Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes Free the Legion Five!

It is a strange and unsettling time in Legion History. There is a deep rot at the heart of the United Planets, and one Legionaire has figured out that there is a seditious factor working to undermine it. This Legionnaire has to gather four other members to investigate and find the agents looking to take the UP down. The danger is, which four to choose and why? And, who is the legionnaire that figured out that there is a sapper in the Legion.

So, Who do you think figured it out? Who will be the chosen four and why? And most importantly, who is the sapper within the Legion?

Rules. 1. It cannot be a member of the Legion Espionage team that figured it out. Keep the characters consistent with the eras.
2. Keep it short and sweet.
3. Go Nuts!

My choices:

Person that figures it out- Sun Boy. One of the longer serving members of the Legion, and until the last couple of incarnations, a pretty smart one as well.
His Team- Blok for clarity and insight, Timber Wolf for being a tank as well as the sneakier instincts, Shadow Lass for concealment and subterfuge, and Lightning Lass, just to bring the Kaboom.
The Sapper- Wildfire. Because...why not?

nice thought exercise Rick. I'll have to think about it...

if it were the Reboot team...

The galactic economy collapses at the end of The Magic Wars.

The United Planets returns to ideals of nostalgia in an effort to bind its member worlds together. Yet, one man sees that those traditions are being used to curtail freedoms. New restrictions, for the benefit of all it is said, come into place. But there is little progress.

From his place within the United Planets, he watches aid programmes stalled, rampant corruption and nothing being done to stop enemies such as the Khunds, the Dominion, the Guild and Mordru circling UP borders. Worse, he sees the tradition of the Legion being used as a front for UP activities. He does not know who to trust. But knows that he must act, aware that his own often outsider status in the team is what saved him from the fate of his former teammates.

Welcome to an alternate volume 4

Tenzil Kem is expertly placed to see the rot within the united planets. His media profile allows him freedoms that few others have, and he has more contacts than nearly anyone in the galaxy. His love for the Legion and its values, and views from outside the core of the team, make him the key person in focusing the investigations of his team.

Tenzil looks at a number of the older Legionnaires helping the United Planets. He can’t be sure if they just don’t know what’s really going on, or are complicit.

His first recruit is Dawnstar. A loner, independent from group think. She is capable of being in orbit and tracking anything in the galaxy. Diverted aid shipments, cruisers attending clandestine meetings with enemies or bugs planted, by Tenzil, on his suspects. Dawny’s faster than light flight also allows contact to be made with the team, when Omnicoms can’t be trusted.

Outcasts who steal technology for profit and the benefit of the struggling outskirts of the galaxy (mainly profit), the Sklarian raiders have no love for the UP under normal times. But now they are persecuted by UP armed forces are focused on quashing dissent than helping those outskirts against the likes of the Khunds. Tenzil recruits Brita An’Nan. Her mass shifting powers make her a combination of Tinya, Thom and Ayla, even if she hasn’t that level of experience. Tenzil needs her will as well as her thieving and infiltration skills to get behind the UP’s secrets.

With trust hard to come by, and in need of allies, Tenzil turns to another group he has worked with before. From camouflage to blinding light displays and strobes, science trained, Ulu Vakk provides a link with the in training Subs.

Tenzil’s ace is someone who was already close to most of the team, but who’s history has gone through revisions that make her difficult to predict or control. With a vast array of superpowers, and using distorters to conceal her identity, Laurel Gand is a powerhouse who no one in the Legion could stand against. There may be a dark force within the Legion, but Tenzil has a double agent of his own.

Early in their adventures, so not one of the four, the UP would locate and invade Marzal, its leader becoming a fugitive. Tyroc would join Tenzil’s team and become field leader while the Bismollian was working within the UP.

It looks as though Brainy is behind this. Following the rampage of Omega, he worked so hard to keep the Legion and the United Planets together. With every path now ending in defeat, he has become unstable. What seem like complex grand plans from the heart of Webers World, are actually destabilising any chance of recovery.

But this is just a ruse. There is someone controlling Brainy. The screams of the Orakills of Orando scoured their world when magic left the galaxy at the defeat of the Arch Mage. The focal point of the Orakills in our dimesnsion, Queen Projectra, bore the brunt of this. She is now a vessel for their rage and vengeance. Jeckie’s powers are altering the perceptions of many, twisting them to the goals of the Orakills.

It turns out there was a reason why this group were so effective. Tenzil’s encounter with the Miracle Machine; Laurel Gand’s alternate timeline history; Tyroc’s extra-dimensional origins; Dawny’s physics defying powers to see true paths; Ulu’s strange lab origin and alteration powers. All confound the Orakills powers. Their arrogance simply didn’t see someone like Kono as a threat.

Thoth, Holy Shit, dude. That's taking a toss off and running with it. Beautiful.

Now this would make some Legion stories that not only grip but bind.

wow thoth, WOW! Bravo, bravo, I love it! nice double twist at the end, first Brainy, then Jeckie, then the real big bads are the Orakills. And having a reason for each of the group confounding the Orakills. mega awesome!

I don't wanna follow up thoth's, his is too good

I especially love how it uses underdog characters who mostly have one power specialisation, they are my favourite Legionnaires! And Tenzil and Kono bounced off each other well whenever they interacted in the 5YL era

I have some half-cooked ideas, I am gonna come back when I can flesh one of them out a bit!

EDIT: okay, I got one!

(Also, for reference - this would be the original Legion from some point between Magic Wars and Black Dawn)

Ganglios of Hykraius is one of the few of his species to have left his homeworld to explore the wider United Planets.

He joined the Legion of Superheroes using the codename Tellus, and found himself often confounded by the subtleties and complexities of social interaction with offworlders. When four Legionnaires formed a conspiracy to kill the Time Trapper, Tellus learned that even heroes can betray their ideals. When his fellow Legion recruits Quislet and Magnetic Kid were lost in battle, Tellus felt their loss...but he also felt the lack of consideration the rest of the (notably humanoid) Legion gave to Quislet's disappearance compared to how they mourned Cosmic Boy's little brother. A few more experiences happened to heighten Tellus's disillusionment with his teammates and with United Planets society in general, and he was soon easy prey for the Dark Circle. With Tellus's secret assistance, the Dark Circle weaseled their way much further into the workings of the UP than they would have been able to manage on their own.

Saturn Girl first became suspicious of Tellus's activities when she realised that the Hykraian who was normally an open book had begun to erect psi-shields to protect his thoughts. Saturn Girl's own strict ethics regarding her powers prevented her from breaching the psi-barriers he'd erected just on her own suspicions, but now that she was paying attention she noticed there were some other strange changes to his behaviour.

Imra talked over the matter with her husband Lightning Lad, and together they decided to involve a couple of people who'd known Tellus longer than any other Legionnaire for their opinions; Bouncing Boy and his now powerless wife, Luornu Durgo. Luornu's former experience with the Espionage Squad gave her the skills she needed to really investigate Tellus's recent activities, and once they were reasonably sure that Tellus was working against the UP they recruited Blok to their cause because of his immunity to telepathy.

Saturn Girl, Lightning Lad, Bouncing Boy, (the former) Duo Damsel and Blok now need to find out just how badly Tellus has betrayed the Legion and the UP, and if he's gone too far to be rehabilitated!

These are great! The post-Magic Wars always focused on the collapse of technology, apart from the wizards abandoning Zerox - to have orakills running wild as a result is really scary. The effects of the Miracle Machine on Tenzil, beyond his insane period, were never explored; hardly makes sense that he would have just gone back to normal, so this is a perfect role for him.

Tellus and the Dark Circle is another association that was just kinda thrown out there, without much given to explanation of why he embraced them or what he might have done for their ideology. Did Blok always have immunity to telepathy? I don't remember, but that also makes sense. Tellus might be suspicious of Imra and Garth asking questions, but Chuck and Lu, probably less so.


Take the Chu conspiracy and expand it, Ibby!

a great one raz, taking Tellus' 5YL Dark Circle affiliations and coming up with a reasonable lead-up to them!

thanks for the encouragement, FC ::) and good to see you again. maybe soon I will be in the right headspace to contribute...

Thanks y'all!

re Blok and telepathy, I think it has only ever come up one time - when the Baxter Legion faced off against the LSV, there was a throwaway line about how Esper Lass's power wouldn't work on him.

Mind you, there was also something about Radiation Roy being able to affect Tinya while she's phased which I have always ignored - so selective continuity I guess

that Roy/Tinya one was odd. then in theory, Tinya could be affected by any energy power... nope!

also, Blok being immune to telepathy could easily be a double-edged sword.

Imra: "I'm transmitting a plan..."

Blok: "Has Saturn Girl already said anything?"

I have to wonder if there wasn't some sort of confusion between Ultra Boy's vulnerability to radiation and Tinya? Or maybe just some ill-thought-out attempt to give them the same weakness?

Or they just wanted to show Tinya having trouble during the battle, to raise the stakes?

or... was Roy blasting Tinya while Esper Lass was scrambling her ability to go intangible? maybe that's what was being implied?

I think it is this one - it just wasn't particularly well thought out, especially when Esper Lass was right there and it'd make total sense for a telepath to be able to affect Tinya even when she phases.

thinking back to that story, we also have Nura regaining consciousness, and then Silver Slasher comes up to her... then we have Nura going AYEEIII ... but nothing seemed to come out of that scene, I don't even remember Nura visibly being injured after that!

Even though that was my first really epic Legion story I read, there's a lot in there that doesn't make too much sense.

After his mother was killed in a bombing, Cosmic Boy turns against the United Planets for what he considers their lax stance on law and order. He plans a long game to assassinate key political figures, then use his celebrity and influence as a Legion founder to install replacements more to his liking.

Projectra, recently returned to the Legion, becomes alert to his plans, using her perceptive skills heightened by the Orakills.

She needs a support team to gather evidence and expose Rokk's plan, people who will not be swayed by devotion to Cosmic Boy. She's not averse to getting her hands dirty in a deep political game. She chooses:

Timber Wolf, long trusted as Val's close friend.

Shadow Lass, aware of the danger of threats to an established state as Shadow Champion of her own planet and someone who was never particularly enamored of Rokk Krinn.

Insect Queen, honorary Legionnaire Lana Lang, known to Projectra through reputation but valuable as a 30th century outsider, a woman game for adventure and particularly nosy.

Command Kid, Jeem Rehtu, ex-Legionnaire, valuable as a paid operative for a variety of unsavory tasks.


So I've stretched it a bit including Command Kid, but was prompted to use him after reading a fanfic from a friend, "Jeem Rehtu's Diary", chronicling his adventures while touring as a punk rocker.

I like it! Nice premise, FC!

Rokk is definitely believable as the traitor!