DC EARTH
Atrius knelt upon ashen soil that still breathed with heat from the earlier battle. With each ragged inhalation his chest hitched, as though his lungs refused to obey him. He attempted to rise—yet even that simple act betrayed him. His body felt foreign, weighed down by phantom sensations: the reek of daemon-ichor clinging to his skin, the remembered heft of the Guardian Spear in his palms, the echo of a vision that felt real enough to scar.
His senses spun out of control. Sound, scent, and touch warred with one another until everything collapsed into a dull, suffocating hum.
What… is happening… so many… memories… Father? …no… Lord… why have you discarded me…?
His thoughts dissolved, words splintering into a haze of static. A tidal wave of memories not his own—lives he had never lived—crashed through his mind with ruthless force. His very self-eroded beneath the psychic aftershock left festering within him ever since the ruinous powers had tried to tamper with his mind in the Webway. Here, upon this alien world, their corruption had slumbered in silence.
Now it tore itself open.
"A—rrrgh!" Atrius clutched his skull with both hands, teeth grinding together as if trying to bite through the agony.
Then—
Swoosh.
Like a mirage collapsing, he vanished from the field. Only the wounded and "dead" mortals remained, writhing in agony from their forced resurrection and rejuvenation.
Elsewhere on the battlefield…
Heracles swung his great wooden club and the air itself cracked.
BOOM!!!
Parademons burst apart on impact, shredded into wings, limbs, and smoldering fragments. To him, they were not enemies—merely obstacles delaying his true quarry: the silhouettes standing in the distance, watching the carnage with cold indifference.
The tyrant and his generals.
Behind Heracles surged the army of mortals, their once-distinct cultures blurred beneath layers of gore and ash. They pressed forward without faltering, each step driven by human stubbornness and the sheer refusal to die quietly.
Spartan phalanxes locked shields, their bronze walls turning aside the swarming attackers diving from above. What they lacked in strength they compensated with unity—each shield a promise, each spear thrust a defiant prayer.
At first, they were overwhelmed by these hellish creatures born of Apokolips…
But mankind adapted.
Without a moment of hesitation, they merged into a single, relentless tide.
The Amazons, long dismounted, carved through the enemy with fierce precision. Their cavalry had been rendered useless against winged beasts, but their adaptability was legendary. They fell into formation seamlessly, blades flashing like moonlit arcs through blackened skies.
On the flanks, archers loosed storm after storm of arrows. Though few found the creatures' vital points, sheer volume drove the demons crashing to the earth where human steel greeted them.
Horns thundered as
bowstrings sang in rhythm.
Then arrows hissed like rain.
Yet still, the sky darkened beneath an unending swarm.
Some parademons dropped from the air to engage directly, their eyes burning with manic focus, their talons tearing at shields with rabid fury.
And then—
SWRRRRRR—
A shrill whistle cleaved through the chaos.
A golden blur ripped across the heavens.
It moved like a fiery divine arrow—unstoppable, merciless—shredding the swarm as it passed. Parademons scattered, twisted aside and tried desperately to evade.
Futile.
The blur punched through skulls, armor, and plated flesh as easily as a hot blade through wax.
THUD.
It halted abruptly, suspended against an unseen barrier near the three Mother Boxes spinning in their ritual orbit behind the hooded Apokoliptians.
SWRRRRRR—SWRRRRRR—SWRRRRRR— SWRRRRRR—
Then more blurs streaked down like meteors of light raining down on the swarm of parademons.
thud!! thud!! thud!! thud!! thud!!....
Corpses rained like black hail.
Watching from below,
Heracles rested his club across his fur-lined shoulders and watched the sky with a widening smirk. Around him, exhausted mortals stared upward, awe eclipsing fear. the phenomenon alone was enough to free their hands from the endless carnage.
He nudged the nearest soldier with a reassuring pat—startling the poor man from his trance.
"Why the long face?" Heracles murmured, voice rich and booming. "Rejoice."
As if on queue,
above them, clouds churned violently as they darkened into a maelstrom. The air chilled; the wind thrashed.
BROOOOM—!!
Lightning tasted the sky in every color, thunder rolling like titanic drums hammered by ancient gods.
On the opposite front, Desaad narrowed his beady eyes at the disturbance. His nostrils flared as he inhaled the rich scent of wet dust and iron.
"I warned you, Desaad. They would come."
A deep, implacable voice sounded as a looming figure treaded toward him from behind, each footstep radiating authority and tyranny.
Darkseid.
"I have waited far too long," the tyrant intoned, gaze lifting to the descending pillar of celestial plasma.
BROOOOM—!!
The beam struck the earth with world-shaking force.
Soil turned to solid stone in an instant from the impact alone, the earth shattered and crumbled as Parademons in its path vaporized, their ash scattering on the wind.
Mortals shielded their faces, some dropping to their knees, lips whispering frantic prayers before the overwhelming majesty of the storm.
Far from the battlefield…
On a distant ridge overlooking the battlefield, three figures stood silently: one man, one woman, and a young girl clutching the man's hand.
The skies split, the god-king's herald descended—yet none of them reacted.
They were not here for the war.
"Brother," the girl asked softly, her mismatched pupils bright with curiosity, "are you certain this will mend the anomaly?"
The man did not answer. His gaze pierced the horizon, not at the armies or the destruction, but far beyond—toward a place unseen by mortal eyes.
Sunlight glinted on his dark skin as he considered the impossible calculus before him. At length, he turned to the woman at his side.
She shook her head.
He exhaled slowly, weary.
"I do not know, Delirium. I truly do not."
"Was it fair?" the girl pressed, voice barely a whisper. "What we did to him? The fate we cast him toward?"
The woman answered instead, tone gentle but unyielding.
"He is safer where he is. Had he remained here even a second longer, this world would have been doomed."
Delirium tilted her head.
"You like this world, don't you?" the woman asked, her tone gentle.
The little "goddess" nodded eagerly, her eyes shimmering with chaotic light.
"Yes. Very much. I will like it here… just as the others do."
A moment earlier…
elsewhere beyond the mortal plane
A flicker of fractured light tore open the air within a secluded cavern-temple. In an instant, a figure dropped into existence like a stone falling from the heavens.
Murals of forgotten warriors watched from cracked stone walls. Broken statues lay scattered, yet dozens of torches still burned with unwavering flame, casting trembling shadows across the pillars.
Kneeling on one knee, the figure clutched his head with both hands.
His breath rasped. His teeth ground together with such force that the ancient silence of the cavern shuddered.
White hair veiled his face as he hunched forward, red eyes burning beneath the strands—two dangerous embers flickering in the gloom.