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Brighter than Sunshine ~ Volume 1, Chapter 14 "Wondergirl vs the MMCPD"
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The rest of Cassie's afternoon was spent in class. From Ancient Mythologies to Early Brit Lit, she hauled her books and notebooks across campus, participated in class discussions, and picked up a bit of fruit and a chocolate milk at the campus commissary after class. At 5:20, when her last class ended for the evening, she headed back to her room and logged into her computer, checking for e-mails and instant messages, and was gratified to see something from Babs in her inbox, indicating that the super-wiz former Batgirl had designed an app that could be downloaded onto Cassie's cellphone, as long as she had the seven randomizing encrypted passwords and blah blah Bat family paranoia... The app, so the e-mail promised, would allow Cass to pull up police, fire, news, traffic, weather, and federal alerts for Metropolis and its surrounding suburbs, as well as setting an in-built alarm for certain types of alerts that might go off, such as alien invasion or neighborhood fire. Cass spent the better part of an hour trying to follow Babs' directions on how to download the app and make it work, gritting her teeth and groaning before she finally made it work. Once it was downloaded, and installed, however (and after she logged in with her custom-user-designed password, which she noted with a roll of her eyes was 'TimisaDick'), Cassie was delighted to see how smoothly it worked. One of the unmentioned features was that she could also check the security logs of the top one-hundred companies and corporations in the city, to see if they had logged a disturbance or a break-in (the big glaring oversight on this list was, predictably, Lexcorp, which apparently even Babs herself could not reliably hack.)Samantha exploited her powers to the furthest degree by waiting until she knew for a fact the Zeta house was completely empty- except for one girl napping- and taking that 15 minutes to clean the house at a speed that was probably more dangerous than it was worth. She was getting better and better at not smashing things as she came to a stop though, and the challenge was actually pretty fun. She ran a dozen other errands and then spent the rest of the afternoon "running into" various key members of key frats. Sam could exploit her super-senses to basically bump into anyone on the sprawling Met U campus. She made small talk with, flirted with, and endeared herself to a handful of frat boys on campus this way. Somewhere in the conversation she would drop the party information and the fact that she was a soon-to-be Zeta.Read more...She finished in time to go home and shower and then, unsure about what the appropriate attire but not one to reuse an outfit for two different events, she changed into snug black low-rise pants and a low-cut tank. She left her hair down and casual but spent a solid hour on it, pampering and then straight-ironing her natural curls into the shape she wanted. She added just enough texture to bring out the blue-black shine in her hair. She rolled up in front of Cassie's place on time, wearing a short black leather jacket which combined with the rest of the look made her look a little more badass than she'd intended.Cassie meanwhile was just finishing her primping when Samantha pulled up. Her heart pounding, her hands trembled slightly as she rushed to finish lining her eyes and rolling on lipstick and mascara before bounding down the stairs and out onto the sidewalk. Having showered and changed after returning from class, the blonde girl had brushed her hair out and left it down and slightly tousled, wearing a pair of dark blue stretch skinny jeans, a blue pair of four inch heels with chunky toes like the red ones she'd worn that morning, but instead of the casual t-shirt she was now wearing a form-fitting satin camisole that was rouched under the bust, and had matched the look with a shiny new leather jacket that came down to just above her bottom. When she came out the door and caught sight of Samantha, she paused and grinned, raising her eyebrows. "Meeeeeowwww..." Cassie laughed, wiggling her eyebrows. "You look hot."Samantha grinned at the greeting. "I didn't know what appropriate dress code was exactly. Judging by your outfit I got it about right." She toyed with the jewelry that was dangling just below her cleavage. "Where are we headed?""Buffalo Wild Wings," Cassie grinned and leapt into the car, sliding an arm over Samantha's shoulders. "And I actually know where this one is." Grabbing her cellphone out of her shoulder bag, she turned on its gps feature and entered the address of the restaurant. Then she fixed it to the top of Samantha's dash with an attachable suction cup base.Sam smirked. "A sports bar, even. I should have known- I've heard cheerleading is the number one gateway sport for young women." She pulled out and followed the phones directions toward the restaurant.Cassie blushed, biting her lip and turning in the car so that she was facing Samantha. "I love our fancy dress-up dates. I love them. But sometimes I just need to wear a pair of jeans and eat some messy food while I play a game and I wanna share that experience with you. Unless you think you might hate it, cause if so I am totally up to changing plans."Samantha smiled. "I'm just teasing. I do know that some people frequent sports bars, I just haven't been that person. It'll be an adventure.""I do not frequent 'sports bars,'" Cassie clarified with a smile, still blushing. "I just like wings, and trivia, and Buffalo Wild Wings gives me both." She shrugged, rolling her eyes. "Anyway... how'd your party planning go?"Sam smirked at Cassie's somewhat-defensive clarification as she drove toward the nearest Buffalo Wild Wings. "I think we're actually going to pull it off without any major disasters. The expectations were very vague, but I have a good feeling that the right people will show- ya know, whatever makes the Zetas happy."The blonde girl sighed, shaking her head. "The idea that anyone might turn you down for anything is non-credible. I refuse to believe that. Everyone's going to show up for your party, 'cause you asked them to."Samantha smiled brightly. "Well, I have cheated a little along the way, but only to convince some douchey jocks to remember to go to a party they were going to go to anyway."Cass raised her eyebrows suspiciously. "What exactly does cheating entail?" She asked suspiciously. "Did you thump them over the head until they agreed to come?""I may have targeted a few of them and arranged to bump into them in various adorable ways. It's really good that I'm not the stalking type, because I would be excellent at using my powers for evil," Sam noted.Cass raised her eyebrows even higher and chuckled, shaking her head. "God, I'm gonna have to beat them all off with a stick, aren't I?" She blew Sammi a kiss.Samantha grinned and cocked her head. "It is totally possible. I think that was probably kind of inevitable either way but I didn't make it better. You might consider a cattle prod.""Well that works out, cause I already sorta own one." Cassie wiggled her eyebrows and smiled. Then her expression softened to encouragement and sympathy. "...you ready for tomorrow night? Cause um, bringing me, to the biggest social event on the Zeta calendar, anyone who didn't know about us is probably gonna by the end of the night. I wouldn't blame you if the idea was a bit intimidating for you."Samantha shrugged. "I don't think it's really a secret to anyone at this point. The idea of being in a big room with everyone thinking about it and probably being rude and terrible is a little intimidating. I think I've been on the receiving end of every possible reaction since the game."Cassie's fingers snuck over the divide between them and found Sammi's thigh, running gentle fingers over her there as they pulled off the highway and towards the restaurant. "... I'm really touched, you know," she said, as they turned through traffic, "... the kiss, the invite to your party. It makes me feel special. And I'm super proud that I'm gonna get to go to the fancy party with you on your arm. I feel like I won a prize." She smiled. "Thank you."Samantha smiled softly. "I just don't want you to feel like this drama is about you, or that any of the things I'm feeling are about anything but how strategic I've been about my identity so far."As they pulled into the parking lot, Cassie waited for Samantha to park and then took her right hand in her left, twining their fingers together and pulling their joined hands up to her mouth. She kissed the back of Samantha's hand. "I'm yours?" She said, smiling encouragingly.She gave a little smile, raising her eyebrow as she turned to face Cassie from the driver's seat. "You are.""And you're mine." Cassie grinned and shrugged, batting her eyelashes and unlocking her door as she released Sammi's hand. "That's what's important to me." Stepping out of the car, Cassie led the other girl up to the front of the restaurant and inside, requesting a booth for two. A pretty waitress about their age led the two girls to a corner booth, and when they slid inside, Cassie requested two game boards and an appetizer sampler with their drinks. Samantha smiled as she got out of the car, giving a little nod, still feeling like she might be teetering on the edge of disaster but fairly sure if everything went wrong tomorrow Cassie would be there at the end of it. She sat down with her at the table and ordered a diet coke, raising an eyebrow at her girlfriend as the waitress departed. "So, we're doing trivia?""Yeeeeepppp," Cassie grinned her biggest, silliest smile. "You gotta create a username and password for this service, but that takes five minutes. Then you watch as questions come up, and they give you a couple of lame hints, and whoever gets the right answer fastest gets the most points. At the end of every round, they post the scores." Grinning again, she leaned across the table and whispered conspiratorially, "If it helps as incentive, we're primarily competing against drunk dudes, so: score one for womankind with every victory we rack up."Samantha smiled. "I can get on board with intellectual competition. Seems a little uneven though, sober and brilliant vs. drunk...whomever." She looked over the menu with passive interest. Next to her fashion, her eating habits were the snobbiest thing about Samantha and nothing on this menu was rare or imported enough to spark her palate. Not strictly needing to eat very often at all only compounded the problem. Cassie meanwhile didn't even need to look at the menu. She logged into her little trivia game board app and then glanced up when the waitress arrived, ordering a heaping pile of chicken wings and two sides of coleslaw and potatoes. Then she raised her eyes hopefully at Samantha. Samantha registered with the app on the game board and ordered the buffalo ranch chicken sandwich since that seemed in the spirit of the bar, and a huckleberry limeade since she'd been preoccupied when they'd done drink orders.Cassie grinned, diving into the trivia with a relish. For the first several questions, she helped Samantha out by letting her know when the question was up so that she could answer it in time, but after those first few she stopped giving her date pointers, hoping that her own competitiveness would hook her interest without prompting. Samantha played idly for the first few questions, getting distracted in the space between questions by the room's various TVs, but as soon as she got a decent score on a few questions, her focus shifted and she began to playfully eye Cassie's answers after punching her own in. "Hey, now, missy," The blonde girl protested, grinning as she propped her screen up on a rolled up set of silverware. "That's actually cheating." She grinned and answered a few more questions, pulling into second place behind Samantha, but still behind by almost a thousand.Sam chuckled. "I'm just making sure you have the right answer, that's allll." She was frighteningly well-versed on science, politics, geography, and pop culture, but much weaker than Cassie on some of the history and literature categories, and completely hamstrung by sports trivia. She face planted into the table with a groan as a football question came up. "I know we're in a sports bar but COME ON.""Yeah, this part's annoying," Cassie admitted, having no better luck on the sports questions than Samantha. "Sometimes I come and it's a Sports-Themed game, and I just up and leave. But this is okay: it's mostly stuff we're into, right?"Samantha stuck out her tongue. "It's ruining my score.""Oh, and I suppose your score has to be perfect?" Cassie teased, trying to hide her pleasure that Sammi's competitiveness had surfaced. "You can't always be the best at everything, you know, lovely."Sam pulled a face, sitting back primly. "I am pretty sure that's limited thinking. I have unlimited potential for perfection."Cassie laughed, shaking her head and biting down on her own smile. "You're fun." She glanced up as the waitress returned with their food, and gleefully began to devour her wings.Sam picked at her fries but couldn't find a way to eat her chicken sandwich while playing trivia so it went untouched. She hadn't really found herself hungry since breakfast anyway. "So if we were to absorb each other's knowledge we would totally destroy at this game."Cassie laughed again. "Yeah, creepy, that is potentially what would happen," She shook her head and won another question, pulling slightly ahead of Samantha. "Oooh! Look it! Looooook!"Samantha's grin melted into a pout. "That is some Ancient Greek bullshit. Cmon, ask me Khloe Kardashian's favorite brand of shoooess...""Who knows that?!" Cassie chortled, tossing her rolled up straw wrapper at Samantha’s head, "Who even knows that? Does she even know that? I can't even tell you what I'm wearing now.”Sam smirked and batted the straw wrapper away. "I know that." She sat forward a bit to get a better look at the shoes on Cassie's feet. "Those are Louboutin's, the fall line. Donna bought them?""Mmmhmmm...." Cassie frowned down at her feet and then up at Samantha again, missing a question entirely due to bewilderment. "How can you possibly know that-- you don't know that--" Reaching under the booth, she slipped one shoe off and looked inside. "...wow, seriously, how did you know that?"She smiled knowingly while Cassie confirmed the designer on her shoe, then shrugged. "I like shoes. And bags, and other things fashion-related." She raised an eyebrow and gave a little smile. "You knew this.""Sure, but I didn't know you could tell a designer label just by looking at it," the blonde girl shrugged, tossing her hair over her shoulder and devouring another wing, then licking off her fingers with a grin and a wink. "That's pretty next level fashioning."Samantha grinned and shrugged, answering questions in the game as she spoke. "It's not all that mysterious. Certain designers have certain aesthetics, and if you shop enough you know who came out with what shoe in what season. I guess the only real talent it takes is telling the real thing from a knock-off.""Huh." Cass stopped answering questions for a moment to cock her head to the side and just watch Samantha play, a small smile playing across her lips as she considered the other girl. "...well it still doesn't make sense to me, but I guess I can always call on you for fashion advice, huh?"Samantha gave a little smile. "I figured you were getting enough of that from demanding big sister.""Donna is a pushy, aggressive, lovable pain in my ass who is intent on turning me into a supermodel Barbie so she can try on me all the blonde-girl outfits she would never wear herself," The blonde girl smiled again, her shoulders up as she blushed and wiggled her nose happily. "But, Baby, I would never turn out pampering, primping, or fashion advice from you. It's hot when you do it.""Is it? Should we be planning some sort of makeover sleepover or shopping trip fashion show?" Sam asked.Cassie's shoulders met her cheeks and she grinned, blushing and glowing as she bit her lower lip. "Don't make fun," she mumbled, "but I'd love that. With you."Samantha giggled and shook her head. "You're adorable. Seriously. And I would love to play dress up with you any time. I want to see those gorgeous long legs in many many outfits."Cassandra smiled and ducked her head again, answering another question but now hopelessly far behind Samantha. The (clean) fingers of her left hand slipped across the table and onto Samantha's right arm. She just kept smiling, poking at the trivia boardSamantha smiled at the gesture and took advantage of the trivia break to work on her sandwich a bit, though it wasn't elliciting any culinary thrills from her. She grinned winningly when her victory was announced and sat back in her seat. "Okay this is fun.""Yeah, it is," Cass stroked Samantha's arm and smiled softly, munching on wings. She wasn't talking about the game. "So how are your classes going?"Samantha gave a half-shrug and made a face. "Philosophy class is kind of hard, I mean the subject matter is EASY, but the number of weird hipster douche bags in the class is incredible. I'd be more annoyed the professor never calls on me except the conversations they're having in that room are painfully boring. Who CARES what the widely disputed exact correct translation for Nietzsche's Übermensch is when in-context we know that Nazi Germany used nihilism as the national rallying cry of a genocide and we have a local superhero in this city with that name. We're not talking about ANY of that though, we're too busy quibbling about the text and debating theory.""Sounds pretty irritating," The blonde girl observed, still working on her wings and her drink, asking for a refill with a shake of her glass and a smile when the waitress returned checking on them. "Bunch of boys sitting around talking about theory and no practicum?”Samantha nodded, finishing her fries slowly. "It's dull. Duller than I thought this subject could ever possibly be. They're strangling it. And then I get back home and do the readings and the primary sources are so clear and solid and awesome, and then we have to read all this shit about what some dude thinks about what that primary text says.""Well, is there someone you could talk to, maybe get out of this class and into an advanced discussion group or seminar? There must be some less-general, more practical ways to study philosophy." Cassie offered Sammi a wing with a bashful smile and a shrug. "...it's fun, really."Sam took the offered wing, trying to find a way to eat it without a mess. "I don't know, I didn't really take the course for the challenge, but I didn't think it was going to be a total drag, either. If I test out of it I might end up biting off more than I can chew with a higher-level course, ya know?"She shrugged, watching Sammi's face. "But if it's something you really care about, something that's important to you, rather than let a boring class dominated by theory-spinning bros drive you away from the subject, maybe it might be worth it to push for a more advanced, more challenging class." Something occurred to her then, and she suddenly smiled. "One thing I learned in high school is that challenging doesn't always mean harder. It just means that it pushes you more, and sometimes being pushed is actually easier than being asked to cruise through something at a dull, weary pace."Samantha gave a little smile and shrugged. "Maybe I'll sit in on the 2 or 3 hundred level class and see if it's less terrible. What about your classes? Didn't you have your two best ones today?""Yeah. They're both really easy, but I like that, because it means I don't have a lot of homework, so that I can spend more time watching over the city," she winked at Samantha, batting her long dark lashes. "And with you."Sam grinned and slipped her fingers around Cassie's. "Well if I knew I was going to be in the midst of a great romance, I might have taken a lighter class load."Cass grinned and pulled Samantha's hand up off of the table, wrapping her lips around Samantha's pinky and making eyes at her. "Mmmmm, I might have reconsidered Diana's offer to hang up my lasso for a while," she admitted, blushingly.Samantha eyed her playfully. "Ohh really? But then what would you do to impress your new girlfriend?"The blonde girl leaned further across the table, into Samantha's space, her long, dark heavy lashes fluttering slowly as she tilted her head to the side and licked her lips, her eyes darting from Sammi's eyes to her mouth. "I have a couple ideas," she whispered, "I could've become captain of the cheerleading squad," she touched her nose against the tip of Samantha's as she angled in for a kiss, "Or a sexy sexy glamour model," tipping her head forward, she brushed her lips over Samantha's, "or... maybe I could've just ...fallen in love with her?" Slowly, she pressed her lips against Samantha's --only to be interrupted by the sound of sudden, loud, and persistent alert chimes coming from her phone.Samantha giggled and kissed her, her forehead wrinkling and her lips freezing as her phone started going off. After a minute of listening to the irritating sound, she turned her head. "Is that your text message alert? Holy crap."Cassandra groaned pitifully against Samantha's mouth as her phone went off, her shoulders slumping dejectedly. ".... nooooooot nowwwwwwwww...." she grumbled, sitting back and grabbing the offending peice of technology out of her purse. "It's not for text messages, it's something new I had made so that I'd know if crazy crap was going down in the city- something that needed 'Wonder Girl,' since y'know, I don't have super senses..."She raised her eyebrows at Cassie's phone. "Maybe it's a very very minor disaster?" She offered, hopefully.Cassie snorted and flipped the phone over in her hands, unlocking it with one of Babs' codes. "Let's find out..."Unfortunately, the information that scrolled across the screen of Cassie's phone was not detailing a minor disaster, or even minor crook on a high speed chase through downtown. No, apparently, this was much much worse: according to the police wire and several news networks, a previously-peaceful, 60,000-strong labor protest and sit-in that had started in Centennial Park (the seventh in as many weeks) had swelled several times over in response to news (broken by ace investigative reporter Lois Lane) that several influential Fortune 100 corporations including Stagg Industries, American Steel, Dupree Chemical, AmerTek and Dante Foods had secretly signed a non-compete clause agreeding that none would acceed to any labor and industry demands for more livable wages for entry-and-mid-level employees, better health care and life insurance policies, and other measures. Although in response to the press leak labor-favorite-Lexcorp's founder and CEO, the multi-billionaire philanthropist Lex Luthor, had generously volunteered to relocate one of his newly planned solar power planets to Metropolis, bringing nearly 20,000 highly paid blue-collar jobs to the city, and increase Lexcorp's city-wide operational payroll by a further 15,000 within a month, the generous move did little to defray worker angst against the conspiring companies who were signatory to the non-compete agreement. Outraged at their poor treatment, the poor workers of Metropolis had assembled in Midtown - many of them walking out on their jobs to do so - to demand better wages or else.Initially, it appeared that the expanded protest was going to remain peaceful as well, but when the numbers of protestors chanting and waving signs began to spill out of the Park (due to sheer numbers) and impede traffic, hampering Midtown business, the heads of the corporations responsible for the non-compete agreement had called city hall and demanded that the new police commissioner do something to restore regular business operations by the end of the day. Although his own political backers - Lexcorp - were publically supporting the protests, the new commissioners pockets were apparently being lined from more than one source, and he acceeded to the corporation's demands, rounding up a police force comprised of the city's roughest and most savage cops, the 'dirty' cops whose first loyalty was not to the city or its people, but to their paycheck, and sent them out to put the protest down.By the end of the afternoon, Lexcorp Plaza and Centennial Park were surrounded by police officers, and barricades had been erected by both sides. After repeated calls for peaceful dispersement had gone unanswered, violence had quicky ensued. Tear gas rained down all around Centennial Park before riot-geared officers had begun to push their way into the park, and the camera crews brave enough to stick it out in the chaos (including one commandeered by Lois herself) were recording images of extreme police brutality. Some of the protestors, cradling the bleeding and the unconcious, had begun calling out for help from their costumed protectors - for Superman - and for Wonder Girl. One of the protestors had even improvised a call for help, writing over a 'Stop the War on Workers!' sign, changing it to read: "WONDER GIRL! Stop the War on Workers!" and pushed it infront of the Daily Planet camera crew."I gotta go." Pushing herself up out of the booth, Cassie grabbed her purse and frowned, hanging the cellphone over to Samantha.Samantha looked through the images on the phone screen, her face sinking a little with each image. The people in the crowd weren't just in trouble, they were calling her by name. She gave a little sigh. "Yeah, looks like you do. See you later? Tomorrow?"By the time Samantha looked up, though, Cassie was already gone. Having left a few bills on the table, the blonde girl had sped out of the restaurant and flung herself into the sky, streaking back towards the school to retrieve her uniform. (On the way there, it occurred to the super powered teen that she might want to start taking a shoulder bag with her costume in it wherever she went, in case of situations like this.)Several minutes later, changed into her costume although still tugging on her boots even as she flung herself up into the sky, Cassie rolled over in the air and spun in the direction of Midtown. When she reached the center of the city, bursting into the sky over Centennial Park, the blonde girl glanced down at the scene beneath her and gritted her teeth in sympathetic anger. The mass of protestors had been broken by the police advance, splintering this way and that under the clouds of tear gas and fleeing from the spearhead of the police advance. A number of small groups of officers, clustered around the outskirts of their advance, had pinned down a number of Metropolis citizens, and were issuing painful beatings, blasting protestors with pepper spray, and or grabbing peaceful protestors nearly blinded from the tear gas and hauling them away in handcuffs. Cass didn't know where to begin. The number of people being harassed by the cops was far too many for her to figure out where she was needed most, but when she spun in the direction of Lexcorp tower, she suddenly caught sight of the Daily Planet camera crew, and a half-dozen officers who were grabbing camera equipment, throwing it to the ground, and shoving the camera men around belligerently. Lois was up in the face of one of the officers, shouting at him about something Cass couldn't make out, but when another officer came up behind her and raised a police baton, Cassie dove straight down, tackling the officer to the ground.Samantha was left with Cassie's phone in her hand, so she didn't have a way to contact her even if that had been a practical option. She swiped a remote from the host stand and turned one of the TVs off a basketball game in order to scan news channels until she found one screening live coverage of the violence at the protest. Cassie could be seen dropping on the officer who she had knocked unconscious, and the rest of his compatriots had backed off when they saw that Wonder Girl had arrived to help the DP Camera Crew. Lois turned to her young friend, grinning and hugging her. "I knew you'd come! Thanks for the save! What are you going to do?"Cass looked around her at the chaos and confusion. Darkness had set in over the park a few hours ago, and now the light of the park lamp poles and the police strobes were casting an unearthly pallor through the slowly dissipating tear gas smoke. From where Cassie was standing on the sidewalk in front of the Daily Planet, she could make out dozens of protestors still coughing and gagging from the fumes, and even more running from the police advance through the park. There was shouting and violence everywhere. Some of the protesters had regrouped, and were pushing back against the police advanced, and the two groups were going at it pretty hard now with riot gear and shields on one side and improvised shields made out of trashcan lids and clubs made out of broken tree-branches and lead pipes. "I..." the blonde girl glanced around herself in some alarm, looking this way and that as she tried to figure out where she was needed most. "...I have no idea. What would ...what would Superman do?"Lois looked up from the camera that she was repairing, trying to come up with the answer to that question for her young friend. "...I'm not sure," she admitted, quietly. "I'm not entirely sure he's ever seen a riot like this before - usually his presence is just sort of..." she shrugged, "awe-inspiring. Everyone calms down long enough to listen to him, and then he gets people talking.""So I need to get their attention," Cassie surmised, glancing all around herself as she looked for a way to do that. Unlike the Man of Steel, Wonder Girl didn't really possess the awe-inspiring physical presence that would just naturally draw eyes her way- especially not through this smoke. She also didn't have his powerful voice, or the super breath to clear the plaza of tear gas- All she really had in the way of awe-inspiring was-Glancing down at the golden-red, sparkling lasso coiled on her right hip, Cass suddenly had an idea. "Okay, I got an idea," she said. "I'm gonna go give a shot.""What can I do to help?" Lois asked, pulling the camera off of the ground. The rest of the camera crew had fled, but Lois was turning the camera back on and shouldering it by herself."Keep the camera rolling," Cassie said with a grin, jumping into the air and soaring into the middle of the crowd. The center of Centennial Park was dominated by a giant fountain, with jets of water spurting all around a towering statue of Metropolis' patron philanthropist billionaire, Lex Luthor. Pulling her lasso out, Cass considered the giant, watery landmark, wondering: would it be enough? Would she be able to get the attention of both sides in the protest and riots, prevent further violence, so that she could convince both sides to sit down and work out a non-violent solution to the crisis? She wasn't sure. But before she could put her plan into action, the blonde teen girl superhero knew she had to clear the area around the fountain first - it wouldn't do if her grand attention-grabbing gesture electrocuted a half-dozen people. And heaping fun upon fun, the fiercest fighting between the police and the protesters was located around the base of the fountain - several of the protesters had even been thrown into the fountain's base by the police. Diving into the center of the melee, Cassie dropped between the line of police and protesters, barreling into the police line and driving it back. Harmlessly shoving a few of the officers into their fellows, she began calling for the two sides to separate, to put down their weapons, to listen to her. When the red-and-blue clad super heroine came upon a pair of white male officers who were beating a fallen woman who was screaming at them about her rights, Cass snarled, grabbing both men and- spun them around- tossing them several feet into the air so that they could come crashing down on top of some of their advancing colleagues.The disturbance caused by Cassie's arrival into the center of the melee had already attracted some attention - but not nearly enough for her to get both sides to call and end to fighting. Although she had already cleared a large circular space around herself and the statue by tossing police officers into their advancing mass and helping protesters to their feet and yelling at them to back away while she handled things, outside of her little bubble around the statue, both sides were still going at it, with the police continuing to batter the protesters back while some of the protesters pushed vainly back at them.But at least she had the space she needed now. Cassie turned, spinning around to make sure the center of the park was clear of the melee now - and that no one was still inside the fountain itself - and then barreled into the nearest police line, slamming her booted foot into the concrete before them with a yell. Her foot slammed through the concrete, splitting it for a dozen feet in front of her and behind her, causing both sides to jump back in surprise. Taking advantage of the distraction, Cass yanked the megaphone off of one of the stunned officer's belts and leapt into the side, spinning her lasso above her head and looping it over the head of Lex Luthor's water-sculpture, pulling it tight as she hovered above the apex. Landing on the top of the fountain's statuary, Cassie lifted the megaphone to her mouth, thumbing it on, and called out "BY THE POWER OF ZEUS - I ORDER YOU TO STOP!" The sound of her voice, amplified by the megaphone, rang out over the crowd, but it was what came next that really got the attention of both the protesters and the police. As she invoked her divine father's power, lightning snarled and crackled down the length of her lasso and out into the fountain, bursting out through the flowing water, creating a crackling, sparkling light show. The statue itself began to crackle and shake, shooting light out of any cracks and holes in the copper structure, and light began to spear through the mouth and eyes. On both sides of the melee, police offers and protesters took a step back, covering their eyes at the bright, crackling display of pyrotechnics. Gritting her teeth with the effort of channeling so much mystical energy, Cass continued the light display for several more seconds, lifting the megaphone to her lips again and calling out for a second time. By now the statue's structure was beginning to crack and smoke, collapsing slowly in on itself, but Cass kept it up as she asked "...Nnnngghhhh--- DO I HAVE YOUR ATTENTION NOW?!"The crowd all around the statue had gone totally silent. So silent, in fact, that when Cass let the lasso go slack and the lightning show died down, that only the sound of the cracking, smoking metal, shooting water jets, and Cassie's own boots, splashing about on the top of Lex's now-deformed, melted head, could be heard. Cassie took a deep breath, stunned and staggered at the attention she was now receiving from all quarters, and lifted the megaphone to her mouth again, turning to address the police officers. "You are interrupting a lawful protest! There is no violence here, no law breaking, and no criminality - except for what you've brought with yourselves!" The crowd behind Wonder Girl began to call out in support of her, with distant cheering and scattered clapping. "You're here only because the moneybag bigwigs who own the politicians in this town yanked on someone's chain! You're beating your own citizens for a few extra dollars of overtime! Or... whatever you're... getting paid... for." Cassie winced, not having had any time to practice this impromptu speech before delivering it, and suddenly realizing how little she actually understood about the dynamics of police riot control and lawful protesting. "...I'm telling you now! Superman would not stand for public servants like yourselves beating protesters into submission, and NEITHER WILL I! Now Back THE HELL OFF, or I will show you what the power of Zeus feels like up close and personal!"The other patrons in the sports bar grumbled when Samantha turned one of the fifty television screens streaming constant sports over to the news, but the grumbling quieted down when the images of the violence taking place in the park splashed across the screen, the majority of the bar- those who were sober enough to realize what was happening- turned their attention toward the screen, and then the rest looked on as the Daily Planet cameras caught Wonder Girl commanding lightning to hush the crowd. At that point, she didn't have to fight a single person for the remote and a few employees were turning other screens over to the live news coverage. The feeling in the room was tense, and Sam was front and center, hypnotized by both Cassie's speech and the sight of the police force of her city committing such violence against its citizens. For the next several minutes after 'Wonder Girl' made her speech from the top of the Centennial Fountain, there was confusion and uncertainty in the central plaza. Behind her, the protesters had slowly recovered from their shock after Cass turned towards them to tell them to see to their wounded, and to let the emergency response vehicles through, and to let them know that their lawful, legal activities were under her protection- as long as they did not attack the authorities, intimidate any non-protesters, intentionally disrupt essential city emergency operations, or cause intentional property damage to storefronts and businesses, she promised to defend them from the intimidation efforts of the city's monied elite, and -- jumping down off of the statue to address the Daily Planet's camera woman and reporter personally - Wonder Girl called for the true public servants among the city's fire and police corps to come out and support her efforts to defend the lawful, peaceful exercise of local democracy, and called for Lexcorp to make good on their overtures of support for the protesters by providing security, comfort, and material support to the protesting citizens.
Meanwhile, the mass of officers on the other side of the park had initially backed off after Cassandra's threats, but so far they had refused all calls to negotiate a peaceful end to the standoff with the protesters. In fact, while Cassandra continued to address the citizens of Metropolis, calling for them to support the protests and to demand that the police commissioner pull his riot troops back, the officer-on-the-scene in charge of the locally-deployed Riot Troops was grinning as he received some news that back up was on the way. Stepping back up towards the front of the police line, the officer-on-the-scene, a big, blustering blowhard with a big, bushy mustache and a car much too expensive for a police sergeant's salary, raised his own megaphone to his lips and called out to the protesters again, ordering them to stand down and disperse or face the consequences. The loud message was repeated several times, enough that it eventually caught Cassie's attention, and the blonde super heroine interrupted her talks with the leaders of the protest in order to launch herself into the sky and float over the heads of the protesters back towards the direction of the police line. Landing on top of the molten, ruined sculpture of Lex Luthor again (it no longer remotely resembled the famous billionaire, unfortunately), Cassie's eyes flashed dangerously as she stretched herself up to her full height, her figure glowing in the glare of the police signal lamps and her hair swaying dramatically in the breeze as she stared the advancing wall of riot officers again. "I warned you!" The golden haired Amazonian superhero yelled. "And I'm warning you again! Keep your distance, or I will make you keep your distance!"When the police line continued advancing, however - although in places it staggered and slowed as the officers at the forefront of the line caught Cassandra's gaze and suddenly wilted under the electricity firing behind her jade pupils - Cassie stepped down off of the sculpture and began to ready herself for a charge, when suddenly she was hit with strobe lights from above, and the loudspeaker voices of a dozen deputized Armored Lexcorp Security officers swirling overhead in their gleaming silver and blue defense suits. "WONDER GIRL!" They called out en masse in a ringing tone that filled the plaza, "YOU ARE UNDER ARREST FOR THE ILLEGAL AND UNSANCTIONED EXERCISE OF METAHUMAN ABILITIES, AS PROHIBITED UNDER PUBLIC ORDINANCE 338.52B! YOU ARE ORDERED TO STAND DOWN, DROP YOUR WEAPONS, AND SURRENDUR YOURSELF FOR ARREST AND PROCESSING! ANY RESISTANCE WILL BE MET WITH DEADLY FORCE! WILL YOU COMPLY?"Stunned, shocked, and alarmed, Cass stared up all around her at the swirling figures of the deputized armored security officers, whose golden 'deputized' shields were gleaming from the front of their armored chest pieces, pulling out her lasso reflexively and flinching back from the brilliant glare shining down on her. "What-- I---..." Cass frowned, stepping back a pace, suddenly confused and uncertain of herself. She was technically breaking the law, wasn't she? Even in the defense of a lawful protest--- was... was she... could she... "THESE PEOPLE NEED PROTECTION!" She shouted back at the troopers, squaring her shoulders back and crouching down on her knees. "ARE YOU GOING TO PROTECT THEM FROM THE POLICE? BECAUSE I'M NOT LEAVING UNTIL SOMEONE DOES!""YOU HAVE NOT COMPLIED." The uniform voice boomed back at her, as four of the metal-clad officers landed all around her with a loud crash, bending and breaking the concrete beneath them as they leveled their titanium-gauntleted hands and arms at her, weapons powering up. "PREPARE TO BE SUBDUED."Samantha was there one moment and gone the next, disappearing on the spot as soon as Cassie stuttered. She ran straight across town and pulled up at the edge of the park, wandering slowly through the crowd of protesters toward the strobing lights of the Lexcorp Security. Cassie gaped around her at the sight of the four silver and blue armored troopers, tightening her grip on her lasso as she tried to figure out a response to their demands. "I'm sorry," she said finally, gritting her teeth and setting herself into a combat pose, one hand out in front of her while the other bound up into a fist behind her. "I can't let you take me in." The troopers rushed her as one. Their metal armor propelled them at superhuman speeds as they charged, but Cassandra was still faster. Ducking under the first punch, she bobbed up and caught the outstretched metal arm with both of her hands, swinging him around to use as a bat against the other three armored deputies. She caught one squarely in the face, sending him flying into the rubble of the fountain, but the third and fourth leapt up into the air again, vaulting over and behind her, somersaulting into a kneeling position on the ground and kicking out with their titanium bladed boots, sweeping her off of her feet. Cassie landed flat on her back with a 'woomph!' of surprise at their quick maneuvers and sharp coordination.Rolling onto her palms, Cassie pushed herself off of the ground with a grunt and tackled one of the remaining two standing armored troopers to the ground, slamming him down into the ground several times until the pavement cracked underneath him. His suit cracked as well, the metal bending under her fingers as they crunched into the suit. The fourth and final of the original four troopers tackled the blonde girl while she was occupied with his comrade, however, grabbing her by the shoulders and spinning her around and around with his enhanced strength, then flinging her across the park and into the storefront of the Centennial Square KODAK shop. Glass exploded all around her, raining down on the pavement as Cassandra flew through the window. Protesters on the sidewalk scattered, screaming as shards of the glass cut into them, but the blonde girl was relatively unharmed, except for her shirt, which was torn in several places. Growling, the blonde girl crawled back through the window and pushed some of her mussed up hair out of her face, glancing up just in time to gasp as the fourth metal man launched itself through the air at her with the prepulsion of its rocket boots, punching her on the jaw and driving her back into the store."Oh, for crying out loud," Cassie shouted, tumbling through the broken remnants of the cash register and grabbing the metal suit by the chest piece, tearing into it with her hands and slowly prying the metal apart. Inside, a normal looking Lexcorp Security officer gasped at her, panicking as his combat systems began shutting down, but he still managed to raise the armored gauntlet on his fist and aim it at Cassie's face. Blinking into the gun, Cass raised her eyebrows just quickly enough to catch a face-full of rail-gun fired rounds that knocked her back, out of the store, and back into the park. Then the suit in the store finally shut down, just in time for the second-story level to come crashing down on top of the downed pilot. Lying on her back in the park, smoking from her face and from her chest where the rail gun rounds had hit her, Cassie groaned, picking herself up off of the ground and gazing around her as she checked on the downed troopers. Two of them were definitely down and out of the fight, she could see, but the other two were picking themselves up off of the fountain where she had batted them, and were preparing themselves for another round. "STOP THIS!" She shouted at them, holding her lasso in her hands. The gold and red colored rope began sparking with the force of her anger. "I don't want to hurt you, but you're leaving me no choice!""You have but one choice:" the flat-sounding computerized voices warned her from above as the remaining eight metal figures circled slowly around the plaza, keeping their gauntlet weapons trained on her face, "Surrender. Anything else is not tolerated.""I can't surrender!" Cassie shouted up at the shapes circling in the sky. "These people - this CITY! is under my protection! I--OOOMPH!" The two remaining armored figures on the ground tackled Cassie in tandem mid-speech, one jumping on her from above while the other collided with her waist, together driving the Amazonian superhero to the ground. As Cass struggled to throw the metal men off of her, four more of the metal men took position hovering above her, aiming their rail-gun gauntlets at her."Hold her down," the passion-less voice announced over the loud speaker, and four more of the metal forms dropped from the air, two each grabbing at her legs and her arms, pinning her to the ground while the floating four armored forms blasted her with their gauntlets."AHhhhhhhhhHHH!!!!" Bullets collided with Cassie at nearly impossible rates of speed, streaming almost like lasers as they blasted her back into the ground, like a hundred super power punches pummeling her into the concrete. Many of the blasts ricocheted off of her and slammed into the ground all around her, some of them even hit members of the protest crowd that was approaching in a vain, albeit heroic attempt to rescue their protector. But as the barrage kept up, Cassie continued to scream.Samantha froze at the edge of the crowd, watching the fight with wide eyes. She couldn't believe that this fight had turned into a fight between Cassie and the Lexcorp security and her disbelief was shared by the crowd, a murmur of unrest vibrating through the assembled protesters, but no one but Sam had the power to do anything about it. She stood on edge, following the fight closely, ready to charge in. Her fists were clenched at her sides, her legs coiled to spring and her face creased in distress. She managed to hold back until the forces drove Cassie to the ground and she paused, then took a few strides toward the fight. A woman with long dark brown hair in perfectly-permed waves threw herself between Samantha and the fight, holding her hands out in front of her and pushing her back as much as she could. "No! Don't go out there!--- you'll just get in the way!"Samantha backpedaled and shot the woman a sideways glance. "That's all I'm planning to do." She gestured toward the fight, toward her struggling girlfriend. "They're hurting her!""She'll be okay!" The other woman wrapped her arms around the younger girl's waist, dragging her away from the fight, whispering fiercely in her ear. "Your girlfriend is tougher than she looks, believe me!"Meanwhile, on the ground, Cassie was no longer screaming, but she was continuing to struggle. Finally, she pulled her right arm free of the troopers holding her down and grabbed one of them by the leg, flinging him with a powerful yell up into the sky at the swirling, blasting quartet of metal suited troopers. All four scattered, and Cassie, whose whole upper body was now smoking, her shirt more or less in tatters, reached over to her left arm and pulled herself free, grabbing at the nearest metal suited man she could get her hands on, pulling him down on top of her so that when the four hovering suits began blasting down at her again, the suit was between her and them and was torn to shreds by the fire. "BREAK OFF! BREAK OFF! FRIENDLY FIRE!" The impersonal voice called out, as Cassie tossed away the downed trooper like a discarded doll, climbing her feet with her eyes aflame, smoke rising from her smoldering shirt as she snarled, staring the remaining eight troopers down."YOU WANT ME?" The blonde firestorm in the middle the park wrapped her sparking, burning lasso around her right fist and planted herself on the ground, her right hand crackling with lightning as she waved the metal men on. "COME GET ME!"The troopers hesitated for a moment, and the disembodied voice seemed to hesitate as it recalculated the amount of force it would take to actually subdue Wonder Girl - especially now that they'd royally pissed her off. But the hesitation didn't last too long. "BLAST HER!" The voice cried out again, and all eight troopers leveled their rail gun gauntlets at her and opened up again. But this time they miscalculated. With her arms free, Cassie was able to block the shots with her enchanted silver bracelets now, using her superhuman dexterity and speed to aim the ricocheting shots back at the troopers who fired them, blowing several off of their feet and across the park towards the line of police troopers that had paused, waiting to see how the fight between Lexcorp security and Wonder Girl was going to turn out. "CEASE FIRE, CEASE FIRE!" The voice called out again, apparently aware that it was getting nowhere blasting at Wonder Girl, and instead it demanded that they "TAKE HER APART, WHATEVER IT TAKES!"The remaining eight troopers, including those hovering in the sky above and those pulling themselves off of the ground in front of the police, gathered themselves together and charged at Cassie, who reared back and waited. When the first man reached her, Cassie ducked the first punch and bobbed up around it, repeating her first trick by grabbing the trooper's arm from beneath with both of her hands, but this time the trooper was ready for her, delivering a powerful punch to her gut that pushed her back several feet. Reeling from the blow, Cassie cradled her stomach and gritted her teeth, watching the eight circle around her and prepare to take her down all at the same time. Deciding that her only chance to beat them was to take aggressive action, the blonde girl launched herself forward, jumping onto one of the troopers and driving him into the ground with her feet, crushing the pavement underneath them and reaching down to rip into his suit enough to effectively disable it. The remaining troopers reached Cassie before she could turn to another of them. One of them grabbed a park bench and tore it off of the ground, batting Cassie in the back and sending her flying across the park and into a building on the far side. Cassie crunched into the brick wall and mortar of a third-story office building and then dropped to the ground, momentarily dazed. The seven leaped after her again. But twisting back off of the ground and onto her feet, Cass ducked away from the first trooper to reach her and lashed out with her lasso-encased fist, connecting with the trooper's metal-visored head and channeling divine thunderbolts into his armored suit, blowing out the circuits and dropping it cold."PULL BACK!" The remaining six troopers moved back, away from Cassie, who was panting now and wearied, the fire in her eyes beginning to die down as her energy began to ebb. Channeling the thunderbolts of her father and relying on her invulnerability to absorb the blasting fire of the troopers had taken a lot out of her, and she wasn't sure how much longer she was going to be able to keep this up. "TAKE HER AS ONE!" The voice commanded, "DELTA SIX! GO!" The troopers divided into two groups, surrounding the blonde girl on two sides and then charging at her, dragging her down to the ground and piling on top of her. Twisting beneath them, Cassie slammed her elbow into the pavement beneath her and created some room for herself to maneuver, rolling on the crushed concrete and then lashing out with blindly with her lasso-wrapped fist again, connecting with one more suit and channeling Zeus' thunderbolts into it - knocking the voice out of commission as she did so "Hold her down, keep her down and apply the restraining coll---" The voice cut out as the suit Cassie hit blew all of its circuits, and Cass exploded out of the metal man pile up on top of her, grabbing the ruined, smoking suit from which the commander's voice had been emanating and leapt high into the sky, swinging it around and then hammering it down through the air - through seven stories of air, into the metal man down beneath her.The remaining five troopers scattered, and the blonde super heroine, convinced that the commander of the unit must be inside the dead suit, ripped the head and chest plate of the suit apart, and pulled the pilot out- only to find herself face to face with-- "HOLY SHIT. YOU?!"--- Mercy Graves.Behind her, the five remaining troopers reformed, crouching, and then charging. Cass noticed their advance only too late, and swung around, but several metal clad fists pummeled her face, her chest, her gut, slamming her into the building behind her and causing it to quake, shiver, and shake. On the ground where she'd dropped her, the ice cold Mercy Graves raised herself up onto her feet, straightening out her deputized uniform and lifting a communicator device to her lips. "BEAT THE BRAT DOWN!"Samantha had let herself be dragged away from the fight reluctantly, going back to standing in ready-to-lunge position once she saw that Cassie got back the upper hand. It didn't even occur to her that the woman who'd corralled her had called Wonder Girl her girlfriend, she had more urgent things on her mind. She watched the fight closely, up until her mother was unmasked. She stepped back a pace, realizing sharply for the first time that her worlds were inevitably going to come into conflict. She wasn't sure what she was supposed to do in this situation. Standing next to the raven-haired girl with the striking blue eyes, Lois was still trying to wrestle with filming the fight while also proving a live commentary, and keep an eye on her young friend's girlfriend so that she didn't get herself into trouble and make things even worse for Cassie than they already were. The irony of the situation made her smile for a moment, before she realized just how badly Cassie was doing: although she'd taken seven of the metal-clad troopers out so far, she'd lost her lasso in the last scuffle, and her face was looking tired and fatigued. Reaching into her blazer's inner breast pocket, Lois pulled out her cellphone and checked her messages, muttering under her breath when she saw that there were no new messages. "C'mon Turpin.... we're running out time."But midst all the fighting, the yelling, and the thunderbolt magic blasting around the square, it was the unmasking of Mercy Graves as the commander of the field forces of the deputized Lexcorp Security Forces that seized Lois' attention most firmly. "Mercy Graves, as I live and breathe," she said, rattling off what she was seeing into the camera's microphone pick-up. But when Lois saw Samantha's reaction to Mercy's unveiling, her eyebrows leapt up on her face, and she glanced over at her. "... do... do you know that woman?" She asked carefully.Samantha was getting legitimately tired of admitting her mother like a dirty secret, though she knew from experience that people saw little resemblance between herself and her dark-eyed but mousy brunette mother. She nodded, picking up from Lois' familiarity with Cassie and her possession of a camera who she was. "That... is my mother," she sighed, feeling like she probably shouldn't have told her anything."Your mother," Lois gasped, raising her eyes and glancing back and forth between Samantha and Mercy. The two looked as unalike as night and day, but there was still something about the way they carried themselves, a prideful reserve that was almost familial. Lois switched off the audio on her camera without a second thought and glanced at the girl. "...holy shit, you're Samantha Graves, oh, damnit, Lois, how did you NOT know that?" The reporter sighed, fixing her with a sympathetic look. "...so I'm guessing this is a really confusing day for you?"Meanwhile, Cassie was reeling from the hand-to-hand beating she was receiving. Her energy depleted, her lasso lost somewhere after she grabbed Mercy and pulled her from her suit, the blonde super heroine, smashed up against the collapsing wall of a building that bordered Centennial Park, was becoming disoriented by the successive battering she was receiving. POW-One-two-three! A chain of blows hit her on the face, on the side of her head, in her gut, and a roundhouse kick connected with her back as she twisted and stumbled away from the punches. Slamming face first into the building's wall again, she grabbed with the brick and mortar under her fingers and tried to pull herself free, but one of the metal men grabbed her head from behind and snickered at her through his mask, "Tch-Tch-Tch. Not so fast, Wonder Brat." Pulling her head back, the trooper slammed her face into the brick wall once, twice, a third time, and a fourth time, then spun around and roundhouse kicked her through the wall and into the building. Bits of brick and mortar and metal and sheet rock began to crumble down all around her, and the whole building groaned. She collapsed to the floor amid the rubble.The metal troopers followed her into the building, while Mercy continued to shout into the communicator. "NOW! QUICKLY! Seize her while she's down and secure the collar!"Glancing up amidst the pile of rubble, Cass coughed and gasped as she reeled from the pain in her ribs, her back, and her face where she'd been pounded. Looking around herself in a daze, she saw that she was in the middle of a store-front Starbucks connected to what looked like an indoor office-mall. Pushing herself up to her knees, the blonde girl's hand slipped on the rubble, and she collapsed again, only to be knocked clear through the next wall in the complex by a savage kick to the gut. "UUHHhhhhhh!" Cass crashed to the ground under a pile of clothes in a woman's boutique - ironically, one of the same that she'd visited with Donna a few days earlier, and then rolled onto her back.One of the metal troopers grabbed her by the legs, while another came at her with one of the metahuman restraining collars she'd seen the MMCPD use before on rogue metahumans. While she wasn't entirely sure the device would work on her given the mystical source of her powers, the blonde girl was in no hurry to find out. Yanking her knees up to her chest, Cass tugged the trooper holding her feet in front of her face and snarled up at him, hauling back with one dust-covered fist. She summoned all of her remaining strength into that fist, and it quivered with strain and tension."Hi," she growled into the surprised troopers face just before he jerked back, too late. Her fist connected with his face-plate with the force of a small sonic boom, and the store they were in was leveled with the impact. The trooper, his face plate-smashed and broken in, was blown clear out of the building, and the remaining were knocked off of their feet. Climbing to her feet using one of the shopping racks lying around her, Cassie panted, unable to straighten all the way up because of her bruised ribs. Winded, she saw the remaining four troopers clawing their way out of the rubble and clothing into which they had been thrown by the shock wave of her last big punch. One of them still had the collar. But Cassie was exhausted. She had to get away from them, try to catch her breath and maybe find her lasso - even though she wasn't entirely sure she had the strength to channel any more lightning tonight.Stumbling away, out of the building and back onto the pavement outside of Centennial Park, Cassie collapsed to her feet and sucked in the clean air. In front of her, a few dozen feet away, stood Mercy. Sammi's mother stared down at the nearly-broken teenager in front of her with dispassionate distaste, her gaze like forged steel as she lifted her communicator again. "The girl is kneeling in front of me on the street. Where are you? Get out here and arrest her before she recovers her strength.""Too late," Cassie snarled up at Mercy, clawing her way up to her feet and glaring at her. Filled with anger and hurt, not just at what the woman was doing to her, but to the cruel and abusive way she treated her daughter, Cassie took an unthinking step forward, gripping her fists tightly as she considered showing the woman what getting into a fight with Wonder Girl really felt like. But before she could get within striking distance of Mercy, the wall behind her began to buckle and give way.'Look Out!' 'It's coming down!' 'Run!' People all over the crowd began to cry out in alarm, and glancing up in confusion Cassie winced and then backed away a step as she saw the bottom floor of the building's outer wall begin to collapse, the rest of the wall sliding down after it. People began to run, and Mercy raised the communicator to her lips again, ordering her remaining troopers to get out of the building. Meanwhile, Cassie dashed along the street in front of the collapsing building, pulling startled and scared protesters and police officers out of the way of the falling rubble, then glancing back at the building front, worrying about the four Lexcorp officers still inside. But she needn't have worried: the four remaining metal suited troopers smashed through the collapsing wall as they escaped the building in a panic, their desperate attempts to get out only making the situation worse as the whole front side of the building began to tumble down on top of the crowd.Fortunately, most of the protesters managed to get away from the building in time. But one of the bricks tumbling from the wall hit Mercy on the shoulder and dropped her to the ground like a sack of potatoes. Glancing from the collapsing building to Mercy and then back again, the blonde girl dashed over to the downed woman, grabbing her and trying to heave her onto her shoulder. But as she did so, a ripple of pain tore through her ribs, and gasping, she collapsed to her knees. The shadow of the building's collapsing side swept over her, and Cassie knew they were out of time, so she lowered Mercy to the ground and stretched her body over her, holding herself up right on her hand as the bricks and mortar rained down on them. Mercy stirred herself just before the big hit came, and she blinked up at the blonde girl in surprise, her eyebrows twitching slightly in confusion. "...why are you...?""It's not for you, trust me on that," Cassie grunted, closing her eyes and bracing herself against the pavement as the wall came down. It hit her back like a giant thirty-ton lead balloon, and she cried out, her hands and knees driven down into the pavement beneath her as she groaned against the collapsing rubble and tried to hold herself upright.Samantha noticed that Lois switched off the audio on the camera, a move that intrigued her. It was definitely in the reporter's interest to scoop the daytime drama that had become her life. She hadn't realized how powerful Cassie really was, or how much damage she could take, and she was starting to feel just as much awe as fear. She watched the building tumble down on the both of them and cried out, feeling like she should have intervened, feeling like she ought to have been braver in the moment.When the building collapsed on top of her, Lois felt the young woman beside her tremble and she hastened to reassure her. "No, it's okay! It's okay! She's protecting your mother, it's okay..." For about a minute the flood of falling wall and building rubble rained down on her, and through it all, Cassie held herself up over Mercy, sheltering her from the collapse. After it ended, Cassie panted, her back raw and bruised from the pounding it had just received, and she pushed herself up through the foot or so of rubble on top of her, helping Mercy up with a hand."Thank you," Mercy said coldly, staring at the dust and rubble-covered superhero with something approaching interest as she shook the dirt from her own uniform."Shut up," Cassie panted, staggering as she looked around herself, blinking as she caught sight of Samantha's face staring back at her, her vision swimming as she tried to focus in on her. Cocking her head to the side, pulling her hair out of her face, Cassie took a step forward, unthinkingly again, in Sammi's direction, before she suddenly realized that Mercy was using her communicator again. "-she's nearly unconscious. Take her down, HARD.""What?" Cassie spun around, her eyes burning against as she glared accusatively at Mercy, "you... bitch..." She growled, before the first metal punch caught her on the chin. Taking her by surprise, the hit knocked her off of her feet, into the air and across the rubble pile to land on the grass in Centennial Park. One of the metal troopers landed on top of her, pummeling her in the face with a jointed-fist blow that split her lip, spraying blood across the metal gauntlet. A follow up punch from the third trooper blackened her eye, and she saw stars as she was slammed into the pavement beneath her. Another punch connected with her ribs, and then a metal boot came down on top of her chest, and she cried out.The fourth, and final troopers came up with a collar and snapped it around her neck finally, saying out loud "I am hereby placing you under arrest for the crime of illegally using your metahuman abilities and endangering the public without the approval and sanction of --" Suddenly, surprisingly, however, this speech was interrupted when a brick bounced off of the hollow metal head of the trooper in question. Glancing up in confusion, the four metal deputies were confounded to see that a throng of ordinary citizens drawn from among the protesters had gathered around them, hurling bricks and bits of metal and shouting at them to get off of their hero. The four troopers, convinced that Wonder Girl was no longer a threat, straightened up and began barking orders at the protesters to get back, get out of the way, and not impede the officers in their lawful arrest. Once the riot police were convinced Wonder Girl was down, as well, they began to move in on the crowd again, jeering and demanding that they disperse immediately."Looks like we got 'ere just in time," a gruff voice came from behind Lois' shoulder as she watched the riot police moving in on the protesters again. The brunette reporter grinned at the sound of the voice and the accompanying smell of old tobacco and whirled, flinging her arms around the shoulders of the big, burly man in the white button up shirt, brown tweed vest, and brown bowler cap."DAN! You made it!""'Course we did, Lane," the older man growled gruffly, puffing on his cigar even while he patted Lois on the back. "You call, we come. READY BOYS?" Dan glanced over his shoulder as several dozen police officers - either in their blue street uniforms or their red and brown MMCPD heavy duty tactical gear - poured through the ranks of the protestors and into the center of Centennial Park, all of them wearing a red arm band with the symbol of Superman (and some of them carrying a pin bearing the golden W symbol of Wonder Girl as well) to identify themselves. Behind them came several silver-armored S.T.A.R. Labs Security Forces, armored in a fashion similar to the Lexcorp Deputized Security Forces, but in slightly less advanced gear. "You comin'?" He raised his eyebrow appraisingly at Lois, who shouldered her camera and nodded enthusiastically. "Oh you bet it. Let's go."Sam's head spun a little as first Cassie rose from the rubble and then helped her mother out of the half-collapsed building. She'd never wanted to break Cassie's secret identity so much than in that moment, and though no one watching would have faulted her for charging in after her mother, Mercy was the woman in her life least in need of her concern at the moment- besides which she might just get decked for running in and interfering. When the reinforcements that Cassie had been hoping for arrived, Samantha rushed in with them, using the cover caused by the scuffle to reach her girlfriend. As the security forces rushed to deal with newly arrived troops, she was able to sneak in and pull Cassie out of sight. Turpin's police force was culled from the old core of the Metahuman Police Division, the police force that had worked alongside Superman repeatedly in the past and which had a reputation for its honor, integrity, and dedication to the ideals which Superman upheld: truth, justice, and liberty. Other officers from the Metro PD force had shown up at Turpin's call as well, good people whom Turpin had been sure he could depend on to stand up to the new police commissioner and his thugs with a badge. Turpin had also put in a call to S.T.A.R. Labs, where the head researchers were familiar and friendly with the Metahuman Police Division, and having watched the stand off between Wonder Girl and the Anti-Metahuman forces on their televisions, they were eager to supply their own armored defense forces when Turpin called. Together, the joined forces moved to the front of the protest line, forming a human shield of blue and silver around the protestors to separate them from the riot-cops, who stopped in their tracks when confronted with some of their brother officers. The two sides exchanged shouts and yells for the other to stand down while Samantha pulled Cassie out of sight, and Lois - catching a glimpse of what the raven-haired girl was up to out of the corner of her eye - hastened after them. "Is she gonna be alright?" the older woman asked, bending down on her knees in the rubble behind some parked cars to check on her young blonde friend.Cassie meanwhile, was drifting in and out of consciousness. On some level, she was aware that she was no longer getting beaten on, but the rest of the word was fading in and out of her sensory perception now. As her eyes began to flicker open, flashes of Samantha's face faded in and out of her vision, swimming around uncontrollably, and she raised an unsteady hand. "...Sammmmi?"Sam touched Cassie's cheek and gave her a cursory once-over, making sure she didn't have any serious injuries. "Hey, I got you. The cavalry is here so you take it easy, alright?" She looked at Lois. "I think she'll be fine but I've got to get her out of here before anyone notices." She glanced back toward the conflict, knowing better than anyone that she had a limited window of distraction on her mother."Sammi, you're here?" The blonde girl on the ground shook her head, sitting up slowly and squeezing her eyes shut for a moment as she tried to steady her vision. Reopening her eyes again, Cass focused in blearily on the face of her girlfriend, smiling weakly and then hissing as she reopened the cut on her lip. Dabbing at it with her fingers, Cassie felt a chill go through her. She hadn't seen her own blood in over two years. Despite her discomfort, however, Cassie was aware enough of her surroundings to catch the gist of what Samantha was saying. She shook her head, grabbing ahold of the car beside her and gritting her teeth as she tried to stand. "No. I can't leave yet. I have to get back out there."Samantha shook her head urgently. "You're in no condition to do that, and there are leagues of people out there keeping the peace. It's time to let the people handle this."The blonde girl shook her head again, pushing herself upright, leaning on Samantha and throwing her arm around the raven-haired girl's shoulders as she swayed on her feet. "I told those people I would protect them. I'm not leaving until those riot troops leave." Looking into her lover's deep blue eyes, she pulled some of her blonde hair out of her face and tucked it behind her ears. "Help me?" She asked her lover meaningfully, her voice soft and insistent.Samantha slid an arm around Cassie, holding her up as she wobbled on her feet. She frowned softly, her eyes searching Cassie's. "...what can I do?""Just help me up to the fountain," Cass pointed across the road towards the center of Centennial Park. "You can hide while I climb up on top of it," she smiled encouragingly."I think she might be right," Lois jumped in, slipping a shoulder under Cassie's other arm and making eye-contact with Samantha. "Those people out there, they need to know that their hero didn't just get taken down by the corporate brute squad - even if it is more or less a technicality at the moment." Samantha nodded, propping Cassie up as they helped her limp to the statue in the center of the park, keeping a sharp eye out for her mother as they moved. Mercy though, was much like her daughter in the way that she didn't miss details. The blonde girl smiled at Samantha in thanks as they reached the fountain, pulling herself up on it and climbing atop the pile of rubble. Reaching for her waist, she felt for her lasso and then sighed, remembering that she had lost it sometime earlier in the fight. But just as she was looking around for it, Lois reappeared from having disappeared after the three women reached the fountain in the first place, tossing the rolled up lasso up to Cassie, who caught it, twirling it slowly above her head."MERCY!" Cassie called out loudly over the jostling of the two crowds, and the whole square went silent as all eyes turned to the battered, bloodied, bruised, and girl standing tall on top of the Centennial Park fountain in the tattered, torn, and burned shirt and jeans of Wonder Girl. "CALL OFF YOUR DOGS, OR LET'S FINISH THIS." Samantha ducked when Cassie started yelling, but it was a long past time because she’d definitely been seen if not identified. She stepped back into the crowd, ready to jump up and catch her girlfriend should she begin to topple. The blonde girl did sway on top of the fountain a little, staggering as her left leg continued to tingle like it was still quite numb, but on the whole she stayed upright, twirling her lasso above her head. Across the divide between the two forces, Mercy was invisible to Cassie amid the throng of the riot forces, but her silver and blue deputies were not. The four still-working units leapt into the sky at Cassie's challenge, streaking towards the battered super heroine as she stood alone on top of the fountain. The silver S.T.A.R. Labs armored forces pulled themselves up out of the crowd and prepared to defend Wonder Girl, but Cassie waved them aside, not wanting anyone to get between her and the Lexcorp guys again - she needed to make this point, and she didn't want to have to do it again in the future. Tossing the loop of his lasso around the torso of the closest Lexcorp trooper, she yanked the suit-wearing trooper down onto the crowd in front of her, and leapt off of the fountain, grim determination on her face as she grabbed the head piece of the armor and tore it off, crushing it in her hand and tossing it to the ground. When the downed trooper raised his gauntlets to fire at her, Cassie socked him in the jaw, knocking him out cold and tearing the gauntlets off just in time to be tackled by the remaining three troopers and driven back into the molten heap atop the fountain. "Ahhhhh!" Cassie groaned as the troopers grabbed her arms and tried to hold her down. But even in her weakened state, three troopers could not subdue her when eight could not do so at her strongest, and she shrugged them off, looping the double-looped lasso over the front of the neck of an armored suit and yanking it down between her knees, slamming her joined hands down into the unit's chest and tearing through the metal until the circuitry popped and broke.A pair of sharp, painful blows shattered her focus next, though, knocking her off of the fountain and face-first into the water of the fountain. The first, a metal fist to the face, reopened the cut on her lip and opened a new cut on her cheekbone. The second blow, a kick to her ribs, made her gasp and cry out, rolling in the water in pain. When the two remaining troopers followed her down into the water, though, Cassie grinned wickedly up at them from her place in the water. Her plan had worked after all. "I win," she gasped, wheezing, as she flicked the lasso in her hands in and out and then back into the water of the fountain. The two metal-clad troopers jerked their heads back as they suddenly realized their error, but it was too late. Throwing her head back, Cassie shrieked at the top of her lungs "BY ... THE POWER.... OF ZEUS!" The explosive burst of Olympian Lightning that crackled through the lasso at her outcry, electrifying the water instantly, made the fountain explode with the concussive force of its detonation. Cassie screamed as she tasted the burning fire of the thunderbolt for the first time herself, and was flung into the air, crashing down on top of a car parked alongside the sidewalk outside of Centennial Park, where she lay still; her clothes singed, smoking, and burning in several places. But the two metal-clad troopers who had been in the fountain with her had fared no better. Their armor had overloaded with the massive electrical charge running through them and had collapsed into the smoking ruin of the fountain, unconscious. The fight was over. Almost as if in sympathy, in the echoing silence after Cassie's last thunderbolt attack, the sky overhead, long-covered by dark clouds and roiling with distant lightning, began to crackle and thunder, rain beginning to pour out of the clouds and wash the world below of its smoking scars.The riot police, their champions defeated and staring into the faces of the big, tough MMCPD heavy defensive corps, began to withdraw almost as soon as the rain began. The protesters, sensing a victory not only for their super powered champion but also for themselves, began to cheer. Meanwhile, however, some of the emergency crews who had been attending to the injured and battered protesters only a few minutes before began to examine the downed Lexcorp troopers, as well as carefully and gently moving the unconscious Wonder Girl onto a stretcher and loading her into an ambulance bound for Met Gen. Lois, camera in hand and already on her cellphone talking to her editor about how to get what she'd taped onto the evening news, managed to talk her way into the ambulance as it loaded up, holding her young friend's hand and glancing out over the crowd as she looked for Samantha, whose eyes she caught just before she hopped up inside, raising her eyebrows expressively as if to ask whether she was coming along or not. Samantha had watched in stark shock as Cassie electrocuted both herself and the Lexcorp security in the fountain, feeling a little like her body was vibrating, like the feeling of a tongue gone numb, her nerves becoming dull instruments. She glanced out over the crowd as Cassie was lifted onto a stretcher, and her eyes stumbled on the dark sharp gaze of her mother's full knowledge that her daughter was at the very least friends with Wonder Girl. She felt a little unsteady until she caught the very steady gaze of the Daily Planet reporter offering her an opening. She took it, jumping into the back of the ambulance with Lois and two paramedics, feeling shaky and dazed and like nothing in particular had been won.