Endless Legacy (DC Comics)

 

For a long moment, Lucien continues to stare down at the invitation to the gala. But finally, he shakes his head and sets it back on the kitchen counter. The event was over a month away still, so there was every possibility he would wind up going down the road… but sitting and spinning his heels for the next month instead of reaching out and finding a way to grasp more personal power… was anathema to him.

 

In the end, that was what really led him to the choice to seek more personal power over financial or political influence. Both of the other routes were good and he could certainly begin making motions to walk down them over the coming weeks… but they each took time as well.Time that Lucien wasn’t entirely sure he had.

 

If his real father suddenly came back and replaced his clone, if Mercy found out that the true Lex Luthor had returned, then Lucien wasn’t sure she would keep his secrets any longer. He had not managed to secure the blonde bodyguard’s loyalty, and so he needed to be very careful about his next moves… but he also needed to move as quickly as he possibly could.

 

Filing patents and preparing to attend parties that were months away was all well and good, but in the meantime Lucien would be a fool not to reach out and take some of the opportunities that were just around the corner. If he could get his hands on certain DNA, literally… he could become nigh unstoppable in a very short amount of time.

 

Turning away from the counter and thus the idea of looking for political and social influence first and foremost, Lucien mentally pivots at the same time, instead thinking on what his best chances for gaining more personal, physical power are in the immediate future.

 

Obviously, the best option would be to try and get his hands on Kryptonian DNA somehow. But the problems with such a proposition were… immediately apparent. One, while there were Kryptonians flying around and saving the day pretty much twenty-four-seven, the amount of fights that they got into where they actually bled were few and far in between for obvious reasons. So getting his hands on their DNA from a battle scene was not happening any time soon.

 

Likewise, getting close enough to one for even a handshake was unlikely to go well for him. Not only was he Lex Luthor’s bastard son, but a Kryptonian who looked at him right now with their X-Ray vision would automatically see the sort of changes that he’d made to himself and grow even more suspicious. Though… there was a potential idea. Down the line, he COULD approach one of the Kryptonians and try to pass his biological changes off as experimentation and genetic manipulation by his father…

 

But not right now. Not when he was so weak that Lex could easily retaliate against such a lie. And certainly not while he was weak enough that getting in the middle of a Kryptonian Superfight might result in him being turned into a smear on the sidewalk. Sure, he was technically immortal, but he knew his resurrections to be seemingly finite now, and he had no intention of living OR dying too frivolously.

 

If he was going to die, it needed to either be worth it, or his only option left to him.

 

There was, of course, another way of getting his hands on Kryptonian DNA. It was likely to be easier, even. Maybe safer… for a comparative value of ‘safer’. Put bluntly, Lucien COULD go snooping around LexCorp’s more clandestine labs. He knew for a fact that his father collected all of the Kryptonian DNA that Lucien could ever want. However, he also knew that Lex would keep his trophies and prizes sealed behind multiple layers of security.

 

It would certainly be easier for Lucien to get into a LexCorp laboratory than it would be for him to survive the sort of city-destroying battle that would make a Kryptonian bleed, but that didn’t mean it would be EASY… or particularly safe.

 

No, he needed something with lower stakes. But not too low. He wanted a battle with heavy hitters that weren’t so heavy he was more likely to wind up dead than not.

 

Luckily, his memory of his past life was pretty good, and he could remember several battles that happened around this time. He just had to pick one that happened in his general vicinity. Sure, he probably COULD have used his position as Lex’s son to charter a private jet or something, but that would only draw more attention to him than he wanted right now.

 

There’s an option that eventually comes to mind, one that Lucien almost dismisses out of hand at first. But… no, it’s perfect. Well, maybe not perfect but then nothing ever truly is. Still, it’s good enough for his purposes. Especially since it will give him a stepping stone to Kryptonian Biology… namely, by giving him access to Tamaranean Biology.

 

Tamaraneans were an alien species that absorbed Solar Energy, much in the same way Kryptonians could. It gave them incredible strength and stamina, as well as the ability to fly… albeit, not nearly on the same level as Kryptonians. Meaning that it took a lot less to make one bleed than it did one of the even more powerful solar-powered aliens.

 

For instance… another Tamaranean could make a Tamaranean bleed. Lucien just so happens to know about a big knock-out slugfest that takes place between the Titans Heroine known as ‘Starfire’ and her supervillain sister ‘Blackfire’ in just about a week from now. And the location isn’t even that far from where he is, only an hour or two away on foot.

 

In his original timeline, he’d only heard about it after the fact of course. But it’d stuck in his mind despite being a somewhat more minor altercation because someone on the street had gotten pretty decent, if shaky, video of the fight happening in the sky. And they only stopped being able to record the battle… when Blackfire plowed Starfire into a nearby warehouse and out of their sight.

 

Lucien could find that warehouse. It wouldn’t even be particularly hard now that he wasn’t sickly and weak and in pain twenty-four-seven. He could find that warehouse and he could be ready to… take advantage of the sisters’ tussle.

 

“Mrow~”

 

Blinking, Lucien realizes that Spot has come up beside him just as the Snow Leopard Cub pushes into his leg. Chuckling, he reaches down and gives his new pet a scratch behind the ears… which Spot tolerates for all of a minute before pulling back and looking at him expectantly.

 

“Mrow.”

 

Ah, right. The cub had rapidly decided he was its mother… or at least, its source of food. Smirking a little bit at Spot’s priorities, Lucien nods and moves to get another meal together for the growing tyke.

 

-x-X-x-

 

A week later and Lucien finds himself lurking in an abandoned warehouse that would soon be a condemned warehouse. He didn’t know where the battle necessarily started or why it happened or anything like that… but he knew from his memories of that video that this was the warehouse where Starfire and Blackfire would end up.

 

He also knew that, for whatever reason, the Titans had not all been there to back-up their ally in her fight against her villainous sister. Lucien assumed that Blackfire must have done something or set something else up that left them indisposed at the time, for the purposes of getting her sister alone in the first place.

 

And yeah, sure… Lucien technically could have done a good deed by alerting the Titans to Blackfire’s plans, but he hadn’t. There were multiple reasons for that. One, he wasn’t a hero, had never claimed to be a hero, and had no desire to be pressganged into being a hero. Honestly, he didn’t expect they would truly trust him for a long, long time even if he DID want to join the Justice League. He was the son of Lex Luthor after all, and having his own son infiltrate his enemies for his purposes was definitely right up Lex’s alley.

 

Two, if Lucien tipped the Titans off to Blackfire’s plans with what little he knew in the first place, they might have been able to stop her sure… but only this time. They might have been able to derail whatever she had going on this time around, but what about the next time? And the time after that? Lucien hadn’t even paid all that much attention to the Titans or Blackfire’s activities but he could easily name half a dozen battles between them and Starfire’s villainous sister that would take place in the next eight years.

 

So long as the heroes weren’t willing to kill and the villains refused to give up on their mad impulses, these things would continue happening. The heroes never pursued a permanent solution, and the villains kept coming back for more. And the little guys, like he’d been in his past life, were the ones who suffered for it.

 

It kind of pained him that he didn’t even know WHO was to blame for his first death. Was it one of the alien invaders trying to conquer their world? Or an accident by a hero? Though to be honest… he would probably rather thank them than curse them, whoever they were. Dying was singlehandedly the best thing that had ever happened to Lucien, bar none.

 

Regardless, he-

 

A sudden crashing sound causes Lucien to go absolutely still. The sort of stillness that only a cat, or someone with cat-like abilities, can possibly manage. His pupils dilate as his prey comes into view a moment later, slamming through the ceiling of the warehouse.

 

If not for the changes he’d made to himself thanks to Spot, Lucien would definitely have flinched as Blackfire slammed her sister into the concrete floor. It sounded painful, though he could see from where he was hidden in the shadows that the one who truly lost from the encounter was the floor itself. Starfire, meanwhile, fires blasts of green energy that throw Blackfire off of her, allowing her to break away and get to her feet as the two face each other.

 

“Blackfire! Why?! Why do you keep doing this, damn it?! Leave me alone!”

 

In response, the Tamaranean Princess’ older sister just laughs.

 

“Leave you alone? I don’t think so. You don’t get to just scamper off and have a quaint little life with all your little friends, sister. Not while I still live and breathe.”

 

Then, Blackfire smirks, her eyes suddenly dancing with malicious and malevolent delight.

 

“Of course, it might not matter which of us wins here. Without your help, you might not have any little friends left after today.”

 

There it was, confirmation that Blackfire had engineered some way of leaving the Titans indisposed while she and Starfire fought. With a howl of rage, Starfire shoots forward, the orange skinned Tamaranean launching herself at Blackfire as their knockout slugfest resumes.

 

Lucien continues to watch from his hiding place, relying entirely on some of his feline instincts, prowling and stalking his prey. Of course, at the same time he has to tamp down on the feline instincts that tell him to run and flee every time one of the Tamaraneans throws a concrete-shattering punch or kicks out one of the warehouse’s support pillars.

 

Its entirely possible that this whole place could come down on his head… but for the time being at least, he thinks it’s still fine. And he’s not willing to back out now, not when he’s so damn close to getting what he wants. As they fight, he watches both Starfire and Blackfire pull out all the stops against one another. They’re both quite a bit more powerful than he is, and he finds himself categorizing their abilities as they use them, admiring their power.

 

Yes… definitely their power… certainly not their incredibly beautiful bodies, barely contained in those somewhat revealing costumes they choose to wear. Okay, so there might be a reason that Lucien remembered the footage of this particular battle better than most. Sure, the video was taken from a phone and rather shaky, and it only showed them clashing in the air… but it was still enough to stick in his mind.

 

Of course, even as beautiful as they both are, he finds himself comparing the two Tamaraneans to Death and ultimately finding them wanting. And would having Tamaranean Physiology himself really get him any closer to making Death cum? Probably not, but it was still a stepping stone on the path. The staircase before him was a long one, and all he could do was take it one step at a time.

 

Just as he’s thinking this… as abruptly as it came into his vision, the fight comes to a close. To his mild surprise, Starfire ends up the winner. Not easily by any means, the orange-skinned, green-eyed alien woman is bloodied… but she’s the one who manages to slam Blackfire into the cratered concrete floor hard enough that the other woman is finally knocked clean out by the blow.

 

Lucien doesn’t dare to breathe as Starfire raises her fist, almost like she intends to bury it in Blackfire’s skull and finally end this. There was no way that was going to happen though, right?

 

“RAAAARGH!”

 

SLAM!

 

… Yep, no way. As expected, Starfire instead punches the fist down through the concrete right next to her unconscious sister’s face, showering Blackfire’s visage with little fragments of stone. Then, before Lucien can even blink, Starfire lifts up into the air, taking off without another word. For a moment, he’s surprised that she would leave Blackfire here like that… but then he remembers what Blackfire had said and his own assumptions.

 

In the end, whatever Blackfire had done to the other Titans, they clearly needed Starfire’s help to survive it. Help that Lucien’s memories of the future told him would be rendered. Everything and everyone would be fine. Starfire had won this fight and would go on to save the day, and within the year Blackfire would be back to harass and assault her younger sister all over again.

 

But that wasn’t his problem. No, Lucien was here for one reason and one reason only. Moving out of his hiding place, he quickly approaches Blackfire. On the way however, he stops at the first crater the two made upon their entrance into the warehouse and touches some of Starfire’s blood left behind by the Tamaranean Heroine. Collecting her DNA turns out to be very important, because when he finally lays a hand on Blackfire’s unconscious for a moment later, Lucien is able to recognize the genetic modifications the other alien woman has undergone as a result.

 

Blackfire has been through some serious experimentation that have altered her physiology from that of a normal Tamaranean. It makes her Energy Manipulation stronger, supercharging the energy blasts she’s capable of making and giving them their bright purple color. The green that Starfire generates by comparison is the ‘natural’ color.

 

It’s everything he could have wanted, but of course he’ll need significant biomass in order to start making changes to himself with this new information. Of course, that won’t be a problem, he can-

 

Lucien’s eyes widen as his enhanced senses scream at him to move away… but he’s simply not fast enough to out-speed a Tamaranean, even one who’s just been unconscious. Blackfire’s hand closes around his wrist like an iron shackle and he suddenly finds himself caught in the villainous alien’s clutches as she glares at him, dazed and confused and clearly concussed.

 

“Y-You… who… who do you think you are, to touch me?”