Secret Mission 2: Legion of Darkness

This article is about the novel. You may be looking for Legion of Darkness (Disambiguation).

"When Hero Factory starts making things hard for villains, Blank Phantom realizes that the criminals need a team of their own. From every corner of the galaxy, he assembles an army of criminals. Their mission: wipe Hero Factory right off the map. Outnumbered and out-powered, the heroes Thresher, Von Ness, Stringer, Bulk, and Stormer must come up with a way to win - or else see the galaxy become an empire of crime."
― Back Cover

Parent Page: Media

Secret Mission 2: Legion of Darkness
Media
Type Secret Mission Book Year(s) released 2012

Secret Mission #2: Legion of Darkness is the second book in the Secret Mission series, written by Greg Farshtey. It was released by Scholastic on October 1, 2012. The book primarily serves as a prequel to the first four televison episodes, which formed a mini-series called Rise of the Rookies, in 2010.

Synopsis

William Furno is investigating the Hero Factory files and finds File 14Y-YX6, which is strangely above his security clearance level. Dunkan Bulk sees Furno looking it up as it has a connection to a lot of the villains that escaped in the breakout. Bulk decides to tell Furno the story of the Legion of Darkness himself.

Many years ago, at one night in planet Epsilon Gamma IV, Voltix and Splitface are doing a robbery on upgrades, but they are being pursued by an unknown robot. The robot announces himself as Preston Stormer, a Hero from Hero Factory. He goes in to attack the criminals, but is beaten by Voltix's power until his leader Thresher attaches a magnetic mine to Voltix that begins to count down, causing Splitface to flee. As Thresher apprehends Voltix, he tells the criminal and Stormer the mine was a dud. While on the Drop Ship with Voltix, Thresher tells Stormer that his overconfidence would have killed him if he did not arrive.

At the Hero Factory building, Bulk meets Von Ness and Jimi Stringer. Thresher and Stormer enter the room and meet the three Heroes. Thresher announces they are Hero Factory's Alpha 1 Team, the first active Hero team and will be stopping crime galaxy-wide, as there are many crime scenes in the galaxy that happened sometime in the last year.

Splitface tells Jawblade of this 'Hero Factory', but Jawblade assures Splitface it is nothing to worry about.

On the next night, Jawblade and Toxic Reapa attempt a museum heist, but are busted by Bulk and Stringer, and Toxic Reapa is captured. Jawblade flees.

Throughout the next several weeks, the Hero Factory is a huge success galaxy wide. Splitface, Jawblade, Thornraxx, and Speeda Demon stay in a refueling station, afraid to do crimes. They think about finding a way to stop the Hero Factory or finding another line of work, but Black Phantom, who disappeared over a month ago, arrives and tells the villains that he has been monitoring Hero Factory and has a plan to stop them: by forming a Legion of Darkness. The four villains accept. In past midnight, Black Phantom, Splitface, Speeda Demon, and Thornraxx go to a Makuro Industries plant on a planet, where Thornraxx hijacks a hover vehicle containing a shipment of 24 industrial robots and lands it. After Black Phantom steals the industrial robots, he has Splitface and Speeda Demon smash the ship to make look like it crashed. He reprograms 23 of the industrial robots to go in different directions in the area, and reprograms the last one to be a villain, XT4.

Thresher and Nathaniel Zib leave to investigate Thornraxx's hijacking, as told by Akiyama Makuro, and Thresher leaves a mission for Stormer and Stringer, where they have to watch over a relocation of some Mining Robots from the Aird Mining Company from the northeastern region of a planet to another in the planet to save them from getting swallowed up by a sinkhole in an area in the northeastern region. Thresher leaves another mission for Bulk and Von Ness where they have to meet and escort a freight convoy. The four Heroes see the missions as dull, but they go do them. After Stormer and Stringer get into a new Drop Ship that Zib provided for them, and then are using it to head for the mission site, they talk about Black Phantom and how to deal with missions. After the two Heroes arrive, they find that there is nothing to watch, according to a foreman robot from Aird. The Heroes discover that someone gave them a fake mission and the communications are jammed. They then are attacked by dozens of mining robots from the Company, and more mining robots block the Heroes' way to their Drop Ship. They are saved by XT4. The three robots defeat the mining robots. XT4 claims that he is the new Alpha 1 Team rookie, but Stormer and Stringer become suspicious of XT4, so when they are heading to their Drop Ship to return home, they bring him with them. Black Phantom watches this moment while hiding and remembering himself having set it up, as his reprogrammed XT4 infiltrates Hero Factory while Splitface and Speeda Demon steal an old ore space freighter from the mining robots.

At Hero Factory, Stringer and Stormer meet Bulk and Von Ness, who are also done with their mission wihtout any incidents. The Heroes leave XT4 in a secure room while Stormer goes to look over the Assembly Tower manifest program to check on him. Splitface, who is piloting the freighter to go to Makuhero City, activates XT4's second layer of programming, and XT4 steals all data on Hero Factory. Stormer discovers XT4 is a fake since there are no Heroes built in the last week, but XT4 uses the Hero Factory's security devices called Stunners to make all of the Heroes go unconscious. He then steals and leaves in a Hero Craft, heading to Asteroid J-54. XT4 contacts Black Phantom and tells him that the Heroes are stunned, so he and Black Phantom can proceed with their plan. Black Phantom orders Splitface to help XT4 if XT4 needs it. A few minutes after the Drop Ship left, the Heroes wake up, notice XT4 going to Asteroid J-54, and go after him.

XT4 reaches the asteroid, defeats several guards in the asteroid's jail, and breaks Voltix and Toxic Reapa out of prison. Stormer has Bulk and Von Ness go stop XT4 while he and Stringer go investigate the freighter.

In space, Splitface and Speeda Demon rig the freighter's engines to blow, direct the freighter to Stormer and Stringer's Drop Ship, and get in Black Phantom's scout ship. Black Phantom scolds at the two villains for directing the freighter to the Heroes when he ordered the villains to help XT4 if XT4 needs it, but Splitface and Speeda Demon believe that Black Phantom's plan is too slow. Black Phantom goes to try to make the Heroes collide with the freighter, enlightening his smug henchmen.

As XT4 leads Voltix and Toxic Reapa to the exit, they are attacked by Bulk and Von Ness. XT4 releases all the prisoners to stall the Heroes.

Black Phantom introduces the Legion of Darkness to Stormer and Stringer.

Von Ness uses his gravity weapon to aid Bulk in stopping the prisoners from escaping. Bulk takes on the prisoners alone while Von Ness goes there after XT4, Voltix, and Toxic Reapa.

Stormer and Stringer fight Black Phantom to try to avoid the freighter, but he and his henchmen escape before the two Heroes are engulfed by the freighter's explosion, though Stormer and Stringer survive, going unconscious.

Von Ness goes to the roof, where XT4, Voltix, and Toxic Reapa are going. However, he feels that he cannot defeat the three villains alone, so he tries to call Stormer and Stringer for backup, but he notices their Drop Ship explode. The Drop Ship automatically uses its Life Support Beacon to prevent Stormer and Stringer from freezing up.

When Von Ness notices XT4, Voltix, and Toxic Reapa coming out of a hole on the roof, he wants to fight them at first, but he feels outnumbered by them, so he becomes afraid and unsure. Voltix and Toxic Reapa notice his fear and uncertainty, so Voltix convinces him to let them and XT4 escape in order for Von Ness to survive, so Von Ness lets the three villains escape. After Bulk defeats the prisoners in the jail, he and Von Ness try to go after XT4's group while the three villains use XT4's Drop Ship to get out of the asteroid, but Toxic Reapa destroyed the two Heroes' ship, leaving Bulk and Von Ness stranded on the asteroid.

Thresher arrives and picks up the Heroes.

A few days later, Stormer awakes and meets with Thresher, Zib, and the other Alpha 1 Team Heroes. Zib tells them that the Aird Mining Company is claiming damages to their mining robots, so they shut down their entire mine while replacements were being sent. Aird is upset over the hijacking and destruction of the freighter, and money in valuable ores was lost. The Company believes that Hero Factory could have happened that from happening. Zib also mentions that the Asteroid J-54 incident has destroyed Hero Factory's galactic reputation. Thresher reluctantly informs his team that this caused Makuro to decide to closed down Hero Factory, surprising and saddening the team. Thresher also states that the Legion of Darkness will be dealt with by local law enforcement. He informs the team that Makuro made a very generous offer to hire the Heroes as security for his various manufacturing plants. Zib states that Hero Factory will be shut down temporarily, and over the coming weeks, it will be used to produce robots for deep space exploration rather than Heroes anymore. Stormer tries to convince his comrades to fight the Legion and to convince Makuro to change his mind, but his fellow Heroes do not listen, saddening Stormer. However, Stormer is not giving up, but Thresher tells Stormer that he should not risk his life fighting the Legion, and tells him to stay in the Hero Factory and oversee shutdown operations with Thresher. After that will be done, Thresher and Stormer will decide what comes next.

At a Legion of Darkness meeting in the back room of a refueling station, Black Phantom, who looks at the Legion as the greatest army of crime ever assembled, is happy about his successful actions and thinking about how to defeat the Hero Factory. Splitface sees a report from a news anchor that Hero Factory will be no more as of the end of this week, and critics hail this decision of Makuro's as a return to common sense. This represents the fact that the Legion succeeded. However, some of the villains theorize that the Heroes would come back to sneak attack the villains. Black Phantom tells his gang that they will claim the Hero Factory building as their new spacious base before they will start conquering the galaxy.

Stringer, Bulk, and Von Ness start to leave in a Makuhero freighter to be guards at Makuro's industrial plants. Stormers tells his former teammates that he will miss them. Bulk asks Stormer to come with them, but Stormer is uncertain about it. Stormer gives each of the three Heroes a metal ring-shaped device called a Hero Factory Signaler, which Stormer made and just in case Hero Factory is imperiled. The former members of the Alpha 1 Team promise that they will send messages to each other after they get their new jobs. Stringer, Bulk, and Von Ness slowly leave the Hero Factory's planet, and then Stormer uses an external camera from his quarters to sadly watch them go.

Black Phantom flies the Legion in their two scout ships to Makuhero City to destroy the Hero Factory itself. One of the ships has Black Phantom, Speeda Demon, Toxic Reapa, Voltix, and Thornraxx. The other has Jawblade, XT4, and Splitface. The villains in the second ship drop Jawblade in a missile that the Hero Factory's defenses, which are automatic laser cannons, shoot, breaking him out. He lands in a body of water in the Makuhero Reservior and uses information from XT4 to swim to the Hero Factory's external defenses. Jawblade bites on the defenses' thick cables and powers down the defenses, making him unconscious as a result and causing a power outage in the Hero Factory's external security systems for around sixty seconds until its backup system is activated. The villains use their scout ships to crash through the roof of the Hero Factory's Mission Control Room. XT4 enters the room and starts hacking into one of its main consoles to close and lock the factory's external doors, preventing the factory's security robots from getting back in, so XT4 and the Legion can get ready to destroy the factory. However, Stormer stops and attacks XT4 as payback for tricking him earlier. Speeda Demon is driving one of the Legion's ships, which contains Thornraxx, Toxic Reapa, and Voltix, and heads to the Hero Factory's Assembly Tower's opened launch bay door. When the door starts to close, this makes Thornraxx panic, but Toxic Reapa is annoyed by his behavior and throws him out of the craft, making Thornraxx hit the Hero Factory building so hard that he gets hurt and gets knocked unconscious. Toxic Reapa, Speeda Demon, and Voltix land at the top of the Assembly Tower where they see Thresher preparing to fight them while their ship gets destroyed. Despite Thresher's power, he is no match for the three villains, who plan to disassemble him in the machinery.

Splitface jumps on Stormer to help XT4 fight him. Black Phantom uses his scout ship to destroy the security robots who guarded the outside of the Hero Factory and were trying to get inside before he goes to join his fellow villains in their against Stormer. The three villains overwhelm Stormer while Black Phantom uses the ship to damage the Mission Control Room's floor along the way, but Stormer barricades himself in a room called the Mission Control Fail-Safe Room. In there, Stormer activates Zib's dangerous and untested prototype security systems and uses his Signalers to contact the other Alpha 1 Team Heroes through theirs. Meanwhile, Von Ness is skeptical about Stormer calling him and the other Alpha 1 Team Heroes as they just left. Meanwhile, Stormer uses the security systems to shoot a pile driver at Black Phantom's scout ship to destroy it, making Black Phantom escape from it, and make XT4 get tangled in 12 metal coils. Splitface runs in the Mission Control Fail-Safe Room, but Stormer defeats him by opening the floor underneath him, taking Splitface down a metal pipe to the bowels of Hero Factory. Stormer goes to help Thresher, but is attacked by Black Phantom, who freed XT4. Black Phantom tells Stormer that he plans to have the Legion captured because he wants to get rid of the competition, though he will keep XT4. With the competition out of the way, he will be the sole destroyer of Hero Factory. He does not notice that Stormer records his plan. Von Ness, Bulk, and Stringer arrive. Von Ness defeats XT4 to start redeeming himself for the mistake he made in Asteroid J-54. The Heroes chase Black Phantom into the Assembly Tower, where they see Thresher still alive. Von Ness lowers Thresher's gravity, and Stormer plays a recording of Black Phantom planning to let his henchmen get captured. The other villains get enraged, so they attack and defeat Black Phantom. The Heroes defeat the three villains, so the whole Legion is defeated, and the Heroes save the Hero Factory.

Afterwards, three days later, the Heroes arrest all eight villains and imprison them in Asteroid J-54's jail. Mission Control and the Assembly Tower were damaged by the villains during the fight, but they are getting repaired. Thresher hides evidence of the incident, telling Stormer it was almost a failure. He believes that when the villains would come back someday, they would go back to being solo since they hate each other. Zib tells the Alpha 1 Team that Makuro is going to re-open Hero Factory, though Von Ness is not excited about the news. Later that day, Makuro gives a speech through Vid Screens where he re-opens the Hero Factory.

In the present, after Furno turns off the monitor, Bulk tells him that the Legion of Darkness and Von Ness' unknown actions almost led to Hero Factory's downfall. Stormer walks in and forgives Bulk when Bulk told Furno about the Legion of Darkness. He says Thresher is working as a guard on a highly classified planet, defending against mind attacks. Stormer also mentions the Hero Factory organization made the external security system run on independent power sources, so how Jawblade took it down cannot happen again. Stormer says that the organization ringed the buildings with defense screens, so no one can crash through the Hero Factory building's ceiling again. Bulk says that Stormer forgot to shut down Zib's security systems, so a pile driver from one of them accidentally and almost hurt Makuro when Makuro was checking the Hero Factory after the attack, and Zib shut the security systems down. Stormer tells Bulk and Furno to not worry about the past, but focus on the breakout, which he sees as bad as the Legion of Darkness's attack in the Hero Factory. The Heroes go to continue re-capturing villains.

Characters

Heroes

• Thresher (In a Flashback)
• Preston Stormer
• Dunkan Bulk
• Jimi Stringer (In a Flashback)
• Von Ness (In a Flashback)
• William Furno

Villains

• Legion of Darkness (In a Flashback)
  • Black Phantom
  • Thornraxx
  • Speeda Demon
  • Splitface
  • Jawblade
  • Toxic Reapa
  • Voltix
  • XT4
• Many prisoners in Asteroid J-54's jail (In a Flashback)

Other

• The Hero Factory Staff (In a Flashback)
  • Akiyama Makuro (In Vid Screens)
  • Nathaniel Zib
  • Clean-up robots
• XT4 robots (In a Flashback)
• Mining Robots (In a Flashback)
  • A forebot
• Security robots at Asteroid J-54's jail (In a Flashback)
• A news anchor (In a Flashback, On Television)

Trivia

• The preceding chapter book, Secret Mission 1: The Doom Box, shows a preview to Legion of Darkness, showing its premise and Chapter 1.
  • In this book's premise on its back, it made a spelling mistake, which is that it spells Black Phantom as "Blank Phantom". However, in the preview for the book in the back of The Doom Box, Black Phantom's name is spelled correctly.
• Strangely, Thornraxx's name is not listed in the secret file, despite him being a member of the Legion of Darkness. It is most likely an error.
• There is an error where Jimi Stringer is described as having "black and yellow armor" when his 2010 set has black and orange armor.
• Although Mechna's name is not mentioned in the book, the book implies that the planet where XT4 was created in is indeed Mechna.
• Like The Doom Box, this story does not act like Stormer is in his XL form.
• In Episode 8: Breakout Part 1, Zib did not know who Black Phantom is before he met him. In the chapter book, Zib heard about the Alpha 1 Team's fights against the Legion of Darkness, which was led by Black Phantom. It is possible that Zib at least never met Black Phantom during the fights.
• In the television episodes and The Doom Box, Splitface argued with himself, but in Legion of Darkness, he did not.
• In the episodes, Speeda Demon is insane, but in this chapter book, he is not.
• The chapter book expands Thresher's character and Von Ness' personality as a Hero.
• Since Thornraxx and XT4 did not appear in the episodes for an unknown reason, the chapter book expands their characters and tells XT4's origin.
• Core Hunter is the only Breakout villain to not appear in the flashback or be mentioned in the chapter book. However, it is possible that he exists during the events of the flashback, according to Secret Mission 5: Mirror World.
• Mirror World has a story of an alternate universe where Von Ness betrayed the Hero Factory early during the events of the Legion of Darkness book, so he sold the plans for the Hero Factory building to Black Phantom. Black Phantom used the plans to make a plan, where he formed the Legion of Darkness and the villains went to destroy the Hero Factory. The villains succeeded in doing so.
• According to a News Story in HeroFactory.com in January 24, 2011,^{[Villain Update: Depot on Fire! (January 24, 2011)]} Furno became a veteran Hero after he and his fellow Alpha 1 Team members defeated Von Nebula and his gang in Hero Factory's 2010 story arc and when they were fighting the Fire Villains in Hero Factory's early 2011 story arc. Furno also once said to Evo in Episode 8: Breakout Part 1 to "stick with a veteran like him" before Furno accidentally hit a door. However, in the chapter book, Furno is called a "rookie."
• It is said that Kelly McKiernan, known as "Binkmeister" in BZPower and who worked on BIONICLE and Hero Factory's websites, said that this chapter book and the four other Secret Mission books are not canon, but Dangerous Dimensions and Face Off: Makuro's Secret Guidebook reference to them, which makes this fact disputable, so it can be assumed that the books are semi-canon.^{[Hero Factory 2014 Dissussion]}

See also

• Episode 8: Breakout Part 1
• Episode 9: Breakout Part 2
• Omega Recon Reports
• Saga Guides/History of Hero Factory
• Saga Guides/Breakout