JAN 2004 - #5

Krakoa . . . The Island That Walks Like A Man! by Paul Hahn

On one side: Linda Danvers, Sam Guthrie, Jennifer Lynn-Haden and Illyana Rasputin. On the other side: A wall of vegetation and vines covered in thorns swinging about menacingly, intelligently. And in the middle? Young Justice.

"What do you mean?" Cissie asked. "The island's alive? Like, sentient?"

"No way," Bart said.

"It no longer matters," Linda frowned.

"You're not Linda," Superboy coldly stated.

"We've got to get back to the caves," Chuck said. "It's got to be our top priority."

"Then there's only one thing to do, right, mon?" Anita asked.

"Yeah," Superboy nodded. "Let's do it to it!"

And thus, the battle began. It seemed like it would be easy; seven (Nightwing, Superboy, Impulse, Arrowette, Jolt, Empress, and Rebel) against four (Phoenix, Cannonball, Jade, and Magik). However, the very island stood against them.

"Whoa!" Empress exclaimed, barely teleporting out of the way as a piece of the very beach rose up in an attempt to swallow her. "This place is getting crazy . . . "

Jolt tried to take a swing at Magik, who teleported away. However, Impulse was able to move fast enough to punch her hard just as she reappeared elsewhere.

"I've got no weapons," Cissie exclaimed. "I had a bow and arrow back at the hut . . . "

"Then you're just easy prey," Jade said, creating a solid green sword in her right hand.

"She's not alone," Cassandra said, standing tall with a broken tree branch in her arms.

Cannonball flew right into Superboy, knocking him hard into the ground. The ground proceeded to shoot up thorny vines which wrapped around Kon's arms, legs and waist. Cannonball began punching Superboy, but was suddenly hit over the back of the head with another branch, thanks to Nightwing.

Superboy flexed his muscles and broke free of the vines. "At least my tactile telekinesis is still workin'," he said. "How are we lookin'?"

"Bart and Hallie got Magik," Chuck explained. "Looks like Cissie and Cassandra just took down Jade. You and I got Cannonball . . . so there's just . . . "

" . . . Linda," Superboy said, his heart heavy. The two looked up to see her floating above them, preparing for the fight.

"Do you think we can take her?" Cissie asked, joining the two.

"We couldn't take the real Linda, way back when*," Chuck frowned. "And she's grown a lot powerful since then. But we have no way of knowing just how powerful a fake one is . . . "

*(Waaaay back, in an as-of-yet unseen battle taking place just before YJ #1! - Paul)

"We can't fight her, chuck," Superboy said. "Please . . . even if she is fake, I . . . I did it once. And I hated myself. I can't do it again . . . "

Jolt electro-shock punched the wall of vegetation trying to keep them from getting to the mountain. "Maybe we don't have to," she said. "Let's go!"

"Right," Chuck said. "YJ! Form up and follow me!"

Nightwing then began a sprint, leading the group towards the mountain. Jolt and Superboy had no trouble keeping up, neither did Rebel. Impulse was going as slow as he could bring himself to go, carrying Arrowette. Empress teleported alongside them.

"She's following us!" Cissie yelled, able to see Linda flying above them.

"Why isn't she attacking . . . ?" Chuck asked himself.

Suddenly, two large vines erupted from the ground. One wrapped around Empress, the other around Rebel. Empress teleported out with ease. Superboy responded quickly, tearing the vine apart.

"Keep moving!" Nightwing ordered.

As they approached the mountain, a landslide occurred, trying to bury the team before they could get inside.

"Move, move!" Superboy yelled.

With but seconds and inches to spare, the entire team made it inside a cave; the exit was now sealed.

"Now what?" Arrowette asked.

"Now you follow me," Chuck said. "But we've still gotta move fast . . . "

And so the race began. The catacombs were very dark; some of the only light came from Jolt's glowing eyes. Chuck lead the team the way he had gone previously, until they had reached the chamber that was their destination.

"My Lord . . . " Cissie gaped as she and the others saw themselves, in their tattered and torn uniforms attached to all sorts of vines.

"I don't understand," Cassandra frowned.

"Cut yourselves free!" Chuck exclaimed. The cavern started to rumble. "Hurry!"

Each member of YJ went to their own body, not quite sure what to think. The rumbling increased until, finally, all the members of Young Justice had cut themselves free of the vines. Each one then lost consciousness . . .

. . . And then each one woke up.

"Everyone okay?" Nightwing asked. He was in uniform again; they all were.

"I don't get it," Empress said.

"We were in some sort of stasis," Nightwing tried to explain. Then, the rumbling started up again. "We need an exit, now! Superboy!"

Superboy nodded, then flew full force at a cave wall and smashed through it, giving the team a way out. They all followed, escaping the rumbling cave. Linda, who had waited outside, was now gone. She no longer existed.

The rumbling didn't stop, however. It increased, just in front of them, on the jungle surface.

"Of course," Chuck said, putting pieces together as a large piece of the island continued to rise up. "She said 'No man is an island' doesn't apply here. The island . . . it's alive . . . ?!"

Images then flooded into each members minds, remnants of the interfaces they were locked into for who knew how long. Images of the sun-burst brilliance of an early testing of an atomic bomb, whose radiation permeated every living organism on the island until they grew linked in a colony intelligence that gave the island a life of its own. And island which named itself Krakoa.

"Yesss," the island's voice boomed. The growing piece of ground had become a hulking mass of vegetation, standing fifty feet tall, with massive arms, huge, bulging eyes and sharp, angry teeth. "We grew hungry . . . and we learned that we could be sustained by the lives of the humans who had accidentally created us. You humans crashed into the waters just outside our island in some sort of metal construct. We sensed your life, knew it was weak, but . . . we hungered. So we saved you . . . restored you to health. We have come to know radiation intimately since our creation, and knew how to cure you of its poisons. Once you were restored to full health, we began to use your life energies to sustain us. Some of you have . . . great power . . . and will be able to feed us for years . . . "

"But . . . why the dream-world?" Cissie asked. "Why give us that?"

"There was a risk of you regaining consciousness," Krakoa explained, looking upon the young heroes with hunger in his eyes. "So we created for you a new consciousness, one that you would be happy in and not try to fight back . . . "

"But you underestimated us," Nightwing said.

"Yeah, especially Chuck's paranoia," Superboy said.

"No matter," Krakoa replied. "We have learned much from our time together . . . it will help in the future. But make no mistake . . . none of you are escaping alive."

And thus, the battle began again.

"I'm still out of batarangs!" Nightwing said, relying on his bo-staff to attack.

"And I'm still out of arrows," Arrowette frowned, hitting the creature with her bow.

Empress began slashing away with her blades. Impulse and Jolt relied on their fists, as did Rebel. Superboy tried pounding away as well. Krakoa just shrugged the assault off, smacking Superboy down with one of its huge arms.

"We're in over our head," Nightwing said. "We need some serious help . . . "

"Ask and ye shall receive!" Wonder Girl exclaimed. She burst forth from Chuck's body, as she was in full ionic energy mode.

"Whoa," Chuck said quietly.

"Without Krakoa interfering, I can be myself again!" she exclaimed. "And it's time to take out the trash!"

"Got a plan, I take it?" Chuck asked.

"You bet!" she replied. "The creature was born out of radiation, right? And it had no trouble absorbing the radiation from our bodies that we absorbed in space, right?"

"Right," Chuck replied.

"Well, in my ionic form, I can absorb and rechannel radiation, like I did when I piloted us back to earth," she continued. "Sure, it wasn't a huge success, but I think I might know how to do it . . . "

"What're you suggesting?" Chuck asked.

"You guys keep him busy," Wonder Girl explained. "And I'll absorb all the radiation back out of him!"

"It's a shot in the dark," he frowned, "but it just might work . . . "

So seven members of Young Justice began hitting Krakoa with everything they had, doing their best to keep him busy. Wonder Girl set to work, focusing like she never had before, and began drawing radiation out of the island. She started slowly, absorbing the radiation one atom at a time. But sure enough, she began to get the hang of it, and she began to absorb the radiation faster and faster, more and more of it. She couldn't stop . . . this was their only real shot, and they had to take it!

"Wh-what is happening to us?" Krakoa asked, his attention being taken away from the battle being waged against him. "Why do we feel so strange? Our mind hurts so . . . can't retain our humanoid form . . . ! Please . . . help us!"

The creature fell over, and was starting to become one with the island again.

"It's working!" Nightwing exclaimed. "Keep going, Cass . . . until you've got it all!"

"Almost there," Wonder Girl said, her body glowing brighter with energy.

"Nooo . . . !" Krakoa moaned, his voice getting quieter and quieter, until, finally . . . it stopped.

"Got it all," Wonder Girl said, her voice straining. "He's . . . he's been undone."

"Alright!" Superboy exclaimed.

"Gotta . . . gotta get rid of the energy . . . " she said. She aimed her arms up into the sky, closed her eyes, and released it all in one huge, concentrated blast. The sky exploded, as if on the Fourth of July, bright colors bursting from behind every cloud. It was a beautiful and brilliant site, and heralded the end of the fight.

The eight team members sat around in a circle on the beach, not sure of what to do. The only thing they really could do was talk; to try and figure out all that had happened.

"So, you were captured by Graviton," Chuck started.

"Yeah," Superboy frowned. "Because I betrayed the team. After I was cloned, I began losing my powers . . . and Graviton, who found me after the explosion at the castle, told me that, if I didn't find my clone and stop him, I would eventually lose all my powers. He gave me a power boost to help me, as a way of thanking me for helping him by telling him all about the world's heroes. Because of me, he almost conquered the world."

"But we stopped him," Wonder Girl said. "I pulled myself back together after being blown up by the Marauders in the Morlock Tunnels. Apparently, being made of ionic energy has its advantages."

"But Chuck, you were launching an assault of your own?" Arrowette asked.

"Yeah," Chuck sighed. "While the thing with Graviton was going down, I had tracked down Ultimatum and Flag Smasher . . . the man who killed my parents. I was in a rage, beat him within an inch of his life . . . shocked at what I had done, I fled, only to learn what had happened. Red Tornado was still around, so I came up with a plan to strike back. I convinced Ultimatum . . . no. I promised them that I would delete Avengers League files on them, if they'd help fight Graviton."

"You what?" Wonder Girl asked.

"And, how come Mister Freeze was there?" Impulse asked.

"I thought his powers would be essential in helping us, and they were," Chuck continued. "But I also promised him that Flash and . . . Impulse would work with him and help him find a cure for his wife."

"That's not cool," Bart frowned. "That guy's a whacko . . . he's tried to kill me' an' Wally . . . that's not cool."

Chuck sighed. "I know . . . but it was desperate times, and they needed desperate measures. And it worked, right?"

"And then we got abducted by aliens who believed Linda was a threat to all existence," Superboy frowned. "And so we fought for her life . . . and we managed to win, too. But . . . but Linda thought they were right. And she . . . she left. She put us on the shuttle to try and save us, and she left . . . she looked out into the cosmos, and left us. Left . . . me. And worse, the aliens were still trying to kill her! We don't know if she's dead or alive!"

"But we do know that we're alive," Wonder Girl said. "Somehow, I did manage to get us back to Earth. And, surprisingly enough, if it wasn't for Krakoa, we would have died. But now . . . now we're all alive. All okay."

"Except Cassandra can't talk anymore," Empress frowned, looking at her friend.

"Yeah . . . and everyone thought I was crazy when I realized something was wrong," Chuck frowned. "I mean . . . no one trusted me . . . "

"Well, you did promise Mister Freeze you'd give him Bart," Hallie frowned. "That's not right."

"And you admit to losing control attacking Flag Smasher," Bart added.

"I did what I had to," Chuck frowned.

"Uh, hate to interrupt all the thrilling conversation . . . but there's a ship out there," Cassie said. "And life boats approaching . . . "

"They must have seen the release of energy I did," Wonder Girl said. "They've come to rescue us!"

"Good," Kon said. " . . . 'Cause when we get back to land, I . . . I quit."

"What?" Wonder Girl asked.

"I betrayed the team," he said. "I almost got us killed . . . and now? Linda . . . she's gone . . . maybe forever. It's too much to deal with right now. I'm not saying I'll be gone forever, but . . . I quit."

"Chuck!" Cissie exclaimed. "Do something!"

"Alright," Chuck said. "I quit, too."

"WHAT?!" Wonder Girl, Empress and Arrowette exclaimed.

"You guys don't trust me," he explained. "So when we get back to land . . . I quit."

Superboy turned and walked a bit away from the group. Chuck turned and walked a few paces in the other direction. The rest of Young Justice looked from one, to the other, to the life boats, and to themselves.

Hallie looked at the others and asked, "Well, what are we gonna do now?"