Confrontation pt.4

"Don't look at me like that." Ares said, "It should be here any time soon."

Howard's eyes widened as he concluded what Ares could be up to but he still maintained his calm. "Do you really think you can win this war?"

"I am sure of it." Ares smirked, "But it seems you're quite sure of yourself as well."

"What can I say I am a little too confident." Howard stood up, "You can all come in now, the show's over."

*Bang* The wall smashed as Diana, Artemis, and James came through.

"I tried." Artemis shrugged as Howard nodded looking at Diana who was staring at him and Ares.

"Having a divine being at your beck and call, you sure are something." Ares laughed as he looked back at Diana, "We will meet each other soon."

Diana who rushed over to him couldn't catch him as Ares disappeared into nothingness as her hand caught nothing but air. She stared back at Howard with disbelief and distrust as he didn't ignore her gaze either.

"I'll explain later, for now, James you go back and evacuate the village as quickly as you can." Howard said, "You two come with me."

James looked at Artemis and Diana as he nodded at Howard quickly rushing back into the village.

"A little bit of a lift," Howard said pointing upwards as Diana came over and jumped high up toward the roof as Artemis soon followed after.

"You've got a lot of explanation to do," Diana said,

"I am surprised you're calm enough to talk to me." Howard said, "I thought you'll be slaying your way the moment you noticed Ares."

"I would but-- What is that?" Diana said suddenly stopping in the middle of her sentence as she pointed at the flashes in the sky.

"Missiles... Quick stop it!" Howard said as Diana jumped towards the thing in an instant slaying it with her sword. The explosion rang in the sky as a heavy cloud of gas formed in the air.

"There seems to be another one." Artemis pointed at the one heading towards the village from another direction as she prepared to leap at it when Howard grabbed her arms.

"Throw me."

"What do you mean?"

"No time to explain," Howard said as Artemis took his hand and spun him around like he was nothing and threw him in the way of the missile.

-------------------------------------

"What's going on?" Victor who was half-naked rushed towards the explosion with James as they secured the villagers far away. Steve and the rest were following him looking quite distraught too.

"Don't." Diana's voice came in, "The air is poisonous."

With Steve and others stopping in their tracks, Victor and James continued as they finally met up with Diana.

"It seems you two could do fine," Diana said with a bitter smile as they went around the forest in the foggy area as they located the site of the crash finding pieces of flesh and blood everywhere around.

"Do you think he is okay?" Diana asked looking around at the gruesome scene.

"Guys?" They heard a voice as they looked around, "Up here."

James jumped a little as he looked at the bloody head of Howard which was stuck in the tree with the creepiest smile ever.

Heading back to the village with Howard whose body was nearly recovered, James put him down.

"Do anyone have an extra pair of clothing?"

"Be serious." Artemis said, "Why didn't you let me go there? I would have handled it just fine."

"Because it was the poisonous gas Dr. Maru was inventing and I wasn't sure how it would affect you." Howard said, "The gas was toxic enough to slow down my regeneration by a little too."

"You call that slow?" Victor sighed, "You grew your whole body back in a couple of seconds."

Howard shrugged as Diana passed him a blanket to cover himself up and threw his bag towards him as he asked to do as she then proceeded to point her sword at his neck, "Explain!"

Howard wasn't shocked at her reaction as he took a deep breath, "I figured out who Ares was before we set out to this journey."

Everyone looked at him with their eyes wide open as they couldn't understand why.

"He was under the disguise of Sir Patrick Morgan, you should know about him, Steve." Steve nodded getting more and more shocked as Howard continued, "I matched the connection when I suspected something was wrong when all the women showed up, and in short without giving you the boring explanation I figured out the connection as to who he could be and why he was after me. So to confirm that, I sent him a little message asking for a talk and he showed up as promised."

"You do realize we're fighting a war against him, don't you?" Victor said not understanding his rash decision.

"I do," Howard said.

"Then why talk? Diana here can defeat Ares with her sword, so why take this roundabout way."

"To figure something out." Howard said looking at Victor with gleaming eyes, "You remember the night, don't you? He was the one who caused it."

"Wait you mean..." Victor was startled learning the information and as to satisfy everyone's curiosity he told them about the night his lover died and things he did.

"...that night, I lost a part of myself. And I needed to know if all this time I was being manipulated by him. But in the midst of the conversation, I realized he couldn't. For some reason, his manipulating telepathy doesn't work on me." Howard told the truth as the whole time in Ares's imaginary world he could feel something trying to poke through his consciousness but as if it was a natural ability he managed to fend it off without much effort.

Howard for the first time realized that his powers could be something more than just healing but it would require some time to figure that out. But the other worse thing about their confrontation was that Ares now might have figured Howard out a little bit. With him knowing his identity, his powers, and the huge fact that he figured out about the missiles heading their way, Howard was sure that Ares knew that he had some sort of ability other than healing to know things.

"So what now?" Steve asked though he wasn't completely bought off by his reasons he could understand why someone like Howard would go this far for revenge. Diana, on the other hand, was more confused, with the way he jumped at the missile without hesitation to protect the villagers he didn't seem to be the bad guy but what he did, meeting up with Ares was surely a break of trust and she needed more of an explanation from him.

Howard took out a device from his bag with a smirk on his face, obviously, he wasn't meeting up with Ares to just play his games. Just looking at it plainly it was simple to decide that this meeting was a loss for Howard but on the contrary, it was finally a time to get even. "Now we strike back."

"What's that?"

"James, do you remember the thing we shot in the sky awhile back?" Howard said as he used the device on his hands.

"That satellite thingy?"

"I am glad you remembered the name." Howard said with a smile, "But it seems we have been compromised."

"What do you mean?"

Howard smirked, "Has anyone noticed our invisible guy?"