The bottom line is only one place Toyota could take a beating in the months to come, after CEO Akio Toyoda took his own hits at a Congressional hearing.

In the comic books, cosmic rays are likely to turn your big, green and mean, or give you the ability to fly and turn invisible.  But frustrated in their attempts to find a cause for still-unexplained problems with Toyota vehicles that allegedly race out of control, investigators are now looking at the possibility that rare cosmic ray strikes could cause onboard computer systems to race out of control.

Toyota is finding itself in an unusual and increasingly untenable position.  The maker has already recalled more than 8 million vehicles around the world.  But despite its efforts to focus on two fixes – and several high-profile efforts to dismiss critics who contend there are other, as yet-unidentified problems with electronic controls – there’s little sign the safety crisis surrounding the world’s largest automaker is about to end.

Quite the contrary.  Though a hefty increase in incentive spending is bringing buyers back to U.S. showrooms, sales are slipping in other parts of the world, notably Europe, where Toyota struggled long and hard to crack into a market much less open to Asian imports than the States.

Meanwhile, hundreds of plaintiff attorneys are queuing up for the right to take the automaker on in court in what could turn into one of the most contentious legal battles ever involving the auto industry, observers warn.

Certainly, all is not doom-and-gloom.  As Senior Vice President Don Esmond told TheDetroitBureau.com, last week, Toyota’s upgraded incentive program – which is offering cash deals of as much as $3,000 – is bringing buyers back to American showrooms.  Sales for the first part of the month are up about 40% from year-earlier levels and nearly double the dismal numbers from this February.

But new figures from the 27-country European market show Toyota struggling there, with a 20% decline for February, even as the soft EU automotive market showed some signs of life, picking up 3% overall.

At the Geneva Motor Show, earlier this month, senior Toyota officials lifted a page from the handbook being written on the fly by their American counterparts, apologizing to European consumers and trying to shift focus to new products – and the recalls Toyota insists will prevent further problems with so-called “sudden acceleration.”

A critical question, senior officials like Esmond acknowledge, is how much damage the constant headline coverage will do to Toyota’s reputation, and for how long.  On the downside, recent polls have shown that a sizable portion of Americans now question the safety of the maker’s vehicles.  The upside, according to a study by Corporate Research International, is that only 6.5% of current Toyota owners say they will not repurchase one of the company’s products.

Esmond said he is confident Toyota will win back loyalists, but he admitted it may have more trouble with so-called “conquests,” the buyers it has steadily converted from other brands, over the years, who are needed to keep its market share momentum growing.

In recent weeks, Toyota has begun to get more aggressive when it comes to defending its position.  After taking a beating during several days of hearings before Congress, last month, the maker came back with a widely-covered news conference tearing apart claims by a Southern Illinois University professor claiming to show how Toyota’s onboard computer system could unexpectedly fail without warning.

Then, this week, the automaker held another news conference to refute the claims of a California motorist who, last week, alleged that his Prius hybrid had unexpectedly shot up to 94 mph before he was able to bring it back under control with the help of a highway patrol officer.

But winning a few victories with a carefully-staged news conference is one thing.  The more difficult battle is yet to come.  The legal system is now preparing for what could be landslide of court actions taking on Toyota.  Some will seek damages for accidents, injuries and deaths allegedly caused by faulty Toyota vehicles.  Others involve owners seeking to make up for declining values of Toyota vehicles, the result of all the headlines.

Toyota may, in fact, have put itself into a box.  At last month’s Capitol Hill hearings, CEO Akio Toyoda once again apologized for the company’s safety problems, but more significantly, he promised that Toyota would “not blame the customer” for those problems.  Those words will almost certainly be turned against the maker if it tries to raise doubts about some of the complaints lodged against it.

On February 4^th, Toyota estimated the worldwide recalls could cost it about $2 billion.  But some observers scoff at the figure and suggest the litigation alone could run well above that amount.

Kohei Takahashi, an analyst with JP Morgan, predicts the all-in cost to Toyota will top $5.5 billion.  As a result, Takahashi has lowered his forecast for Toyota earnings for the fiscal year beginning April 1 from 760 billion yen to just 540 billion ($5.9 billion).

What remains uncertain is just how much Toyota will have to spend to keep its owners loyal.  “We expect Toyota to respond aggressively to win back much of its lost market share, but it will come at a cost,” said Deutsche Bank’s Kurt Sanger.

The current U.S. incentive package, with cash givebacks of $500 to $3,000, along with zero-interest loans on many models, is actually modest when compared to recent Detroit givebacks, but Toyota has traditionally shied away from such offerings.  And, hinted Esmond, it could ramp things up if the momentum slows, having promised its American dealers that the brand “will remain competitive.”

Of course, there are different ways to define that.  At the very least, Toyota is hoping to hold onto its current owners.  But it may find it much more difficult than before to get new buyers into its showrooms around the world.  That could stall critical momentum in places like Europe, China and other markets that are becoming increasingly critical to the troubled brand, and where it has fewer loyalists to fall back on.