"Carl," Linda whispered. "That man over there. Doesn't he look like Doom Master?"

What made you think that? Carl thought. The robot laser eye, or the trio of badly disguised android henchmen? What he said out loud was, "I'm sure it's just your imagination, love."

". . . Carl, I'm pretty sure that's Cybermentor," Linda went on. "Isn't he the one who held the United Nations hostage last month? Someone should do something. . ."

"Well, given that his arch-nemesis Hyperion is sitting across the aisle from him and isn't doing anything, I don't think anything you or I could do is going to matter, honey," Carl hissed between his teeth.

"Carl! I'm serious!" Linda hissed. "This entire funeral is filled with SUPERVILLAINS!"

"Linda. . ." Carl sighed and glanced around the chapel. The services weren't about to start for another fifteen minutes, so he took Linda by the arm and gently led her into the narthex. "All right, Linda. You're right. The entire supervillain community is here for my Grand-Dad's funeral. I don't know why any more than you do, but it probably has SOMETHING to do with the fact that Skywatch called Mom last Thursday and asked to give the eulogy."

"Skywatch!?" Linda gasped. "Reverend McEnroe is Skywatch?!"

"Keep it down!" Carl hissed. He looked around the church lobby, but the mourners seemed undisturbed by the conversation. "Look, I don't understand this either. I mean, I know Grand-Dad was a small-time hero when he was younger, but nobody really gives a crap about Captain Liberty these days. Let's just get through the service, and maybe someone will explain this to us once this is all over."

Linda didn't seem to like that, but she quietly acquiesced, and the couple returned to their seat. As the organist finished their prelude, and the mourners took their seats, a tall, iron-haired woman in black clerical robes took to the pulpit.

"Please be seated," Reverend Isabel McEnroe said.

A hundred-odd friends, family, and the most powerful superheroes and villains in the world took their seats.

"We are gathered here today to lay to rest the man whom many of you knew as Dr. Grant Mason. Many others knew of him as Captain Liberty: a superhero active during the post World-War II years for about a decade and a half. Captain Liberty had a modest career as a superhero and crimefighter, before hanging up his cape. . . most people believed, for good." The reverend took a deep breath. "To most of you, Dr. Mason's superhero career ended there. But. . . among those of us who wear the cape and mask, Dr. Mason's hero career began on the day that he put away his cape and donned doctor's whites for the first time.

"Because, despite what the public believed, Captain Liberty did not lose his cosmic powers during the battle against The Menace From the Stars. Dr. Grant Mason retained his cosmic strength, his laser vision, and his super-speed and flight. However, it was his wish that this fact be kept secret. . . not only from the public, but from his closest friends and family as well. Only those of us who were there, at the final confrontation against the Menace, would be allowed to know his secret."

The reverend took a deep, shuddering breath, eyes haunted. "The Menace, we learned on that day, was not an alien being bent on conquest. The Menace was the final form of Dr. Grant Mason, come from the future to conquer the past. During that final confrontation with the combined forces of the Guardians of Earth and the Legions of Evil, we learned that Captain Liberty was destined to lead the Guardians in one final battle against the Legions of Evil. . . a battle during which all life on Earth would die. This moment. . . the Singularity Point. . . was a fixed moment in time. An inevitability. Captain Liberty had come from the future to change the past over and over and over again, sustained by cosmic energy into a lifetime of tens of thousands of years, until transformed into the being that emerged over Star City on that fateful day fifty years ago.

"Grant saw that there was no future during which Captain Liberty would not become the Menace from The Stars. . . and so, he created a future where there would be no Captain Liberty. Only Grant Mason, a quiet country doctor with a quiet little practice in a quiet town in the midwestern United States.

"I don't know that there is anyone else in this room who would have had the strength to do what he did. To live an entire life knowing that you possessed the power to change the world, and never doing so. To know every single moment of your life that you possessed the power of a living god. . . could grasp the power of the cosmos itself. . . but to do so would inevitably lead to the end of all life on Earth.

"Without drawing upon the cosmic power within him, Grant's life ebbed away as normal human lives do. Though long-lived, his body began to fade and die. Cancer. What must it have been like to face the end of your life, knowing that all you had to do was reach out and grasp the power at your fingertips, and death would pass you by? I do not believe I would have had the strength. I know all here feel the same.

The reverend reached into her coat and pulled out a silver and blue domino mask. She donned it in silence. "As the Reverend McEnroe, I am here today to lay to rest my old friend, Dr. Grant Mason. As the superheroine Skywatch, I am here to celebrate the success of my old friend Captain Liberty's final mission. The Bible says that, through Christ, we triumph over death in new life. . . I know that in his death, Grant triumphed over the greater death that lay in our future. I pray that the Lord takes him safe into their loving arms, and I know that the gates of heaven stand ready to welcome him safe."

There was a quiet murmuring and the sound of sliding cloth. Carl turned to see half the people in the chapel reaching into their jackets to pull out masks and don them in unison. The Garden Master. Pirate Pete. Annihilatrix. Iceglider. Killer Bee. The greatest heroes and villains of the Golden Age now sat in silent unison to witness the passing of the greatest of their own.

Skywatch nodded quietly. "Thank you," she said. "Now, I'd like to pass the mic to someone who needs no introduction. Oliver?"

The hulking five-hundred pound form of The Terrifying Brute rose from the church pew with the creaking of old wood and older joints. With titanium cane in hand, the giant lizard-beast hobbled his way up the steps to the pulpit, assisted by a younger lizard-girl in a black suit. Pausing for a moment to pay respects at the open casket, the monster stomped slowly to the microphone, adjusted it, gave a rheumy cough, and began to speak.

"The first time Brute meet Captain," he growled, "Captain punched Brute in face. It was okay. Brute was eating doggy at the time. But dat was how Brute meet Captain, and Captain help turn Brute from Bad Guy to Good Guy. . .