DC Infinity - Animal Man

#15

Cityscapes - Part 2

By Ed Ainsworth

“I've never been pushed out of the Red before,” Buddy said to Traci as they watched from atop a Skyscraper. The infection was sweeping through the homeless centres of the city, each one spilling out into the street.

The spectacle before them left both heroes somewhat dumbfounded. On one hand, Traci and Buddy could be the most potent heroes in a situation involving the Urban environment and Animals but they were both left without their powers, or access to them.

“What about you, can't you do something?” Buddy asked Traci, turning to her.

“Not really,” She offered with a shrug and an upturned lip.

“The city will let me move through her and speak with her, but...it seems like this is what she wants.” Traci sat down on the edge of the building. If she got involved the way she was now, she'd get killed. Buddy put a hand on her shoulder and sat down next to her; the same applied for him.

“Okay, so we don't have any powers,” Buddy began, removing his jacket and putting it over Traci's bare shoulders.

“But, your Dad was Doctor Thirteen, Traci. Your boyfriend is Martin Stein. I've touched the face of the Universe, and I've been connected to it all multiple times. You talk to cities and I hold the entire animal kingdom in my hands – Why the hell can't we do this WITHOUT our powers?”

Traci took a moment and pulled Buddy's jacket over her shoulders a bit more.

“Right,” She said with a definitive nod. “I'm going to need some tools though, and you're going to need to be with me on this; we're going to have to try and gain alternative access to our power-stores. Come on.”

Traci got to her feet, and slid her slender arms inside of his jacket. She ran towards the roof edge, leaping through the air towards the next rooftop. She landed effortlessly, with Buddy running behind her, and landing awkwardly on his ankle.

“Damnit.”

The sounds of violence from below caught their attentions. Leaning over the edge of the building, they saw the defenders of Metropolis fighting their way through the hordes of mutates below. Flying in low, the attacking squadron pushed forward, with Power Girl dropping out of the air first, fists forwards and ploughing into the mutates, who clawed and bit at her, one even wrapping it's body around her midsection.

Next to drop from the sky was Steel, his hammer raised above his head as he exploded into the street, knocking the creatures off their feet, until he was bum-rushed by several powerful looking mutates, knocking his hammer from his reach and repeatedly punching his armour.

“Damn. How can we compete with that?” Buddy said, scratching his head as he looked down onto the street below.

“I'm not sure we can, but I am sure we don't need to. Come on.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

They walked silently down the fire-escape, casting worried looks to each other. Buddy hoped that the mutates couldn't smell his connection to the Red, because that would make for a tricky situation.

As Traci and he melded through the walls of the buildings, Buddy noticed a stark contrast of events. There was activity everywhere, but none of it human. Ferns were growing violently, along with all other pot-plants, over-running front rooms, and growing into and around kitchens.

Pets were running wild, and Buddy could swear he saw a white Labrador flying around the corner. He shook his head and looked down. There were millions of insects, probably billions. They parted under his footfalls, like a sea of black and green. He coughed a little, looking over to Traci, who appeared to be more than a little freaked out.

“Have you tried getting in contact with the cave?” she asked him, looking over her shoulder with her hands held high, her skin covered in goosebumps. It was clear she wasn't used to this degree of nature manifesting itself in the city.

“No signal,” Buddy replied, moving a bit quicker to get next to her.

“Are you okay?” he asked, putting a hand on her shoulder.

“Yeah, I just...I'm built for Urban environments, so all this...nature stuff is throwing me off a little.” Her skin was pale and devoid of colour.

“I meant to ask – How did you get into all of this, Traci? I mean, why are you the only Urban Magician I know of?”

“I'm a Pioneer.” She smiled as they walked through another thick concrete wall.

“It seems that way,” he offered.

“Well, there's thousands of magicians out there, all working from the same grimoire and other dusty old books, all vying for the same position that's existed for thousands of years. They're all a hundred times more powerful than me, so I took up this Urbanmancy.” They began to walk up through the air, steel rods and girders bending to form stairs for the pair, she took Buddy's hand as guidance.

“So, it existed before you?”

“Yeah, it's existed for as long as cities have, and before that towns, and before that, Villages. Anywhere where something new exists, it creates it's own magic and power places, Buddy. It's a bit like saying Magic is evolving with every new adaptation of humans onto nature.” She smiled, as they reached their destination. A building, it could have been anything, but Traci knew exactly where it was.

She sat down on the ground, and removed Buddy's jacket.

“Thanks,” he said, picking it up off the floor, she touched his hand gently gripping the front two fingers.

“Buddy,” she began, and all of a sudden he realised that she was a very attractive woman.

“Yeah?” he answered, looking from her lips to her hand holding his.

“Thank you. You remind me a lot of my Dad before....” She gave his hand a little squeeze and the guilt crept into the back of his mind. Stupid. How could he think she was attractive? She was barely a woman, let alone stupid enough to be attracted to him. He shook it off and returned the squeeze as best he could.

“Thanks.”

In that moment, it dawned on him what was happening, completely. He dropped his jacket and sat down opposite Traci.

“The Red pushed me out because it wants this. It's trying to reclaim the land it lost. You were right, for every place there is a place of power, and we've been building over the Red's places of power for hundreds of years.” His eyes were wide with the realisation, and he took both of Traci's hands.

“Of course!” she started, giving his hands a squeeze, and tapping the rooftop they were on. Tendrils of concrete and mortar moved into the air, as pieces of paper, blue prints, floated up through the gaps in the floor to float in the air around the duo.

“The Green must be involved in this as well – And we're here without two Elementals. Crap.” Buddy scratched his head, and looked at his dead mobile. It was useless.

“We're going to have to try and right this ourselves. What building are we on, Traci?”

“City Planning.” She gave him a wink as the papers unravelled to be hundreds of blue-prints.

“You can't get access to the Red without your powers, but if we found a natural opening, and forced it open, you could get into it. The city has a hole in it.” She pointed towards the blue-print floating around her body.

“We go to that hole, and we use it to get into the Red, and you can try to convince it that you're going to help it, we'll tell the Red that we're going to start healing the cities across the world. That we're going to start making things right again.” She had an excited look in her eyes, something he'd only seen in her when Martin was around.

“This is going to be really dangerous,” Buddy said, getting to his feet, standing up so his head and face was obscured by a blue-print that wrapped itself around his face.

“Damnit.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A bulge the size of a small car moved its way through the city streets, diving and surfacing again to move around obstacles. It eventually came to a stop in the city park, between the side-walk and the grass.

As the blister in the surface of the city opened, Traci and Buddy got out, with Buddy coughing and spluttering. Traci seemed fine, quite breezy in fact.

“Sorry, I didn't expect that to be so rough on you.”

Through his hacking cough Buddy managed to wave it off, and move towards the centre of the city. There, invisible to the untrained eye was a massive, gaping hole. Blood red, and flowing downwards in a spiral, the skeleton's of animals ran deep into the Red, their flesh and organs and identity peeled away until it was just blood and skeletal matter. Buddy had been into the Red before, and nearly lost himself completely. He'd managed to climb out of it's crimson embrace, but it was the most difficult thing he'd ever done.

“We're going in, right?” His eyes unfocused and he looked down at the Red before turning to Traci.

She'd formed herself armour from the city around her, iron and concrete shields across her flesh, and a re-enforced circular screen made from bullet-proof skyscraper glass across her face.

“We're going in.” She gestured for him to go forwards as she walked into the Red, and let the crimson drag her down, like a spider in the currents of water heading down a plughole.

“And we better do it fast!” He looked over his shoulder as a hundred group of animal Mutates charged towards them. With Traci already in the whirlpool, Buddy dove in after her, his face crashing through the liquid Red first.

Buddy felt a pang of guilt and fear as they descended deeper and deeper into the Red. He saw hundreds of Animals fighting their way to get out of the whirlpool, the Red's hold on them lessening with every effort. Eventually, the duo moved into the very centre of the whirlpool, where there was solid ground beneath their feet.

“I'm not sure what to do at this point,” Buddy began, met with a look of shock, and then disgust from Traci.

“So, we're inside the Red and you have no idea what to do now?”

“Pretty much. Things just tend to happen arou...”

“BUDDY BAKER.”

“See?”

Before them stood a bestial creature, and a woman. Buddy instantly recognized her.

“TRISTESS!” he ran over to her, but the creature, a mixture between a giraffe, with a huge body, and long neck, and a leopard, with a feline face, sharp fangs and spotted body, moved between them. It's neck was much more prehensile than a real Giraffe.

“BAKER, DO NOT APPROACH. YOU HAVE BROUGHT AN OUTSIDER INTO THE RED.”

“Yeah, don't worry. She's with me. Tristess, this is Traci Thirteen, she's an Urban Shaman, she's part of my organisation...I'm fairly certain you've met before.”

“ENOUGH.” She raised her hand, as the creature moved forwards.

“SHE IS THE REASON FOR OUR UPRISING, HUMANS LIKE HER. THEY BUILD OVER OUR LAND, REMOVE OUR BREEDING GROUNDS, OUR HOMES AND OUR FOODS. THEY COVER IT WITH MATERIALS TOXIC AND IMPENETRABLE.”

“Yeah. A City, but that's why we're here Tris..”

“SILENCE!” The creature leapt forwards, pinning Buddy to the ground with it's massive body. Buddy noticed in a moment of curiosity, that it had hooves, with toes and claws. Something that didn't make a huge amount of sense.

“Trist...Come on!” Buddy yelled, as the snarling head bit a chunk of Concrete from Traci's armour.

“I'm fairly certain that's not a normal Leopard Giraffe!” Traci screamed, as she fell backwards onto her back.

“Is there such a thing as a normal one?” Buddy muttered, looking at the creature's underside.

“Look! Trist, we're here to tell you Traci and I are going to try and instigate a change in the cities of the world! We've seen the power of the Red.... GOD! I know the power of the Red, we know that it's hurting...and you're hurting (Is this where we go when we die?) but we want to make a change.”

“LIES,” she offered, walking to Buddy and crouching down next to him.

“Trist, come on. We shared something, you and I. Remember that time when I was a Bear?”

“You were a Bear?”

“Not now, Traci.”

“You remember that time, Trist? Our spirits moved through the Red and that was the first time I saw nature properly. This is the first time Traci is seeing it? Remember the fascination and the fear? We couldn't cover ourselves with city armour to protect ourselves, But Traci can.”

Tristess directed the creature to move off Buddy's body, and offered him a hand.

“We can make other people see, it won't happen overnight, Trist, but we can make it happen. I've got a lot of leverage now especially since...you know. What happened with you.”

Tristess looked to the ground, her long dark hair falling over her Red-tinted skin.

“WAS IT...A NICE FUNERAL?”

“Everyone was there Trist.” Buddy put his arm around her shoulder, and kissed the side of her head.

“Everyone you met in our big adventure was there. Hell, I almost even cried.” He offered her a smile, and pushed his thumb and fore-finger under her chin.

“Just give us a chance, Trist. We're going to try and change the world, but it's not going to happen quickly. Humans are stupid animals.”

“ONLY SOME OF THEM, BUDDY BAKER.”

“I guess.” He smiled, and looked over to Traci.

“So, you'll remove the Mutates, right? You'll stop this madness and we'll do what we can to save the Red of this city.”

“YES, BUDDY BAKER. I WILL CALL MY “MUTATES” BACK NOW.”

“Right. Well, we better leave them. This place is going to get rammed!” He gave her a curt hug and made his way back towards where they came.

“Take care of yourself, Trist. Maybe you could manifest at my place next time.” He shot her a wink, as Traci and he began to make their way up the Whirlpool, a physical impossibility that made Traci's brain hurt.

“I SHALL.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As they reached the surface, hundreds and hundreds of mutates were leaping into the Red, leaving the homeless men disorientated by the lip of the hole into the Red. Buddy helped a few up, but noticed Power Girl, Steel and Superboy were nearby helping out. He nodded to Power Girl, and guided Traci back from the hole.

“We're going to have to make a start on that, Traci. I can try and pull some strings with Checkmate so we can get some real clearance, but I don't know how we're going to be able to do this,” he offered her, and she patted him on the back.

“We'll work something out, Buddy. I'm fairly certain I can work something out myself, you know.” She smiled a wide smile at him, and he rubbed the back of his head.

“Alright.”

“So...what's this about you being a bear?”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In an abandoned Subway station the scratching against the walls was becoming louder. Henry George, a man who had for the last seven years been homeless, was sitting in his usual spot, recovering the occurrence of the last few days. He'd spent the last 48 hours as a man-sized Rat, and had no intention of sleeping. Visions of his time as a rat haunted his unconscious mind.

“Will you shut the hell up?!” he yelled. The scratching persisted, and in anger, he jumped to his feet, charging around the corner, his fists balled.

“If you don't shut the fu...” His jaw dropped, as the large Cat-Man, Dog-Woman and Insect Children all turned to look at him. The markings on the wall began to glow, even the half completed ones.

“Oh God..Not again...NOT AGAIN!” Henry George ceased to exist from that moment onwards. There was only the Bear-Man.

Next Issue: It's all about James Highwater! (And as for the White Lab – Wait a few months for a Legion of Super-Animals One-Shot!)

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