet mostly though. She looks...almost ready enough. Enough to go die for her world. Because that's what's at stake.

"I can do it!" she says bravely. "You can do it Angelica," she tells herself, slightly more quietly. She looks like she used up most of her energy reserves fighting on the ground though. So the biting of her lower lip is totally incidental, as she listens to the briefing with uncertain panic.

Gar Logan has posed:
"We can both go smol," Beast Boy says to Nadia as he finishes his prep. And yes, 'smol' sounds different compared to 'small.' "Then we could get on ahead and relay back to the others what's what. I'm all for being as sneaky as possible."

He mimes this, in the classic Spy vs Spy way of creeping about. "Like so. Now then, to the moon! Or, I guess, the War World! Once the shields are down, of course."

Karolina Dean has posed:
    Karolina is thankful for the help, and the kind words. She nods, smiling brightly at Donna, even with smudges on her face from being down in the fighting. "It really is being tossed into things quite quickly! But if we don't, a lot of people will get hurt... This is as much my home as anyone here, and diving into the deep end is quite a way to learn how to swim, right?" She keeps positive, despite the unease. Through all the stress and concern and suiting up, though, she'd forgotten to put her bracelet and powers in mind. It's on her wrist, of course, where it belongs. Inside her spacesuit.

Kate Bishop has posed:
Kate looks over to Vorpal and gives her such a winning smile "Sorry kittykat, not trying to rub it in at all.. it is just like you are cursed with chaos or something.... think about it."

She stands up from the seat, grabbing a strap for balance and looking towards some of the screens. "I guess that was good timing...Troia I still put in a vote no more alien invasions for at least six months though okay?" there she has registered her vote.

She looks to America "Will do, if anything I will be happy to give you the option to punch things even harder America." she grins.

"that said Roger roger..." to Troia and then she looks to Grayson "You're on point then Nightwing?"

Dick Grayson has posed:
Nightwing takes a deep breath and listens as Donna gives the briefing on the situation. As he is assigned to the infiltration team, he moves closer to Raven and says, "They never expect us. We may as well just get nice red uniforms." He grins and looks to Donna, "We'll get it done." He punctuates the sentence with a nod.

"Best we move quickly and try and avoid contact with the enemy whenever possible. Not that I don't think we can take them, but our primary resource is time." Nightwing says to those assembled and nods to Nadia, "That's the plan." He then looks to Raven. "Let's do this."

Siobhan Smythe has posed:
Standing up from her seat, Siobhan takes in a breath and then nods to Donna, "Probably best I move with the infiltration folks den. And what the Nadia asked. We goin' in quiet or we goin' in loud. From what I understand, infiltration with this group isn't always silent." She then shifts in her spot slightly, closes her eyes, and takes in a breath. Suddenly her eyes pop open and they are glowing beads in a sea of darkness as her face takes on that skull like features and her other form takes over.

"~Now I'm ready.~" She states and looks to Nightwing briefly before to Raven and then she moves up to get in place, "~I can hide our noise completely if need be or I can make our enemies quake with the fear of our coming. Which is it?~" She asks, her eyes glowing slightly brighter as she looks to Dick briefly and nods to him, "~I'll do my best ta keep people unaware of us but I can make no guarantees that I won't...have a little fun when de time comes...~"

Terry O'Neil has posed:
Vorpal listens to Donna's breakdown and nods, "I'm on portal duty, no worries. I'll get everybody where they need to be, and I can also use them to deflect fire. This will be a triumph."

He glances at the eerie young woman people call Raven, and gives her a thumbs-up, "If you keep greenie out of trouble over there, I'll buy you a year's worth of that nice coffee you drink, Rae. Alright, everybody..." the Cheshire Cat cracks his knuckles and adopts a serious expression. "... let's get dangerous."

It takes a moment of concentration, but an appropriately-narrow Rabbit Hole appears. He can usually create economy-sized ones of up to ten feet, but it's good to know he can adjust the size for cramped situations like this one.

The surface is visible beyond the Rabbit Hole- the gunmetal-grey world of the hull of Warworld, punctuated with glowing red lights and spires. The immediate area ahead is dominated by a thirty foot shield projection tower, their first target.

Vorpal gestures to the dimensional rift, "Okay, Tanks and DPS first in, everybody second, target is in sight- Titans, Together!" he waves people through, going last himself in case he needs to adjust the portal. On the other side, it is as Donna predicted: nobody is expecting the Titan Inquisition to boldly set foot on the hull right away. They are undetected. But that is likely to change a soon as they start with the property damage.

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Caitlin's hair is tied back in a fighting braid and worn at the base of her neck in a tight bundle. Out of the way; less likely to snag on something. She wears her usual lightweight attire but there's a fair amount of pouches and tactical gear along for the ride now.

There are several storage containers in the underbelly of the T-jet; Caitlin hauls one out and produces a large backpack that only a couple of the Titans could comfortably wear.

"Assault team, our job is to be as loud and scary as possible," Caitlin advises her crew. "We obviously want to take down the shield generators-- it's not a pointless op." She pulls out what can only be some kind of demolitions charge. "Explosive charges are in here, they're limpet mines with magnetic feet." Caitlin mimes attaching one. "Attach, pull the ripcord. It's on a thirty-second tamper proof timer. Just put the cord back in if you change your mind. If you don't want to carry explosives, I'll haul 'em."

Other stuff comes out; ray-guns, projectile weapons... it looks like some of it was borrowed from SHIELD. Probably some from Stark Industries. Hopefully 'borrowed'-- Caitlin does at least work there. "If you can use it, take it. This falls under one of those 'don't conserve resources' missions."

"And this is mine," she says with a satisfied expression. A cannon-- and it can only be called a 'cannon'-- is dug out of the largest container and braced against her hip.

"I'm *so* gonna lose my job if I lose this thing," she frets, and runs her fingers over the muon cannon's shell.

Caitlin makes sure her respirator mask is set properly, then goes down the line checking others to make sure they've got their masks and tanks full. She only then moves to the front of the wedge. She hefts the cannon and primes the charge on it, and nods at Vorpal. "Hit it, V. I'm first through; everyone else, come in hot behind me with everything you've got."

The second the portal opens, Caitlin rushes forward and dives into the gap. She sets her feeet, gets her balance low, and hits the muon cannon. There's a roaring of ionization flooding past evryone's senses and then the muon cannon blasts a hole through the first tower' shields making it erupt in a spray of glittering light and crate a vulnerability for the other Titans to exploit as they charge in behind her.

Caitlin slings the cannon out of the way while it recharges. "Titans, GO!"

Angelica Jones has posed:
Angelica is the second one through, as un-ready as she's going to get. She dives in, taking Caitlin's energy as a hint...also that she's the next closest and is in the way! So, drained, confused, hoping for a recharge. Something, anything. Space. Oh boy..
Is there energy in space? YES. Yes, there is.

...

Angelica is exposed to the radiation so freely available, and stops. Cold, right where she is. She arches her back slowly, her hair blazing to life. Literally. "Oh. Oh, my," she says into the comms. She looks at her hands in the suit, a small light in the darkness, and her hands begin to glow.

"I don't know what to do with it all!" she says, her eyes glowing, her hair turning a briliant white.

Then she looks at the nearby target, and says, dumbly, "Oh. Right." Which is when she lets out a blast..that takes off a corner of one section, but also sends her TUMBLING head-over-heels! Gah!

"Damn you, physics! Betrayed!"

Then, "Seriously somebody catch me."

Karolina Dean has posed:
    Karolina isn't sure about any of the gear. She does take one of the charges, though, as it's the least she can do. Loud and scary isn't really what she does. She's anything but, usually! So she goes through, lugging the explosive in both hands and thumping down on the hull of the War World. "Oh I never get tired of riding through those Rabbit Holes!" she laughs, unease giving way to joy at that method of travel.

    Then the lovely explosion of Cait's ordnance opens up the gap, and she awkwarely trundles forward, following the instructions given. It's not hard, right? Magnetic the thing. Pull the cord. And get away from it, right? She manages that, at least, and seems satisfied. At least until Angelica suddenly is cut free on her own.

    "Eh? Ehhh! Wait, come back!" she calls out, a little panic of her own. More panic sets in when she realizes she's powerless right now. She can't fly, she can't project beams, and as her hand reflexively goes to her wrist to pull off her bracelet, she finds it there... under her suit. "Oh. Oooohhhh.... hell."

America Chavez has posed:
America does not take a weapon. She has her own. Or, at least, that's her opinion. Without hesitating, the worked up latina girl dives through the portal to come out behind the others on her team, and she's moving forwards as fast as she can; which is to say, pretty damn fast.

She might not ever get up to Kryptonian Speeds, but she gets through the gap made by Caitlin's blast before the shields even have a chance to try and regather further energy and reform.

Those who have fought with America before know she usually takes a certain joy, even when treating battles seriously, in the fight itself. Now? Now is a different story. Her jaw is set, and there's that determined, unwavering stare in her eyes. And it's not going away anytime soon.

She slams her fist, hard, into the first shield generator/array, not so much under it, as against it, and she begins to pummel it, hard with the purpose of either smashing it to pieces from above, or at least doing enough damage to allow the rest of her team to get through without any further problems.

Kian has posed:
    Kían's words float softly over comms, like he didn't think they were on.  It's in his own language, and it has the sing-song cadence of a prayer.
    That done, Kían flits through the portal without any evident hesitation.  He's from a spacefaring race.  *Everyone* ship-surfs at least once in their lives, just to experience the black and star-spangled all-sky openness of space, with nothing around but one comparatively measly starship.  Kían was kind of fond of the experience, so being space-suited -- even uncomfortably -- is something he's actually looking forward to in a weird way.
    Electromagnetism is easy -- as he approaches the hull, he simply magnetizes himself to it and stands up like he was on the surface of a planet.  He didn't study way too much physics for nothing.
    He considers his options for a moment.  Draining the power out of it only means it can be re-energized later, so instead he resorts to what he did with the robot spider.
    E=mc^2 isn't just a good idea, it's the law.  It doesn't take the fission of too many atoms to simply blast the side of the shield generator's bulge out -- the side pointing away from Kían, of course.  He's not an idiot.
    And then he looks for some sort of cover -- that's going to attract some attention.

Rachel Roth has posed:
    There is naught but silence from Raven as Donna explains the roles that they'll be taking. Instead, she looks out into the nothingness, unblinking, as if seeing something that has not yet happened.

    "We will have many challenges. They communicate oddly."

    She regards, before finally turning from facing the front of the ship, to facing the rest of the group. "This will be jarring. You may feel as if you are going to die. Don't worry, that is just your body knowing more than your mind."

    It is then, at Nightwing's bidding, that liquid shadows leap up from the ground, retracting and pulling from the walls in a three-dimensional fashion, difficult for the mind to comprehend in its sheer impossibility, as if for a moment, a four-dimensional shape had begun to exist in this three dimensional world.

    For the uninitiated, the reaction may be to shrink and flee, to scream and run, but it is already too late- Raven has been on the Jet too long, and allowed to stretch her wings without interruption. She is everywhere.

    Travelling within Raven's soul self is akin to being asked to recontitute yourself by reciting the chemical composition of your very soul while someone tugs behind your nasal bone with some well placed steel hooks.

    It is only made better by the sudden accomplishment of that fact when the group re-emerges within warworld itself, as if they had always been there.

    Amidst the steel and alien architecture of Warworld, Raven is aloft on the wind.

    "We will have company soon."

Dick Grayson has posed:
Nightwing nods to Raven as she gives the warning and braces as they are taken by the liquid shadows to their destination. He stretches his neck and gets his sticks out, nodding again to Raven as she gives the warning. He glances about to get the lay of the land and says quietly to the group, "All right, Nadia, find a good vector to get an idea of what we need to do. We can cover you." Nightwing looks to the others, "Very well, then. Since they know we are here, we can try to delay. Odds are we cannot defeat them all, but we can make them bottle neck at a couple of points, so let's aim for that. It will buy us the most time and the lowest risk."

Gar Logan has posed:
Taking the Raven Express is something Beast Boy is used to, as much as one /can/ be used to such a thing. It's still quite uncomfortable.

"I should have gone with the shield team, just turned into a giant space whale, and flattened everything," he mutters to himself.

On the other side of it, he doubles over for a moment with his hands at his knees. Breathing in the hangar is no big deal, he finds, so he makes use of that knowledge and takes a new form: a tiger for the moment, as he seeks a way forward without much interruption. Should that not work, "I'll clear the way if I have to!" he calls back.

Kate Bishop has posed:
"I am really not sure about which mode of travel is more frightening." trusting Vorpal to throw you bodily through Chaos and out the other side, or traveling through Raven's soul self and .. right. She has been through both before and yeah she really isn't a huge fan of either. If she had to place money down on which one is less disturbing she would probably go with Vorpal's though. She just won't ever say it out loud or near Raven.

When they reconsitute though Kate does give a little full body shudder in her spacesuit. Never getting use to all that.

She glances at the readings on her suit, okay good, gravity and atmosphere. Also breathable. Awesome. She taps her helmet and lets the visor for now slide up out of her eyes. No need for any level of unfamiliar refraction when this is already going too be dire as all hell. She does snickt an arrow out of her quiver and fire it down the way into one of the walls, no aiming at an enemy, calibrating to the gravity and general lay of the land as it were. "Ready to have an exciting picnic lunch in War World.... we totally need a selfie drone so we can send 'Wish you were here' post cards on these excursions... Caitlin or Vic can make it maybe." ah yes the most critical part of these missions, banter.

"Cheer up little green buddy." Kate teases Gar lightly ready to follow him though and ...well she is mostly following Nightwing's lead on this, staking out one of the natural choke points, three arrows in her arrowing hand as she waits for the enemy.

Actually, she draws a different arrow and sends it down the hallway, where is embeds and just qietly blinks a small light near the shaft. Waiting to be triggered explosively by charging WarZoone.

Nadia Pym-van Dyne has posed:
Jarring is one word for it! Normally Nadia is all about teleportation and new experiences, this however was decidedly not in the fun category. Despite the fact she probably /could/ recite the chemical composition of her soul, doing it with steel hooks on your nasal bone is decidedly unpleasant. The end result is even the ever exuberant Nadia comes out the other side a bit shaken and wide-eyed, but with her training she manages manages to put her game face back on pretty quick.

First things first, big wasp becomes smol wasp as there is no sense in remaining full size when she doesn't want to be seen. With that a micro sized thumbs up is given to Nightwing whether he can see it or not. <<On it.>> she says through the comms before setting to work using the computers in her suit to scan for communication signals she might be able to use to get into the network wirelessly, as well as power concentrations that might lead to an engineering access point to access things more directly. Because hey if a macbook can hack an alien mothership, so can her suit!

Siobhan Smythe has posed:
For someone like siobhan, traveling through Raven's soul self is likely not something pleasant. She wouldn't really enjoy it and isn't sure she'd like to do it again. However, she isn't Siobhan right now and as she comes out the other side, she lets out a laugh and then grins a disconcerting smile, "~Now dat makes ya feel...alive.~" She grins right at Kate when she says it before looking around slowly and she takes the mask of the suit of, "~I can feel it. Dis place is so full of vibrant sounds.~" She tosses her face mask toward Nadia and calls out to her.

"~Hold dis for me, I have new friends to make.~" With that, she turns and looks in the direction of the incoming Warzoone. She grins as she snatches one up by the neck and raises into the air. She doesn't even seem to care that others might be firing at her or aiming at her, "~Ye know...I've been constantly holding back. Always reigning in what feels so right...~" She looks at the Warzoon and grins, "~But ye lot came for trouble and for me world...~" And she grins darkly even amongst the chaos.

"~Who would begrude a girl a little...cuttin' loose.~" And with that she unleashes a point blank scream right at the Warzoon and then turns to look at the others arriving, releasing what is left right at their feet.

Donna Troy has posed:
    Note for future missions: grav boot training.

    Caitlin's opening salvo with the portable canon (portable if you're Caitlin, anyway) punches a hole right into the tower, and a crackling of energy flows down the surface of the tower as its own local shield fails. Angelica's blast is accompanied by a jet of purple flame from the top of the tower, and America starts to pound on it in the way that only America can. Karolina plants explosives on side of the tower while Kian's energetic but silent blast rips a hole in the other side.

    While America beats on the front of the tower, a cloud of brilliant light burst out the side from Karolina's planted explosives, hollowing it out. Undermined, America's impacts have little resisting them, and tower starts toppling backwards.

    In the blackness of space above, a curtain of purple energy ripples and starts to fade. Angelica drifts into the night, and as she drifts she's the first to see the lights of four Warzoon fighters hurtling low over the horizon towards the group. The alarm has been well and truly sounded. The team can make their way to the next tower via another Rabbit Hole before the fighters arrive, but the element of surprise is gone, and it's a good bet that there will be Warzoon forces heading to all the shield towers now.

    Inside War World itself, Raven can sense the life force of thousands of Warzoon surrounding them. The battle station is the size of a small moon, and although many Warzoon are fighting down on the ground, there are plenty more still here - and some of them are closing on the Titans' position rapidly.

    As Archer, Tiger, Banshee and Bat take up defensive positions, the first Warzoon burst in and are quickly dealt with by the Banshee's scream. Nadia hooks into the docking bay computers and starts to try to figure out the alien technology. Cyborg has had the best part of a day working on the Dreadnought's systems, and slowly the flow of data starts to make sense. It really is a lot harder than Independence Day made it look. Not only is the code completely different, but outside it all being binary at root, the language problem is a nightmare. She has to focus on the most abstract parts of the system - signal routing, memory overflows, code re-entry points - but slowly she's making some sense of it all. The local terminal seems to have a very limited outward flow of data, connecting to some kind of local computing sub-nexus. She sends gigabytes of raw data that way, and registers some kind of automated counter-measure, shutting off data flow in a particular direction? interesting.

    As Nadia works, the two doorways leading into the hangar start to fill with warzoon - a dozen at each point, rushing into the hanger in a frenzied and confused mass, leaderless. They advance with all the tactical nous of a particularly stupid brick, getting in each other's ways and blocking the lines of fire. It would be nice to believe they won't get any more organized than this, but that seems unlikely.

    Back on the T-Jet, Donna confers briefly with Cyborg in the bridge of the battered dreadnought. She switches on the T-Jet's positional transponder, sending encrypted location data back to the T-Coms of the Titans on Teleporting duty, so they can get back to it when required, then switches on maximum stealth and sets it on a holding course. She adjusts her breather mask, opens the cargo bay doors, and drifts out into space. The doors slide shut behind her, and the T-Jet drifts away. Donna hovers in space by the bulk of the dreadnought and watches tiny pinpricks of light in the distance - a platoon of Warzoon special forces in maneuvering suits, closing in on the Dreadnought, too small to be picked up by the Dreadnought's point defense systems. Donna unloops her lasso, and it glows gold in the darkness of space. She waits.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"Don't worry, I've got you!" Vorpal calls out, opening a Rabbit Hole to catch Anjelica and deposit her by the team. "Taking a walk into outer space is nice and all, but make sure you've got a way back first. Gooooood shootin', though..." the Cheshire cat thumbs-up, and he admires the sheer destructive power of their team. "You okay in there?" he asks Karolina, as the tower topples. He didn't grab weapons or explosives himself, since he knew he was probably going to have to turn his powers into transportation and defense.

The Rabbit Hole opens towards the second tower, "Alright, next target. Let's go cause some havok because I think they're onto us. We're going to have to move fast for the next three." And, just like last time, he'll be the last through the hole.

Angelica Jones has posed:
Flipping weightlessly, Angelica seems to be having a less useful day this time. She can be heard on comms: "Guys? Ladies? Sapient species?" At least she's not speciesist. "Hang on, I might be able to do something with this," she says, and then lets off another short blast from her left hand.

The whirling changes direction, and she seems to get a little loopy. "woah." Yes, small 'w'. Then she does a bunch of other littler ones, and...eventually...seems to stabilize.

"Ugh. Might've thrown up a bit in my suit." She looks around, at the slowly spinning universe, and bumps into an outcropping of the station..that she clings to for dear life! But, she does get to see around her. And it's not good.

"Um. Alert! Warning, danger! Incoming...triangle shaped blobs! That look more and more like fighters the more I look at them." She looks down, at the group who are (mostly) together, and then waves. "Go ahead! I can hold them off," she actually manages to say, before the hole opens up, grabbing her through it. And she finds herself next to Vorpal, Karolina, and anyone else who hasn't done much. Ouch, irony. "Tthhhanks?" She does mean it, it's just...sudden.

She leans over near Karo, her hair still blazing, and whispers, "Need a hand?"

The fact that her comm is still on is immaterial. She's helpful, but not as effective. The thing is, she might be able to actually help. With a certain bracelet.

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Caitlin dives and rolls, charging forward and grabbing up a section of ... something. A bulkhead? The redhead slaps a remote charge to it and primes it, then spins twice like someone prepping a hammer throw. One, two, three, and Caitlin grunts explosively and throws the bulkhead into space. Missed the first fighter, grazes the second-- and bounces square into a third. The explosive charge blows up with a fierce but brief flare of light in the vacuum of space.

"Keep movin!" Caitlin calls over the comm set. "Don't let yourselves be a target; Vorpal, America, keep people moving and get under the shields if you can! My cannon's gonna need a while to charge. I'll deal with the spaceships!"

It would look *comical* if anyone else did what Caitlin is doing, hurling debris off the ground at the fast-moving spacecraft as they dart around and try to close in.

Then again, few people can throw a five-hundred pound chunk of hardened alien alloy with the sort of velocity that the redhead can muster. It hearkens back to the old days of the Olympics, when it was training and competition not for athleteic prowess but for wartime skills.

She didn't spend six months on Themyscira just doing her nails, after all.

Karolina Dean has posed:
    Karolina, for the time being, does feel helpless. But she's in space, what -can- she do? She can watch the first tower go up in flame, marveling at the colors as the shields shimmer and buckle. And she can carry another explosive charge. It's not exactly where she thought she'd be tonight, packed in a spacesuit and planting explosives, but she's doing her part not just for the fate of the world, but her new team. People she's only had mere days to get acquainted with. To say nothing of Angelica whom she'd just met.

    "I'm fine! I'm fine," she tries to reassure Vorpal, though her answer is a little quick, her voice a little strained. Seeing Firehawk safe, and seeing their next destination, she gathers herself and joins the charge on the second generator. The fighters are alerted, though, bearing down on them. Lances of hostile cyan energy tear into the hull in front of her, cutting off her rush so very suddenly. She trips, the charge flying out of her hands and up away from her body. "Ah.. no!" she reaches for it, then, eyes wide, suddenly curls up into a ball. The next fighter strafes over her, missiles ripping up the hull and sending flames billowing up in a hot trail before, around, and after her.

    The charge she'd lost is hit, the explosives going off with the missiles around her, creating a much bigger boom than the others--and catching Karolina in it. Her comms are hard static through the interference for precicous seconds, her suit burning away as she's bathed in fire. The force breaks the chains on her bracelet, sending the silvery remnants scattering. The orange flames of devastation are devoured by a burst of rainbow light, Karolina floating there, chest heaving, panicked expression on her face. "I'm fine? I'm fine! I'm fine!" she laughs, the terror and panick bleeding away to jubilant laughter, joyous and as bright as she is. Any remnants of her suit are gone, between the blaze of Warzoon missiles and her own aura flaring hard.

    She basks in the glow of the sun, soaking in its rays, like a star reborn. "...but they won't be..." she spreads her arms wide, floating higher, a beacon of prismatic light, and then thrusts her palms forward at a formation of fighters coming down on their next attack run. A solid, steady beam of yellow fused with ripples of color explodes from both palms, the heat and concussive force enough to rip the vessels apart.

    "Get the towers! I'll hold off the ones I can!" she rattles off over the communicator, recoiling as she brings a shield of light up to deflect energy fire from a different angle.

America Chavez has posed:
America feels the rumble of the explosion, and her next few meaty hits topple the tower, very, very satisfactiorally to her. She nods, "Good job," she calls to the rest of the team, "But that's just our first target. We've got three more. Stay focused. We're not out of the woods yet," she calls.

As Vorpal's rabbit hole opens to the second tower, she's moving, speedily, towards it and into it showing just how much she's trusting the teammate she'd had yet to really work with and how committed she is to this particular engagement.

She had been moving to intercept the gunships, but as Caitlin says 'she has it', America isn't one to argue - not in this battle, at least. "On it," she confirms.

She flies low, fast, and hard towards the generators and then she slams a fist straight into the shield; a bright white light seems to burn through the shields - a star pattern, outlined in brilliance.

As the light fades, there is now a star-shaped hole in the shield and America rushes through it. There are no explosions she has, so instead she lands and moves quickly under the generator and she begins to simply tear it off it's bearings, straining, hard, brow creasing as both legs and arms and back are put into the effort to simply rip it off it's foundation and topple it.

Kian has posed:
    Kían spots the Rabbit Hole with some relief and darts through -- running isn't so bad when there's no wind resistance, although flying would be a lot faster.  Pesky non-atmospheric murderworld.  You'd think a sentient species would have designed it more sensibly, and he grumpily says so in reply to Caitlin: "It woul' be easier to move if there was air!"
    Okay.  /c'Rhys'yw/, what now?  Teammates other than America are busy, and she's... disturbingly efficient.  Still, he can add to the mayhem a little.
    As stated, Kían is from a spacefaring race.  So he knows how much small craft will want to avoid fields of debris -- which he reduces a fair amount of the upper reaches of the tower to.  Aim is iffy... but it doesn't need to be exact.  If he knew what a shotgun was, he'd say it was like that -- except he'd complain mightily about the term 'birdshot'.
    If it helps cover their evacuation to the next tower, good.  If not, it's a training opportunity for later.  If there is a later.

Rachel Roth has posed:
    Infinitely, impassively, appraising the various entrances and exits to the room that she shunted them through reality into, Raven remains wholly silent as the others take position. Engaging the oncoming swarms of Warzoon would be pointless- adding more to the fray that others are already better suited to engaging. The immediate threat is not her concern.

    Instead, Raven's consciousness expands, becoming acutely and deeply aware of the things coming behind what is already present. Her expression remains neutral, but one by one, she starts projecting images of grand beasts, horrible nightmarish entities with anatomies that make little to no sense, gibbering mouths filled with razors, and grasping limbs covered in protruding blades and spikes.

    Such horrors are things birthed in the psyches of the Warzoon, monstrosities they have seen elsewhere, ideas and concepts befitting only of the title of alien bogeyman.

    It is no small number of Warzoon that quite suddenly perish due to natural causes.

    Yet still, she extends into the decks above and below them, pulling emotions into herself and acting as a mental form of filter- many Warzoon are left as slothful husks, robbed of their will to fight over any particular matter, including the emergency of the Titans' infiltration.

Dick Grayson has posed:
Dick Grayson says, "Uninvited guests, how rude," Nightwing notes as the enemies pour in. He calls over comms for Nadia, <<Keep us posted on progress. Once you get it done we are out of here.>> Dick nods to the others, "Keep up the good work." Especially as the first few are felled.

Raven deals with a good chunk of the enemies and it gives Nightwing a chance to breathe, though he first blinks and was definitely not ready for it. The fact that the others are an immediate threat, though means it's going to be hard to keep them at bay, "All right, not sure exactly which ones are officers, but if someone looks like they are giving advice, take them down first. Our only hope is to keep them disorganized and in managable groups, especially if we cannot force them into choke points." To Beast Boy, "Don't let them bunch up or organize, pounce away." Nightwing sighs and switches one stick for a few wingdings, each one with flashbang capabilities and chucks them at any clumps of grunts he can see. Giving him time to roll in and begins laying into them with his escrima sticks, giving them all the juice he can at this point, an electric human whirlwind of pain. He works to keep himself in shooting lanes to prevent enemy shots when possible."

Gar Logan has posed:
Not knowing what exactly Raven is doing is often best for the sanity and well-being of others. This right here is no different. What they don't know can't traumatize them.

While Nadia works on the hacking job, Beast Boy runs some interference to help keep her from having to shift her focus elsewhere. It works better swatting away a few things as a bear. "Already on it, dude," he calls back to Nightwing. "When this is all done, I'm gonna celebrate with a pot of honey!"

Around him, those Warzoon that haven't 'quit,' along with many that have, are sent flying in random directions.

Kate Bishop has posed:
The arrow Kate embedded at the end of her hallway explodes dramatically when the Warzoon reach it, thinning at least one of them down. "Experimental arrow 23 worked very well." she notes happily to herself. Maybe she is recording notes, or just narrating her life, hard to say.

She doesn't pause though and does actually back up a little ways as she draws more of the explosive arrows and sends about three of them down range before ducking behind somethng that gets belted badly with blaster fire. She is making friends and influencing Warzoon now. "That was unbearrrr-able BB..." she quips back over comms to him.

Before ducking back out and letting fire an oilslick arrow on the hallway she is covering, turning it into a slip and slide for the charging Warzoon.

Then back behind cover she ducks.

Nadia Pym-van Dyne has posed:
Nadia continues to buzz about furiously, the tiny wasp has cut a tiny hole in the wall in order to patch in more directly to the station's non-wirelessly transmitted data networks. <<Working on it!>> She continues sending scouting packets of garbage data, things like a copy of her entire collection Dazzler MP3s into the network just to see where they go. This leads her to an actual terminal in the bay but even from the ship's actual communications interface she is still getting blocked. Of course the thing wants access codes.

Luckily Nadia has been working on something for just such a situation ever since that time she watched Dr. Banner rewrite one of SHIELD's operating systems on the fly and replace it with one of his own making in order to accomodate the SCIENCE! they were doing. She's not quite doing that, but what she does use is an algorithm generated by an experimental quantum computer that is able to unlock the variables that it was thought would keep the system secure at /frightening/ speeds.

And then the data is off again! <<I'm through!>> she calls through the Comms, <<The data flow is pointing a major network nexus on the engineering deck below us!>> The explanation is punctuated by one of the Warzoon diving for the panel she is working on in a last ditch attempt to shut things down.

Suddenly a full sized Waspette appears about the foolish creature wrapping her legs around his neck and essentially backflipping in mid-air slamming him into the ground with what could be dubbed a Reverse Aerial Piledriver.

Siobhan Smythe has posed:
And then they start dropping like flies. Siobhan goes for one more Warzoon when an arrow hits it. She sees another group just in time to watch Beast Boy go 'wild' all over them. Raven has many, many of them not even wanting to fight or screaming in terror (a fact that the worst part of her appreciates). Even Nightwing is doing his part and she's having fewer and fewer targets. She twitches as she looks over at one Warzoon that is retreating from Beast Boy and gets in his path. He pauses briefly before she grabs him by the face and throws him into the ground.

"~Just how is a Banshee meant to see what she can do when all her enemies fall so quickly?~" She then looks over at Nadia when she hears the comms and then she grins, "Below us ya say? Lets go den!~" And she flies up and turns her face to the floor, "One deck below...comin' up. So, to speak.~" And her echoy voice is replaced by a massive scream as she lets loose with a powerful blast right at the floor, attempting to blast open a way right on down to the next level.

Donna Troy has posed:
    At the second tower, it's chaos as soon as the Titans arrive. Four fighters loop around the tower in a protective screen; their formation flying is precise and skilled, and these pilots clearly know what they are doing.

    Formations however can be broken, and a huge hunk of flying hull does just that. As Caitlin utterly obliterates the world shot-putting record and totals one of the fighters, the survivors peel away and wheel around to make a strafing run. The first run peppers the ground around the Titans with those cyan bolts of energy, and that attack sees Angelica blasted to the side - but this time, she's able to regain her footing and avoid drifting away. Karolina apparently was not so lucky...

    But no. It's the fighters that were not so lucky. Bursting into radiant light, Karolina rises up to meet them, and as they wheel back for a second run, readying their heavy missiles this time, they run into a ray of yellow destruction that tears them to pieces. More fighters hurtle low across the gunmetal landscape, but the team has earned a few seconds respite.

    Those seconds are enough for America to bring down the tower's defense shield in a blaze of star-shaped glory, and again she sets to work on the base of the tower, tearing into the metal. As more fighters close in, Kian starts working from the top down.

    Kian's first effort sunders the cap of the tower, bringing forth that burst of purple fire that had been seen when the top of the first tower had gone. Refocusing his /Rhy'thar/, getting a feel for the molecules of this tower, his second is more destructive, the top third of the tower billowing out suddenly like a vast metallic dandelion puff, shards of metal expanding slowly outwards in the low gravity.R
    wo of the fighter reinforcements fly straight into the cloud of debris and lose control, wheeling away across the surface of War World. Two more, following close behind, roar upwards and away to escape the fate of their fellows.

    America continues her assault on the base of the tower, chunks of metal being ripped away. Lightning bolts of energy crash up the sides of the tower stump, and as America yanks out a final hunk of something vital, once again the shimmering field of purple in the sky above crackles and dies.

    Another tower is down.

    Inside War World, the infiltration team faces heavy odds, but it is situations like this where Nightwing comes into his own. It's not just his ability in hand-to-hand combat at play - it's his reading of the tactical situation. The younger Titans in particular might be less aware of this, but they learn quickly. He barks out suggestions as he fights, and they always seem to make sense - directing the other combatants where they are needed, controlling the flow of battle.

    Kate's trick with the first arrow is timed perfectly to deal with the incoming rush from one corridor - just as they are at their densest trying to struggle through, the arrow explodes and fills the doorway with stunned and dying Warzoon. Those at the other doorway find an equal barrier in the form of an enraged bear and a whirlwind of escrima sticks

    Nadia continues her work on the computer system, the quantum computing core running through impossibly parallel equations, deriving vast sequences of prime numbers that look too much like good data to be caught by the system's anti-garbage defenses at the incredible speed they are being generated. The pipeline clogs; memory gets overwritten and the firewall becomes corrupted. The datapath is clear and a physical location derived - just a deck down is a computing center that handles shipwide diagnostics, a perfect target for the Brianiac virus.

    Kate's oil slick has the Warzoon not engaged by GarBear and Nightwing sliding across the floor, easy targets for her arrows, and the herd thins. The Banshee's how seems to be the last straw, and as her voice blasts a hole in the deck, the last of the attackers withdraw in panic.

Donna Troy has posed:
    Through the hole below them, the infiltration team can see a main engineering corridor that leads to where the computing center is located. Scattered around the floor of the corridor are a half dozen Warzoon. Two lie unmoving. The other four are moving but incapacitated; clutching their hands to their heads, weeping, curled up and catatonic. Whatever it is that Raven did to them, the other Titans are suddenly very clear that they are glad it was not meant for their eyes.

    Before the Titans can make their way through the hole, a vast snuffling can be heard from the corridor beyond, then a shaking and shuddering passes through the deck. A shadowy form fills the corridor beyond, blocking out the light; whatever it is braces against the doorway, and then with a sudden deafening clatter, the doorway and surrounding wall collapses inwards. Standing in the ruins of the corridor is a Behemoth, two Warzoon handlers standing well back behind it. It roars in fury, and tiny eyes focus on the beastial appearance of Gar - although in bear form he is much smaller than it, the Behemoths seems to identify him as some kind of rival, and the floor shakes as it advances towards him...

Terry O'Neil has posed:
<<This is Vorpal. Minas Morgul and Orthanc are down. Two Towers. Two to go.>> Not only was that an unnecessarily nerdy way of updating the team, it also states where the Cheshire cat stands in the debate of movie versus book.

Though, then again, considering who he is, it really shouldn't surprise anybody, <<We're moving as fast as we can. Keep on rocking,>>

America suplexes the fricking tower. That's one for the books, and for a moment he is very sorry that he didn't incorporate a go pro onto his getup so that he could capture this for the article. Lois will yell at him for not thinking of that.

Karolina's metamorphosis gets a 'woah' from the Cheshire, as he stares for a few seconds. And then, just out of his head, he sings "She comes in colors everywhere. She's like a rainbow"- and then she flies towards the incoming fighters.

<<Roger, K, but be careful. If you need a bail, holler and I'll open a Rabbit Hole. We're moving onto the third.>> Caitlin and Kian have made the aerial space a veritable obstacle run full of floating debris, and discus-thrown death chunks of hull, it's a sight that would bring tears to his eyes, if he weren't afraid to ruin his mascara.* "Beautiful job, Kian and Cait!"

Rabbit Hole to the third Tower, and here things are getting a little hairier. The first tower, they had the element of surprise. The second tower, the enemy was scrambling and sending in help. By the third? There was already a busy swarm around the tower. As soon as the Titans and Friends come through, there's a volley of aggression waiting to fire on them.

"Superbuds, squishy blue mage needs shields!" Vorpal calls out, as he is in the company of two indestructible women and powerful energy manipulators, "I've got an idea, but I need some cover to get it right."

What America did, star-portalling through the shields, was brilliant. He decides he wants to add his own version of it, because portalistas gotta stick together, right? The Cheshire cat then crouches low and opens his eyes wide, trying to follow the movement of craft around. He needs to get just the right one, and anticipate the movement just, so. While he does so, though, he's a sitting duck.


*He doesn't actually wear mascara.**
**Or does he?

Caitlin Fairchild has posed:
Caitlin gasps in horror when Karolina's *exploded*. She doesn't have any context for the girl's abilities or powers. It just... looks like one more horrific fatality, one that would have been all too soon for the Titans.

Not again. The words are soundless on her lips.

And then Karolina appears with a flash of light and wrecks her way through the fleet, and Caitlin's cheering before she realizes it. America and Caitlin share a pretty common powerset-- 'Girl Smash'-- and the redhead is more than happy to make a giant spectacle of herself while America's busy upsetting the proverbial apple carts.

Caitlin rushes over to Vorpal and skids to a halt on the hull, putting herself between the cat and the incoming fighter craft. An arm and shoulder's thrown up so she can tuck her face away from harm as energy blasts pepper her and the hull around her. Vorpal, however, is thus shielded. "Do your thing, V!" Caitlin shouts. She's already on the move, trusting someone else to handle the next volley aimed at him.

There's a *fweer* from the muon cannon. Caitlin unslings the massive gun, braces it against her hip, and tracks the flying craft. The muon canon explodes with another roar of ionizing radiation and chases a brilliant yellow pencil of particle beams through the sky. It rips apart multiple aircraft, even aimed from the hip. More importantly, it does what Caitlin needs it to do-- it pulls a *lot* of attention to her one-woman light show, visible even from a fast-moving cockpit.

Angelica Jones has posed:
She's dropped once again, and Angelica who has apparently forgotten her own callsign stares up in amazement at the damage folks are doing. She needs a second. She isn't ready. She watches a rainbow come to life, and it almost breaks her heart.

"YEAH! Karolina! Caitlin! Vorpal, did you see?! All the things!" She's so excited she's forgotten why they're here. "She...America, she SUPLEXED a tower!" Breathe, girl. Breathe.

She's standing there glowing, and the ground beneath her is...well, not ground. Metal. Hard, resistant metal...is melting. Not slowly either.

"I can't breathe!" She seems to be smiling, but she's not. In fact...it almost looks like her suit is...translucent?

"Um. I'm...I've never done this before." But people are already rushing the tower, and she gulps. "Not sure if I can shoot without hitting someone."

So, she trusts her team to work. As her charge gets bigger.

Karolina Dean has posed:
    Karolina is not easy to miss, and her being closer, for the moment, to the third tower might be more dangerous for the group. She does her best fighter ace impression, or, at the very least, her best Rainbow Dash impression. A game of 'catch me if you can' peppered with return fire of white-hot sunbeams begins around the wider radius around the third tower. The shining star flies hard and fast, having had more than enough practice flying instead of fighting, and even those laser blasts that manage to hit her only seem to make her -stronger-.

    As she bolts by, she hears the request, even as she spirals through a formation of fighters, bolts flung around her in ribbons of light punctuated by the explosions of Warzoon interceptors.

    "Tag!" she calls out to Caitlin, not so much taking her place as a shield for Vorpal, but engulfing him in a sphere of transulucent rainbow energy as she lands and skids across the metal to stay close to him. She focuses most of her efforts on holding that barrier, and anti-air fire to keep fighters at bay. "Those missiles are trouble!" she warns, however.

    Through it all, though, she casts that winning smile to her compatriots, feeling more alive than ever here in the naked sun and with people. GOOD people. It's especially directed at Angelica, as if feeling her doubts and insecurities. Even if she's not saying it, it's a look that speaks volumes. 'You can DO this.'

America Chavez has posed:
As the new portal opens, America once again blazes through it; she is a focused, intense machine. "You want cover, you got it, Vorpal," she agrees, determination and will in her voice. It's the sort of tone that makes you -very- glad she's not upset with you. But, America is, and always will be a 'team player', even if she's not always on the same wavelengths as her team.

She looks up and then she's lifting off the ground and flying fast and furious towards the hell that is a swarm of small fighter craft, attempting to pick the incessant insects that are, to them, the Titans off of their precious shield generator and tower system.

They are everywhere. Surrounding, and she does her best to manuever and make her way to them to give Vorpal the cover he needs. One of the blasts from the ships hits her, and she goes wheeling back, making a pained sound as she spirals out of control before righting herself in the air. There's a lot of swearing in spanish, and her brows knit together.

She skyrockets back towards the offending ship, changing course here and there to avoid further fire because /that hurt/. She narrowly dodges a second blast, curses again in Spanish and swoops down to avoid further fire. Then she angles and flies upwards to connect a right uppercut to the nose of the offending ship that would, back on Earth, flip a tank over and then some. She then flies forward again, not done with the wreckage yet.

Kicking a leg out, she snarls, "I'll give you something to fire on," and yet another star portal opens.

Well, two, actually. One right in front of her - the other in front of the missles trajectory that Karolina just pointed out by a few hundred yards.

America twists, throwing the bulk of the spaceship into the first portal, and the ship immediately exits out of the second a few hundred yards away, careening towards the oncoming missles and spinning like a top due to the heave America gave it. The pilot will have enough time to eject out, if they are smart.

Kian has posed:
    "Minas *hwat*?  I thought they were force shiel' towers!" the birdman replies to Vorp, and then catches his breath as he slips through the Rabbit Hole.  "/Ai, c'Rhys'yw/!"  Kían wasn't ready for the masses of fighter craft that were waiting for them, and then he says something in his own language that has the tone of one of Vic's sharper epithets.
    Physics and the instincts of a science geek to the rescue.
    Magnetic induction is a thing; in an intense magnetic field, even non-magnetic metals are affected.  And an intense magnetic field is exactly what he sets up in the middle of the clutch of fighters bearing down on them.  Why the middle?  So they won't get thrown into each other.  In fact, in his panic, the field might have been strong enough to qualify as an electromagnetic pulse, which does electronics in the vicinity no favors at all.
    "I hope," he says a little breathlessly over comms, "that means they haf fewer ships to use at the las' tower."

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"You got it, C!"

Vorpal does his best to hide from fire while also keeping his eyes on the prize. There are several moments where he thinks he's about to have a close call, but his team-mates make sure he has all the protection he needs (mental note: bring some churros to that celebratory partay.)

And there it is. Finally. There is one craft in the swarm that's gunning for the long-term engagement instead of its partners' attempt to immediately engage. It is taking a wide, curving path that will prepare it to do a wide-raging sweep across the hull. The fact that its armament seems bulkier, perhaps modified to pack a greater punch, hints at the fact that this is precisely its function- to be the big-hitter while its counterparts distract enemies.

Someone's expectations are about to get shot. "Here goes Alice, down the hole!"

The Rabbit Hole opens immediately in front of the fighter, far too close for it to swerve away. The cockpit and body manage to pass through the Rabbit Hole, which is stretched as wide as it possibly can, but the wings and assorted equipment are torn from the body as it squeezes past the tight fit of the hole, sent drifing and spinning into space. One errant wing clips another fighter, sending it spinning out of control.

But it is the fate of the body of the fighter that is important, as it emerges through the other side of the Rabbit Hole, past the shield of the tower. The explosion that ensues is pretty phenomenal, with the augmented armament detonating at the base of the tower. "Third down... let's go!"


The Cheshire opens the Rabbit Hole to the fourth tower, and taps to Karolina. <<Rainbow Sparkle, we might need you over here! The way things are going, we expect heavy resistance at the fourth tower.>> If Karolina assents, he'll send the Rabbit Hole her way at the location of the third tower, so that they all emerge at the site of the fourth tower to find...

Gar Logan has posed:
The Beast Bear covers his ears as best as he can when the scream cuts through the room, but there's only so much that can be done with paws. Whatever the case, it opens the way into another path for them to take, getting them closer to their goal. "I can't bear to wait any longer, guys! Let's go!"

Onward, until...the behemoth, and the rubble it leaves in its wake. Larger than any landbound earth creature, there may only be one rival to its size: the blue whale. It dwarfs the lot of them, and for a moment the ursine intruder is frozen in place. "Dude."

It's only because he's thinking about how to deal with this.

The answer soon comes, as the great amount of space in the room provides little deterrent to a suitable form. If the Warzoons are going to come with something that could be found in Fantastic Beasts, Beast Boy himself has a counter. It's going to take everything he's got, but sometimes situations call for holding nothing in reserve.

He grows, grows, and grows some more, sprouting bony, horned ridges along his head and down his back, all the way to a tail that forms. Massive wings fan out from his back as his body becomes scaly, and once the form is complete the wings beat and send a rush of wind through the cavernous area, guiding him airborne.

The green dragon makes the behemoth look small, smoke curling up from his nostrils. Just before he spits out a blast of flame that shoots out at the thing and its handlers, he roars, "Don't fuck with a Jedi Master, son."

There is always a suitable movie quote to borrow, as the temperature rises all of a sudden.

Will it survive?

https://imgur.com/a/BH39BbS

Dick Grayson has posed:
Dick Grayson says, "Outstanding!" Nightwing says as he calls out to the team, twirling his sticks as he thinks. He looks to the others and their efforts and grins, "Made it look easy." He then looks to the hole in the ground and points, but he does not need to to get people's attention due to the /thing/ that comes out of the hole.

"Beast Boy, I think this one's meant ... Nevermind, you got the idea, kick his ass." He gives a thumbsup to Beast Boy and leads the charge down the tunnel.

The new threats in front of them cause Nightwing to grumble as he looks to the approaching robots, and randomly selects one and says, "Well, I'll take... that one. Everyone pick one and move over once you take it out, time is not on our side," and chucks a electropulse wingding at it that has a short timer before running in with his own sticks, though it takes a little bit of effort, he cranks the sticks to full and aims his strikes at where he estimates major nodes are on the robot to do the most damage."

Kate Bishop has posed:
"That was bear-ly tolerabearle BB..." quips Kate and then pops a grapple arrow into the floor and drops down through the hole to join the others. Honestly she move up to join Dick falling in near him. "Huh... right." she was thinking really hard about about an arrow to slick the floor under the behemoth but honestly that might cause BeastDragon to slip and fall too so probably best let BB just handle that whole... thing ... over there.

She selects two arrows, the first that she fires at the WarZillaBot is one that sticks to it's chasis and then blows an explosive AP charge. The second ... which she is trying to Robin Hood into it is an EMP arrowhead, trying to land it right in the hole the first made <KRACKTzzzzZZt>.

So many hours of practicing against simulations against Brainiac Drones and the Warzoon through Robots.. I mean.. this was not well thought out.

Nadia Pym-van Dyne has posed:
Thank goodness for helmets with sound dampening technology. Nadia watches the scream tear a hold in the floor and the BeastBear leap into the fray, only to grow and grow and grow, into a collosal green dragon moments later. Her head nods up and down a few times, as someone else who changes sizes she's definitely impressed.

There's no time to stand around being impressed though and in the blink of an eye big wasp is tiny wasp again. Wings buzz as the Waspette flies down into the whole evading around the giant form of the dragon, she zips straight for one of the robots at top speed.

Robots, it should be noted are a terrible thing to send against the Waspette, because there is usualy not much they can do once she gets inside of them. Which is exactly what the Waspette does becoming even small until she seems to disappear.

Once inside the mechanical monstrousity she barely even slows down as she begins pulling a variety of sticky bombs out of her miniturized stores, liberally throwing them here, there, and everywhere, as she navigates a path through the robot. Taking the whole time is of the essence thing to heart, she doesn't stop the whole way through making her way out the other side again.

Once she is clear she continues flying straight for the door to the data center carving a hole in it with her wrist mounted energy blasters as the robot explode from within, lighting up like a Christmas tree behind her in the worst case of indigestion a machine has ever experienced.

She collides with the laser cut door like a wasp-sized human bullet, relying on her speed and increased density to knock the cut metal plating inward and enters the data center beyond.

Rachel Roth has posed:
    When the others move down the hole, Raven floats forward, and quietly slips down through the air to follow. As yet, she hasn't removed her hands from her pockets, and her hood has remained up around her head.

    The speed at which she's descending is only somewhat swift, enough to follow along with Dick and the others. While they hit the ground and get to work on fighting the robots present, Raven turns her attention to the perimeter of the room, and the hole from which they all descended.

    Opening her mouth, words do not come from her, but instead a light, bellowing tone and a billowing, shimmering gout of that same two-tone darkness. It is then that the entrances to this room proper, both freshly created and not- are swallowed in a film of night.

    All around them, the Warzoon are charging in with impunity, and yet they never actually enter the room. Instead, Raven's mouth shuts after a moment, the shadows over the doors remaining.

    "I have begun littering."

    Sorry, Jupiter. You're the Warzoon homeworld now.

Siobhan Smythe has posed:
Dropping down the hole she made in the floor, Siobhan stares at the big monster that is coming toward them only for Beast Boy to turn into...a dragon?! Siobhan stares and takes a step back, watching this before she turns her gaze over toward the area they have to reach, "~Well, we have a dragon it seems.~" She states and shrugs before rushing past only for a robot to appear before her and she-

<~You're shamin' yourself.~>

-Silver Banshee stumbles and the robot slams a metallic fist right into her face and into the ground. She gasps in pain and pushes up a little from the jarring hit. She stares with those glowing eyes and growls out, "~I am in control...go away.~" She then pushes up and goes to throw a-

<~Ya don't even understand what ye can do...~>

And she's hit again, slammed back and spits out a black ichor as she stumbles and stares at the ground. "~Go away!~" She screams at nothing. She suddenly turns a burning gaze at the gorilla like robot even as its eyes begin to glow with a powerful blast and she screams again. This time though, she's screaming at the beast.

She leaps forward, the blast of sonic power blocking the cannons even as she slams her right hand like a knife into the shoulder of the gorilla robot and then slams in her other hand. She slowly rips its arm clean off and this time isn't distracted as the voice in her mind speaks again.

<~You could be more...~>

"~SHUT UP!!!~" She screams even as she grips the robots arm and begins slamming it into the thing repeatedly, slamming it into the bot and riding it to the ground even as she slams that arm into it, screams into another part, slams again and seems rather...occupied with telling the silent gorilla bot to shut up?

Donna Troy has posed:
    If the density of defenders at each tower seems to get thicker, so it seems the power and aggression of the Titans and allies grows to match it. The fighter cover at the third tower is a swarm that seems to block out the stars, but as the heroes rise up to give Vorpal the cover he asked for, they seem ready for any challenge.

    Caitlin's muon cannon blast a hole in the formation, and pilots wheel away in panic, fearing a second blast from the deadly canon - but when it's not immediately forthcoming, they close ranks again. The cannon takes a while to build up charge. Karolina zooms around Caitlin, a cheery rainbow of destruction that breaks up the fighter's next charge. The initial barrage of laser fire seems to be doing her more good than harm, and the ships ready missiles for the next run.

    America recovers from the blast that hit her in that initial volley, and crashes into the formation like an avenging Angel of Destruction, simply /punching/ the offending fighter out of the sky. Her trick with the star portals deals with the incoming missile fire, as Warzoon missiles struggle to cope with friendly vessels suddenly appearing in front of them.

    Angelica? Angelica is charging up like never before, but will there be time? The fighters reform and hurtle forwards for another run. The lead ships launch their missiles, while the flock behind opens up with a barrage of laser fire on the heroes. Then, with shocking suddenness, the formation splits apart. Fighters and missiles spin off to either side. Engines arc and fail. As Kian's powerful electromagnetic field pulses outwards, even the Titans feel it - the metal beneath their feet, even beyond the range of Angelica's heating, warms up. T-coms are filled with crackling noise.

    It's the perfect moment for Vorpal's Rabbit Hole. The body of the fighter explodes /inside/ the tower's shield, and for a moment the explosion surrounds the tower, contained within that shield in a column of superhot plasma. It's only a moment though before the the shield fails, and a moment later that the tower burns out. Metal melts and pools around the base, and again the purple haze in the sky above fades to blackness.

    The fourth tower awaits, and through the Rabbit Hole are the strongest defenses yet. Not only is there another swarm of fighters filling the air above, but the metallic landscape of War World's surface around the tower is covered in Warzoon fighters in vacuum armor.

    Inside the vast hanger, the Behemoth bellows its challenge at the bear, but when the bear turns into a frickin' DRAGON, even this powerful beast looks worried it may have met its match.

    Red-hot dragon breath curls around the Behemoth, and tendrils of flame dance past it to the handlers beyond. When the smoke and fire clears, the handlers are gone. The Behemoth's body shudders in pain, and it opens tiny, furious eyes? and charges!

    Nightwing leads the charge to the Data Center, dropping down through the hole in the floor torn out by Siobhan's scream, and immediately engaging one of the defending bots. The powerfully-built guard robot raises enormous arms into the air in a challenge, and stomps heavily towards him, only to be met by the wingding that stops it in it's tracks. Servos complain, but it the stun only lasts a few moments - long enough for Nightwing to engage it at close quarters, where those powerful fists have little room to swing, and fast-moving Escrima sticks are far more effective.

Donna Troy has posed:
    The Gorillabot facing Nadia roars mechanically as it charges her - and stops suddenly when she seems to disappear. It looks around in confusion, trying to find its target, but sees nothing. Deciding Nadia must have gone, it turns to help its fellow struggling with Nightwing, but stops suddenly in its tracks. It tilts it's head curiously as the first explosion rips out a part of its control circuitry, and it starts to walk around in circles. Another internal blast severs connections, and it's arm falls off. It raises its head to howl defiance at the universe; before it can, its head explodes, and it falls.

    Following behind the robots, the corridor starts to fill with Warzoon soldiers. They've figured out what's happening at last - and just how vulnerable they are if the infiltration team reaches that data core. The Warzoon advance - and one by one, they find themselves drifting peacefully down through the upper atmosphere of Jupiter. Great columns of colored gas, vast canyons in the atmosphere, come up to meet them, and their last moments before the pressure of that enormous world crushes them are moments of unutterable beauty.

    Kate's thoughts are well-placed. The Titans had drilled and practiced to deal with robots for weeks. They were equipped to deal with some of the most powerful robotic opponents the universe has seen in the Brainiac drones, and these Warzoon constructions are simply no competition. With EMP and precision, Nightwing and Kate dispatch their opponents, and after a few moments struggling with her inner beast, Siobhan wins out and demands it play its part too. Metal gives way to sound as the banshee scream tears the final robot apart.

    The door is open. The computer terminal awaits. Victory is in sight.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"This is it, team!" the Cheshire cat calls out. "There's too many to do what I did," there was no way he could get cover now, with the swarm /and/ the fighters."

Out comes the Rabbit Hole, both ends appearing just feet away from each other, and the Cheshire Cat crouches, primed for battle, "We need to clear some of these weeds..."

He doesn't charge into combat, not immediately, but sends both ends of the Rabbit Hole zooming towards the Warzoon at high speed. He's going to try to juggle and collide them at first, but soon the sheer number of them will force him to use the Rabbit Hole to dart around, do hit-and-run attacks while portaling over the field. He takes his fair share of injuries, but he's very much in survival mode, somewhat feral and aggressive.

Karolina Dean has posed:
    Karolina has no objections to taking the portal to the next tower, and she's eager and in. The overwhelming force of defenders gives her a moment of pause, but it's the last tower, and this has to count. Mustering her courage, she takes off again, intent on distracting at least a good portion of the fighters. "We can do this!" she calls over the comms, trying to be as encouraging as she can, even in the face of such odds. The rainbow-glowing heat signature is an easy target to spot both with eyes and sensors, and does her best to draw attention--and fire.

    The heavy concentration of ground forces is what gives her some issues, though, taking fire from all over, spiralling and diving, more focused on flying than fighting, only able to lance back laser-like blasts at her pursuers ever so often. The amount of missiles gathering behind her is turning into an angry swarm, relentless alien munitions following her moves, more agile and more dangerous than the fighters. Some of her bolts hit one, the explosion a chain reaction causing multiple balls of fire to bloom behind her, sometimes engulfing a few fighters. But always more. More. More.

    "I can't..." she can absorb the laser fire, but they still -hurt-, and she's still getting buffeted around. Then she just... drops. A hard dive, her trailing rainbow ribbons almost hitting a ninety-degree angle as she hits the deck literally. She brings a shield up before her, bowling over the suited ground troops, forcing her way through and letting the trailing missiles slam into them instead, using their bodies as shields and their own weapons against them.

    The draft and shrapnel from the blasts chases her, rushing in her wake, and she feels the shards of metal, her flightpath altering and her focus interrupted, sending her careening out of the ground formation and tumbling haphazardly across the War World's surface. She's leaking wisps and tendrils of brightly glowing starlight from several holes in her clothing, but she's still laughing, laughing through the ache, reaching out for the sun for warmth and a recharge. "...can't hold all of them... we can do this~!"

America Chavez has posed:
One more to go. America's relentless attacks, and uses of her star-portals are starting to wear on her, especially from the former battle prior to this and getting hit by that nasty energy weapon from the ship. But she still has some effort left to give, if by nothing other than sheer willpower and grit. "Alright, team. One more tower. Let's show these locos just why we're called the Titans."

She is ready to clear the weeds. She does this by swooping down onto the Warzoon fighters, and she begins to just outright -brawl-. There is no beauty to her method of fighting. There is no rhyme, or reason, or form to it. It is pure, relentless brawling with the sole intention of hurting your enemy with as much power, and force, that you can. She is swarmed, hit, beaten. And she hits back. Some Warzoon's go flying as she connects huge right hook, others with a kick. Some go down on the ground. And sometimes, she goes down to the ground, rising up momentarily after the swarm with meaty uppercuts.

America, vs. The Hoarde. She begins to clear the path for one of them to be able to assail the final tower, getting their attention on her rather than anyone else. She's taking her fair share of blows, but she's giving far, far more than she's getting, a veritable one-woman army against the many.

No star-portals anymore. Either too tired to make them, or simply too focused on the fight at hand to consider them as strategy, America provides the perfect diversion for those ground troops by being the most threatning, and dangerous thing in the vicinity to their livlihood and reputation.

Kian has posed:
    Kían is not feral, ever.  He can get cold and calculating, however, and that's kind of where his mind has gotten: /how do I live through this, and how do I do it without hurting anyone?/
    Stick with what worked.  Magnetic repulsion.  EMP.  Pray a lot.
    He doesn't seem to be running out of power for his /rhy'thar/ -- instead, it's instinct that gets him in trouble.  An energy beam hits the surface near him, and he automatically tries to take flight.
    No air.
    The birdman comes back down hard with a pained squawk, and rolls onto his side, expecting the worst....

Angelica Jones has posed:
Angelica hasn't used any of the energy that's in her; that first blast barely counts. And it keeps building. She almost whimpers when she doesn't get to discharge on the third tower, and then she's yanked to a fourth.

"I NEED to get rid of this!" she almost yells into comms. "My suit is starting to disintegrate! Put me someplace I can target the thing!"

And...there it is. A free target, and she looks up with eyes that are incandescent. There's nobody attacking HER. She's gathered almost all the ambient energy in the area, from xray to gamma, and it boils into her fingertips. The moment is here.

"Please get out of the way," she begs. Then she opens her hands in front of her, wide, and strikes. Fire in the hole.

The EMP goes out first, a wave of power-dampening. The shield ripples, at the worst possible time for it. Because it really needed some of that shielding love right about now.

The power isn't even visible at first. Until it is, and light BENDS.

      =======================**
*   ============================
      =======================**

The soft 'Hadoken' spoken into the comms is almost secondary. She is, however, no longer audible afterward, her blast having done her in. The shield, however, is the same.

The center of the tower is gone, the areas around the hole melted to slag. There's a gulley burnt into the planet behind it as well, the blast having gone...through. The tower, not the planet. I'm not that twinky.

And Angelica is unconscious and floating. Retreival must be done, and luckily the team has fliers. She broken.

Karolina Dean has posed:
    Still laughing, she's laying there, re-gathering her energy, her wounds sealing up as the solar radiation fills her. She's still tired, though. Being filled up, drained, and filled up again and again with so much fighting takes its toll.

    That outpouring of energy, she'd never seen such a thing before, or felt it, what waves ripple past her. It's felt and seen, maybe some of it drunk in just a bit. And then she sees the girl, the one she hadn't really met yet. Angelica, not a Titan? Or was she? After so much, starting to float away. "Oh... no... can't... have that..." she musters her energy and it flares around her, taking 'wing' on ribbons of light and color, swooping towards Angelica and catching her in her arms.

    "I've got her...!" she announces, then says quieter for the unconcious girl, "I got you. We'll make it home."

Gar Logan has posed:
As the rest of the crew with him deal with their robotic adversaries, the Gargon turns its head in their direction and shouts, "Go!"

His head swivels back around toward what's left of the behemoth, its handlers now reduced to crispy critters behind it in the wake of its charge.

Too long in any one form can bring with it some interesting side effects. Committing so much to such a massive transformation can do the same, and a feral gleam shines in the dragon's green eyes as it sees what it considers to be prey storming toward it. Jaws lined with razor-sharp fangs part and create a show of threatening strength as the dragon lands and bristles upward, all of those sharp ridges fanning out to present even more of an image of danger. There are a few moments where fang and claw come to a clash, wounds opened up on both sides, but that's not all Beast Boy has at his disposal.

The dragon plants and spins in place, the tail lashing out at the behemoth with a tremendous speed and impact behind it. It was that or chomp the thing, which might not have been so bad either.

Suddenly the great green monster breaks into a lyric from a song. "When a problem comes along, you must whip it!"

Never thought you'd see a dragon singing Devo, did you?

There's still enough of Gar in mind and body to pull something like that...for now, but how will he come out of it later?

Nadia Pym-van Dyne has posed:
Once through the hole she carved in the door and inside the data center, the unstoppable Waspette scans quickly around until she spies the central access terminal and zips over to it becoming a full sized Waspette again as she begins accessing it and using the quantum computer device to overwhelm its attempts to lock her out.

<<I'm in.>> She informs the others through the T-comms once the initial defenses fall. She then sets about interfacing the datacore housing the modified Brainiac code with Warworld's computer network. It takes a bit of doing and even some MacGuyvering, one might even wonder where she got that soldering iron, but eventually a hardline connection is established.

And then all that's left is to hit the Enter key. <<Starting the upload... now!>> The Waspette's finger jams down the button and the data transfer begins as she tracks its progress through her interface... 5%... 10%... the status bar continues to track across the screen, 20%... 40%... it's only seconds but it feels like an eternity, 70%... 100% at last!

<<It's done!>> she calls through the T-Comms, <<Let's get out of here!>> But not before she scatters a few more sticky bombs around the data center on the way out on the notion that it'll probably be really hard to fix this once underway without the access terminal. And because explosives are fun!

Dick Grayson has posed:
Dick watches as the robots are rendered into junk by the team, including the one he dealt with. "We're almost there, Nadia if you need anything from us, let us know now." He flashes a thumbsup over that way, but noise reaches his ear of approaching threats and he moves forward, "So close, and yet, so far," he grumbles.

A blast goes and is able to tear through some of his armor on his side, burning his side and he says, "I just had this fixed!" through bared teeth in pain as he charges forward, letting loose three wingdings in quick succession at his enemies, "You all had better hurry!" He calls, swinging his sticks as quickly as he can, though now hindered by the slight wound, holding nothing back as he guards the door. Once Nadia's notification comes out over T-Comms, Dick calls out, <<All right, Raven, sounds like we're good to go!>>

Rachel Roth has posed:
    It's Done is all Raven needs. Even before Dick is making the evactuation call, Raven is summoning up the shadows in the room, shreds of sentient night pushing up from the floor around the group.

    "We are leaving."

    Once again it is abrupt and unfriendly, wrapping each of the combatants up into her soul-self for transportation, each one of them momentarily in a voidspace filled only with rocks and serenity as Raven lingers within War World for a moment longer.

    Her mouth opens, and it erupts with pure red hatred, anger projecting itself out of her and spilling out into the section of the battlestation that they'd infiltrated, before spreading much like anger and hate do: Like wildfire.

    It infects, it eats and claws, cloys and gnaws, changing the attitude of every Warzoon remaining that had intended to break into this room. All together, each one believes that the other is responsible for a nebulous but supreme crime against them, personally.

    It is now that the Warzoon are a danger not to the Titans, but to one another.

    The respite in Raven's soul self ends quickly: Soon after even arriving, those present are ripped out of it and deposited whole upon the floor of the T-Jet, Raven floating among them in the imperious manner that is her signature, looking wholly like she simply doesn't belong on this earth.

Kate Bishop has posed:
Kate uses precision shots, one two punches of shaped charges, then EMP burst arrows. She is hmming a pop song at this point as she step, shoot, dodge dodge step shoot. Like it is a dance routine almost. The comms lighting up with Nadia having done it and Nightwing calling it. She steps quickly over towards the others for transport back out now.

Nope never ever going to get use to the Raven Soul Express. Okay well maybe eventually but man this is a disturbing way to travel.

Back on the T-Jet though after everyone reincorporates there is a "Got it." called by Kate as she moves quickly and nimbly up to the front of the T-Jet. She slides right into the pilot seat and starts to hit controls bringing up the HUD in front of her and bringing the weapon systems online now before taking the flight controls.

"Hold on!" she calls back to the others and then fires up the engines hard ripping away from the Dreadnought they were piggy backing and takes the T-Jet in low and fast towards the Tower where the Titan shield team is under intense pressure and needing some more room to make an evac. <<Incoming Guys, use this>>.

Kate starts to throw everything Cyborg has loaded the T-Jet up with at the insurmountable horde... honestly it seems that her Marksmenship with bows translates over to just about every ranged weapon, which begs why she uses bows exlusively really. Her hands moving at amazing speeds for a human as she works the flight and weapon systems using the T-Jet like a fighter jet this time. She has been clocking a lot of hours into the T-Jet .. T-Sub... it has a T on it and a simulation in the danger room she has been practicing. Right now though she is lighting up the Warzoon pinning down her Team.

Lots of BOoooOooms.

Donna Troy has posed:
    Throughout the War World's computer systems, the Brainiac virtual machine - with the Brainiac personality excised and replaced with junk data - starts spreading through the network. Counter-measure programs burst into life, identifying the software and deleting it wherever it appears - but each generation of the software changes. Advanced heuristics code attempts to determine unique markers in the mutating code, but the genetic algorithms of Brainiac's software soon learn to mimic system files in the Warzoon systems. The War World's own anti-viral software starts deleting chunks of its own operating system before living operators manage to deal with the Raven-inspired Warzoon civil war breaking out on the engineering deck long enough to figure out what's happening, and suspend the anti-viral code. The cascade is unstoppable.

    Quite simply,Warzoon are not the greatest computer programmers. Brainiac is. It's no contest. All across the vast space station, systems begin to fail and programs necessary to run the station shut down. Even before the infiltration team has evacuated, they see lights failing and doors opening and shutting at random. T-Coms fill with the sound of Cyborg yelling a victory "BOO-YAH!"

    And then the fourth tower falls. Once more the purple shimmer fades from the sky above, and the defensive forces peppering the Titans and Angelica on War World's surface fly against a black sky. There is now a vast hole in the War World's defenses, several miles across. The exhausted heroes ready to continue their fight, to hold off just long enough for Vorpal to open a Rabbit Hole to the T-Jet...

    And there it is... the cavalry has arrived! Silent in the darkness of space, the T-Jet unleashes all its remaining missiles into the fleet overhead, and a wall of cannon fire rips into the oncoming ground forces. The distraction gives the heroes the time they need, and Vorpal's Rabbit Holes bring them quickly on to the T-Jet, which streaks away into the sky, the great, welcoming globe of Earth - of home - growing large in the cockpit windows.

    Cyborg's voice booms over the T-Jet's intercom, broadcast unencrypted and wide-band from the dreadnought, where it will be picked up by the Titan's T-Coms, the T-Jet, the enemy fleet, War World itself, and the whole planet below. <<ATTENTION EARTH, mission successful. Enemy shields are down in sector four by seven to six by three. All planetary defenses, take your target. We have taken control of their computer systems and are disengaging their defenses. Commencing Muon disruptor fire in 5...4...3...2...1>>

    On one, the first explosion happens on War World, a great blast tearing a hole in the side of the station. Muon disruptors? Was that part of the plan? No, there are no muon disruptors, at least nothing bigger than the one Caitlin is carrying. But all around War World, crippled Warzoon fighters, sent back to base under Titan's remote control over the course of the day and stuffed with explosives, start blowing up inside fighter bays filled with munitions. The first explosion is followed by a second, and a third, and a fourth?

    The T-Jet's sensors burst into life as it detects multiple launches from the ground. Back on earth, the Warzoon forces have been put on the run - not least by the surprise arrival of the Army of Themyscira, a horseback charge through a portal that crashed into the massed ranks. On War World itself, the Warzoon leaders unable to be certain the Titans haven't actually taken full control of their computers are in a panic. A full retreat has been ordered.

    Donna's voice, utterly exhausted, breaks through on the T-Com. "One last job. Vorp, I need you and Cait on the Dreadnought, come on over please. We need to point this thing at War World as a final hint. Guys, hold there for us, we'll be with you in a few minutes."

Gar Logan has posed:
Dragons are great and powerful and terrifying and awesome, but dragons do not fit on T-Jets.

Thankfully, by the time Raven's teleport job is done and those on the infiltration team have returned, the dragon is back to normal Beast Boy, with a caveat: he's still carrying a few telltale signs of a reptilian nature, mainly in a humanoid form with skin that's still scaly, plus claws and a hint of a draconic face with a few lingering bony ridges. Oh, and a much, much shorter, less lethal tail. When he sniffs and looks around, a puff of smoke escapes his nostrils.

He looks down at his hands as he regains his bearings, glancing over a shoulder. "Whoa, I..oops!" In trying to stand back up, he falters and lands heavily in one of the chairs, a wave of fatigue smothering him in its tiring grip. "Think I..need a few, guys. We did it, right? We're still doing it?"

Kian has posed:
    Kían seems genuinely surprised to find himself not only on the T-Jet, but breathing.  "Still alife.  Huh."  He takes a few deep breaths.  After a moment, half under his breath, he starts up: "/c'Rhys'yw/, this /qokh/ planet..." and the rest rapidly degenerates from accented English to fluent /Akiár'shak/.
    A translation is not forthcoming.

Kate Bishop has posed:
Once everyone is safely onboard the T-Jet.. well Kate will break off and pull back.

Honestly she has fired most of the T-Jets missiles and while the canons are good, she has what they charged in for right.

She doesn't head back to earth though, Donna has a plan after all. <<Copy that, holding for you.. well dodging and shooting stuff but sticking around. Hustle people>>

So yeah Kate will hold the T-Jet for the final extract before ferrying everyone home to earth.

Of course there are decent odds Caitlin kicks her out of the pilot seat at that point to take everyone into atmo.

Karolina Dean has posed:
    Reinforcements! First mission successful! A trial by fire indeed. Karolina is happy to get swept up by one more Rabbit Hole, having learned so much about her own abilities today. Flying in space is addictive. But for the moment, she's sitting down in the T-Jet, an unconscious Angelica still in her arms, and seems a little reluctant to let her go.

    "We did it!" she laughs, still bright and rainbowy. She lost her bracelet in space. "Hey.... you're leaving again?" she asks those called out, and gives a concerned look.

    "Just come back safe, okay? We got so much accomplished!"

Angelica Jones has posed:
Angelica? She's out cold, her suit fused in several places, and is taken in under someone else's power. But she doesn't complain, which is nice. And when the helmet is pried off of her, she's missed all of the action. In fact she might not wake for a bit. The lady did the least of anyone, showed no grace under fire, and only managed to help at all because of a side effect of her powers which is dangerous to both herself and others.

And yet, she sleeps. A soft mumble of 'Rainbow' on her breath, before settling in deeper. She'll be fine. And so will Earth.

Nadia Pym-van Dyne has posed:
Back on the T-Jet, an exhausted Waspette pulls off her helmet, wipes the sweat from her forehead, and slumps back in her seat before strapping herself in. It may have been a grand amazingly cool adventure but it was also a lot. Somewhere in her mind she's also likely secretly wishing there had been a chance to capture and study the planetoid sized spacecraft, but alas that does not seem to be in the cards.

When Donna starts talking about one more thing though she sits up, her eyes darting between those named for the mission. It is a new beat of stress just when she was starting to relax that things are not in fact quite over just yet.

Dick Grayson has posed:
Nightwing exhales in relief as they are back on the T-Jet. He sighs as the ship unloads its payload to help out their allies. He prefers victory, but never enjoys the cost. Nightwing listens over comms and calls out <<Sounds good. If you need anything, you let us know." He frowns and takes a small case out of his belt and begins tending to his wound.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
As the Cheshire Cat brings the team to the T-jet, he stops and looks at Gar for a second and gives him a little smirk, "I see you've been practicing... your scales. You'll have to sing me something when I come back," he says, for Donna's message comes through loud and clear. He looks over at the assembled team, "We're almost there. Go us! Cait, it looks like we have a nought to Dread, let's go!"

He Rabbit Holes to the appointed location and he and Cait vanish through the portal. A "See ya soon!" jauntily floats across the portal before it closes.

Gar Logan has posed:
Little by little, the draconic features start to fade back to normal. It's an occasional side-effect of Beast Boy's transformations, especially significant ones. "Haha, dork. Be careful," he tells Vorpal, sitting up to look around, head tilting at what he sees of Karolina. "Whoa, shiny."

Exhaling, one of the last things to go away is the puff of smoke that rises again. "Man, I'm sore."

Donna Troy has posed:
    The great wounded space battle station shudders in the distance as the Warzoon attempt evasive maneuvers to get out of the way of the promised barrage of fire from Earth, but the disrupted systems fail and the engines die almost as soon as they fire. Aboard the dreadnought, Cyborg programs in a flight path aiming the great ship directly at the hole in War World's Shields. Caitlin takes fire control of the missile batteries, and Donna sits in the controls for the point defenses. Vorpal's mission is the simple one - man the sensors, but mostly Rabbit Hole the Dreadnought's skeleton crew /the hell/ out of here before the collision.

    On the screens in the T-Jet, the dreadnought recedes from view, heading towards the great metal orb of Warworld as the swarm of fighters closing in to intercept it like angry insects. The battered hulk of the Titan's stolen behemoth is shaken by the first wave of incoming fighter fire, but then the dreadnought's point defenses burst into life, tracing a web of fire across the sky that tears into the incoming fighter fleet.

    The T-jet's tracking systems continue to light up with the traces of countless smaller ships taking off from the planet. Atmosphere-capable fighters, many smaller transport shuttles and a giant, battered, troop carrier soon flood past the T-Jet, ignoring it as they retreat to the wounded War World. Some close in on the dreadnought, but others seem to be making for War World's damaged docking bays. After the first wave of ships has past, amongst the stragglers, a pair of flying humanoid figures accelerate into the distance, passing the wounded War World on some course of their own, ignoring this struggle in Earth's orbit.

    Radio chatter from the Dreadnought continues at a frantic pace, but the Titans left on the ship are too busy coordinating the assault to talk to those on the T-Jet. Vic's voice, lacking his normal levity: <<Incoming attack formation at two-one-two by one-nine-niner.>>

Donna's business-like reply: <<I see them, retargeting point defenses.>>

Vorpal, with a calmness in his voice he perhaps doesn't truly feel: "They're trying to light the engines again, but barely any thrust."

Caitlin, determined: "All missiles locked, final approach. Vorpal, be ready. Ten seconds to evac. Seventeen to collision. Firing."

    The ships surrounding War World are now too distant to see clearly from the T-Jet, just a cloud swirling around it. Only the dreadnought can still be made out against the silvery disc of the massive space station. Dozens of points of brilliance burst across the surface of War World, bathing it momentarily in fire. Somewhere behind War World, space starts to glow purple.

Donna Troy has posed:
    The purple glow expands, tendrils of light becoming a vast whirlpool that dwarfs even War World itself. The movements of the cloud of ships surrounding the station changes suddenly, tiny pinpoints of light swirling away and tumbling into the vortex. The cockpit of the T-jet fills with radio hiss, then a confusion of voices from the Titans on the dreadnought, barely comprehensible through the crackle.

Vorpal's voice, pitched too highly, <<...distort... what's...>>

Caitlin's, yelling urgently, <<...vacuuum! Close it and...>>

Donna's, leaden, <<...pact, four sec...>>

    The Radio breaks into a static hiss. The whirlpool spins languidly behind the disc of Warworld and the faint points of light of so many other ships circling it and drifting inwards in a stately dance that at this distance shows nothing of the violence that must be taking place. The whirlpool suddenly pulses like a beating heart, once, twice, then a flower of fire unfolds its petals on the surface of War World, and the sky is filled with a blinding flash.

    The sky fades back to blackness. Where the great space station, the swarm of smaller ships and the purple vortex had been, there is nothing but a luminous cloud, spreading out across the stars. From the radio, nothing.

    Time passes. The cockpit is silent and the universe seems to be holding its breath.

    The control console lights up, and alarms blare. The control system's synthesized voice speaks up, sounding incongruously unemotional. "Collision alert. Collision alert. Initiating evasive maneuvers. Debris swarm incoming. Brace for impact. Emergency RTB protocol active. Initiating emergency re-entry burn in 3...2...1..."

Donna Troy has posed:
    EPILOGUE: 17 hours later.

    The Ungaran Green Lantern drops lightly onto the hull of the Nova Corps scout-ship. A string of green bubble-constructs trail behind him like faintly-glowing Christmas tree baubles, each one containing imprisoned Warzoon fighters.

    <<Still nothing on our scans Lantern,>> the commander of the Nova vessel sends. <<Our analysis of the warp echoes remains inconclusive, but it's clear something was disrupting the wormhole. Our guess is that there was too much damage to the wormhole generators and they opened up onto a hyperspace anomaly of some sort. It probably collapsed in on itself. Find any survivors?>>

    "A few," the Lantern replies. "Several of the Warzoon fighters managed to escape the wormhole collapse. They didn't have anywhere to go. I doubt they'd be given a warm welcome on Earth. You want to take custody? They're not worth a Sciencell."

    <<Can do, Lantern.>>

    The officers of two galactic police forces watch in companionable silence for a while as in the distance, unaware of them, a United States Space Plane picks its way through the debris field, scanning the wreckage.

    <<You don't think they actually managed to destroy Warworld, do you?>>

    "Very unlikely. It has survived worse in the past. Let's just hope the anomalous wormhole threw them somewhere a very, very long way away."

    <<Mongul? And the Kryptonians?>>

    "No sign of the Kryptonians. We detected a recent warp signature from Jupiter orbit, they probably had their own ship there. My last report on Mongul has him being dragged away from the planet by Captain Marvel. We think the pursuing Warzoon fled to War World, but we're not certain. Still trying to find out."

    <<They're a resourceful lot, these Humans. Impressive what they have achieved here, for such a supposedly primitive species. With this lot on the verge of stepping out among the star-lanes I'm not sure whether I should be filled with optimism or dread.>>

    "Yes, that's Humans for you. I'll tell Jordan you said so, he'll be amused. How bad was it on the ground?"

    <<Surprisingly good. One city took the brunt of the invasion, but the Humans and their assorted friends on the planet seem to have put up an amazingly stiff resistance right from the start. Total casualties in the low thousands. I can't help feeling the Warzoon picked the wrong target.>>

    "They are a feisty lot. And remarkably powerful for such an insignificant-seeming world."

    <<They are brave, I'll give them that. Any chance the humans on the dreadnought survived?>>

    "No signs of human life anywhere. Readings suggest they tried and failed to open some kind of inter-dimensional portal in the last moments. They were inside the wormhole horizon though. Magic is not my strong point, but it's hard to imagine they could have opened a stable portal within a wormhole, let alone one that was undergoing that peculiar gravitational collapse. I found a small amount of debris from the dreadnought, and it looks like the impact took place a fraction of a second before the wormhole collapsed. Even if they somehow survived the impact, the gravitational shock must have torn them to pieces."

    <<Pity.>>

    "Yeah."