2,772Xander's head snapped to the side as the golden chains formed of order magic wrapped around him, binding his arms to his side. "Quick, scratch my nose!" he ordered Starfire.
Everyone stopped what they were doing and turned towards him.
"What? Every time I've been tied up my nose started itching," Xander explained.
Starfire shrugged and scratched his nose.
Xander let out a relieved sigh. "Thanks for that."
"You are very welcome," the orange skinned alien replied. "You are not upset about being restrained?"
"You expected this," Robin said suspiciously.
"Of course, I'm Lex Luthor," Xander said cheerfully, as Dr. Fate turned his attention to the mummy display and began making arcane gestures.
Beast Boy blinked and tilted his head. "You expected this because you're a super genius or because that's the way heroes tend to respond to you?"
Xander grinned. "Yes."
Cyborg chuckled. "You walked right into that one."
"I would like a non-smartass answer please," Raven requested politely.
Xander nodded. "Understandable. The League is understandably paranoid about me and anything I am involved in, plus I'm a bit chaotic. Dr. Fate, being both a member of the League and a Lord of Order, would naturally respond this way to ensure I am out of the way while he deals with this problem."
There was the sounds of birds crying in the distance and a wave of heat swept over everyone, drawing their attention to the helmed hero as a white mist arose from two of the mummies and vanished into a direction their eyes couldn't follow.
Dr. Fate turned back to them and gestured with his left hand, dissolving the golden chains around Lex Luthor. "You are beloved by Chaos."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Xander exclaimed, holding up his hands. "Love is a bit strong. I would say I am liked by Chaos, possibly thought of fondly, but not loved. Okay, there is that one night I don't remember all the details of…" He rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
Dr. Fate simply stared at him for a moment, unable to form a reply.
"Are you bangin' a universal constant?" Cyborg asked cautiously.
"That's doubtful," Dr. Fate replied dryly, "and when dealing with Chaos, It is the one who does the… banging."
"Okay, I may have been roofied by Chaos," Xander admitted with a shrug. "Back to the matter at hand. Mummies dealt with?"
"They have been granted release from their mortal coil," Dr. Fate replied.
"Huh, didn't spot Didi, but then you did distract me with the chains and all," Xander said with a shrug. "Since you're here, I'd check for cursed artifacts and cultists."
"Didi?" Raven muttered.
"Cursed artifacts and cultists?" Dr. Fate asked. "What leads you to believe things of that nature could be found here?"
"Well, we just dealt with a bunch of cultists at the pier, and cultists usually sprout from people who come into contact with forbidden knowledge, which is usually dug up from ancient tombs and the like. Basically, archeology is a lot more exciting and dangerous than most people think. As for artifacts, magical items are more resistant to the passage of time, so the best-preserved items from the past are usually magical ones," Xander explained.
Dr. Fate nodded thoughtfully. "I'll have to put aside some time to check all the public museums."
"Did you chain up Lex Luthor because he's Lex Luthor or because he's chaotic?" Beast Boy asked.
"Yes," Dr. Fate replied before he vanished in a flash of light.
Beast Boy groaned. "Twice in one day!"
Xander snickered. "An order mage with a sense of humor, will wonders never cease."
"Who's Didi?" Raven asked, not allowing him to sidetrack her.
"Teleute, otherwise known as Death of The Endless or as she prefers to be called, Didi," Xander explained.
"Death, death?" Beast Boy asked. "Bony guy with a scythe?"
"That's the one, but She prefers to take the form of a goth woman in her early twenties with a black ankh over one eye," he replied. "I figured if someone stuck between life and death were to pass on, I would see her, since I know of her existence."
"And you call her Didi?" Cyborg asked in disbelief.
"She wants to be called Didi," Xander said, "she's not big on formality."
"Death looks like friend Raven?" Starfire asked.
"Her skin is pure white, and she has much shorter hair, also not nearly as much in the hips and rear," Xander said as he examined a blushing Raven who pulled her cloak around herself. "She's like eighty percent goth and twenty percent punk rock in style, if you want to be picky, but it works for her."
"You've actually seen her or is this all just theoretical?" Cyborg asked.
"Everyone meets her when they are born and then again when they die, but I haven't gotten a chance to talk with her in this life," Xander replied with a shrug.
"You wish to meet her," Raven stated.
Xander sighed. "Mercy and… Mercy are training with the amazons, so I'm both lonely and bored, plus I wanted to ask her a few questions."
"You want to ask Death a few questions," Cyborg said, giving him a look like he was a few screws short.
"Didi is kindness itself," Xander told him firmly. "Death doesn't kill people the way you think of it, she collects them when their life ends and walks with them to their final destination, ensuring they aren't alone."
"Easy there, he wasn't saying anything bad about death," Beast Boy said, "just about you being crazy enough to bug… her."
Xander relaxed. "Oh, that's okay then. She's omnipresent, omnipotent, omniscient and probably about every other omni you've got, so it really wouldn't take up any of her time in any real way, so I doubt I'd be bugging her and if I was… she simply wouldn't show up."
"And she hasn't," Raven pointed out.
Xander sighed. "Yeah, I guess I would be bugging her then." He shrugged. "Well, saved some kids, put some undead to rest… it's been a worthwhile day. I'll simply find something else to do."
"Like what?" Robin asked, eyes narrowed, but not nearly as suspicious as he had been.
"Go through thrift shops, looking for unusual items, maybe see if there is an old Chinese man selling something called a Mogwai," Xander said with a shrug. "I'll play it by ear."
"I do not believe there are any Mogwais on this planet, but I am also not sure," Starfire admitted.
"Star, Mogwais don't exist, that was just a movie," Raven told her.
Starfire shook her head. "Mogwais are indeed real. The Psions created and released them on their enemies over twenty thousand years ago, though I have not heard of any proven cases of them in well over a thousand years. Truthfully, they were less than successful as a weapon of war."
The other Titans exchanged glances.
"Looks like you're going to have some company while hitting the thrift stores," Beast Boy told Xander.
"Yeah, that's probably a good idea," Xander agreed.
Raven gave Starfire a suspicious look, but Starfire just tilted her head and looked at her cluelessly in return. After Raven turned back to the others Starfire forced herself not to grin, carefully controlling her emotions so Raven couldn't sense them as she followed the others out of the museum and promised herself, she would laugh freely when they realized she'd pranked them.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0
Ben filled out the final form he needed for registration and passed it across the table for Batman to look at while the founding members of the League, as well as a couple of additional heroes looked over copies of his file, and occationally glanced at the black clad hero.
"This is acceptable," the caped crusader said with a nod. "Welcome to the Justice League. If you want to operate in Gotham, I'll need you to do a month's worth of patrols with people of my choosing, however you are cleared to work anywhere else the League sends you."
"Thank you, let me know the patrol schedule and I'll make myself available," Ben said, his voice pitched low with a raspy growl that was similar to Batman's and in fact he had based on him. He leaned back in his chair. "I'm told you have someone in the League who could help me get in contact with Anasi," he said and fell silent.
Batman considered that and gave a slow nod. "I can think of several with the appropriate background."
"I'll handle it," The Question offered, getting to his feet and gesturing for Spider Noir to follow him. "I hope you have a couple of days free and haven't eaten recently."
"Just coffee, black like my soul," Spider Noir replied solemnly.
"Good, that won't react negatively to the mushrooms," the blue trench coated hero replied. "We'll transport down to an Amerind shaman I know, and he can walk us through it."
The door closed behind the two heroes who took their fashion advice from fifties era detectives and Flash turned to Batman. "Are we just going to ignore the fact that Lex Luthor actually went into a comic book and rescued the Scarlet Spider?"
"We have not confirmed that as he has the right to privacy just like anyone else," Batman said, "and while his origins are unusual, all our tests say he's a good fit for the League."
The Flash nodded. "Yeah, I have no problem with that, my problem is with Lex Luthor being able to do something like that."
"And what can we do?" Superman asked. "As far as I know there are no laws against dimensional travel."
"I approve of what he chose to do with the ability," Wonder Woman offered.
"Yeah, I'm not disagreeing with that," Flash assured her, "I'm just concerned with him having that much power."
"He's always had that much power," Superman said, "it's just until recently he spent most of it trying to kill me."
"Are we certain he's stopped?" Green Arrow asked.
"As much as I'd like to be suspicious of him, considering past events, he doesn't seem to care about me anymore," Superman said. "If I didn't know any better, I would say he'd been replaced with someone else."
"Are we sure he hasn't?" Green Arrow asked. "Sometimes the obvious answers are the right ones."
"Do you know how to tell when a Kryptonian has undressed you with their eyes?" Superman asked dryly.
"How?" Green Arrow asked, wondering what that had to do with anything.
"The burns," Superman said with a sigh as The Flash started laughing, getting the joke before anyone else.
"Why don't Kryptonians have bosses?"
"Why?" The Flash asked with a grin.
"Because they already have supervision," Superman said with a groan. "He sent me over three hundred awful jokes and puns. If he's still trying to kill me, it's by annoying me to death now."
There was a flash of light and Dr. Fate appeared and took a seat.
"Report?" Batman requested.
"Two of the mummies in the museum were undead, it's been taken care of," Dr. Fate replied. "What did I miss?"
"Just a discussion about Lex Luthor and Spider Noir being accepted as a new member," Batman replied.
"Coincidentally, Lex Luthor was at the museum," Dr. Fate noted, catching everyone's attention.
Batman started tapping away at the display set into the table and brought up footage from Jump City police on their recent capture of a group of cultists and the report filed by Robin, the others following along on the screens set into the table's surface.
"He seems to work well with the police," Wonder Woman noted.
"According to Robin, Luthor spotted the cultists while he was on his way to the museum and reported it to the police, they followed him to the museum afterwards where Luthor requested they call for the League to handle the mummies," Batman said. "Apparently he's lonely and bored without Mercy so he's just wandering around looking for something to do."
"Well, at least he's found something productive to do," Superman said.
"Now… he's with the Titans searching for Mogwai," Batman noted.
"Gremlins?" The Flash asked. "That's not something that exists… right?"
"No, according to Robin it's his alien teammate's attempt at a prank that he's going along with, though Luthor does seem to be taking it seriously," Batman replied.
"Is that because he's fallen for the prank or does he know something we don't know?" The Flash asked with a frown.
Everyone exchanged glances.
"Maybe we should look into this," Wonder Woman suggested.
"I'll start in Asia," Superman said as he stood up.
Typing by: Me! I think I'm getting faster at this.
Beta by: Abyssal Angel and Mist of Shadows
AN: Do I have a Patr**n page? Yes, I do. Do I hide anything behind a paywall? Nope. It's all free, just bookmark it.