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SM/DC Chapter 109 : Illusion
🕑 Added 2025-05-04 21:03:48 +0000 UTCLAS VEGAS – NIGHT – INSIDE THE LOTUS CASINO
The neon lights of Vegas bled through the tall windows, casting the casino floor in hues of violet and crimson. The Obsidian Lotus wasn’t the flashiest place on the strip, but it had an old charm a vintage elegance with a whisper of something darker underneath. Laughter echoed, dice clattered, and chips changed hands in a steady, hypnotic rhythm.
Arthur walked through the crowd like he belonged there. Black coat brushing against his boots, his presence seemed to part the space between drunken tourists and wealthy gamblers like the tide yielding to a storm.
Kara, now dressed in ripped jeans, a leather jacket, and a white tee, followed beside him, arms crossed and clearly unimpressed.
“So…” she said, sidestepping a passing waitress holding a tray of martinis. “You brought us here because… you wanted to gamble?”
Arthur didn’t stop walking as his lips curled into a faint smile. “I enjoy gambling.”
She raised an eyebrow, half a smirk forming—but before she could comment, he added coolly, “Obviously, I sensed something here. A magical trace… very similar to Doctor Fate. The same energy he left behind when he appeared to us through his astral projection.”
Kara glanced around skeptically. She gestured toward a nearby roulette table where a man in a cowboy hat screamed joyously over a lucky spin.
“Right,” she said, voice dry. “Because this definitely screams ‘ancient library of forbidden knowledge.’”
Arthur stopped just before a golden-embellished hallway and looked over his shoulder.
“Not everything is what it seems,” he said, voice low, his tone cutting through the noise like a dagger of calm in the chaos. “Especially in a place built on illusion.”
Kara blinked. His words held weight. She fell into step behind him.
They moved past the casino floor, deeper into the bowels of the building. The noise faded. The music grew faint, replaced by a subtle hum in the walls. Arthur led her to an unmarked door between two slot machines machines that seemed older than the casino itself.
The door creaked open.
Inside was a private high-roller suite but no one was there. No gamblers. No dealers. Just a plush carpet, vintage leather furniture, and walls lined with golden drapes. A fireplace in the corner, though no one had lit it.
Kara looked around, puzzled. “I don’t sense anything.”
“Well I did just a moment ago now I don’t...,” Arthur muttered, eyes narrowing. “And that’s the strange part.”
He stepped further in, inspecting the room. There were ancient paintings along the walls abstract scenes of deserts, stars, and what looked like robed figures gathered around glowing tomes. A piano rested in the corner, keys dusty.
And then
Arthur stopped.
Dead still.
Across the room stood a full-length mirror, framed in black silver, veined with emerald-like cracks. But there was no reflection. Nothing. Not of Arthur. Not of Kara. Not even the room behind them.
His eyes sharpened, glowing faintly blue.
“Kara,” he called softly.
She turned, following his gaze. “What the hell? Where is our reflection?”
Arthur approached the mirror slowly. “This… this isn’t just an illusion. It’s anchored.”
“Anchored to what?” she asked, stepping beside him.
He reached out his gloved hand hovering near the surface. There was no warmth. No chill. Just… absence.
“To somewhere else,” he whispered.
The mirror pulsed faintly, like a heartbeat.
Kara approached the strange mirror, her fingers hovering over the surface before lightly pressing against it. Her expression twisted in confusion.
“It… just feels like a normal mirror, Except for the no reflection part..” she muttered, palm flat against the cold, smooth glass.
Arthur, still a few feet back, tilted his head slightly. His eyes flickered with blue light, glowing brighter by the second.
“Maybe a burst of magic could activate whatever this is,” he said, lifting his hand slowly, fingers curling like a conductor readying a symphony.
An invisible force gathered around his palm, Ruler’s Authority humming to life. swirling around his arm like a storm being held at bay. Kara instinctively stepped back.
The mirror shook violently, its frame rattling against the wall. Cracks began to form, spiderwebbing across the surface with each pulse of Arthur’s will.
And then
CRACK.
The mirror shattered outward in a sudden blast of shards and shadow. Pieces scattered across the floor like frozen rain.
Kara turned to him slowly, one eyebrow arched high.
“Okay,” she said, “maybe that really was a normal mirror.”
Arthur kept his hand raised, his breathing even, but his jaw clenched. “No. There’s no way..”
But he stopped mid-sentence.
From the jagged edges of the shattered glass, something shimmered a new surface, reforming not from glass, but magic. The broken mirror reassembled itself into a perfect pane once more, this time humming softly with arcane light.
And in its depths… a reflection appeared.
But it wasn’t them.
It wasn’t the room.
It Rows upon rows of towering shelves. Floating orbs of light. A vast domed ceiling painted with stars that moved ever so slightly. The unmistakable sight of a grand, ancient library.
Kara’s eyes widened. “Well, that’s... Interesting..”
Arthur stepped closer, captivated. “Told you it wasn’t just a mirror.”
The reflection pulsed once, as if inviting them.
And then, with a quiet hum… the mirror began to ripple like water.
Arthur’s voice dropped to a whisper. “We’ve found it.”
Kara gave him a small smirk. “Ladies first?”
Arthur smiled faintly. “After you.”
She rolled her eyes, then stepped forward disappearing into the mirror without a sound.
Arthur followed, the glass sealing behind them like a closing curtain.
****
JUSTICE LEAGUE WATCHTOWER – OBSERVATION DECK
The vast observation deck was cloaked in silence, broken only by the soft hum of power conduits and the distant crackle of containment fields.
Behind reinforced glass and layered magical wards, five of the League’s finest Superman, The Flash, Hawkgirl, Aquaman, and Black Canary floated in suspended animation, their bodies still… but not peaceful.
Eyes closed. Faces strained. Each of them visibly trapped in a battle within one they were clearly losing.
Martian Manhunter stood at the forefront, arms clasped behind his back, unmoving as stone. The red glow of his eyes dimmed with silent contemplation.
Wonder Woman approached beside him, her voice calm, but laced with sorrow. “Is there anything we can do? We barely managed to contain them after all.”
J’onn didn’t look away from the glass. “No. Not yet. Their minds are... barricaded. Whatever’s taken hold of them is deep. All we can do now is wait.”
“Waiting’s not really my strong suit,” Green Arrow muttered from the corner, arms folded. “Any word on Constantine? Or Zatanna? This is their department.”
Green Lantern shifted his gaze from the prisoners, frowning. “Especially Constantine. Possessions, exorcisms, reckless magical chaos, that’s basically his Tuesday.”
J’onn’s brow creased, just slightly. “Still nothing. They’ve vanished off our network.”
“Convenient,” Lantern said dryly. “Or suspicious.”
Green Arrow stepped forward, voice dropping. “And Batman? Any updates on him? Haven’t seen him since.. You know..”
Everyone turned at that.
A beat of silence.
Hal folded his arms. “He wasn’t even possessed. Whatever hit the others didn’t touch him. And yet he...”
He trailed off.
Wonder Woman lowered her eyes briefly. “He locked himself in the med-bay. Crashed his own nervous system. J’onn... why would he do that?”
Martian Manhunter didn’t answer right away.
He stared through the glass again, watching as Superman’s fingers twitched barely perceptible. A pulse of darkness rippled through his veins, gone in an instant.
“I wonder...” J’onn finally said, softly. “Perhaps he saw something. Something he couldn’t fight. So he took himself out before they took control of him.”
The silence that followed was thick.
Green Arrow looked away. “Hell of a time to start losing our heavy-hitters.”
Wonder Woman exhaled deeply, her fists clenched at her sides.
J’onn’s glowing eyes dimmed for a moment as he turned toward the others, about to speak.
But then his body stiffened.
A flicker. A twitch. Something off.
His gaze snapped back to the containment chamber.
Inside, Superman’s body shifted, almost imperceptibly first the hand, then a slight tremor in his chest.
“Something’s wrong,” J’onn said, voice low.
The others followed his gaze instantly.
Wonder Woman stepped closer. “What is it?”
Inside the chamber, Superman’s fingers clenched into a tight fist. A crack webbed across the reinforced platform beneath him.
Martian Manhunter’s hands flew across the glowing console. Alarms triggered in a low, pulsing thrum. Red runes shimmered around the edges of the containment unit.
Green Arrow pointed nervously. “Wait, wait...there’s kryptonite embedded in that chamber, right? I mean that should hold him. Right?!”
J’onn didn’t answer immediately. He froze, eyes narrowing as his fingers paused over the console.
Then, slowly… he looked up.
“He’s actually… resisting it.”
Everyone turned sharply.
“What?!” they all said at once.
A sudden, loud crack burst from inside the chamber.
Superman’s eyes snapped open.
But they weren’t his.
Not anymore.
Four glowing red eyes, blazing like suns stacked on top of each other, stared through the glass right at them.
An unholy hum resonated through the air like a heartbeat from another plane.
Green Lantern’s ring lit up instinctively, projecting a shield in front of the group.
“Shit,” he muttered.
Green Arrow already had an arrow notched pointed, but trembling. “Tell me this isn’t as bad as it looks.”
Wonder Woman’s lasso glowed faintly at her hip as she took a guarded step forward. “J’onn?”
But Martian Manhunter didn’t respond.
