Legion of the Damned

Legion of the Damned Reboot » Post-Zero Hour Issues Legionnaires #78 (epilogue only) Legion of Super-Heroes v4 #122 Legionnaires #79 Legion of Super-Heroes v4 #123 Legionnaires #80 Cover date December 1999-February 2000 Creators Writer(s) Dan Abnett Andy Lanning Penciller(s) Olivier Coipel Inker(s) Andy Lanning Letterer(s) Comicraft Colourist(s) Tom McCraw Editor(s) Mike McAvennie Cover artist(s) Olivier Coipel (all but Lgs #78) Jeff Moy (Lgs #78)

Legionnaires 78 (epilogue)

Main article: Legionnaires 78

A cascade of energy travels through stargates, collapsing the stargate network as it passes over Aleph, Xanthu, Braal, Winath, Korzon 5, Rimbor and Loberzia, on its' way to Earth...

Part One: The End of All Things

Main article: Legion of Super-Heroes v4 122

One Month Later, the Blight has taken over Earth, "blighting" most Legionnaires and the visiting Amazers into its' service. Live Wire, XS, Chameleon and Shvaughn Erin are all that remains free of the Legion, and they begin to despair even as they try to get a bunch of refugees to R.J. Brande, who is planning to open a last stargate away from Earth once he has collected as many refugees as possible. Confronted by a couple of Blight and the Blighted Karate Kid, Umbra and Ultra Boy, they lose. Live Wire radios Brande to move the refugees even as Shvaughn and XS are captured, while he is "choke-weeded". Only Chameleon escapes, disguised as a rat.

With the captive Legionnaires and refugees taken to an internment camp, and then on to the Blight's headquarters, The Stem, for interrogation given their Resistance origins. Chameleon, meanwhile, is lost, unable to return to Brande's headquarters in case he is followed, and knowing that they would move soon if they hadn't already. He hides in the ruined Science Police HQ to wait to see if he had been followed. He isn't disappointed, as the Blighted Star Boy and three Amazers. Using stun grenades he'd pre-wired, he takes out the Amazers, then blasts Star Boy with a maximum intensity stun from his blaster. Hearing more noises outside, and expecting more Blighted, he reluctantly sets the blaster to lethal levels before checking.

What he finds are the previously missing, unblighted and confused Apparition, Cosmic Boy, Brainiac 5.1 and Monstress.

*Subtitle taken from the "Next issue" blurb of Legionnaires #78, since all other subtitles from LotD and Widening Rifts were also used in "Next issue" blurbs.

Part Two: Damned if we do

Main article: Legionnaires 79

Chameleon relates the Blight's arrival at Earth to his four teammates, where their teleportation tendrils crashed through the attempts of the Legion, Science Police, Amazers and Workforce to prevent them touching down and "entwined" Earth in less than five hours; before the Blight themselves emerged when victory was already assured. Many were believed killed in the process, but soon reappeared as the Blight's slaves, known as the Blighted. The others are shocked, but confirm for Chameleon that, with the Stargates down, it took them a month to return from their mission to rescue a freighter. Chameleon then points out the Blights' interment camps - and their headquarters, the Stem.

In the Stem itself, those captured in the attack in part one are being processed after interrogation. XS, as the only metahuman among them, is sent deep for power-tapping as one of the humans is killed by a Blight member.

Apparition dreams of her and her three teammates' arrival back at Earth, her frustration at being seperated from Ultra Boy, and how, on discovering the Outpost abandoned in Earth orbit, they had only had time to find Chameleon's flight ring before realising they had triggered a booby-trap. As she remembers the explosion knocking their cruiser out of control, she wakes to find Chameleon hadn't slept, traumatised by the previous month.

XS, regaining full consciousness thanks to her accelerated metabolism, is carried down the Stem in a bubble of sap by three Blighted. As this happens though, she hears a small telepathic voice, who can't remember its' name, telling her to escape. She then sees several Legionnaires hung like slabs of meat, but, as it grows louder, she begins to recognise the telepathic "voice" moments before she sees the source - Saturn Girl. Immediately, she bursts out, grabs Saturn Girl from her prison, and sprints away at super-speed. The Blight look for them, but Jenni, forced to stop, vibrates them invisibly until they pass. Once they are gone, however, the exhausted and defeated Saturn Girl tells Jenni to go without her, and roughly implants what she had learned of the Blight into XS' brain before collapsing.

Meanwhile, Cos' team are approaching the Stem, when a group of Blighted fly out, looking for them.

Part Three: Damned if we don't

Main article: Legion of Super-Heroes v4 123

Part Four: Damned for all Eternity!

Main article: Legionnaires 80

Notes

Blighted

The Blighted included, in addition to a number of unknown or unclear characters:

• Atmos (LSH123)
• Element Lad (Lgs79, LSH123)
• Evolvo (Lgs79)
• Ferro (LSH123, Lgs80)
• Insect Queen (LSH122)
• Karate Kid (LSH122, possibly also LSH123)
• Kid Quantum (Jazmin Cullen) (LSH123 (cover only), Lgs80)
• Kinetix (Lgs79, LSH123)
• Lori Morning (Lgs79)
• Particon (LSH123, Lgs80 (cover only))
• Radion (LSH123)
• Spark (Lgs79 (cover only), LSH123)
• Spider-Girl (Lgs79)
• Star Boy (LSH122, Lgs79, LSH123)
• Thunder (LSH123, Lgs80)
• Triad (Lgs80)
• Ultra Boy (all issues)
• Umbra (LSH122 and LSH123)
• Violet (Lgs79)

In addition, Triad, Kid Quantum, M'Onel, Ferro and Atmos are shown in the process of being Blighted in Lgs79; although LSH123 reveals that the attempt to Blight M'Onel fails. The head of someone who appears to be Invisible Kid is also seen, but LSH124 confirms Chameleon's mention in LSH122 that Lyle was chokeweeded.

Chokeweeded

The following were "chokeweeded" - a process that drains the life directly from its' victims, who are imprisoned in the lowest tier of the Stem.

• Gates (unconfirmed)
• Invisible Kid
• Live Wire
• Magno
• Sensor