Bruce had deliberately omitted Steppenwolf from his tactical assignments for a simple reason: his teacher had already claimed that fight.
He didn't know the full extent of Marcus' capabilities—doubted anyone truly did—but he knew with absolute certainty that Steppenwolf was nothing compared to the being who'd trained him, Diana, and Clark.
Leaving the Apokoliptian general to Marcus was the smartest tactical decision Bruce could make. It freed the entire team to focus on their actual objectives: separate the Mother Boxes, eliminate the Parademon threat, save any civilians caught in the crossfire.
Simple. Straightforward.
Or it would be, if anything involving alien invasions was ever actually simple.
The Parademon army reacted instantly to the Justice League's assault.
What had been a relatively organized patrol pattern dissolved into aggressive swarm tactics. Hundreds of the creatures took flight, converging on the intruders with single-minded hostility.
The nest's defensive systems activated simultaneously. Energy cannons mounted on the organic superstructure swiveled toward targets, primitive AI systems identifying threats and prioritizing fire.
And their primary target was obvious: the large, flying vehicle that had just deployed multiple hostiles.
The Batplane became the focus of concentrated fire.
Bruce's piloting skills were exceptional—honed over years of aerial combat against everything from street gangs with stolen helicopters to alien warships. He twisted the plane through impossible maneuvers, dodging energy blasts that would have vaporized conventional aircraft.
But there were too many cannons firing from too many angles.
Eventually, the math caught up with him.
BOOM!
A direct hit struck the port wing. The energy blast punched through the armor plating, and the wing exploded in a shower of sparks and burning fuel. The plane immediately went into a spin, alarms screaming, systems failing.
Bruce didn't panic. He'd planned for this.
His hand slammed down on a bright red button beside the pilot's seat.
CHUNK!
The seat's restraints released. The floor beneath Bruce suddenly dropped away, and he fell backward—into the Batmobile that had been secured in the plane's cargo bay.
The heavily armored ground vehicle's systems activated the moment Bruce landed in the driver's seat. The bay doors blew open, explosive bolts detonating in a carefully timed sequence.
The Batmobile shot out of the dying Batplane like a bullet from a gun.
Bruce hit the ground hard, the Batmobile's suspension absorbing most of the impact but still rattling his teeth. The vehicle's wheels dug into the corrupted earth, tires finding purchase, and Bruce floored the accelerator.
Behind him, the Batplane completed its uncontrolled dive and slammed into the nest's outer wall.
The explosion was spectacular—fuel tanks detonating, munitions cooking off, the entire aircraft transforming into a massive fireball that blew a gaping hole in the organic structure.
Bruce allowed himself a small smile. Even in destruction, his equipment served its purpose.
"Now!" he barked into the comms. "Execute the plan!"
The Batmobile's engine roared as he accelerated, weaving between Parademon attacks. Energy blasts scorched the ground where he'd been milliseconds before. The car's armor held against glancing hits, but Bruce knew he couldn't take a direct shot.
So he didn't let them land one.
The Batmobile's weapons systems came online. Machine guns emerged from hidden compartments, firing armor-piercing rounds at pursuing Parademons. Missile launchers popped up from the hood, tracking and eliminating the energy cannons targeting him.
Every second Bruce drew fire was a second his team could advance unmolested.
Diana didn't need an engraved invitation.
The moment the Batplane's explosion created an opening, she dove through it like a spear thrown by the gods themselves.
Her shield led the way, the divine artifact deflecting Parademon claws and energy blasts with equal ease. She hit the ground inside the nest running, sword already swinging in deadly arcs.
The first Parademon died before it realized she'd arrived—her blade removing its head in one clean stroke. The second and third fell in rapid succession, the fourth managed to block her initial strike but couldn't stop the shield bash that crushed its skull.
"Aquaman, Cyborg, with me!" Diana called out, her voice carrying over the chaos. "We push to the center!"
Arthur landed beside her with a ground-shaking impact, his trident already dripping with ichor. "After you, Princess. I'll watch your back."
"Much appreciated."
They moved as a unit—Diana in front, Arthur covering her flanks, with Victor providing aerial support from above. It was a formation they'd practiced dozens of times, and it showed in their efficiency.
Diana's combat style was aggressive, unrelenting. She'd been trained by warriors who'd fought in conflicts that predated human civilization, and it showed in every movement. Her sword found weak points in Parademon armor with supernatural precision. Her shield became both defense and weapon, blocking attacks and then striking with enough force to shatter bone.
Arthur fought differently—less refined but no less effective. His trident was an extension of his will, the ancient weapon responding to his Atlantean heritage with eager violence. He swept it in wide arcs that cleared entire groups of Parademons, the enchanted metal cutting through their armor like it was paper.
"These things are endless!" Arthur growled, impaling two Parademons on his trident and throwing them into a third. "How many did Steppenwolf bring?"
"Enough," Diana replied, deflecting an energy blast back at its source. "But not infinite. Keep pushing!"
Above them, Victor had transformed fully into his combat configuration. His body had become a flying weapons platform—cannons extending from his arms, missile launchers deploying from his back, targeting systems painting threats faster than human eyes could track.
BRRRRRT!
Energy weapons fired in controlled bursts, each shot calculated for maximum efficiency. Parademons fell from the sky in smoking heaps, their formations disrupted by precise fire.
"Detecting 3 Mother Box signatures ahead," Victor reported, his mechanical voice somehow cutting through the battle noise. "Distance: two hundred meters. Heavy Parademon concentration between here and there."
"Then we go through them," Diana said simply.
She raised her shield and charged.
Outside the nest, Oliver Queen moved like a ghost.
He wasn't enhanced like the others—no superpowers, no alien heritage, no divine parentage. Just a human with a bow, exceptional skill, and a magic ring that made up for his lack of natural abilities.
Which meant he had to be smarter than his enemies. Faster on the draw. More precise with every shot.
Oliver found a vantage point in the ruins of a building, crouched behind cover, and went to work.
His first arrow took a Parademon manning an energy cannon—the shaft buried in the creature's eye socket, punching through into its brain. The Parademon toppled backward, dead before it hit the ground.
Oliver was already drawing his second arrow.
The ring on his finger pulsed with holy light, a gift from Marcus years ago. Oliver had learned to channel that divine energy into his arrows, transforming ordinary projectiles into something far more lethal.
He notched the arrow, drew back, and released in one smooth motion.
The arrow blazed with golden light as it flew, trailing sacred fire. It struck another Parademon square in the chest, and the creature burned—not with normal fire, but with the kind of flame that consumed evil itself. The Parademon didn't even have time to scream before it was reduced to ash.
Thwip. Thwip. Thwip.
Three more arrows, three more targets. Oliver worked with mechanical precision, prioritizing the Parademons operating the energy cannons. Each cannon he silenced was one less weapon firing at Bruce.
"East side cannons neutralized," Oliver reported calmly, as if he wasn't sitting in the middle of an alien invasion. "Moving to assist with the southern battery."
"Copy that," Bruce's voice came back. "Good shooting, Arrow."
Oliver allowed himself a brief smile, then returned to work.
His arrows flew in a constant stream now, each one guided by years of practice and enhanced by divine power. Some carried explosive tips that detonated on impact. Others released clouds of electrified particles that fried Parademon nervous systems. A few were simple broadheads that relied on pure kinetic force and accuracy.
But all of them were deadly.
A group of Parademons spotted his position and changed course, diving toward him with claws extended.
Oliver calmly drew three arrows at once—a trick he'd perfected through countless hours of practice—and fired them in a spread pattern.
THUNK. THUNK. THUNK.
Three Parademons fell, arrows buried in their skulls.
The rest of the group got close enough that Oliver could smell their rotten breath.
He dropped his bow, drew a knife from his belt—also blessed by the ring's power—and met them head-on.
The knife blazed with golden light as he moved. Oliver was no match for these creatures in raw strength, but he didn't need to be. He was faster, more skilled, and he knew exactly where to strike to make each movement count.
He ducked under a claw swipe, drove his knife up into a Parademon's throat. Twisted, pulled free, and spun to slash another's eyes. Kicked a third in the knee hard enough to shatter the joint, then finished it with a thrust to the heart.
Five seconds. Three dead Parademons.
Oliver retrieved his bow, already drawing another arrow.
"Still kicking," he muttered to himself. "Not bad for a normal guy."
Barry Allen moved through the battlefield like he existed in a different timeframe than everyone else.
From his perspective, the world had slowed to a crawl. Parademons flew through the air in slow motion, their wing beats like molasses. Energy blasts crept along at speeds that would make snails impatient. Even his teammates seemed frozen in comparison to his velocity.
He'd been tasked with civilian evacuation, but so far he hadn't found any.
"Flash to team," he reported, his words coming out at normal speed despite him moving at hundreds of miles per hour. "Checking the perimeter. No civilians detected yet. The area was already evacuated—thank god."
"Keep searching," Bruce ordered. "Expand your radius. Check buildings within a mile of the nest."
"On it."
Barry became a bolt of lightning, covering ground faster than most people could blink. He phased through buildings, checking each room in microseconds. Empty. Empty. Empty.
The Parademons had been thorough—whatever this area had been before, it was abandoned now.
But Barry kept searching anyway, because if there was even one person hiding in a basement or trapped under rubble, he needed to find them.
Above him, Clark was doing the same thing—using his X-ray vision to scan structures, listening for heartbeats with his super-hearing. Even weakened, Superman was still the best search-and-rescue operator on the planet.
Barry caught sight of Clark flying past—slower than usual, his movements showing strain—and felt a pang of concern.
"Hey, Superman," Barry called over the comms. "You good?"
"I'm fine," Clark responded, though his voice was tight with pain. "Just... tired."
"Want me to take over the search? I can cover your sector."
"I've got it, Flash. You focus on your area."
Stubborn Kryptonian. Barry shook his head fondly and kept searching.
Then he heard something—a faint whimper, barely audible even to his enhanced senses.
Barry changed direction instantly, following the sound to a collapsed building on the nest's periphery. He phased through the rubble and found a small family huddled in what had been a basement: mother, father, two young children.
"Hi," Barry said, forcing his voice to stay calm and friendly despite the battle raging outside. "I'm with the Justice League. We're getting you out of here."
The father looked at him with wide, terrified eyes. "The monsters—"
"Are being handled," Barry interrupted gently. "But we need to move. Fast. Like, really fast. I'm talking speedster fast."
He didn't wait for permission. Barry grabbed all four of them—using the Speed Force to extend his protective aura around their bodies—and ran.
From the family's perspective, the world blurred into incomprehensible streaks of color. From Barry's perspective, he was jogging at a leisurely pace.
Five seconds later, they were three miles away in a designated safe zone where emergency services had already set up.
Barry deposited the family with paramedics, gave them a quick salute, and vanished back toward the battle.
"Found one family," he reported. "Relocated to safe zone alpha. Continuing search."
"Good work, Flash," Steve said. "Superman, status?"
"Nothing yet," Clark admitted. "But I'm still looking."
Deep within the nest, in a chamber constructed from corrupted metal and living tissue, Steppenwolf knelt before a monument.
The metal obelisk stood ten feet tall, covered in glyphs from Apokolips' ancient language. It pulsed with energy—a communication device linking this primitive world to the heart of Darkseid's empire.
A hooded figure manifested in the air above the obelisk, projected across light-years of space. The image flickered slightly but remained stable enough for conversation.
"Master," Steppenwolf said, his voice carrying genuine reverence. "I have found the planet you've been seeking. The world where the Anti-Life Equation is engraved."
The figure—DeSaad, Darkseid's chief torturer and scientist—leaned forward with obvious interest. "You're certain? You understand the price of deceiving the Master, Steppenwolf."
"I understand completely," Steppenwolf replied, no hesitation in his voice. "But the Anti-Life Equation is here. I can feel it. This is Earth—the planet where Lord Darkseid was defeated millennia ago. The planet he's been searching for ever since."
DeSaad studied him for a long moment, then nodded slowly. "If you speak truth, this will earn you redemption. The Master will welcome you back to—"
"Master?" a new voice interrupted. "You're talking about Darkseid, I assume?"
Both Steppenwolf and DeSaad froze.
The voice had come from behind the obelisk—from a space that should have been empty, that Steppenwolf had personally verified was secure.
Marcus stepped into view, his Rhino armor making him look like a walking fortress. The massive frame gleamed with power, and even through the helmet's faceplate, his eyes burned with interested intensity.
"How did you—" Steppenwolf started to say.
He didn't finish.
The Apokoliptian general moved with shocking speed for something his size, leaping across the chamber and bringing his electro-axe down in a devastating overhead strike.
"You dare speak the Master's name!" Steppenwolf roared. "For that blasphemy, you are sentenced to death!"
The axe crackled with energy as it fell, enough electricity to fry a tank.
Marcus didn't move.
CLANG!
The axe struck Marcus' armor and stopped. The impact should have cleaved him in half, should have at least staggered him.
Instead, Marcus stood perfectly still, like Steppenwolf had just hit a mountain.
A shimmer of silver material spread across the Rhino armor—iron skin, hardening in response to impact. The defensive ability absorbed the kinetic force completely, converting it into additional armor layers.
"Iron Skin," Marcus said conversationally, as if someone wasn't actively trying to kill him. "Useful ability. Absorbs damage and makes me harder to hurt. Thanks for activating it."
Steppenwolf's eyes widened behind his helmet.
Marcus reached up casually and grabbed the electro-axe's handle, stopping Steppenwolf's attempt to pull it free.
"That's an interesting weapon," Marcus observed, examining the axe with academic interest. "Apokoliptian design, powered by exotic particles, capable of cutting through most conventional armor. I could extract a lot of Aya from this."
"Release my weapon!" Steppenwolf snarled, kicking at Marcus' head.
The kick connected—a blow that could dent steel.
Marcus' head moved approximately one inch to the side.
"Hm. That tickled."
Steppenwolf kicked again, harder. Then again. Each impact would have crippled a normal person.
Marcus just stood there, unmoved, still holding the axe.
"Are you finished?" he asked politely.
"Steppenwolf!" DeSaad's voice cut through the chamber, sharp with command. "Kill this blasphemer! Offer his head to the Master when he arrives!"
"Arrives?" Marcus turned to look at the projected figure, still holding Steppenwolf's axe in one hand. "Oh, you're planning to bring Darkseid here. Interesting."
He raised his other hand.
The Paracesis Prime blade materialized—a holy weapon forged from light and Void, shimmering with power that made the air itself tremble.
"That seems inadvisable," Marcus said.
Then he swung.
The blade moved faster than Steppenwolf could track, cutting through the space where the obelisk stood.
CRACK!
The metal monument split in half, the cut so clean it looked like it had simply been divided by divine will.
But Marcus hadn't just cut the physical object. The Paracesis Prime existed on multiple levels of reality simultaneously, and when it struck, it struck everything.
Including DeSaad's projected consciousness.
The blade passed through the hologram, and DeSaad's eyes went wide with sudden, terrible pain.
On Apokolips, thousands of light-years away, the high priest screamed.
Blood erupted from his mouth as his psychic connection was severed—not gently, not cleanly, but cut like a physical thing. His consciousness, which had been extended across space to communicate, was split in two.
Half remained in his body on Apokolips.
Half dissipated into nothingness, destroyed by a weapon that could kill concepts.
DeSaad collapsed on his throne, trembling, blood leaking from his eyes and nose. His psychic power—his greatest asset, the thing that made him valuable to Darkseid—had been cut in half.
He was crippled. Probably permanently.
Back on Earth, Marcus looked at the fading hologram with satisfaction. "Escaped, but damaged. Good enough."
He turned his attention back to Steppenwolf, who was still trying to wrestle his axe free.
"Now then," Marcus said pleasantly. "Where were we?"
He grabbed the electro-axe with both hands and pulled.
The weapon, forged from Apokoliptian steel that could cut through starship hulls, bent like soft clay in Marcus' grip.
Then it snapped.
The electro-axe—Steppenwolf's companion through countless conquests, his most trusted weapon—broke in half like a cheap toy.
"Oops," Marcus said, not sounding sorry at all.
Steppenwolf stared at the broken weapon, his mind struggling to process what had just happened.
Then Marcus kicked him.
It wasn't a complicated kick. No special technique, no fancy martial arts. Just a straightforward, powerful kick delivered with the full strength of Rhino enhanced by Infinite Empowerment.
BOOM!!!
The sound was less like impact and more like a bomb detonating.
Steppenwolf shot backward like he'd been hit by a meteor. His body crashed through support pillars, pulverizing the organic structure. The entire nest shuddered, Parademons throughout the complex stumbling as their home shook.
Several Parademons near the impact site simply exploded from the shockwave, unable to withstand the pressure wave.
Steppenwolf finally stopped after destroying about fifty meters of nest structure, sitting dazed in a crater of pulverized biomass.
His living metal armor had absorbed most of the impact, but it showed visible cracks now—something that should have been impossible.
"That was enjoyable," Marcus said, walking toward the crater. "It's been a while since I had a proper brawl. Thank you for the workout."
His voice was cheerful, conversational.
It was the most terrifying thing Steppenwolf had ever heard.
The general sat in the ruins, trying to process what had just happened. He'd fought across galaxies, conquered thousands of worlds, battled beings of tremendous power.
None of them had made him feel this helpless.
The only being who'd ever overwhelmed him this completely was Darkseid himself.
"He has the Master's power," Steppenwolf whispered, shock giving way to horrified understanding. "This is impossible. The Master is unique. No one can match—"
"No," he cut himself off, forcing denial. "The Master is supreme! The universe belongs to Lord Darkseid! This... this is temporary. I can still win. I must win!"
Marcus' footsteps echoed across the chamber as he approached.
Boom. Boom. Boom.
Each footfall seemed to shake Steppenwolf's world.
The general looked up at Marcus, seeing his own death approaching, and made a choice.
If he was going to die, he would die serving his master. He would take this threat to Darkseid's supremacy with him.
"ROAR!!!"
The sound that came from Steppenwolf wasn't human—wasn't even close. It was pure bestial fury given voice, the rage of a fanatic facing their end.
His body began to change.
The living metal armor that covered him didn't just repair—it transformed. It hardened, thickened, grew sharp edges and cruel spikes. His muscles swelled beneath it, pumped full of combat stimulants stored in the armor's reservoirs.
But more than that, his energy signature began to spike.