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Scarlet Starlight	By : DarthMeow504 Category: zMisplaced Stories [ADMIN use only] > Spiderman Views: 35989 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 3
Disclaimer: This is a work of non-profit fanfiction. The Marvel Universe, the DC Universe, the Image Universe, and all characters and elements thereof are copyright their respective companies. Additional disclaimers within.

Chapter List
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[Author's Note: Donna Troy is copyright DC, the Eternals and Thanos, as well as the Titan setting, are Marvel. The Cyborg Superman is copyright DC. Starfire and Pantha are copyright DC, and the Weapon X program and Psylocke are copyright Marvel. Starfox is Marvel. As always, I'm mixing and matching Marvel elements with DC and putting original spins on much of it, but as always I claim none of it for profit. It's their sandbox, I'm just rebuilding their castles for fun. Space Ghost is copyright Hannah-Barbera, and Ryoko of Tenchi Muyo is copyright whatever anime studio created her. I only wish I owned her, as I'd do a lot more with her than they ever did. For an image reference for the meow that is my new Pantha, see http://www.angelfire.com/la/nightmoves/images/purplepanthergrrl2.jpg ]

Chapter 10: The Cats from Outer Space

It had been an interesting time for the west coast based Avengers women and their feline subgroup newly dubbed the Thundercats. Diana's joining as a reserve member had opened up more than simply her perfect legs and lips for her female teammates, she'd brought a whole new perspective on the othwerworld's heroes and villains that the native Avengers never had access to. She was able to bring them not only access to JLA database information on hundreds of superhumans, but also personal experience. In return, she was able to provide the JLA access to Avengers files and experience with the native world superhumans. This coordination would bring a new level of effectiveness to both teams.
It had brought more direct benefits as well, as her sister Donna Troy had joined them soon thereafter and nor was she alone. Donna, alias Starfire, had been a member of a group called the Teen Titans who had originally formed from teenaged "sidekicks" of heroes which had been all the rage among their world's heroes for a short time. How that could have possibly been a good idea was boggling, and it hadn't ended well. Nightwing eventually quit and went solo, finding his city duties and the stress and trauma there more than he could handle and also juggle team responsibilities, and the Arrow sidekick Speedy had turned to drugs to deal with his own stress and traumas and was now in rehab. Wally West, the former "Kid Flash" and then replacement Flash, had sacrificed his powers and suffered a career-ending injury in the process of returning his mentor from the apparent dead. Aqualad had proven perhaps even more useless on a land-based team than the elder Aquaman, and hadn't stuck around long. That left Donna and the "new blood" members who had joined later and never held "junior league" versions of other heroic identities. Of those, Cyborg had had perhaps the most success as he had moved on to a successful career as a solo hero in the Silicon Valley area and had made enough of a name for himself that he had received, though turned down, an offer to join the JLA and held a reservist's card with that elite group of heroes. Donna also held a reservist JLA membership, but she'd semi-retired after playing a key role in saving her world in the Crisis event that had merged it with the world they now all called home. She technically held the rights to the group name unless Nightwing asked for it back, but she'd been hesitant to reassemble a new group and unsure how to resume her own career, instead taking time off to recover. Given that she'd been saddled with memories and knowledge from countless multiversal duplicates of herself and been tasked with speaking for their world before the Living Tribunal himself, who had threatened to eradicate the "invading" universe to protect the original, she'd earned her time off.
Remaining with her was the former Starfire, who had given her the name to take the name Starlion herself, and who was a most intriguing feline alien from a distant world. It hadn't taken long for them to suss out that the Tamaran people were an offshoot of the Thunderan race, and the stunning catwoman had expressed instant interest in joining Tigra's group. Given the woman's physical prowess, flight, and energy powers and also her charm and attractiveness, the offer of membership was a boon to both her and they.
Not long after, they brought a new member to the group as well. Even Donna wasn't sure where other former members Raven and Beastboy had gotten to after the group disbanding, and others had come and gone and their short stays weren't particularly notable, but one of those short-timers had real potential. The woman's name was Pantha, and she was an experiment into bio-weaponry dubbed X-24 by her unknown creators. None of them, not even Pantha herself, had known what that meant or where exactly she'd come from, but Jessica's detective mind had pieced it together. Having recently met (and slept with) a pair of weaponized clones designated X-23, she quickly put two and two together and contacted Kat Pryde to confirm and do the necessary research.
What they found out was that X-24, aka Pantha, had been the only successful prototype of a companion program to the X-23 series that had produced the Feral twins Jessica had had intimate experience with. Cloned from a combination of Psylocke and Wolverine, she was rather like a more feral version of the british beauty's ninja incarnation, purple-haired and telepathic but also with a healing factor and physical prowess that eclipsed even Betsy's formidable ninja abilities. She lacked much of the original's higher-level psionic powers as something of a trade-off, but she could still probe minds and read thoughts even if she couldn't blast minds at a distance or pierce developed mental shields or other such powerful telepathic gifts like her genetic forebear. Like Betsy, she could form psionic weapons of purple mental energy partially telepathic and part telekinetic, and like Betsy she could use a form of self-limited telekinesis to boost her physical abilities. She was significantly more stealthy though, with bones of a carbon-fiber like composite material that was as strong as omnium steel but lighter than fiberglass, and her musculature was augmented with organic myomer fiber and lightened with organic semisolid foam, producing a package that was the same size and shape as human muscle but significantly lighter and stronger. Her internal organs were similarly lightened and enhanced, producing a metabolism that was tough and efficient and able to survive beyond human limitations. Her skin was woven with armor fibers as well, able to shrug off small arms and hand weapons with only minor damage and thus reducing the burden on her healing factor which was weaker than that of Wolverine. The total package was as light and agile as an olympic gymnast but with the strength of a world-class powerlifter, with endurance like a decathlete --in fact, her abilities outstripped the best human champions in any of those disciplines. Combined with her self-generated weaponry, ability to track both by scent and psionic signature, and her ability to cloak herself psionically, she was an ideal assassin and covert operative.
She'd suffered horrific injuries at the hands of the Superboy fugue that had been Alexander Luthor's enforcer during the Crisis, and very nearly died. Her healing factor had allowed her to cling to life by a thread even though much of her head had been pulped and her neck had snapped, and they'd been able to get her into a stasis chamber that would stabilize her and allow her to heal without risk of going into shock or arrest. Perhaps more importantly, once she was healed it would undertake a process of mentally reprogramming her with the elements of knowledge and memory and personality she'd surely lost to the traumatic brain injury she'd suffered, a longer process than healing her body. Surely, though, it had been long enough to complete both and she should be ready to rejoin the world and to do so with a new home to join in the Thundercats.
To their delight, the chamber did indeed read as ready when they went to retrieve it from the former Titans base, and the woman proved eager to move forward with a group that actually wanted her and sought out her membership instead of merely tolerating her presence. The group was more than glad to welcome her, not merely for her beauty or feline theme but also because telepathic abilities were in short supply in the Avengers organization and she would be a great addition to the team.
That team would get it's first true test soon thereafter.
-----
Somewhere in interstellar space, a feline figure studied the readouts on her screen. With a frown, she pulled her magnificent, mane-like blue hair from under her perfect butt and readjusted her tail to sit more comfortably in her captain's chair, but her discomfort was more than physical. She nodded softly at a low feline noise from the speakers, and responded.
"I agree, girl... he's still back there. And not seeing him is worse than at least knowing where he is."
Working her controls more with thought than actual buttons on the arm-console on her chair, she called up starmaps of their local area, and then tightened focus on one planet in particular, a rather backwater blue world with little involvement with the rest of the galaxy and yet a vastly disproportionate amount of superhumans that made them a force to be reckoned with despite the laughably primitive state of the world's technology and cultural development. It would be an ideal place to hide, and maybe even find allies.
She was setting course for the little blue rock even as she called up the planet's primitive global database, getting herself up to date on the state of the superhuman population to figure out how to play her hand. It wasn't long into her research that she blinked in such surprise at a certain entry that she doublechecked to make sure it wasn't a prank or hoax of some kind. A Thunderan feline group, actively recruiting? It couldn't be more perfect if she'd designed it to order herself. She already had her cover story mostly sketched out in her mind when she turned off the database search and got up to go to her quarters for a nap. This would be entirely too easy.
-----
Tigra nodded softly after the beautiful blue-haired feline finished her story, and excused herself to talk to Barbara and Cheetara about it.
"What do you two think?"
Cheetara replied first. "What she says is entirely possible... the Thunderan race was once spread wide amongst the stars, and we have already taken in one such starlost cat."
Tigra nodded, and looked to Barb, who frowned softly as she spoke. "I... don't know. Yeah, everything fits, but I get a bad feeling about it, and her. Like she's saying what she knows we want to hear. She's just entirely too smooth for me to trust entirely. I've seen too many cons in my day."
Tigra nodded and smiled. "According to the Eye, your instincts are dead on. It warned me something was wrong about her she even arrived, showed me a vision, but it also seems to think she has potential to be redeemed if we give her a chance. Her story is bullshit, but it could come around to our favor if we play our cards right. I'm inclined to take the shot, but I'm not gonna make the call alone."
Barbara sighed. "I'm inclined to say hell no, but that'd be kind of hypocritical of me considering I'm wooing a villainess of my own in Selina. I'm no stranger to knowing something is probably a bad idea but doing it anyway lured along by the hope for a reward."
Tigra smiled softly to her. "And that didn't turn out so bad so far, did it? Not from what Felicia says."
Barbara sighed and nodded in defeated agreement, and Tigra turned to Cheetara, who replied with much more confidence.
"She's one woman. We have numbers, and the Sword of Omens at our side. I don't fear her. If taking this gambit is your strategy, I back you in it."
-----
Soon thereafter, they were back and questioning the woman Ryoko about the threat she was fleeing, when suddenly an unknown figure materialized as if coming straight from the wall itself. He was a huge, muscled figure in a white bodysuit with black cape and cowl, and red gauntlets with glowing buttons. His eyes were invisible behind glowing white lenses, and something about him was like an apparition, as he floated inches above the ground with a palpable aura of power.
Somehow, he'd gotten in without tripping any of the alarms or defense mechanisms, as if he were some sort of ghost. As the women scrambled to defensive positions, he spoke.
"What 'he' is is interstellar law enforcement, and she is under arrest --" he suddenly paused, and locked eyes on Starlion, who had just entered the room. "...after dealing with a priority target."
He tapped a few buttons on his gauntlets, and then he disappeared. On the monitor screen were the words "YOU HAVE BEEN IDENTIFIED. BACKUP HAS BEEN SUMMONED. PREPARE TO SURRENDER OR BE TAKEN BY FORCE."
Tigra was the first to speak. "What in the hell was that about?" then she looked towards the two women who had been accused. "Care to fill me in? Tell me the truth."
Both spoke at virtually the same time, and Ryoko's confession of "I'm a space pirate" wasn't terribly surprising thanks to the forewarning from the Eye, but Starlion's confession floored even the aforementioned space pirate herself.
"I'm a clone of Thanos."
-----
In the short time since the ersatz Starlion had dropped her bombshell, a small team had assembled in response to the distress call. As so often happened, most teams were unable or unwilling to commit a full force to aid other heroes, prioritizing missions by protecting innocents, then stopping threats, and then if possible aid other heroes who were by and large expected to be able to take care of themselves. Still, they had quickly gathered a rather formidable grouping including Guardian from X-Factor, Jade and Photon from the Avengers reserve list in nearby LA, Diana and Donna Troy, and Tigra and Ms Marvel from their core group of friends. Thor was expected at any moment as well, and the Defenders had dispatched the new female Ghost Rider who would be arriving soon also to lend her aid. And of course, this was just a listing of the heavy hitters they'd assembled, not inclusive of the weaker members not really suited to a cosmic level incursion and who would be held in reserve for their own safety.
So far Starlion, or whoever she turned out to truly be, hadn't been hostile nor had Ryoko, the self-admitted space pirate, and so rather than antagonize either of them they'd started with assessing the external threat first and then seeing where they stood with the pair in their midst. And so it was when the question was asked regarding just who the spectral man in white had been, it was Donna Troy who answered.
"I've never dealt with him directly, but very few ever have. I can confirm he's what he says he is, interstellar law enforcement, but he's more than that. He's... like a legend. A force unto himself. I've worked with the Green Lantern Corps, the Darkstars, and the Manhunters and they all have multiple conflicting legends about him that date back longer than anyone can remember. Even the Corps has those legends and they've been doing this for millenia. Nobody has any real concrete information on him, but they all have the same policy about encounters with him: If he claims jurisdiction in a case, give it to him. Period. And no matter what, do NOT attempt to engage him."
Jessica sighed. "So if he's calling for backup, he's going to be bringing down heat like we've never seen."
Donna nodded and sighed. "One would imagine."
The blue-haired feline removed one potential worry from their list when she spoke up, saying "For what it's worth, the enemy of my enemy is my friend so even if you don't want me staying around after, I'll help you in this battle."
Tigra smiled... the Eye had been right. There was a chance this one could become truly one of them.
"Thank you, we're definitely going to need all the help we can get." Then she turned to the false Starlion. "How about you? What's your story?"
All eyes went to the green-eyed, tawny-skinned feline alien, who sighed. "I suppose I've kept you waiting long enough... but if you'd wait just a little longer? I've asked Thor to retrieve something for me that will make all this a lot clearer."
"Wait no longer. The God of Thunder has arrived." The booming male voice from the entrance annoinced his arrival, and he was carrying a large, technologically advanced looking coffin-like tube on his shoulder that could easily hold a full-sized adult and yet he hefted it like it were made of styrofoam and balsa wood. He sat it down next to her, and then moved to join the others, eyes on her. "By all means, tell your tale, and do not attempt treachery."
She sighed, and began to open the coffinlike container, revealing a humanoid figure within. "As you've surely figured out, I'm not the real Starlion." The inside of the chamber lit up, revealing an exact duplicate of the tawny feline female. "This is."
A few surprised gasps came from the assembled heroes, and more than a few sets of narrowed eyes as well. It was Jessica who spoke first. "Who are you then?"
She sighed once more, and then told instead of showed as her form rippled and shrank, revealing a small female humanoid figure with long red-brown hair that matched her fluffy furred tail and pointed triangular ears atop her head, and her clear blue eyes glittered in a face that could be called more cute than classically beautiful but was still definitely attractive. On her lithe yet curvaceous form she wore a red and white bodysuit with flared shoulders and built-in boots, adorned with a fox-face symbol on her chest.
Again the reaction was surprise, as they recognized her, or at least the uniform and aspects such as her hair and eye color. This time it was She-Hulk who reacted, actually blurring across the room and sending a glowing green fist smashing into the small woman's chin with shattering force, sending her flying off her feet to bounce off the opposite wall with a wet thud. "Starfox, you son of a bitch!"
The small foxlike woman shook her head to clear it as others rushed to hold back the gamma goliath. A nasty looking bleeding scalp wound, matching the wet spot on the wall where the back of her head had hit, dripped purple blood for long moments before it grew closed once more, and she spoke. "I'm nobody's son, and the closest thing I have to a mother was a good and kind woman before Thanos killed her." She let that sink in for long moments, eyes glowing fiercely, before she softened. "I do suppose I kind of deserve that though. I wasn't exactly truthful with you when we slept together."
Shulkie shrugged off those holding her, still angry but no longer dangerously raging as she replied sarcastically. "Gee, you think?"
Her green features remained set in a dangerous scowl, but instead of attacking again she returned to the others and allowed Starfox to speak.
"I do owe you all an explanation... her too, when she wakes up." as she indicated the still slowly recovering form of the Starlion, awakening from her hypersleep. "I promise, I have good reasons for everything I've done... even if in your case it's that you look so damned good in green." she said with a cute little wink to the She-Hulk, which drew a few chuckles from the crowd even as it got a soft growl of frustration from the green giantess.
She grew more serious as she began to recount her tale, sadness in her eyes and voice as she recounted the painful memories. "Many of you have met my father, the Titanian Eternal known as Mentor. Far fewer were lucky enough to meet the woman who would be my mother, had she lived. Thanos, scourge of the known universe, started his killing spree very close to home before he branched out into galactic genocide. Our mother was certainly not his first kill, but it's the one my father and I mourn most. Even having never met her, I miss her with all my heart. I'll never forgive Thanos for taking her from us, or for slaughtering our people."
Soft expressions of sympathy were echoed from the assembled listeners, before she was urged to go on.
"I came about after the slaughter, from Mentor's wish to have another child that would echo the kind features of his beloved wife and give him a legacy that wasn't consumed with death and destruction. Working backwards from Thanos' genome, he isolated the X chromosome from our mother and worked with it to bring forth as many of her traits as possible, before combining it with his own to create a daughter that was as close as genetically possible to one that would have been born from he and Sui-san. So yes, I am a clone of Thanos, but not merely that. I am sister to Thanos and true daughter to Mentor and the memory of Sui-san of Titan, and I am nothing like my brother. Nothing at all."
Tigra asked softly. "Why do they hunt you then?"
The answer was as swift as it was bitter. "Because they don't care who I am or what I want, they only care what I am, and that's the genetic progeny of Thanos. He's supposedly dead, but I'm alive and in their mind as long as I'm alive there's a chance I'll follow his path. To them, the risk of destroying one innocent is preferable to the risk of me destroying billions like my brother did."
Tigra sighed. "I was afraid it would be something like that. We're going to have to fight then, there's no way we can just hand you over to them. Not gonna happen."
Thor nodded in agreement. "Aye, we all stand with you. The God of Thunder has stood in battle with the mad Titan himself, and did not shy away in fear. I will not abide those whose cowardice has overwhelmed their judgement."
Donna frowned at that. "That's what confuses me, actually. The Space Ghost is known for a lot of things, but cowardice isn't one of them. This doesn't seem his style."
Starfox nodded. "That's because it's not him... it's the Guardians who run the Lantern Corps on Oa who issued this thing. He's just responding to the warrant."
Carol replied to her with grim determination. "We've stood up to the Kree, the Skrulls, and the Shi'Ar. These Oans want to mess with us, they'll find out the hard way why no one fucks with Earth."
-----
Starfox was about to reply in appreciation for he show of solidarity from the earth heroes, when Starlion's eyes shot open inside the canister and she burst forth, pinning Starfox to the ground with a glowing energy blade to her throat. "By X'Hal, I should kill you!"
The smaller woman blinked, and managed a little smirk. "You're going to have to wait in line, love..."
The tawny feline nodded with a soft growl. "So I heard... I want what you took from me. Give it back, and I may let you live long enough for the others to try to kill you."
Starfox nodded, and to the surprise of the onlookers kissed the larger woman, full-on and lengthy. When it was done, the blade vanished and the tawny feline beauty got up, staggering slightly until she regained her balance, and locked eyes on what would be her former teammates. "I... remember... Donna, Diana, all of you... all the things she did in my name, those memories are mine now. I am now the woman you knew. She gave me back the part of my life she stole."
Donna frowned softly, and asked. "Kori...? Care to explain? We're a little confused still by this whole thing."
The feline warrior shook her head. "Kori is her name, from a human word for fox. I am... well only the cats amongst you could pronounce my true name, but in your language I would go by Talia, as it sounds like 'talon' which is a good warrior's name and is close to the meaning of my real name. I suppose you wish to know how we came to meet, and she to take my place?"
Donna nodded and expressed that it would definitely be nice, and Starlion, who had now chosen the name Talia, nodded and explained.
"It dates back to the slavers ship, after my sister disposed of me to clear her path to the throne of my kingdom back on my home world. The Starfox was on the same vessel after being captured due to some troublemaking or another she'd caused, as we became first cellmates and then lovers. During our escape, I was gravely injured, and she placed me in a suspension capsule to heal. While I did so, she took my identity so as to hide from her own enemies, the bulk of which we shall face in battle today."
Donna nodded. "So... that makes you or her the person we knew, now?"
Talia smiled. "She didn't merely copy the memories to me, she gave them fully. She now has only echoes, and I the full experiences. I am, for all practical purposes, the person you knew. I certainly know you well..." her eyes sparkled. "I remember well your taste on my tongue and the feel of you in the night."
To her credit, Donna didn't blush, merely smiled. "If we survive this day, you'll know it again."
-----
It was not long after all had become aquiainted and the truth behind it all had been revealed, that the sensors flared to life and the monitors lit up with alarm signals. At the console, Barbara Gordon the Hellcat called out the information as it was fed through to her.
"We have multiple incoming energy signatures, coming in at faster-than-light speeds and converging on a point in direct geosynchronous orbit above our head. I've got the sensors trained on the spot and will announce identifications on them as they come out of warp."
The others tensed in pre-battle adrenaline as the incoming flightpaths resolved themselves into humanoid figures on the screen, and Barbara called them out one by one.
"Ronan the Accuser from the Kree Star Empire... Kl'rt the Super-Skrull... two unidentified female Green Lanterns... a female whose appearance and energy signature matches Gladiator of the Shi'Ar Royal Guard... the Galadorian Spaceknight ROM... John Stewart of the Darkstars... the Cyborg Kryptonian wearing the insignia of the Manhunters... the interstellar mercenary Lobo... and last but not least two former Heralds of Galactus, the Silver Surfer and Nova. Oh, and we can presume though we can't see him that the Space Ghost is still out there."
Jessica sighed. "You realize that the Surfer alone can probably mop the floor with all of us?"
Carol nodded. "Maybe, but surrender isn't an option."
Barbara nodded agreement. "What's our strategy then? We're overmatched and we and they know it."
Starfox addressed her first. "Buy us time... Donna and I are going to Oa to settle this once and for all. They want trouble with the sister of Thanos... they'll get it."
Diana nodded. "Then I say we attack, head-on. They won't expect it, and the battle will hopefully draw in allies. Keep that distress signal going, and hope that others take an interest in the fight. We can't win, but if the object is to buy time then putting the enemy on it's heels with an unexpected offensive is our best chance."
Tigra nodded to all of this. "We have our plan then... if there's anyone you want to kiss goodbye, do it now. There might not be another chance."
-----
[Next: SHOWDOWN]
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Scarlet Starlight