The silence hanging over the palace ruins was heavier than all the tumult of the battle. Teth-Adam sat on a collapsed block of stone, staring at his hands—the hands that had wrought so much destruction. Utopian approached, not with the stance of a warrior ready to fight, but of a man seeking to understand.
"You saved the boy," Utopian began, his calm voice a stark contrast to the recent roar of collapse. "But at a cost no one should have paid. Why?"
Adam didn't look up. "The 'why' is not your concern."
"I believe it is," Utopian insisted, taking a seat near him. "I see the anger in you. I've felt a similar one. A rage that consumes everything in its path. But mine was directed outward, against those who imprisoned me. Yours... seems older. More personal. As if you're punishing yourself with every life you take."
A long silence settled, broken only by the desert wind whistling through the ruins. Then, Adam's voice rose, strangely vulnerable.
"Hurut..." The name was a pained whisper. "Hurut was the true Champion. He was good, pure. And he was my son."
The words fell like stones. Utopian listened, motionless, as Adam unraveled the thread of his tragedy. The Council of Wizards choosing Hurut, Ahk-Ton's jealousy, the assassins, his son's heart-wrenching choice to save his father over his kingdom.
"They gave me his powers while his blood was still warm," Adam continued, a tremor in his voice. "They called it a gift. It was a curse. Every spark of lightning, every ounce of strength was steeped in my rage, my grief. I was not a hero. I was a weapon of vengeance wearing my son's name."
The truth dawned. It wasn't a thirst for power that drove Adam, but a crushing burden of guilt and sorrow. He fought to avenge his son, but every life he took pushed him further from the man he felt he had failed to be.
Soon after, Hawkman and Doctor Fate joined them, drawn by the prolonged silence. Adam, emptied of his fury, repeated his story to them.
"The statue...", Hawkman murmured, his gaze turning to the colossal figure on the horizon. "It doesn't represent you. It's him. It's Hurut. Your son dreamed of a better world. It was for that world he saved you. Not for you to become a scourge."
Those words seemed to shatter the last defenses within Teth-Adam. He looked up at Utopian, then at Hawkman.
"I cannot be the hero he deserved. I am only the curse he left behind."
He stood, squaring his massive shoulders. Then, in a clear, resolved voice that echoed through the ancient ruins, he spoke the word:
"Shazam."
A colossal bolt of lightning tore through the sky, sucking the divine power from his body. When the light dissipated, Teth-Adam was just a man, standing vulnerable and exhausted.
"Do with me what you will," he said simply.
The Justice Society took him away. The journey to a secret ARGUS base, hidden beneath the Antarctic ice, was made in a heavy silence. Emilia Harcourt and her soldiers greeted them.
To prevent any reclamation of his powers, Adam was placed in biostasis. They guided him into a transparent capsule which was then submerged in a pool of icy water, preventing him from speaking the magic word. As the cryogenic fluids fogged the pane, Utopian took one last look at the man inside. He was no longer a god or a monster, but a father shattered by grief, locked in a prison of his own choosing.
As the capsule sank among others containing captured super-villains, Utopian felt a chill that had nothing to do with the ice. He had seen the source of the rage, and he couldn't help but think that sometimes, justice could feel like cruelty in disguise.