Happy Boostlethon, rurone!
Title: Future Perfect
Author: poisonivory
Recipient: rurone
Rating: PG
Summary: Milagro's brother doesn't want her to be a Green Lantern. Rani's sort-of dad doesn't want her to be a Time Master. Clearly, there's only one solution: rescuing Ted Kord.
Notes: Thanks to mizzmarvel for the beta!
Part One
Forty-five minutes later, Milagro sat in the time sphere, kicking her foot impatiently against the control panel in front of her. “Rani, if you don’t hurry up, I swear I’m gonna leave without you!” she called.
Rani came running in from the living quarters. “Sorry, I’m here! It took me a while to find this.”
Milagro stared at her. Rani was wearing a gold and white costume with a blue star on the chest, clearly designed along the same lines as Booster’s. It was a little loose and baggy on her, as if it had been made for someone much taller and, well, bustier. “What are you wearing?”
“It’s Shel’s Goldstar costume,” Rani explained. “I figure it’ll come in handy if we run into danger.”
Milagro raised an eyebrow. “Because you can…what? Wrap criminals up in all the extra material?”
Rani frowned. “It’s not that big. And no. So I can do this.” She held her hand up, palm pointing towards a nearby metal stool, and picked it up, then let it drop with a clang. “It gives me magnetic powers.”
“And your aunt won’t mind you borrowing it?” Milagro asked.
“Well, she never uses it anymore,” Rani said, but she didn’t quite meet Milagro’s eyes. Milagro thought about pressing the matter, then let it drop. It wasn’t like what she was doing was totally Reyes-Parent-Approved either.
“So you’re sure this will work?” she said instead as Rani climbed into the time sphere.
“It should,” Rani said, opening up the control panel to reveal a series of wires hooked and twisted around Milagro’s ring. “I’ve basically swapped out the time sphere’s auxiliary power source for your ring. If you tell it to find Ted Kord, the time sphere should be able to translate that command into a temporal leap.”
Milagro nodded. “I’m gonna be honest with you: I only understood about fifty percent of that sentence. But okay.”
Rani flipped some switches and the time sphere came to life, humming softly as the control panel lit up. “Ready?”
“You bet. We’ll be back here with Ted before your Uncle Rip even realizes we’re gone,” Milagro said.
Rani blinked. “Rip’s not my uncle.”
“Okay, cousin, then. Whatever.”
“No, Daniel’s my cousin. Sort of. Rip isn’t related to me. Well, to Mikey.”
Milagro raised an eyebrow. “Really? Because they look seriously alike. I would’ve sworn they were brothers.”
Rani shook her head. “No, Rip’s not from the 25th century. Or this one. Actually, he’s never really said when he’s from, but I think it’s a little bit into the future. The only way he could be related to Mikey is…” Her eyes widened. “Oh my God.”
“What?” Milagro asked.
“Nothing,” Rani said. “I either just thought of something crazy, or everything in my life suddenly makes total sense.” She shook her head again. “We’ll worry about it later. Come on, let’s go.”
“Going!” Milagro said. She reached forward and touched her forefinger to the ring. Then she shut her eyes and concentrated on the man in the pictures on Booster’s dresser; the man whose initials adorned her brother’s bulletin board at home long after he’d moved into a college dorm; the man who once occupied the grave at Vanishing Point. “Find Ted Kord.”
“I’m getting something!” Rani said. “The chronospectrometer is recalibrating towards…the future? Looks like the 23rd century…no… Wait, it’s fading out.”
Milagro cracked one eye open. “Maybe because someone keeps distracting the carburetor?”
“Well, technically you wouldn’t be the carburetor, you’d be…” Rani caught Milagro’s expression. “Right. Shutting up.”
Milagro refocused her willpower on her mental image of Ted Kord. She felt the unearthly hum of the time sphere start up and all the fine hairs on the backs of her neck and forearms stood up. The time sphere gave a lurch - not into space, but into time, which was a weird feeling.
“Okay, you can stop. I’ve got a lock on the coordinates,” Rani said.
Milagro opened her eyes and sat back in her chair. They were already zipping through the rainbow time void at a steady clip. “You sure? I thought I’d have to steer this thing all the way to…whenever.”
“I thought you might too,” Rani said, “but after a few minutes the directional coordinates settled down into a single time and place. That must be where - when - we’ll find him. The symbiosis between your brain, the ring, and the time sphere is fascinating. I wonder what would happen if we measured your brain waves while- ”
Milagro rolled her eyes. That was way too much talking about science when there was adventure afoot. “Rani. Where is he? I mean, when? And also where. Both.”
“Oh.” Rani’s face grew very serious. “He’s in Gotham,” she said, her tone heavy with meaning. “In 2460.”
It was clear that there was something important about that date, but Milagro wasn’t from the 30th century and didn’t know about World War VII or whatever. “Okay, so what - ”
Wham! Something hit the time sphere, hard. Rani yelped and Milagro went tumbling out of her chair. “What the- ”
“Milagro,” Rani said, her voice tight with fear. Milagro scrambled to her feet and looked out the front of the sphere, already dreading what she would find.
The Black Beetle was floating directly in front of them.
He smirked, then blasted them again. The sphere rocked violently. Milagro clutched the back of her chair to keep her balance, temporarily blinded by the glare of Black Beetle’s volley against the glass sphere.
“Shoot him! Shoot him!” she screamed.
“I can’t!” Rani said, sounding just as frantic. “The time sphere doesn’t have any weapons! It’s a research tool!”
“Oh, come on,” Milagro said, and thrust her fist at Black Beetle.
Nothing happened.
Of course! She wasn’t wearing her ring! She dropped to her knees and started fumbling at the wires wrapped around it.
“No!” Rani said. “He’s knocked us off course. Use the ring to find Ted again so we can get away!”
“Why can’t I hit him with a giant green baseball bat, then get away?” Milagro asked, but she pinched the top of the ring tightly between thumb and forefinger and screwed her eyes shut in concentration. Ted Kord Ted Kord TedKordTedKordTedKord…
The time sphere lurched again, and Milagro lost her concentration. “Hurry!” Rani called. “I think the glass is cracking!”
“I’m trying!” Milagro snapped, and refocused. Ted Kord. TED KORD.
“I’ve got it!” Rani said. “Just…another…”
Thump! The time sphere came to a sudden stop. Milagro opened her eyes.
She couldn’t see much from her position on the floor, but there was a blue sky above her, and what looked like the tops of trees. “Did we lose him?” she asked.
“I think so,” Rani said, looking shaky. “But I think we lost ourselves, too.”
Milagro stood up. They were on a grassy hill in what looked like a park, with paved paths winding through it and a handful of buildings. The buildings looked…well, like normal buildings, not the towering chrome skyscrapers Milagro would expect of the future. And the passersby and parked cars looked normal, if about 25 years out of date.
“When are we?” she asked, though she had a pretty good idea from some of the hairdos. “And…where?”
Rani was already checking the control panel in the time sphere. “I’m not sure,” she said. “I think Black Beetle damaged the chronometer. It’s going to take me a few minutes to get it back online.”
Milagro sighed, sinking into her chair. “Great. Why is he even going after us, anyway?”
“Well, technically he seems to be going after you,” Rani pointed out.
Milagro scowled. “Thank you, that’s very helpful.”
“Sorry.”
Rani didn’t look up, too busy fiddling with what Milagro could only assume was the chronometer. Rolling her eyes, Milagro turned to look out the sphere. Luckily there was no one nearby, though she could see people walking down distant paths in the park.
Actually, now that she was paying attention, she wasn’t so sure they were in a park. Something about the scattered red brick buildings and the carefully manicured landscaping was reminding her of something else. She frowned and tried to place the memory.
Touring colleges with Jaime! That was it. The layout was just like the schools the Reyeses had looked at a few years ago when Jaime was a senior in high school. They were on a college campus.
Rani did something that made the chronometer go blank and start beeping. “Okay, it’s resetting. Give it a minute.” She looked up at Milagro. “But seriously, can you think of any reason Black Beetle might want to kill you?”
Milagro swallowed, taken aback by the abrupt return to the conversation. Rani wasn’t one to dance around a delicate subject, apparently. “I don’t know. I mean, he attacked me once before, years ago, but that was to get to my brother. Jaime doesn’t even know where I am right now, let alone that Black Beetle’s tried to…to…” Green Lanterns were fearless. “…kill me twice.”
“Well, did he say anything to you in the cemetery before I got there? Black Beetle, I mean.”
“He said…” Milagro screwed up her face, trying to remember. “He said something about…ensuring his future, or something? I didn’t really understand.” She bit her lip. “Years ago, when I was little, he attacked me and my brother and he said…he said that I was going to become a supervillain.”
“Well, he’s a time traveler, so maybe he’s going to be one of your rogues,” Rani suggested.
“One of my rogues…” Milagro’s eyes widened. She hadn’t even thought about having her own rogues gallery. “Wow.”
“Or if you become a supervillain, maybe you’ll be rivals,” Rani added.
Milagro glared. “Thanks a lot. You know, maybe you should - ”
Suddenly students started pouring out of the buildings, and the once-nearly-deserted campus was abruptly very crowded. “Uh, can you, like, cloak the time sphere or something?” Milagro asked nervously, forgetting to be annoyed with Rani. “I think a class period just ended, and I don’t really want to explain…”
“Sure, hang on.” Rani pressed a button, and the time sphere flickered briefly. “We’re cloaked. What do you mean, class period?”
“I’m pretty sure we’re on a college campus,” Milagro said. “I…huh.”
A student was walking past them, close enough for Milagro to see his face - and it was oddly familiar. She frowned, trying to place him. He was white, kind of short and a little chubby, with messy reddish-brown curls in need of a cut. His sweater vest was the brightest and ugliest Milagro had ever seen, and he had a half-open backpack slung over his shoulder, crammed with books, crumpled papers sticking out every which way.
Milagro cocked her head. Okay, he was super nerdy…maybe he reminded her of Jaime? But even Jaime wasn’t that much of a dork…
“Uh…Milagro?” Rani said. “Your ring is glowing.”
Milagro looked down. Sure enough, her ring was glowing bright green. Hastily, she put her finger on it - and felt an abrupt mental tug towards the geeky student in the sweater vest.
“What the…Rani, I need to take this out,” she said, undoing the wires that held the ring in place.
“But - ”
“You can put it back in once we know where we are! I just need to…” Milagro got the ring free and slipped it onto her finger. It flared up and her ring hand reached out, almost of its own accord, towards the student.
“What’s it doing?” Rani asked.
“I don’t know! It’s freaking out over that guy! It’s like - ” Milagro paused as understanding hit her. “Oh my God. Rani, that’s Ted Kord.”
“What?”
But it was all starting to make sense. “When Black Beetle knocked us off course, the ring must’ve sent us to the nearest Ted Kord,” Milagro said. “The…time-nearest. The now-est. Whatever.”
Rani stared at Ted, who was heading towards one of the distant buildings. “Are you sure that’s him, though?”
“Why else would the ring be freaking out?” Milagro asked. “Besides, I can see it. He looks like a younger version of the guy in all those pictures. Doesn’t he?”
“I guess…” Rani said slowly.
Milagro opened the door of the time sphere. “Come on, let’s get a closer look.”
“What are you doing?” Rani hissed as Milagro jumped down onto the grass. “We can’t leave the time sphere!”
“Why not?” Milagro asked. “It’s cloaked, right?” Sure enough, when she looked back she couldn’t see the sphere at all, except for the open door with Rani’s upper half sticking out of it - unless she used her ring, which outlined the sphere in a faint green glow. “I just want to get a better look and come right back. It’s not like we’re going to be late getting to the future or anything.” Rani looked unconvinced, so Milagro tried another tack. “Besides, aren’t you curious? I mean, we came looking for Ted, and we found him. Maybe we’ll find out something important.”
Rani bit her lip. Milagro could tell she was wavering. “Well, we can’t just walk into a lecture hall looking like this,” she said finally.
Milagro smiled. “No problem.” She concentrated, and suddenly she was in the civvies she’d been wearing that morning, and Rani was in the clothes Milagro had first seen her in - or at least they looked like they were.
Rani stepped out of the time sphere, taking a small device with her. When she closed the door, the time sphere vanished completely. “And no one’s going to think it’s weird that two 14-year-olds are attending a college lecture?”
“I thought you were supposed to be a genius,” Milagro said, heading off in the direction that Ted had gone.
“I am, but they don’t know that. And that doesn’t explain you.”
“Oh, thanks.”
Milagro caught a glimpse of the ugly sweater vest heading into a building. “That way! Come on.”
They hurried after Ted, trying to keep him in sight while staying far back enough that he wouldn’t notice them. Milagro saw a few people give them curious glances, but for the most part they were ignored.
Ted walked into a large, auditorium-style lecture hall and sat in the very first row. He pulled a book out of his bag, sending papers flying, and scrambled to retrieve them. Milagro hid a smile as she and Rani took seats in the very back. This was Jaime’s hero?
Over the next few minutes, the room filled about halfway up with talking, laughing students. They fell silent, however, when the front door opened and the professor walked in - a tall redheaded man, handsome in a teachery kind of way, wearing a tweed jacket over a blue shirt. “Good afternoon, class. Did everyone do the reading over the weekend?”
There was a mumble of noncommittal agreement from the class. Milagro hid another smile. Apparently college wasn’t all that different from high school.
“Are there any questions about it before we begin today’s lecture?” the professor asked.
A student raised his hand. “Professor Garrett, will Upper Palaeolithic parietal art be on next week’s test, or are we done with that?”
Milagro’s jaw dropped. Professor Garrett? Professor Garrett who was Ted Kord’s archaeology professor?
She started frantically elbowing Rani, who looked just as stunned as she did. “Oh my God! That’s Dan Garrett, the first Blue Beetle!” she hissed.
Rani elbowed her back. “I know, shut up, shhh!”
Milagro stared, amazed, as Professor Garrett answered the student and began his lecture. It felt like she was watching a bit of personal history unfold in front of her, or at least her brother’s personal history - Blue Beetles One and Two, young and vital and very much alive, completely unaware of the tragic fates in store for them. She noticed that even though a lot of the students were doodling or holding whispered conversations, Ted seemed enthralled. He seemed to hero-worship Garrett as much as Jaime hero-worshipped him. Milagro wondered if he knew Garrett’s secret.
Suddenly there were screams from outside, and the sound of running footsteps in the hall. Everyone, including Professor Garrett, looked up in alarm.
A girl stuck her head in the open door. “Run!” she cried. “It’s a giant mummy! That’s…not dead!”
Milagro powered up her ring, ready to change into her costume, but Rani put a hand on her arm, stopping her. “Wait,” she whispered. “Don’t mess with history. There’s already a superhero here.” She pointed to Professor Garrett.
“Uh…class dismissed,” Professor Garrett said quickly. “I suggest you all stay here, where it’s safe. I’m going to…just…call 911.” He darted out of the room.
Of course no one else stayed in the room. Half rushed in the direction the screaming girl had come from, presumably to see the giant mummy; the other half fled the opposite way. Ted was in the half looking for the mummy. Milagro stood up, torn between following Ted and trying to find Professor Garrett, who she was sure had gone to change into the Blue Beetle.
Lightning ripped through the sky out the window, and there was a crash that sounded suspiciously like a bug-themed superhero colliding with something giant and undead. That made up Milagro’s mind for her. “Come on!” she said, grabbing Rani’s wrist and running after Ted and the other students.
They ran out of the building and skidded to a halt. Lumbering across the grass was, sure enough, a giant mummy, three stories high, with bandages trailing from its limbs. Its eyes were a dark, cavernous space from which two red lights burned. “I WILL DESTROY YOU, BLUE BEETLE!” it bellowed in a voice that echoed like an empty tomb.
Milagro instinctively looked for her brother, but of course the Blue Beetle that flew into view was Dan Garrett, sunlight gleaming off his chain mail armor. “You’re not going to hurt anyone, Kha-ef-re!” he declared, flying head-on at the mummy and unleashing bolts of lightning from both hands.
“Wow,” someone said next to Milagro. She glanced over and stifled a surprised yelp. They were standing right next to Ted, who was gazing up at the fight with wide eyes, too enraptured to notice the two definitely-not-college-age girls beside him.
The giant mummy shook off Blue Beetle’s lightning as if it was a minor annoyance. “ARE THESE PITIFUL MORTALS UNDER YOUR PROTECTION, BLUE BEETLE? I WILL CRUSH THEM!” he said, and turned towards the crowd of students.
Ted abruptly turned and bolted for a building - not the one they had just come from, but the next-closest. “Wow,” Milagro muttered. “I guess courage was an acquired trait for him.”
She went for her ring, but again, Rani placed a restraining hand on her arm. “You can’t!” Rani hissed. “We’re not supposed to be in this time period! We could damage history irrevocably!”
“Yeah, well that thing could damage us irrevo-that thing you said!” Milagro hissed back.
But Blue Beetle swooped in, slamming into the giant mummy’s chest with a perfect football tackle. It didn’t down the giant mummy, but it did make him stagger back, arms flailing for balance. One struck Garrett and sent him flying. He hit the ground hard, plowing up a furrow of earth.
The giant mummy laughed, a sound that made the hair stand up on Milagro’s arms, and took a few giant steps until he was standing over Garrett’s prone body. “YOU CANNOT DEFEAT ME, BLUE BEETLE. NOW GIVE ME THE SCARAB!”
“This scarab’s magic may have reanimated you, but I won’t let it be used for greater evil!” Garrett said, struggling to rise. He shot another bolt of lightning at the mummy, but it didn’t even faze the monster.
“THEN I WILL KILL YOU AND TAKE IT ANYWAY,” the mummy said, and reached down.
Milagro took a step forward, throwing off Rani’s grip. “I’m stopping this,” she said. “I can’t just let - ”
“Blue Beetle!” someone yelled.
Milagro turned to see Ted running towards Blue Beetle and the mummy. He had a large spool of wire in his hands, a good foot in diameter and twice as long. He ran heedlessly into the sweep of the mummy’s reach. “Catch!” he yelled, and threw the wire towards Blue Beetle.
It didn’t quite reach, but Blue Beetle rolled and grabbed it, holding it in front of him like a weapon.
The mummy laughed. “THAT PUNY OBJECT WILL NOT SAVE YOU, BLUE BEETLE.”
Dan seemed to agree, because he shot Ted a confused look. Ted backed up, but he was smiling. “I guess mummies don’t know about electromagnets, huh?”
Dan visibly startled, then lunged for the mummy’s ankle. He clung to the ankle, stomped a foot down on the spool, and shot a bolt of lightning down at the wire.
There was a blue flash, and pressure that made Milagro’s back teeth ache. Then the mummy collapsed.
Blue Beetle staggered back, away from the wire, and shook his head as if shaking off the force of what he’d just done. “Is he…dead? Again?” Ted asked.
“I don’t think so,” Blue Beetle said, “but he’ll be out long enough for me to get him somewhere where he’ll never menace innocent civilians again.”
The students burst into cheers. Ted stood there beaming as his fellow students congratulated him. Blue Beetle walked over and shook his hand, and Milagro thought Ted might faint with excitement.
In the midst of it all, Rani tugged on her sleeve. “Come on,” she said. “We need to go.”
Milagro let herself be pulled away from the crowd and back up the hill towards the time sphere. She thought she saw Ted give them a sharp look as they walked away, but she was probably just imagining it.
“Why do we have to leave?” she asked when they were out of earshot. “This is fun!”
“Until someone starts asking questions,” Rani said. “We’ve pushed our luck long enough. Besides, the time sphere should be back online now. We should get going before Black Beetle is able to track us down.”
That sobered Milagro quickly enough. “Okay, fine. Let’s go.”
Rani uncloaked the time sphere long enough for them to find the door and get in, and wired Milagro’s ring back into the system. “I’ll get us back to our time before we try honing in on Ted again, otherwise it’ll just keep us here,” Rani said. The world shimmered around them as she sent them back into the timestream.
“That. Was. So. Cool!” Milagro said as she sat back in her chair. “Wait’ll I tell Jaime!” Then she frowned, remembering that she was still mad at her brother.
“…Okay, yes, it was,” Rani admitted. “I wonder what animated the mummy and caused that extreme growth? Professor Garrett said magic, but that’s obviously nonsense.”
“Oh, magic is real,” Milagro assured her. “My brother’s girlfriend Traci? Well, they’re kind of on-again, off-again, but the point is, she’s magic. Like, actual magic, with conjuring and pentagrams and ley lines and stuff.” She paused. “Also she’s way too good for him, but that’s beside the point.”
“Well, yes, the existence of Homo magi has been proven, so to speak,” Rani said with a disdainful little sniff. “But that doesn’t explain a giant mummy, even if whoever he was was a Homo magus when he was alive.”
“Professor Garrett said the scarab’s magic brought the mummy to life,” Milagro pointed out.
“But the scarab isn’t magic,” Rani argued.
“I know, but Dan Garrett thought it was. Everyone thought it was until the Reach showed up and tried to get my brother to help them take over the world,” Milagro said. “Anyway, Scarab’s brought Jaime back from the dead before. Maybe being buried underground with it for like a billion years brought the mummy halfway back?”
“The dynastic Egyptian pharaohs didn’t live a billion years ago,” Rani said. Milagro gave her a look. “Right. Hyperbole. Anyway, I suppose the scarab could’ve emitted radiation that increased the mummy’s size and imbued it with the appearance of life.”
“Yeah, Scarab’s all about the imbuing,” Milagro said. “And maybe that even helped Professor Garrett take the mummy down, since it was kind of dependent on Scarab to live…or half-live, or whatever.”
Rani made a face. “That seems awfully speculative, but I suppose it doesn’t really matter,” she said. “Okay. Ready to find Ted again?”
Milagro nodded, and once again used the ring to zero in on their target. “Now, we’ll have to be careful,” Rani said once their destination was locked into place. “Time travel is highly illegal in this era. If we get caught…well, let’s just say that Mikey was nearly executed once.”
“Yeah, let’s not get executed,” Milagro agreed.
Rani landed them in an alley, and cloaked them the minute they hit the ground. Milagro gazed out of the time sphere in wonder. The buildings were twice as high as the ones she knew, all glass and chrome and rounded edges. The cars zoomed along several feet off the ground, and the people walking by were dressed in outlandish, alien fashions. Some had shiny little robots bobbing after them, like the one that sometimes followed Booster around.
Yeah. They were definitely in the future.
Rani unhooked Milagro’s ring and handed it to her. “Here you go. I’ve pulled up some examples of contemporary teen fashion on the screens. Can you make our clothes look like that?” She pointed to the time sphere’s monitors.
“I can, but I won’t like it,” Milagro said. She concentrated and their clothing changed. “There. Ugh. We look like a Nascar pit crew redesigned their jumpsuits after watching every episode of The Jetsons. While drunk.”
“These are school uniforms, actually,” Rani said.
Milagro looked down at the shiny fabric and garish colors and shook her head. “I never thought I’d long for a kilt. Oh, well. When in Future Rome, do what the Future Romans do, right?”
“This is Gotham.”
“Forget it.”
Rani shut the time sphere, and they headed out of the alley. Despite the general glossy futurism of the city around them, Milagro could tell that the neighborhood they were in wasn’t the greatest. It was grungy down on the street level, with actual litter, something Milagro never would’ve expected to see in the future. The cars were dingy and some had visible mechanical problems. One that passed by even made a noise that reminded Milagro of Paco’s old convertible, which gave her a sudden and ridiculous pang of homesickness.
“Are you zeroing in on Ted?” Rani asked, looking around as if she expected armed future cops to leap out at them at any minute, ray guns blasting away. “You can’t go sightseeing in this era like you did the last time. We have to move quickly.”
“Yes, I’m looking for him,” Milagro said in an annoyed voice, even though she hadn’t been. She concentrated. “Okay, the ring says…that way.”
She pointed, and they headed off in that direction. Rani walked so fast that Milagro, with her shorter legs, had to trot to keep up with her.
“Hey! Speed Force McGee!” Milagro said, grabbing Rani’s sleeve. “Can you dial it back a little?”
Rani slowed her pace by a fraction. “I just want to get this done,” she said, glancing over her shoulder and shying visibly away from a passing car.
“Dude, the cops are only going to notice us if you keep acting all weird,” Milagro said.
“Huh? Oh, right, the cops,” Rani said. “Well, I’d still be happier if we were inside.”
Milagro frowned. “Is there something besides the police you’re worried about?”
“No!” Rani said a little too quickly. “Come on, let’s just - oof!”
She collided with a man coming around the corner. She stumbled back, and would have fallen if the man hadn’t reached out and grabbed her arms, steadying her.
“Whoops! Sorry, kiddo,” he said, letting go. “You okay?”
Milagro squinted at the man, trying to place why he looked so familiar. He was younger than she’d thought at first, maybe eighteen or nineteen, but tall and broad-shouldered. He was also crazy handsome, despite his tremendously stupid hairstyle - all curled into one big sideways bang in the front. Still, he was blond, blue-eyed, dimpled, and showing approximately nine million teeth as he smiled at Rani, and that more than made up for the weird 80s-esque ‘do.
Those perfect, gleaming white teeth made Milagro think of toothpaste, and then toothpaste commercials, and then one particular toothpaste commercial. And then she realized how she knew him.
“Uh…kid?” Booster asked, his smile now tempered with concern.
Rani stared at him, lips moving soundlessly before she managed to stammer, “Sorry…you’re…uh…”
The line between Booster’s brows vanished. “Oh, you must be a fan! You coming to the game tomorrow?”
Rani shook her head.
“Well, root for me anyway, okay? Here, hang on.” Booster pulled a piece of paper and a pen out of his jacket pocket and scrawled something on the paper. “There ya go. Go Gotham!”
“Go Gotham!” Rani echoed weakly, taking the paper. Booster gave her one last toothpaste-commercial grin, then walked off.
Milagro hauled Rani around the corner. “You okay?” she asked.
“Yeah,” Rani said. She looked more herself now that Booster was out of sight. “Yes. I just panicked for a minute. I thought for sure he’d recognize me.”
“How could he recognize you?” Milagro asked. “He hasn’t met you yet.”
“I know that!” Rani said, a little snappishly. “It’s just weird, okay? You try going back in time and meeting your fa-your guardian when he was practically your age.”
“Good thing he didn’t try to date you, or he would’ve erased you from existence,” Milagro said.
“What? How?”
“You’ve never seen-never mind,” Milagro said. “Are you okay to go look for Ted?”
“Yes, let’s go,” Rani said, setting off. “I was serious about the science police before. I think it’s best if we get out of this time period - with Ted - as quickly as possible.”
They followed the ring’s directions through the weird futuristic streets, at which Milagro tried not to gawk too much. After only a few blocks, the ring led them to a gleaming chrome skyscraper and tugged straight up.
They gazed up at it. “Do you think he’s in there?” Milagro asked.
“Definitely,” Rani said. “Look at the sign.”
Milagro shielded her eyes and squinted up at the sign. “Khepri Industries? I don’t get it.”
“Khepri was the ancient Egyptian god of the rising sun, sometimes seen as an aspect of Ra,” Rani said. “He was generally depicted as a dung beetle, or a human man with a dung beetle for a head.”
“Gross,” Milagro said. “So?”
“Dung beetles and scarabs are the same thing,” Rani said. “Well, technically the ancient Egyptian scarab was inspired by the Scarabaeus sacer, a specific type of dung beetle, so while all scarabs are dung beetles, not all dung beetles are scarabs…”
“Okay, first of all, you know way too much about dung beetles,” Milagro said. “And second, you think Ted…what? Built this building? And then named it after some kind of poop bug?”
Rani shrugged. “Only one way to find out.”
They walked into the building. Milagro expected to encounter a receptionist, but instead there was a set of waist-high barricades, almost like saloon doors, with an elevator bank beyond them. As they watched, a woman in what looked like futuristic business attire came out of one of the elevators. She approached one of the barricades, which zhwooped open like the automatic doors at the mall, and walked out of the building without a second glance at Rani and Milagro.
Milagro glanced at Rani, who shrugged. They approached the barricades, but nothing opened for either of them. Instead, a tinny, robotic voice said: “Please present employee card.”
Rani shrugged again. Milagro leaned forward. “Uh…we’re here to see the head of Khepri Industries?”
“Do you have an appointment?” the robot voice asked.
“…Yyyyes,” Milagro said, crossing her fingers.
“Name?”
“Uh,” Milagro said. “Um. Susie…McFuture…son…worth.”
“What?” Rani hissed.
“Well, you come up with something!” Milagro hissed back.
“I have no record of that name in Mr. Samsa’s schedule,” the robot voice said. “Please make an appointment with Mr. Samsa’s office three months in advance. Thank you.”
Milagro and Rani drew back. “What are we going to do?” Milagro asked. “Even if we hop the barricade, we can’t go poking around this whole building looking for Ted.”
“We don’t have to,” Rani said. “He’s Mr. Samsa.”
“How do you know?”
“Gregor Samsa is the main character in the 1915 novel Die Verwandlung, or The Metamorphosis, by Franz Kafka. In the book, Samsa transforms into a monstrous creature of some sort, usually rendered in English as a cockroach or beetle,” Rani explained.
Milagro shook her head. “Okay, either you or Ted knows way too much about bugs. First dung-beetle-head, and now this.” She glanced back towards the elevators. “Well, Robodoor won’t let us through without an appointment, so I guess we’re hopping the fence.”
“Wait!” Rani said. “Maybe we should - ”
But Milagro was already moving. She ran for the barricade, braced her hands on top, and sprang over it. “Come on!”
Suddenly the hallway was filled with flashing red lights. “ALERT. ALERT. SECURITY BREACH,” the robot voice announced.
“I don’t think that was a very good idea!” Rani said over the noise of the robot voice, which was repeating the alert at top volume over and over again. “Now they’ll send security after us!”
“Well, then, you’d better hurry up!” Milagro said.
Grumbling, Rani ran for the barrier, then flew over it. Milagro stared. “How…?”
“Goldstar suit. Just because you can’t see it doesn’t mean it doesn’t work,” Rani said. “Come on!”
Milagro hit the button for the elevator. “SECURITY BREACH. NO ACCESS,” another robot voice boomed.
“Oh, great,” Milagro said. “Ring, find us some stairs!” The ring tugged them towards a door, which turned out to be locked. Milagro used the ring to wrench it open, then pulled Rani in after her.
They started running up the stairs. “I don’t…think Ted is…going to be very…happy with us…after you broke…his lobby!” Rani puffed.
“Well…maybe he should…be more open to…drop-in appointments!” Milagro retorted.
“HALT!”
Two little flying robots came zooming down the stairwell. “Please provide your security access code or we will fire to stun,” one of them said.
“Here’s my access code, you flying toasters,” Milagro said, ringing up a giant green mallet.
“No!” Rani said, grabbing her arm. “They’re like Skeets!”
“They’re gonna shoot us, Rani!” Milagro said.
“They’re just doing their job!” Rani protested. “Here, hang on.” She held her hands up in front of her. The air shimmered for a minute, and then both robots dropped to the stairs with a clatter.
“Oh, so I can’t break them but it’s okay if you do?” Milagro asked.
“I didn’t break them, I just sent a magnetic pulse that took them offline for a few minutes,” Rani said. “I’m sorry, I just couldn’t…they look just like Skeets.”
“Booster’s little robot sidekick thing?” Milagro asked, raising an eyebrow.
“He’s family,” Rani insisted. “Now come on, before they wake up or the building sends any more.”
Milagro concentrated. “Okay, the ring says Ted’s…yikes. He must be way at the top of the building.” She looked dolefully at the many, many flights of stairs above them. “This is gonna take forever.”
Rani stared at her. “Aren’t you forgetting something?” She lifted off the ground.
“Oh, right.” Milagro lit up the ring and flew ahead of Rani. “Give me a break, I’m new at this. Besides, I thought you wanted to be low-key.”
“Yes, well, hopping the turnstile and breaking the door kind of put an end to that.”
“You’re never gonna let me hear the end of that, are you?”
They flew straight up the center of the stairwell. About halfway up, another, larger fleet of security droids showed up to confront them, but Rani knocked them out like she had the first two, and Milagro used the ring to place them gently on the stairs rather than let them fall down the center. Finally the ring tugged Milagro towards a door - the one that led to the very top floor.
“Here we go,” Milagro said, glancing at Rani. “Do you think he knows something’s up?”
“ALERT. ALERT. SECURITY BREACH,” the robot voice announced for the umpteenth time.
Rani gave Milagro a look. “I think he might have an inkling.”
There was nothing for it, though. Milagro tried the door, which was locked, then used her ring to yank it open.
They emerged onto a hallway that, aside from the flashing red alarm lights, seemed undisturbed. The ring led Milagro to a door at the end. With the red lights flashing like that, she had to lean in close to read the nameplate: Stephen Samsa, CEO.
She looked at Rani, then tried the doorknob. It wasn’t locked. Swallowing, she opened it and stepped in, Rani behind her.
“All right, that’s far enough,” said the man standing in the center of the office. And leveled a gun at them.
“Don’t shoot!” Milagro said quickly. She knew she could take out a gun, and Rani probably could too, with her magnetic powers - but if this was Ted, she didn’t want to fight him.
The man paused, lowering the gun slightly. “Wait - you guys are just kids.”
Milagro bristled a little at that. She opened her mouth, but Rani spoke first. “And you’re Ted Kord.”
The man lowered the gun all the way, blinking in surprise. “Wh-how did you-”
“We’re from the 21st century,” Rani said. “We’ve come to take you home.”
Ted stared, then walked over to his desk. Now that Milagro had a minute to take in her surroundings, she could see that the desk’s entire surface was a touchscreen, which was very cool.
Ted keyed in a password, and the flashing lights and robot voice stopped. Milagro breathed a sigh of relief.
Then Ted keyed in something else, holding up a hand towards the girls in the universal “be quiet” sign. “Sorry about that, folks,” he said. Milagro could hear his voice echoing from the speakers out in the halls. “False alarm. Go about your business.” He pressed another button, then looked up at the girls. “Explain.”
Milagro squinted at him. “You are Ted Kord, right?” she asked. He was dressed in futuristic clothes, and he had a close-trimmed, reddish-brown beard to match his graying hair, but beneath that, he did look like the man in Booster’s pictures - if a little older.
“Yes,” he said, putting the gun down on the desk. “My God. I’m sorry, it’s just…it’s been years since anyone called me that.” He smiled a little crookedly. “It’s nice to feel like myself for a minute. Who are you?”
Milagro glanced at Rani, who nodded. Then Milagro dropped the illusion of civvies, leaving them in their costumes.
“A Green Lantern?” Ted said. “And you’re…” His eyes widened as he took in Rani’s costume. “Isn’t that…didn’t Booster’s sister…?”
“This is Milagro Reyes,” Rani said. “Her older brother Jaime is your successor, the third Blue Beetle. And my name is Rani Carter.”
“Carter,” Ted said sharply. “You’re…Booster’s daughter?”
Rani paused, then nodded. Ted sat down heavily.
“A daughter,” he said slowly. “He has a daughter. And I…” He looked back up at Milagro. “Your brother is the Blue Beetle?”
“Yes, sir,” she said, her stomach twisting. When she’d fantasized about bringing Ted back and throwing it in Jaime’s face, she’d never thought about what it would mean to Ted, learning how his world had gone on without him. “But he - I mean, you’re not forgotten or anything like that. He thinks you’re just the greatest.”
Ted gave her a small smile. “Well, that’s good to know, at least.” He looked back at Rani. “How’s…how’s Booster?”
“He’s…good?” Rani said. She looked as uncomfortable as Milagro felt. “He’s a Time Master now. He works with Rip…do you know Rip Hunter?”
“By name,” Ted said. “We’ve never met.”
“Oh. Well, anyway, Rip and Mikey - Booster - and Shel all work to protect the timestream. I’m still in training.” She looked down at the floor. “Um…he misses you. I know he still misses you.”
“How long has it been?” Ted asked.
Rani didn’t look like she could bring herself to say it, so Milagro did. “Eight years.”
Ted made a soft noise, as if something hurt. Milagro looked away. “…Why didn’t he come get me himself?”
“He doesn’t know you’re alive,” Rani said. “Here, I mean. We, uh…we may have decided to find you on our own.” She cocked her head. “Why are you here?”
“I don’t know,” Ted said. “I remember Max pointing a gun at me, and then…nothing. I mean, I have this vague memory of…attacking Booster? But I don’t know if that really happened. And then this voice said my name, and there was this white glow, and I was floating in space wearing all white…but then it vanished, and I was falling, and I landed here. I mean, now. I mean, six years ago, but in the 25th century. I’ve been here ever since.”
“Of course!” Rani said. “It all makes sense!”
“It does?” Milagro asked.
“Yes!” Rani started pacing, working it out. “You did attack Mikey, when you were resurrected as a Black Lantern. And then…you must have been resurrected properly, I mean not a zombie, as a White Lantern, when Max Lord and all the others came back. But because your body was buried at Vanishing Point, the temporal field around it prevented the ring from bonding with you properly, and you were bounced to a random era. I should have known when we didn’t find your corpse that that was what had happened. It’s so obvious!”
Ted looked at Milagro. “Did any of that make any sense to you?”
“Nope.”
“It doesn’t matter. Rip will understand,” Rani said. “So you’ve just been stranded here for six years?”
Ted nodded. “It was pretty touch-and-go at first. I mean, once I realized when I was I knew not to say anything about being from the past. Booster’s told me what they’re like about time travel in this era. And even without mentioning any of that they still thought I was crazy - this raggedy stranger with no ID, no family, no understanding of this era’s basic technology and culture. Anyway, once I figured it out I did okay. Built this place from the ground up.” He shook his head. “I guess I’ll have to build Kord Industries up again after I go back with you.”
“So you’ll come with us?” Milagro asked.
“Are you kidding?” Ted said. “Do you know what it’s been like for me? I haven’t seen the people I love in six years. I haven’t had a proper meal in six years! Did you know cows are extinct in this century? I would seriously kill for a proper steak. And the music is terrible.” He stood up. “I’ve spent the past six years working on my own time machine, trying to get home. But now that you guys are here, I can skip all that.”
He picked up the gun he’d been holding before. “What’s that for?” Milagro asked.
“Just in case,” Ted said, stashing it inside his jacket. “It wouldn’t have really hurt you guys, just flashed a temporarily blinding light at you. It’s based on my old B.B. Gun.” He headed for the door.
“Do you need to pick anything up before we go?” Rani asked. “Leave a note for someone?”
Ted shook his head. “I’ve left an encoded file on my computer that explains…well, not everything, but enough to cover my disappearance and arrange for my succession at the company. Other than that…” He shrugged. “I’ve just been killing time. I want to go home.”
“Well, we’ve got the time sphere stashed in a nearby alley, so…” Milagro gestured towards the door. “Shall we?”
They left the office and got into the elevator. “Speaking of time spheres, why did you have to invent your own time travel?” Rani asked. “They must be capable of it in this era, or Mikey couldn’t have traveled back to the 20th century.”
Ted shook his head. “Not really. That’s part of why it’s so feared - the government has only a vague understanding of it. They can’t fine-tune it. There’s the one time sphere in the Space Museum, but I needed to leave that there for Booster.” His expression turned grim. “He’ll be needing it in just a couple of years.”
“Wait, why is that bad?” Milagro asked as they emerged onto the street.
Ted glanced at Rani. “It’s okay,” she said. “I know about it.”
Ted nodded, then turned back to Milagro. “Things go…badly for Booster in a couple years. He’s going to steal the time sphere and come back to our time to start over. I…it’s been hard, watching. I’ve kept an eye on his career, but I can’t be in his life. I mean, he was only thirteen when I got here, but still…” He sighed. “It’s bad enough that I can’t ever let him see me, in case he recognizes me…later. That’s why I changed my name, and grew this.” He pointed to the beard. “In case we bump into each other. But I can’t…I mean, I know he’s going to make mistakes, and I can’t stop him. It’s hard.”
Milagro looked at Rani. “You know what? I don’t think I like time travel.”
“It’s not easy,” Rani agreed. “Mikey always says it’s not.”
Ted forced a smile. “But hey, he didn’t do so bad, right? I mean, he’s married, he’s got you…”
“What?” Rani asked, looking startled. “Oh, no, Mikey’s…I’m adopted, sort of. He’s not married. He’s never even really dated much.”
“Oh!” Ted said. “Well, that’s good. I mean, not good, but, uh. You know. I’ve missed so much, I’d hate to have missed out on being best man.” He looked away, cheeks a little flushed. “Hey, is the time sphere down that way?”
“It’s in that alley right there,” Milagro said, pointing. “We’d better hurry before someone stumbles over it.”
They picked up the pace. A minute later they were turning into the alley where they’d left the time sphere.
“Now!” someone yelled. There was a zapping noise, and Rani crumpled to the ground beside Milagro.
“What the - ?” she said, lighting up her ring. “Rani?”
Rani didn’t move. Milagro looked wildly around her. There were at least six uniformed men and women in the alley, moving to flank her and Ted. “It’s the science police!” Ted said. “Use the ring, they - ”
ZZAP! Ted collapsed on Milagro’s other side.
“All right, that’s it!” Milagro said, and ringed up a huge green catapult.
“A Green Lantern?” one of the officers said.
“It doesn’t matter! Stun her before she can use the ring!” another one shouted.
Milagro turned and wrapped him up in green ropes, making him drop his weapon, but doing so left her vulnerable to the cops behind her.
“Now!” one of them yelled. Something lit up Milagro’s brain, and then all was darkness.
*
Part Three
Author: poisonivory
Recipient: rurone
Rating: PG
Summary: Milagro's brother doesn't want her to be a Green Lantern. Rani's sort-of dad doesn't want her to be a Time Master. Clearly, there's only one solution: rescuing Ted Kord.
Notes: Thanks to mizzmarvel for the beta!
Part One
Forty-five minutes later, Milagro sat in the time sphere, kicking her foot impatiently against the control panel in front of her. “Rani, if you don’t hurry up, I swear I’m gonna leave without you!” she called.
Rani came running in from the living quarters. “Sorry, I’m here! It took me a while to find this.”
Milagro stared at her. Rani was wearing a gold and white costume with a blue star on the chest, clearly designed along the same lines as Booster’s. It was a little loose and baggy on her, as if it had been made for someone much taller and, well, bustier. “What are you wearing?”
“It’s Shel’s Goldstar costume,” Rani explained. “I figure it’ll come in handy if we run into danger.”
Milagro raised an eyebrow. “Because you can…what? Wrap criminals up in all the extra material?”
Rani frowned. “It’s not that big. And no. So I can do this.” She held her hand up, palm pointing towards a nearby metal stool, and picked it up, then let it drop with a clang. “It gives me magnetic powers.”
“And your aunt won’t mind you borrowing it?” Milagro asked.
“Well, she never uses it anymore,” Rani said, but she didn’t quite meet Milagro’s eyes. Milagro thought about pressing the matter, then let it drop. It wasn’t like what she was doing was totally Reyes-Parent-Approved either.
“So you’re sure this will work?” she said instead as Rani climbed into the time sphere.
“It should,” Rani said, opening up the control panel to reveal a series of wires hooked and twisted around Milagro’s ring. “I’ve basically swapped out the time sphere’s auxiliary power source for your ring. If you tell it to find Ted Kord, the time sphere should be able to translate that command into a temporal leap.”
Milagro nodded. “I’m gonna be honest with you: I only understood about fifty percent of that sentence. But okay.”
Rani flipped some switches and the time sphere came to life, humming softly as the control panel lit up. “Ready?”
“You bet. We’ll be back here with Ted before your Uncle Rip even realizes we’re gone,” Milagro said.
Rani blinked. “Rip’s not my uncle.”
“Okay, cousin, then. Whatever.”
“No, Daniel’s my cousin. Sort of. Rip isn’t related to me. Well, to Mikey.”
Milagro raised an eyebrow. “Really? Because they look seriously alike. I would’ve sworn they were brothers.”
Rani shook her head. “No, Rip’s not from the 25th century. Or this one. Actually, he’s never really said when he’s from, but I think it’s a little bit into the future. The only way he could be related to Mikey is…” Her eyes widened. “Oh my God.”
“What?” Milagro asked.
“Nothing,” Rani said. “I either just thought of something crazy, or everything in my life suddenly makes total sense.” She shook her head again. “We’ll worry about it later. Come on, let’s go.”
“Going!” Milagro said. She reached forward and touched her forefinger to the ring. Then she shut her eyes and concentrated on the man in the pictures on Booster’s dresser; the man whose initials adorned her brother’s bulletin board at home long after he’d moved into a college dorm; the man who once occupied the grave at Vanishing Point. “Find Ted Kord.”
“I’m getting something!” Rani said. “The chronospectrometer is recalibrating towards…the future? Looks like the 23rd century…no… Wait, it’s fading out.”
Milagro cracked one eye open. “Maybe because someone keeps distracting the carburetor?”
“Well, technically you wouldn’t be the carburetor, you’d be…” Rani caught Milagro’s expression. “Right. Shutting up.”
Milagro refocused her willpower on her mental image of Ted Kord. She felt the unearthly hum of the time sphere start up and all the fine hairs on the backs of her neck and forearms stood up. The time sphere gave a lurch - not into space, but into time, which was a weird feeling.
“Okay, you can stop. I’ve got a lock on the coordinates,” Rani said.
Milagro opened her eyes and sat back in her chair. They were already zipping through the rainbow time void at a steady clip. “You sure? I thought I’d have to steer this thing all the way to…whenever.”
“I thought you might too,” Rani said, “but after a few minutes the directional coordinates settled down into a single time and place. That must be where - when - we’ll find him. The symbiosis between your brain, the ring, and the time sphere is fascinating. I wonder what would happen if we measured your brain waves while- ”
Milagro rolled her eyes. That was way too much talking about science when there was adventure afoot. “Rani. Where is he? I mean, when? And also where. Both.”
“Oh.” Rani’s face grew very serious. “He’s in Gotham,” she said, her tone heavy with meaning. “In 2460.”
It was clear that there was something important about that date, but Milagro wasn’t from the 30th century and didn’t know about World War VII or whatever. “Okay, so what - ”
Wham! Something hit the time sphere, hard. Rani yelped and Milagro went tumbling out of her chair. “What the- ”
“Milagro,” Rani said, her voice tight with fear. Milagro scrambled to her feet and looked out the front of the sphere, already dreading what she would find.
The Black Beetle was floating directly in front of them.
He smirked, then blasted them again. The sphere rocked violently. Milagro clutched the back of her chair to keep her balance, temporarily blinded by the glare of Black Beetle’s volley against the glass sphere.
“Shoot him! Shoot him!” she screamed.
“I can’t!” Rani said, sounding just as frantic. “The time sphere doesn’t have any weapons! It’s a research tool!”
“Oh, come on,” Milagro said, and thrust her fist at Black Beetle.
Nothing happened.
Of course! She wasn’t wearing her ring! She dropped to her knees and started fumbling at the wires wrapped around it.
“No!” Rani said. “He’s knocked us off course. Use the ring to find Ted again so we can get away!”
“Why can’t I hit him with a giant green baseball bat, then get away?” Milagro asked, but she pinched the top of the ring tightly between thumb and forefinger and screwed her eyes shut in concentration. Ted Kord Ted Kord TedKordTedKordTedKord…
The time sphere lurched again, and Milagro lost her concentration. “Hurry!” Rani called. “I think the glass is cracking!”
“I’m trying!” Milagro snapped, and refocused. Ted Kord. TED KORD.
“I’ve got it!” Rani said. “Just…another…”
Thump! The time sphere came to a sudden stop. Milagro opened her eyes.
She couldn’t see much from her position on the floor, but there was a blue sky above her, and what looked like the tops of trees. “Did we lose him?” she asked.
“I think so,” Rani said, looking shaky. “But I think we lost ourselves, too.”
Milagro stood up. They were on a grassy hill in what looked like a park, with paved paths winding through it and a handful of buildings. The buildings looked…well, like normal buildings, not the towering chrome skyscrapers Milagro would expect of the future. And the passersby and parked cars looked normal, if about 25 years out of date.
“When are we?” she asked, though she had a pretty good idea from some of the hairdos. “And…where?”
Rani was already checking the control panel in the time sphere. “I’m not sure,” she said. “I think Black Beetle damaged the chronometer. It’s going to take me a few minutes to get it back online.”
Milagro sighed, sinking into her chair. “Great. Why is he even going after us, anyway?”
“Well, technically he seems to be going after you,” Rani pointed out.
Milagro scowled. “Thank you, that’s very helpful.”
“Sorry.”
Rani didn’t look up, too busy fiddling with what Milagro could only assume was the chronometer. Rolling her eyes, Milagro turned to look out the sphere. Luckily there was no one nearby, though she could see people walking down distant paths in the park.
Actually, now that she was paying attention, she wasn’t so sure they were in a park. Something about the scattered red brick buildings and the carefully manicured landscaping was reminding her of something else. She frowned and tried to place the memory.
Touring colleges with Jaime! That was it. The layout was just like the schools the Reyeses had looked at a few years ago when Jaime was a senior in high school. They were on a college campus.
Rani did something that made the chronometer go blank and start beeping. “Okay, it’s resetting. Give it a minute.” She looked up at Milagro. “But seriously, can you think of any reason Black Beetle might want to kill you?”
Milagro swallowed, taken aback by the abrupt return to the conversation. Rani wasn’t one to dance around a delicate subject, apparently. “I don’t know. I mean, he attacked me once before, years ago, but that was to get to my brother. Jaime doesn’t even know where I am right now, let alone that Black Beetle’s tried to…to…” Green Lanterns were fearless. “…kill me twice.”
“Well, did he say anything to you in the cemetery before I got there? Black Beetle, I mean.”
“He said…” Milagro screwed up her face, trying to remember. “He said something about…ensuring his future, or something? I didn’t really understand.” She bit her lip. “Years ago, when I was little, he attacked me and my brother and he said…he said that I was going to become a supervillain.”
“Well, he’s a time traveler, so maybe he’s going to be one of your rogues,” Rani suggested.
“One of my rogues…” Milagro’s eyes widened. She hadn’t even thought about having her own rogues gallery. “Wow.”
“Or if you become a supervillain, maybe you’ll be rivals,” Rani added.
Milagro glared. “Thanks a lot. You know, maybe you should - ”
Suddenly students started pouring out of the buildings, and the once-nearly-deserted campus was abruptly very crowded. “Uh, can you, like, cloak the time sphere or something?” Milagro asked nervously, forgetting to be annoyed with Rani. “I think a class period just ended, and I don’t really want to explain…”
“Sure, hang on.” Rani pressed a button, and the time sphere flickered briefly. “We’re cloaked. What do you mean, class period?”
“I’m pretty sure we’re on a college campus,” Milagro said. “I…huh.”
A student was walking past them, close enough for Milagro to see his face - and it was oddly familiar. She frowned, trying to place him. He was white, kind of short and a little chubby, with messy reddish-brown curls in need of a cut. His sweater vest was the brightest and ugliest Milagro had ever seen, and he had a half-open backpack slung over his shoulder, crammed with books, crumpled papers sticking out every which way.
Milagro cocked her head. Okay, he was super nerdy…maybe he reminded her of Jaime? But even Jaime wasn’t that much of a dork…
“Uh…Milagro?” Rani said. “Your ring is glowing.”
Milagro looked down. Sure enough, her ring was glowing bright green. Hastily, she put her finger on it - and felt an abrupt mental tug towards the geeky student in the sweater vest.
“What the…Rani, I need to take this out,” she said, undoing the wires that held the ring in place.
“But - ”
“You can put it back in once we know where we are! I just need to…” Milagro got the ring free and slipped it onto her finger. It flared up and her ring hand reached out, almost of its own accord, towards the student.
“What’s it doing?” Rani asked.
“I don’t know! It’s freaking out over that guy! It’s like - ” Milagro paused as understanding hit her. “Oh my God. Rani, that’s Ted Kord.”
“What?”
But it was all starting to make sense. “When Black Beetle knocked us off course, the ring must’ve sent us to the nearest Ted Kord,” Milagro said. “The…time-nearest. The now-est. Whatever.”
Rani stared at Ted, who was heading towards one of the distant buildings. “Are you sure that’s him, though?”
“Why else would the ring be freaking out?” Milagro asked. “Besides, I can see it. He looks like a younger version of the guy in all those pictures. Doesn’t he?”
“I guess…” Rani said slowly.
Milagro opened the door of the time sphere. “Come on, let’s get a closer look.”
“What are you doing?” Rani hissed as Milagro jumped down onto the grass. “We can’t leave the time sphere!”
“Why not?” Milagro asked. “It’s cloaked, right?” Sure enough, when she looked back she couldn’t see the sphere at all, except for the open door with Rani’s upper half sticking out of it - unless she used her ring, which outlined the sphere in a faint green glow. “I just want to get a better look and come right back. It’s not like we’re going to be late getting to the future or anything.” Rani looked unconvinced, so Milagro tried another tack. “Besides, aren’t you curious? I mean, we came looking for Ted, and we found him. Maybe we’ll find out something important.”
Rani bit her lip. Milagro could tell she was wavering. “Well, we can’t just walk into a lecture hall looking like this,” she said finally.
Milagro smiled. “No problem.” She concentrated, and suddenly she was in the civvies she’d been wearing that morning, and Rani was in the clothes Milagro had first seen her in - or at least they looked like they were.
Rani stepped out of the time sphere, taking a small device with her. When she closed the door, the time sphere vanished completely. “And no one’s going to think it’s weird that two 14-year-olds are attending a college lecture?”
“I thought you were supposed to be a genius,” Milagro said, heading off in the direction that Ted had gone.
“I am, but they don’t know that. And that doesn’t explain you.”
“Oh, thanks.”
Milagro caught a glimpse of the ugly sweater vest heading into a building. “That way! Come on.”
They hurried after Ted, trying to keep him in sight while staying far back enough that he wouldn’t notice them. Milagro saw a few people give them curious glances, but for the most part they were ignored.
Ted walked into a large, auditorium-style lecture hall and sat in the very first row. He pulled a book out of his bag, sending papers flying, and scrambled to retrieve them. Milagro hid a smile as she and Rani took seats in the very back. This was Jaime’s hero?
Over the next few minutes, the room filled about halfway up with talking, laughing students. They fell silent, however, when the front door opened and the professor walked in - a tall redheaded man, handsome in a teachery kind of way, wearing a tweed jacket over a blue shirt. “Good afternoon, class. Did everyone do the reading over the weekend?”
There was a mumble of noncommittal agreement from the class. Milagro hid another smile. Apparently college wasn’t all that different from high school.
“Are there any questions about it before we begin today’s lecture?” the professor asked.
A student raised his hand. “Professor Garrett, will Upper Palaeolithic parietal art be on next week’s test, or are we done with that?”
Milagro’s jaw dropped. Professor Garrett? Professor Garrett who was Ted Kord’s archaeology professor?
She started frantically elbowing Rani, who looked just as stunned as she did. “Oh my God! That’s Dan Garrett, the first Blue Beetle!” she hissed.
Rani elbowed her back. “I know, shut up, shhh!”
Milagro stared, amazed, as Professor Garrett answered the student and began his lecture. It felt like she was watching a bit of personal history unfold in front of her, or at least her brother’s personal history - Blue Beetles One and Two, young and vital and very much alive, completely unaware of the tragic fates in store for them. She noticed that even though a lot of the students were doodling or holding whispered conversations, Ted seemed enthralled. He seemed to hero-worship Garrett as much as Jaime hero-worshipped him. Milagro wondered if he knew Garrett’s secret.
Suddenly there were screams from outside, and the sound of running footsteps in the hall. Everyone, including Professor Garrett, looked up in alarm.
A girl stuck her head in the open door. “Run!” she cried. “It’s a giant mummy! That’s…not dead!”
Milagro powered up her ring, ready to change into her costume, but Rani put a hand on her arm, stopping her. “Wait,” she whispered. “Don’t mess with history. There’s already a superhero here.” She pointed to Professor Garrett.
“Uh…class dismissed,” Professor Garrett said quickly. “I suggest you all stay here, where it’s safe. I’m going to…just…call 911.” He darted out of the room.
Of course no one else stayed in the room. Half rushed in the direction the screaming girl had come from, presumably to see the giant mummy; the other half fled the opposite way. Ted was in the half looking for the mummy. Milagro stood up, torn between following Ted and trying to find Professor Garrett, who she was sure had gone to change into the Blue Beetle.
Lightning ripped through the sky out the window, and there was a crash that sounded suspiciously like a bug-themed superhero colliding with something giant and undead. That made up Milagro’s mind for her. “Come on!” she said, grabbing Rani’s wrist and running after Ted and the other students.
They ran out of the building and skidded to a halt. Lumbering across the grass was, sure enough, a giant mummy, three stories high, with bandages trailing from its limbs. Its eyes were a dark, cavernous space from which two red lights burned. “I WILL DESTROY YOU, BLUE BEETLE!” it bellowed in a voice that echoed like an empty tomb.
Milagro instinctively looked for her brother, but of course the Blue Beetle that flew into view was Dan Garrett, sunlight gleaming off his chain mail armor. “You’re not going to hurt anyone, Kha-ef-re!” he declared, flying head-on at the mummy and unleashing bolts of lightning from both hands.
“Wow,” someone said next to Milagro. She glanced over and stifled a surprised yelp. They were standing right next to Ted, who was gazing up at the fight with wide eyes, too enraptured to notice the two definitely-not-college-age girls beside him.
The giant mummy shook off Blue Beetle’s lightning as if it was a minor annoyance. “ARE THESE PITIFUL MORTALS UNDER YOUR PROTECTION, BLUE BEETLE? I WILL CRUSH THEM!” he said, and turned towards the crowd of students.
Ted abruptly turned and bolted for a building - not the one they had just come from, but the next-closest. “Wow,” Milagro muttered. “I guess courage was an acquired trait for him.”
She went for her ring, but again, Rani placed a restraining hand on her arm. “You can’t!” Rani hissed. “We’re not supposed to be in this time period! We could damage history irrevocably!”
“Yeah, well that thing could damage us irrevo-that thing you said!” Milagro hissed back.
But Blue Beetle swooped in, slamming into the giant mummy’s chest with a perfect football tackle. It didn’t down the giant mummy, but it did make him stagger back, arms flailing for balance. One struck Garrett and sent him flying. He hit the ground hard, plowing up a furrow of earth.
The giant mummy laughed, a sound that made the hair stand up on Milagro’s arms, and took a few giant steps until he was standing over Garrett’s prone body. “YOU CANNOT DEFEAT ME, BLUE BEETLE. NOW GIVE ME THE SCARAB!”
“This scarab’s magic may have reanimated you, but I won’t let it be used for greater evil!” Garrett said, struggling to rise. He shot another bolt of lightning at the mummy, but it didn’t even faze the monster.
“THEN I WILL KILL YOU AND TAKE IT ANYWAY,” the mummy said, and reached down.
Milagro took a step forward, throwing off Rani’s grip. “I’m stopping this,” she said. “I can’t just let - ”
“Blue Beetle!” someone yelled.
Milagro turned to see Ted running towards Blue Beetle and the mummy. He had a large spool of wire in his hands, a good foot in diameter and twice as long. He ran heedlessly into the sweep of the mummy’s reach. “Catch!” he yelled, and threw the wire towards Blue Beetle.
It didn’t quite reach, but Blue Beetle rolled and grabbed it, holding it in front of him like a weapon.
The mummy laughed. “THAT PUNY OBJECT WILL NOT SAVE YOU, BLUE BEETLE.”
Dan seemed to agree, because he shot Ted a confused look. Ted backed up, but he was smiling. “I guess mummies don’t know about electromagnets, huh?”
Dan visibly startled, then lunged for the mummy’s ankle. He clung to the ankle, stomped a foot down on the spool, and shot a bolt of lightning down at the wire.
There was a blue flash, and pressure that made Milagro’s back teeth ache. Then the mummy collapsed.
Blue Beetle staggered back, away from the wire, and shook his head as if shaking off the force of what he’d just done. “Is he…dead? Again?” Ted asked.
“I don’t think so,” Blue Beetle said, “but he’ll be out long enough for me to get him somewhere where he’ll never menace innocent civilians again.”
The students burst into cheers. Ted stood there beaming as his fellow students congratulated him. Blue Beetle walked over and shook his hand, and Milagro thought Ted might faint with excitement.
In the midst of it all, Rani tugged on her sleeve. “Come on,” she said. “We need to go.”
Milagro let herself be pulled away from the crowd and back up the hill towards the time sphere. She thought she saw Ted give them a sharp look as they walked away, but she was probably just imagining it.
“Why do we have to leave?” she asked when they were out of earshot. “This is fun!”
“Until someone starts asking questions,” Rani said. “We’ve pushed our luck long enough. Besides, the time sphere should be back online now. We should get going before Black Beetle is able to track us down.”
That sobered Milagro quickly enough. “Okay, fine. Let’s go.”
Rani uncloaked the time sphere long enough for them to find the door and get in, and wired Milagro’s ring back into the system. “I’ll get us back to our time before we try honing in on Ted again, otherwise it’ll just keep us here,” Rani said. The world shimmered around them as she sent them back into the timestream.
“That. Was. So. Cool!” Milagro said as she sat back in her chair. “Wait’ll I tell Jaime!” Then she frowned, remembering that she was still mad at her brother.
“…Okay, yes, it was,” Rani admitted. “I wonder what animated the mummy and caused that extreme growth? Professor Garrett said magic, but that’s obviously nonsense.”
“Oh, magic is real,” Milagro assured her. “My brother’s girlfriend Traci? Well, they’re kind of on-again, off-again, but the point is, she’s magic. Like, actual magic, with conjuring and pentagrams and ley lines and stuff.” She paused. “Also she’s way too good for him, but that’s beside the point.”
“Well, yes, the existence of Homo magi has been proven, so to speak,” Rani said with a disdainful little sniff. “But that doesn’t explain a giant mummy, even if whoever he was was a Homo magus when he was alive.”
“Professor Garrett said the scarab’s magic brought the mummy to life,” Milagro pointed out.
“But the scarab isn’t magic,” Rani argued.
“I know, but Dan Garrett thought it was. Everyone thought it was until the Reach showed up and tried to get my brother to help them take over the world,” Milagro said. “Anyway, Scarab’s brought Jaime back from the dead before. Maybe being buried underground with it for like a billion years brought the mummy halfway back?”
“The dynastic Egyptian pharaohs didn’t live a billion years ago,” Rani said. Milagro gave her a look. “Right. Hyperbole. Anyway, I suppose the scarab could’ve emitted radiation that increased the mummy’s size and imbued it with the appearance of life.”
“Yeah, Scarab’s all about the imbuing,” Milagro said. “And maybe that even helped Professor Garrett take the mummy down, since it was kind of dependent on Scarab to live…or half-live, or whatever.”
Rani made a face. “That seems awfully speculative, but I suppose it doesn’t really matter,” she said. “Okay. Ready to find Ted again?”
Milagro nodded, and once again used the ring to zero in on their target. “Now, we’ll have to be careful,” Rani said once their destination was locked into place. “Time travel is highly illegal in this era. If we get caught…well, let’s just say that Mikey was nearly executed once.”
“Yeah, let’s not get executed,” Milagro agreed.
Rani landed them in an alley, and cloaked them the minute they hit the ground. Milagro gazed out of the time sphere in wonder. The buildings were twice as high as the ones she knew, all glass and chrome and rounded edges. The cars zoomed along several feet off the ground, and the people walking by were dressed in outlandish, alien fashions. Some had shiny little robots bobbing after them, like the one that sometimes followed Booster around.
Yeah. They were definitely in the future.
Rani unhooked Milagro’s ring and handed it to her. “Here you go. I’ve pulled up some examples of contemporary teen fashion on the screens. Can you make our clothes look like that?” She pointed to the time sphere’s monitors.
“I can, but I won’t like it,” Milagro said. She concentrated and their clothing changed. “There. Ugh. We look like a Nascar pit crew redesigned their jumpsuits after watching every episode of The Jetsons. While drunk.”
“These are school uniforms, actually,” Rani said.
Milagro looked down at the shiny fabric and garish colors and shook her head. “I never thought I’d long for a kilt. Oh, well. When in Future Rome, do what the Future Romans do, right?”
“This is Gotham.”
“Forget it.”
Rani shut the time sphere, and they headed out of the alley. Despite the general glossy futurism of the city around them, Milagro could tell that the neighborhood they were in wasn’t the greatest. It was grungy down on the street level, with actual litter, something Milagro never would’ve expected to see in the future. The cars were dingy and some had visible mechanical problems. One that passed by even made a noise that reminded Milagro of Paco’s old convertible, which gave her a sudden and ridiculous pang of homesickness.
“Are you zeroing in on Ted?” Rani asked, looking around as if she expected armed future cops to leap out at them at any minute, ray guns blasting away. “You can’t go sightseeing in this era like you did the last time. We have to move quickly.”
“Yes, I’m looking for him,” Milagro said in an annoyed voice, even though she hadn’t been. She concentrated. “Okay, the ring says…that way.”
She pointed, and they headed off in that direction. Rani walked so fast that Milagro, with her shorter legs, had to trot to keep up with her.
“Hey! Speed Force McGee!” Milagro said, grabbing Rani’s sleeve. “Can you dial it back a little?”
Rani slowed her pace by a fraction. “I just want to get this done,” she said, glancing over her shoulder and shying visibly away from a passing car.
“Dude, the cops are only going to notice us if you keep acting all weird,” Milagro said.
“Huh? Oh, right, the cops,” Rani said. “Well, I’d still be happier if we were inside.”
Milagro frowned. “Is there something besides the police you’re worried about?”
“No!” Rani said a little too quickly. “Come on, let’s just - oof!”
She collided with a man coming around the corner. She stumbled back, and would have fallen if the man hadn’t reached out and grabbed her arms, steadying her.
“Whoops! Sorry, kiddo,” he said, letting go. “You okay?”
Milagro squinted at the man, trying to place why he looked so familiar. He was younger than she’d thought at first, maybe eighteen or nineteen, but tall and broad-shouldered. He was also crazy handsome, despite his tremendously stupid hairstyle - all curled into one big sideways bang in the front. Still, he was blond, blue-eyed, dimpled, and showing approximately nine million teeth as he smiled at Rani, and that more than made up for the weird 80s-esque ‘do.
Those perfect, gleaming white teeth made Milagro think of toothpaste, and then toothpaste commercials, and then one particular toothpaste commercial. And then she realized how she knew him.
“Uh…kid?” Booster asked, his smile now tempered with concern.
Rani stared at him, lips moving soundlessly before she managed to stammer, “Sorry…you’re…uh…”
The line between Booster’s brows vanished. “Oh, you must be a fan! You coming to the game tomorrow?”
Rani shook her head.
“Well, root for me anyway, okay? Here, hang on.” Booster pulled a piece of paper and a pen out of his jacket pocket and scrawled something on the paper. “There ya go. Go Gotham!”
“Go Gotham!” Rani echoed weakly, taking the paper. Booster gave her one last toothpaste-commercial grin, then walked off.
Milagro hauled Rani around the corner. “You okay?” she asked.
“Yeah,” Rani said. She looked more herself now that Booster was out of sight. “Yes. I just panicked for a minute. I thought for sure he’d recognize me.”
“How could he recognize you?” Milagro asked. “He hasn’t met you yet.”
“I know that!” Rani said, a little snappishly. “It’s just weird, okay? You try going back in time and meeting your fa-your guardian when he was practically your age.”
“Good thing he didn’t try to date you, or he would’ve erased you from existence,” Milagro said.
“What? How?”
“You’ve never seen-never mind,” Milagro said. “Are you okay to go look for Ted?”
“Yes, let’s go,” Rani said, setting off. “I was serious about the science police before. I think it’s best if we get out of this time period - with Ted - as quickly as possible.”
They followed the ring’s directions through the weird futuristic streets, at which Milagro tried not to gawk too much. After only a few blocks, the ring led them to a gleaming chrome skyscraper and tugged straight up.
They gazed up at it. “Do you think he’s in there?” Milagro asked.
“Definitely,” Rani said. “Look at the sign.”
Milagro shielded her eyes and squinted up at the sign. “Khepri Industries? I don’t get it.”
“Khepri was the ancient Egyptian god of the rising sun, sometimes seen as an aspect of Ra,” Rani said. “He was generally depicted as a dung beetle, or a human man with a dung beetle for a head.”
“Gross,” Milagro said. “So?”
“Dung beetles and scarabs are the same thing,” Rani said. “Well, technically the ancient Egyptian scarab was inspired by the Scarabaeus sacer, a specific type of dung beetle, so while all scarabs are dung beetles, not all dung beetles are scarabs…”
“Okay, first of all, you know way too much about dung beetles,” Milagro said. “And second, you think Ted…what? Built this building? And then named it after some kind of poop bug?”
Rani shrugged. “Only one way to find out.”
They walked into the building. Milagro expected to encounter a receptionist, but instead there was a set of waist-high barricades, almost like saloon doors, with an elevator bank beyond them. As they watched, a woman in what looked like futuristic business attire came out of one of the elevators. She approached one of the barricades, which zhwooped open like the automatic doors at the mall, and walked out of the building without a second glance at Rani and Milagro.
Milagro glanced at Rani, who shrugged. They approached the barricades, but nothing opened for either of them. Instead, a tinny, robotic voice said: “Please present employee card.”
Rani shrugged again. Milagro leaned forward. “Uh…we’re here to see the head of Khepri Industries?”
“Do you have an appointment?” the robot voice asked.
“…Yyyyes,” Milagro said, crossing her fingers.
“Name?”
“Uh,” Milagro said. “Um. Susie…McFuture…son…worth.”
“What?” Rani hissed.
“Well, you come up with something!” Milagro hissed back.
“I have no record of that name in Mr. Samsa’s schedule,” the robot voice said. “Please make an appointment with Mr. Samsa’s office three months in advance. Thank you.”
Milagro and Rani drew back. “What are we going to do?” Milagro asked. “Even if we hop the barricade, we can’t go poking around this whole building looking for Ted.”
“We don’t have to,” Rani said. “He’s Mr. Samsa.”
“How do you know?”
“Gregor Samsa is the main character in the 1915 novel Die Verwandlung, or The Metamorphosis, by Franz Kafka. In the book, Samsa transforms into a monstrous creature of some sort, usually rendered in English as a cockroach or beetle,” Rani explained.
Milagro shook her head. “Okay, either you or Ted knows way too much about bugs. First dung-beetle-head, and now this.” She glanced back towards the elevators. “Well, Robodoor won’t let us through without an appointment, so I guess we’re hopping the fence.”
“Wait!” Rani said. “Maybe we should - ”
But Milagro was already moving. She ran for the barricade, braced her hands on top, and sprang over it. “Come on!”
Suddenly the hallway was filled with flashing red lights. “ALERT. ALERT. SECURITY BREACH,” the robot voice announced.
“I don’t think that was a very good idea!” Rani said over the noise of the robot voice, which was repeating the alert at top volume over and over again. “Now they’ll send security after us!”
“Well, then, you’d better hurry up!” Milagro said.
Grumbling, Rani ran for the barrier, then flew over it. Milagro stared. “How…?”
“Goldstar suit. Just because you can’t see it doesn’t mean it doesn’t work,” Rani said. “Come on!”
Milagro hit the button for the elevator. “SECURITY BREACH. NO ACCESS,” another robot voice boomed.
“Oh, great,” Milagro said. “Ring, find us some stairs!” The ring tugged them towards a door, which turned out to be locked. Milagro used the ring to wrench it open, then pulled Rani in after her.
They started running up the stairs. “I don’t…think Ted is…going to be very…happy with us…after you broke…his lobby!” Rani puffed.
“Well…maybe he should…be more open to…drop-in appointments!” Milagro retorted.
“HALT!”
Two little flying robots came zooming down the stairwell. “Please provide your security access code or we will fire to stun,” one of them said.
“Here’s my access code, you flying toasters,” Milagro said, ringing up a giant green mallet.
“No!” Rani said, grabbing her arm. “They’re like Skeets!”
“They’re gonna shoot us, Rani!” Milagro said.
“They’re just doing their job!” Rani protested. “Here, hang on.” She held her hands up in front of her. The air shimmered for a minute, and then both robots dropped to the stairs with a clatter.
“Oh, so I can’t break them but it’s okay if you do?” Milagro asked.
“I didn’t break them, I just sent a magnetic pulse that took them offline for a few minutes,” Rani said. “I’m sorry, I just couldn’t…they look just like Skeets.”
“Booster’s little robot sidekick thing?” Milagro asked, raising an eyebrow.
“He’s family,” Rani insisted. “Now come on, before they wake up or the building sends any more.”
Milagro concentrated. “Okay, the ring says Ted’s…yikes. He must be way at the top of the building.” She looked dolefully at the many, many flights of stairs above them. “This is gonna take forever.”
Rani stared at her. “Aren’t you forgetting something?” She lifted off the ground.
“Oh, right.” Milagro lit up the ring and flew ahead of Rani. “Give me a break, I’m new at this. Besides, I thought you wanted to be low-key.”
“Yes, well, hopping the turnstile and breaking the door kind of put an end to that.”
“You’re never gonna let me hear the end of that, are you?”
They flew straight up the center of the stairwell. About halfway up, another, larger fleet of security droids showed up to confront them, but Rani knocked them out like she had the first two, and Milagro used the ring to place them gently on the stairs rather than let them fall down the center. Finally the ring tugged Milagro towards a door - the one that led to the very top floor.
“Here we go,” Milagro said, glancing at Rani. “Do you think he knows something’s up?”
“ALERT. ALERT. SECURITY BREACH,” the robot voice announced for the umpteenth time.
Rani gave Milagro a look. “I think he might have an inkling.”
There was nothing for it, though. Milagro tried the door, which was locked, then used her ring to yank it open.
They emerged onto a hallway that, aside from the flashing red alarm lights, seemed undisturbed. The ring led Milagro to a door at the end. With the red lights flashing like that, she had to lean in close to read the nameplate: Stephen Samsa, CEO.
She looked at Rani, then tried the doorknob. It wasn’t locked. Swallowing, she opened it and stepped in, Rani behind her.
“All right, that’s far enough,” said the man standing in the center of the office. And leveled a gun at them.
“Don’t shoot!” Milagro said quickly. She knew she could take out a gun, and Rani probably could too, with her magnetic powers - but if this was Ted, she didn’t want to fight him.
The man paused, lowering the gun slightly. “Wait - you guys are just kids.”
Milagro bristled a little at that. She opened her mouth, but Rani spoke first. “And you’re Ted Kord.”
The man lowered the gun all the way, blinking in surprise. “Wh-how did you-”
“We’re from the 21st century,” Rani said. “We’ve come to take you home.”
Ted stared, then walked over to his desk. Now that Milagro had a minute to take in her surroundings, she could see that the desk’s entire surface was a touchscreen, which was very cool.
Ted keyed in a password, and the flashing lights and robot voice stopped. Milagro breathed a sigh of relief.
Then Ted keyed in something else, holding up a hand towards the girls in the universal “be quiet” sign. “Sorry about that, folks,” he said. Milagro could hear his voice echoing from the speakers out in the halls. “False alarm. Go about your business.” He pressed another button, then looked up at the girls. “Explain.”
Milagro squinted at him. “You are Ted Kord, right?” she asked. He was dressed in futuristic clothes, and he had a close-trimmed, reddish-brown beard to match his graying hair, but beneath that, he did look like the man in Booster’s pictures - if a little older.
“Yes,” he said, putting the gun down on the desk. “My God. I’m sorry, it’s just…it’s been years since anyone called me that.” He smiled a little crookedly. “It’s nice to feel like myself for a minute. Who are you?”
Milagro glanced at Rani, who nodded. Then Milagro dropped the illusion of civvies, leaving them in their costumes.
“A Green Lantern?” Ted said. “And you’re…” His eyes widened as he took in Rani’s costume. “Isn’t that…didn’t Booster’s sister…?”
“This is Milagro Reyes,” Rani said. “Her older brother Jaime is your successor, the third Blue Beetle. And my name is Rani Carter.”
“Carter,” Ted said sharply. “You’re…Booster’s daughter?”
Rani paused, then nodded. Ted sat down heavily.
“A daughter,” he said slowly. “He has a daughter. And I…” He looked back up at Milagro. “Your brother is the Blue Beetle?”
“Yes, sir,” she said, her stomach twisting. When she’d fantasized about bringing Ted back and throwing it in Jaime’s face, she’d never thought about what it would mean to Ted, learning how his world had gone on without him. “But he - I mean, you’re not forgotten or anything like that. He thinks you’re just the greatest.”
Ted gave her a small smile. “Well, that’s good to know, at least.” He looked back at Rani. “How’s…how’s Booster?”
“He’s…good?” Rani said. She looked as uncomfortable as Milagro felt. “He’s a Time Master now. He works with Rip…do you know Rip Hunter?”
“By name,” Ted said. “We’ve never met.”
“Oh. Well, anyway, Rip and Mikey - Booster - and Shel all work to protect the timestream. I’m still in training.” She looked down at the floor. “Um…he misses you. I know he still misses you.”
“How long has it been?” Ted asked.
Rani didn’t look like she could bring herself to say it, so Milagro did. “Eight years.”
Ted made a soft noise, as if something hurt. Milagro looked away. “…Why didn’t he come get me himself?”
“He doesn’t know you’re alive,” Rani said. “Here, I mean. We, uh…we may have decided to find you on our own.” She cocked her head. “Why are you here?”
“I don’t know,” Ted said. “I remember Max pointing a gun at me, and then…nothing. I mean, I have this vague memory of…attacking Booster? But I don’t know if that really happened. And then this voice said my name, and there was this white glow, and I was floating in space wearing all white…but then it vanished, and I was falling, and I landed here. I mean, now. I mean, six years ago, but in the 25th century. I’ve been here ever since.”
“Of course!” Rani said. “It all makes sense!”
“It does?” Milagro asked.
“Yes!” Rani started pacing, working it out. “You did attack Mikey, when you were resurrected as a Black Lantern. And then…you must have been resurrected properly, I mean not a zombie, as a White Lantern, when Max Lord and all the others came back. But because your body was buried at Vanishing Point, the temporal field around it prevented the ring from bonding with you properly, and you were bounced to a random era. I should have known when we didn’t find your corpse that that was what had happened. It’s so obvious!”
Ted looked at Milagro. “Did any of that make any sense to you?”
“Nope.”
“It doesn’t matter. Rip will understand,” Rani said. “So you’ve just been stranded here for six years?”
Ted nodded. “It was pretty touch-and-go at first. I mean, once I realized when I was I knew not to say anything about being from the past. Booster’s told me what they’re like about time travel in this era. And even without mentioning any of that they still thought I was crazy - this raggedy stranger with no ID, no family, no understanding of this era’s basic technology and culture. Anyway, once I figured it out I did okay. Built this place from the ground up.” He shook his head. “I guess I’ll have to build Kord Industries up again after I go back with you.”
“So you’ll come with us?” Milagro asked.
“Are you kidding?” Ted said. “Do you know what it’s been like for me? I haven’t seen the people I love in six years. I haven’t had a proper meal in six years! Did you know cows are extinct in this century? I would seriously kill for a proper steak. And the music is terrible.” He stood up. “I’ve spent the past six years working on my own time machine, trying to get home. But now that you guys are here, I can skip all that.”
He picked up the gun he’d been holding before. “What’s that for?” Milagro asked.
“Just in case,” Ted said, stashing it inside his jacket. “It wouldn’t have really hurt you guys, just flashed a temporarily blinding light at you. It’s based on my old B.B. Gun.” He headed for the door.
“Do you need to pick anything up before we go?” Rani asked. “Leave a note for someone?”
Ted shook his head. “I’ve left an encoded file on my computer that explains…well, not everything, but enough to cover my disappearance and arrange for my succession at the company. Other than that…” He shrugged. “I’ve just been killing time. I want to go home.”
“Well, we’ve got the time sphere stashed in a nearby alley, so…” Milagro gestured towards the door. “Shall we?”
They left the office and got into the elevator. “Speaking of time spheres, why did you have to invent your own time travel?” Rani asked. “They must be capable of it in this era, or Mikey couldn’t have traveled back to the 20th century.”
Ted shook his head. “Not really. That’s part of why it’s so feared - the government has only a vague understanding of it. They can’t fine-tune it. There’s the one time sphere in the Space Museum, but I needed to leave that there for Booster.” His expression turned grim. “He’ll be needing it in just a couple of years.”
“Wait, why is that bad?” Milagro asked as they emerged onto the street.
Ted glanced at Rani. “It’s okay,” she said. “I know about it.”
Ted nodded, then turned back to Milagro. “Things go…badly for Booster in a couple years. He’s going to steal the time sphere and come back to our time to start over. I…it’s been hard, watching. I’ve kept an eye on his career, but I can’t be in his life. I mean, he was only thirteen when I got here, but still…” He sighed. “It’s bad enough that I can’t ever let him see me, in case he recognizes me…later. That’s why I changed my name, and grew this.” He pointed to the beard. “In case we bump into each other. But I can’t…I mean, I know he’s going to make mistakes, and I can’t stop him. It’s hard.”
Milagro looked at Rani. “You know what? I don’t think I like time travel.”
“It’s not easy,” Rani agreed. “Mikey always says it’s not.”
Ted forced a smile. “But hey, he didn’t do so bad, right? I mean, he’s married, he’s got you…”
“What?” Rani asked, looking startled. “Oh, no, Mikey’s…I’m adopted, sort of. He’s not married. He’s never even really dated much.”
“Oh!” Ted said. “Well, that’s good. I mean, not good, but, uh. You know. I’ve missed so much, I’d hate to have missed out on being best man.” He looked away, cheeks a little flushed. “Hey, is the time sphere down that way?”
“It’s in that alley right there,” Milagro said, pointing. “We’d better hurry before someone stumbles over it.”
They picked up the pace. A minute later they were turning into the alley where they’d left the time sphere.
“Now!” someone yelled. There was a zapping noise, and Rani crumpled to the ground beside Milagro.
“What the - ?” she said, lighting up her ring. “Rani?”
Rani didn’t move. Milagro looked wildly around her. There were at least six uniformed men and women in the alley, moving to flank her and Ted. “It’s the science police!” Ted said. “Use the ring, they - ”
ZZAP! Ted collapsed on Milagro’s other side.
“All right, that’s it!” Milagro said, and ringed up a huge green catapult.
“A Green Lantern?” one of the officers said.
“It doesn’t matter! Stun her before she can use the ring!” another one shouted.
Milagro turned and wrapped him up in green ropes, making him drop his weapon, but doing so left her vulnerable to the cops behind her.
“Now!” one of them yelled. Something lit up Milagro’s brain, and then all was darkness.
*
Part Three