Inhuman // Cyborg

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Kingdom Come

"I don't see it." Victor replied with an expression of disapproval at Harper's decision to smoke inside the Hall of Justice. He didn't say anything though. She wasn't the only one doing questionable things in that building... "She looks like the physical embodiment of photoshop."

A snort sounded from Harper, and Victor thought that he had never heard such a beautiful sound in his life. Words couldn't express how severely he'd missed her. "I suppose so. She seems pretty loyal to you though. Well, you and her daughter anyway."

"Lara isn't her daughter." Victor said with so much bitterness that the sound alone could have killed someone...you know, if that was at all possible. "She's yours."

Harper's heart stopped, and in the silence that followed Victor could almost notice the lack of rhythm.

"You found her in the aftermath of a battle. Her parents had died when she was a baby, and her new foster family had also perished in that calamity. You brought her to me with this look of...determination on your face. I knew, straight away, that there was no arguing with you." The memories rushing through his head provided Victor with enough comfort to finally force a smile to his lips. It was an unreachable moment in time, but one he would remember forever. "I just said 'okay'. You died two years later, but she's a constant reminder of the person you always tried to be. 2903 and 2904 were the only mother's she could really remember, and they used that against me every opportunity they got."

Harper noticed very quickly that Victor referred to them by their numbers, and not as 'Harper'. She was almost going to mention it when a loud 'bang' rumbled through the entire eastern wing of the building. Victor sprung straight into action. Within the few seconds it took for the roof to collapse above them, he had rushed to her side and activated a shield. This was apparently enough to protect them from the crumbling building, and when the dust had cleared they saw someone rising from the rubble. It was the alien that Harper had passed in the halls the day before. The one that looked like Starfire...

"Mar'i!" Victor snapped in outrage. "What the hell are you doing?!"

The tall woman sneered at him, hair blazing behind her like pitch black fire. She looked remarkably unscathed by the impact, and unbothered by the destruction that she had caused.

"Uhh...who is she?" Harper asked, though quite possibly at the wrong time. She didn't sound too shocked by the structure that had just collapsed around her but that could have been because, after everything that had been happening, she was still unable to process it all.

"Nightstar. Kori and Grayson's kid." The cyborg hissed as if this girl was nothing but a stain on her parents memory. She probably was, if her recent demolishing of the Hall of Justice was anything to go by.

Mar'i glanced briefly at Harper, analysing her from top to bottom, then gave an unimpressed huff. Another alien appeared within Harper's line of sight, but this one was stark white and had only the smallest bump in the centre of her face to represent a nose. It didn't take long for Harper to deduct that this girl was likely the daughter of Hal Jordan and his Bekkorian partner Vell.

"Deowma! Ru ggralt hsalfin!" The alien yelled in some weird Bekkorian dialect... There were over twenty different languages on that planet, so it was difficult to pinpoint exactly which one she was using.

"I am not a coward!" Nightstar screeched, and in a blinding flash, she had thrown a star bolt in her direction.

The pale woman dodged it with all the grace of a trained fighter. Apparently unfazed by this attack, her black, colourless eyes flickered over to Victor. She smirked. "Dufor ishdy ame Lara, Bakraf'ti."

Victor bared his teeth in fury. "Tarcis. Stay away from Lara."

'Tarcis' clearly didn't understand him but the anger in his voice transcended all language barriers. Her smirk turned into a grin, as if she enjoyed the annoyance that her presence produced within the man. It wasn't long, however, before Nightstar tackled her back out of the debris, and vanished into the sky with her.