Superboy # 207 Starring the Legion of Super-heroes "Lightning Lad's day of dread"

"Lightning Lad's day of dread" Story: Cary Bates, Art: Mike Grell

Lightning Lad is in a viewing chamber watches Slides of himself and his brother Mekt as babies being held by their parents. A few years later walking with their baby sister Ayla. And several more years Later when both he and his brother were teenagers. Then out of no where he shoots a lightning bolt at the screen destroying the viewer. Shrinking Violet goes to the viewing chamber to see what happens and he shoves her out of the way.

The pissed off hero flies outside where one of the Legion cruisers is prepped to take off. Lightning Lad tells Element Lad off, blasts him with lightning and takes the ship that was assigned to Karate Kid.

 A clue less Karate kid comes out and whines that the ship was reserved for him. Cosmic Boy and Brainiac-5  look through the mess of the viewing chamber. This gives us a chance to give a brief recap of Lightning Lad's origin. Lightning Lad (Garth) and his brother Mekt were struck simultaneously by an Electric monster that charged them both with Lightning powers. Garth became Lightning Lad and a member of the Legion of Super-Heroes. and Mekt became Lightning Lord a founder of the Legion of Super-Villains.
  Cosmic boy and Brainy go to see Lightning Lad sister Light Lass to see if she can tell them what set Garth off in such a rage. But she is not able to speak for another 24 hours as she is recovering from Rigil Fever.
Not able to voice her concerns Ayla does know the cause of her brothers strange behavior, and if weren't for the paralyzing fever she has she would be with him right now. In the void of space millions of miles from earth Lightning Lad reaches the spot where he left a statue a year ago, that painful tragic day that his parents traveling to earth to visit Garth and his sister crashed into an asteroid while talking to them on the radio. They went to the sector where they were last reported and at the site of the crash they carved a statue of their parents out of the very meteor that they crashed into. Garth is a lone in his memories when out of the black a space suit clad Lightning Lord appears. They exchange lightning bolts but Mekt tells him that he is here only as a son to mourn his parents. They both pay their respects and exchange threats and go their separate ways.

Bits of Legionnaire Business:
Roll Call:

• Lightning Lad (Garth)
• Light Lass ( Ayla)
• Shrinking Violet
• Element Lad
• Karate Kid
• Cosmic Boy
• Brainiac-5
• Shadow Lass

Room in Legion Headquarters:

• Viewing Chamber
• Medical Center

Equipment used

• Legion cruiser
• Flight Ring
• Telepathic Plugs

Legion Villain

• Lightning Lord (Mekt)

Notes:
Page 1:

• We see images of Garth and Mekt being the same age and Ayla being their younger sister, but in the past it has been shown that Mekt is the older brother and Ayla and Garth are twins.

page 2:

• We see Lightning Lad being a bastard to his teammates, while the Garth of this time period is usually a even tempered guy, this Lightning Lad is more in line with the later version of the character that show him as a hot head.

Page 3:

• Actions like this will not get you voted Legionnaire of the Month.

Page 4:

• Rigil fever, is this the same as Rigel fever that Princess Projectra had last issue?

Page 6:

• If Lightning Lad and Light lass are in their late teens, why does their Mother look like she is in her early to mid twenties? 30th century plastic surgery?

Another good back up, and expect where Cary gets the ages wrong of Mekt and Ayla this was an entertaining story. But I have a question, we are shown in past issues that Legion Members get to take a Cruiser on vacation, why is this they are off duty and should have to provide their own transportation? These cruisers are not cheap and couldn't they be needed for more important duties. Not sure how many they have but they could not have more than a few of the big cruisers shown. And does Karate Kid need a space ship to travel to Japan? come on he can fly commercial like every one else, or just use his flight ring.
Next time Member Profile: Light Lass