If there can be one thing said about Mongul is that he always has a back up plan. Mongul was once one of the most powerful tyrants in the universe. All you had to do was mention his name and it would send shocks of intense fear into the hearts of any living creature. He won wars without fighting, all he had to do was to send a single scout ship to have an entire star system fall at his feet. They would rather live as his slave instead of fighting his massive forces. That was almost ten years ago. Before he fought against the man of steel. As a result of a single encounter with Superman his empire all but crumbled to his feet. After that he would have done any thing to exact revenge upon Superman, even serve a mad man like the Cyborg. He almost had the revenge within his grasp, Superman was at Mongul’s feet in defeat, and his new war world was on the verge of being risen form the ashes of the earth city named Coast City. Their was only one thing that Mongul did not plan for: Coast City’s super hero the Green Lantern of earth returning so soon. The Green Lantern defeated him utterly. Forced to be contained in an earth prison like an animal. He broke free only to be stopped by the Kryptonian and a child pretending to be a Green Lantern. But if there can be one thing said about Mongul is that he always had a back up plan.
When the building of Engine City was underway he took aside one dozen of his most trustworthy men and gave them an important mission.
"In the unlikely event that our plans should fail," he told them. "I want you to go to my secret base on the first moon of the planet that the Earthers call Pluto. If I am taken prisoner you are to wait for one year for me to escape. If I do not you are to plant explosives in each one of the Earth’s capitals. And a special one that I made for Superman that will release Kryptonite into the atmosphere of the Earth. With the fall of every government on the planet chaos and carnage will erupt and the Earth will fall. The Earth will be doomed no matter what happens."
They did what they were all told. After the battle of Coast City the remaining ten of the twelve all boarded a secret ship and they flew undetected to the first moon of Pluto and waited for one year. Time passed and Mongul did not show up. Some of them wanted to wait for Mongul to return but they all knew what Mongul’s orders stated, that they were to go ahead with the plan with or with out Mongul. So the loyal ten went in separate ships and landed in different parts of the Earth. For one month the ten posing as humans planted super explosives in each nations capitals. One of them even set one in Aquaman’s under water kingdom of Atlantis. The ten met in northern Canada when each one of them had completed there jobs.
But before they left for the base there was one last place the needed to set of a bomb. Even though Mongul did not mention it they wanted to place an explosive devise in the JLA Watch Tower. As eight of the ships made there way over to the Watch Tower they moved slowly and low to the surface of the moon. Even tough the two ships had state-of-the art cloaking devices they couldn’t take any chances, if the JLA found them out the whole mission would be in jeopardy. The two ships slowly moved to the one side of the Watch Tower that was a blind spot that couldn’t be seen in any windows. One of them came to a stop and hovered while the other landed right next to the Watch Tower. The one that landed left his space craft and made a space walk over to the other ship. Once he was in the ship he they both took off.
"Did you set the timer?" the pilot asked.
"Of course I did. What kind of moron do you take me for. When that bomb in my ship will go off it will create a crate on this moon twenty miles wide," the other replied to the pilot.
Once the ship flew to the dark side of the moon the two picked up speed to join the rest. Once they landed on Pluto’s moon they went to the command center. There they meet Jongul, Mongul’s son.
"Did you follow my father’s instructions to the letter?" He asked the ten.
One of them stepped forward, "We did every thing that he told us to do plus more."
Jongul spun around to look at the ten in rage, "What do you mean you did more? Did you screw up and have to cover up for yourself?" Jongul grabbed the one that was speaking by the neck and hoisted him three feet into the air.
"No sir," he said trying to gasp for air. "We believed that the Justice League would have interfered with your invasions plan so we filled one of the ships with the remaining explosives into one of the ships and set it to go off five minuets before the rest go off so that the League wouldn’t interfere."
Jongul dropped the speaker to the floor. "That is almost brilliant! With the Justice League out of the way no other fighting force would be strong enough to stop me!" He looked down at the speaker. "Good work, all of you. When I resurrect my father’s war world you all will be generals."
"Nice place your father built for you," Everyone turned around to face the voice in the door way. In the door way they saw a shadowy figure in the door way. None of them could see who it was or make out any features on his face other then a single glowing red eye.
"Who dares to intrude in my domain?" Jongul asked enraged at the shadowy figure.
"I’m a friend of you father, or should I say an employer of his. Any thing of his is my property. Including this base. I cannot believe that he constructed this without my knowing." The shadowy figure emerged from the door way reveling the face of the Cyborg.
Jongul stared in horror at the Cyborg. "You," he said. "What do you want?"
The Cyborg made almost what looked like a smile on his twisted face. "I have a proposal for you."
Jongul eyed the Cyborg suspiciously. He had no idea what the Cyborg had in mind but he was going to hear him out. "What do you have in mind?"
Kyle was spending tonight like the other two nights in a row. He was at his art table working on his new art project. He was designing a billboard ad for some new kind of watch. For the past three days he had been working on nothing else but this project. He always hated taking jobs like this but this one job would pay the rent for this month and the most of the next. He was just finishing up some final touches on the piece when he looked over at the clock. 8:51. Wonder Woman had some big news that she wanted to tell the entire team at nine. If he was one minuet late WW would probably kill him right were he stood. He took one sip of his coffee and took a look at the finished piece of work. He hoped that the watch company would like it this time, he made all the changes they wanted him to make so they should like it.
He was finally done and was very hungry since working on this piece he’d only had fast food to eat. Right now all he wanted to do was to go into a real restaurant with fine food and clear his head with a flight around New York. But that will have to wait. At least he’d get the chance for a flight. He decided that he’d rather fly to the moon and enter through one of the air locks rather then use the tubes. He opened the window and pocked his head out making sure no one would see him. The streets were for the most part clear. He quick changed into his costume and took off.
This was one of the things he enjoyed about the job as Green Lantern was feeling the wind through his hair and soaring. He looked up at the full moon. It was a clear night and you could almost see the Watch Tower from up here. He had is eyes fixed on the Watch Tower once he left the atmosphere, he could now make out the out line of the base. One moment he was looking at the base and the next moment it was gone. The outline of the base was replaced by a large and all consuming light.
"Oh my God no." An icy chill ran down the spine of Green Lantern when he realize what had happened. Where once there was the Watch Tower now there was a large crater.
Green Lantern wasted no time with all the power he could use from the ring he sped up to reach the moon as fast as he could.
"Dear God please don’t let them all be dead," he prayed.
Once he reached the moon he didn’t know were to begin looking. He landed where the Hall of Justice would be and started moving the rubble with his ring. The first body he found was that of Zauriel’s, then Flash’s, then Steel’s, then J’onn’s and so on. He had found everyone’s body except the one’s of Superman and Batman. Then Green Lantern caught a glimpse of a red cape. With two giant hands that Lantern created with his ring to move the rubble. He saw Superman’s body once he moved almost a ton of rubble. The body unlike the other liked almost entirely intact. Just to make sure Green Lantern checked his pulse just to make sure. He felt a very weak pulse in Superman. Green Lantern did not know what to do. He had no idea how long Superman could live with out oxygen but he over herd him talking with Aquaman that if he had to he could go almost one hour with out oxygen under normal conditions but these weren’t normal conditions. He didn’t have time looking for Batman’s body if he wanted to keep Superman alive. He put Superman’s body in a bubble and headed for the only place that could help the man of steel, Metropolis.
It felt like only a few seconds but four minutes later they he could see the Daily Planet building. Green Lantern landed on the top of the Planet building and opened up the bubble that held Superman in it. He didn’t know what to do next. The wisest thing to do was to check his pulse. His pulse seemed stronger then when he checked it on the moon. His chest stared rising slowly taking in oxygen.
"Superman! Can you here me?" Green Lantern withheld the urge to shake Superman. "Superman, are you alright?"
"I am within reason Lantern. What happened?" Superman asked trying to get up.
"That’s what I’d like to ask you." Lantern said looking down at the man of steel. "Lie still, I don’t know how badly you were injured."
Superman obeyed Green Lantern’s request and tried to stay still. "Tell me what you do know then."
"Well, I was flying to the Watch Tower when it exploded. I checked the rubble and you were the only one left alive. All the other’s are dead," Green Lantern tried his best to explain to Superman without really knowing what happened.
"No, not all dead. You weren’t the only one missing. Batman hadn’t come yet and Oracle was monitoring from her base of operations here on earth." Superman explained to Lantern as he was trying to get up again.
"Superman," Green Lantern started. "You need to rest. You just lived through a very large explosion and went for some time without air. I think that I should get you to a hospital."
Superman stood up and dusted himself off. "Save one doctor I don’t now of anyone who knows enough about my biology to do any good."
"Well don’t you think you should go see that doctor?" Green Lantern asked. Superman walked towards the elevator with Green Lantern flowing right behind him. "We have a crisis on our hands right now Lantern, my health is the last thing on my mind right now." Both heroes entered the elevator and Superman pressed the button for the Daily Planet newsroom.
"Well I don’t want to handle this crisis all by my self, and I wouldn’t like it if you kick the bucket before we find out who is behind this all." Lantern replied as the door closed.