The Subterranean World was pitch-black.
The Teen Team hadn't expected to get ambushed the second they stepped foot inside. Everyone except Atom Eve—who could fly—was instantly caught.
Now Eve was missing, and the rest of them were cocooned in webbing from Doctor Seismic's pet: a two-hundred-meter spider, Godzilla-sized and drooling silk.
"So what now?!"
"You telling me we're just supposed to sit here until some other hero punches a timecard and rescues us?"
"Honestly, that doesn't sound too bad. We can't exactly bust out anyway."
Rex Splode stood at the center of the group, teeth grinding as he pulled and tore at the transparent webbing. No good. It was tougher than steel, more elastic than rubber, immune to both explosions and fire. His temper broke right along with his hope.
"Even blasts and fire can't burn through?"
Robot took it in, quiet for half a second. Then he detached his arm, unfolding his ace-in-the-hole: a high-density polymer chainsaw. He revved it and slashed down hard.
"Vrrrmm! Vrrrmm!!"
Nothing. Webs that could laugh at titanium and diamond didn't care about his blade either.
"…I've got nothing. Eve's our only shot."
Robot shook his head.
"If you guys can't cut it, then what chance do I have?" Dupli-Kate sighed, arms crossed. "What do you expect me to do, spawn a million copies of myself to fill the chamber and try to burst the cage from the inside? We'd all be paste long before the webs broke."
"It's fine." Rex forced a grin. "Eve'll find a way. She always does."
BOOM!
Something slammed down in front of them.
"Something just fell," Robot said, swiveling his head to cast more light.
Everyone craned to see—
"Eve!"
Atom Eve lay crumpled on the ground, clothes shredded, blood running down her face. The only one who'd dodged Seismic's trap had clearly just gone through hell. And lost.
"EVE!! Are you okay?!"
Their last hope collapsed in front of them. Panic hit like a wave.
"Hahaha!"
A cruel laugh echoed. The darkness blazed alive with blinding light, flooding the chamber.
"…What the hell…"
For the first time they saw it clearly:
A palace.
A massive underground palace.
"No way!"
"There's a freaking palace at the Earth's core?!"
Rex and Kate both gawked. Even Robot stiffened.
They were caged at the very heart of a colossal throne room. Before them loomed a hundred-meter stone statue of Doctor Seismic himself.
And beneath it—a line of crosses. Each one strung with a familiar face.
The Guardians of the Globe.
"You've gotta be kidding me!"
"The Immortal, Darkwing, War Woman, Red Rush, Martian Man, Green Ghost, Aquarus—they all got taken?!" Rex's voice cracked. "Weren't we supposed to be their backup? How the hell did Red Rush get caught—he's the fastest guy alive!"
"…Sorry, kid."
Red Rush's voice was faint, broken. His leg hung twisted and useless. "Didn't expect Seismic to grease the floor with oil. You know how that goes…"
"What about you two?" Rex barked at the Immortal and War Woman. "How did you get caught?"
"We tried," the Immortal admitted, shame weighing down his voice. War Woman just bowed her head.
The truth was uglier: they'd fought like hell, each killing off swarms of giant centipedes. But the endless tide of monsters and Subterraneans overwhelmed them. They fell, dragged into chains.
Darkwing, Martian Man, Aquarus? Cannon fodder down here.
Green Ghost had been pinned by Seismic's new gravity waves.
The Guardians were done.
BOOM!
More lights snapped on.
"…Wait. Underground palace, where's all the lighting coming from?" Rex muttered.
"You don't want to know," Robot said grimly.
"Those aren't lights."
Rex turned—and froze.
The glow came from eyes. Hundreds of pairs of gleaming eyes.
Every one belonged to a colossal arthropod. Centipedes. Scorpions. Spiders. Each a hundred meters long.
"There's at least a hundred of those things!" Rex breathed.
"Correction—they're arthropods," Robot corrected.
"Shut up. You know I flunked bio."
And behind them, tens of thousands of Subterraneans stood ready.
"Bwahaha!"
"Do you feel it? That despair?"
Doctor Seismic descended, using his gravity waves to snatch Eve's limp body off the ground and slam her onto a waiting cross. His face twisted with glee. "That's right. Despair! I want you to drown in it!"
"…Does anyone else think he's talking nonsense?" Rex muttered.
"Brain damage," Robot explained. "He was a geology professor at the University of Chicago. Built the Seismic Gauntlets without accounting for the side effects. Every use rattles his brain a little more. Now he's obsessed with wiping out humanity."
Kate added softly, "According to reports, every quake gives him another concussion. That's why he's this far gone."
"Silence!" Seismic snapped. "My dream of exterminating humanity started back in undergrad. You know what my majors were? Sociology and Women's Studies."
"Enough chatter!" He raised his arms wide. "I'll gamble your lives against my greatest rival—Superman himself."
"You bastard!" The Immortal roared, still straining against his bonds. "Superman will crush you! Whatever your insane scheme is, he'll stop it!"
"I'll prove humanity has no value worth saving," Seismic sneered. "And you—"
He gestured.
The monster horde began to close in, claws and mandibles clicking.
"Wait! Didn't you just say you were using us as hostages to bait Superman?" Rex shouted.
"You really trusting the word of a lunatic?" Kate shot back.
"Ahahahaha! DIE!"
Seismic's laughter echoed, rabid and wild.
BOOOOM!
The ceiling tore open.
A figure drifted down through the dust, dressed in a black combat suit. The palace light wasn't enough to reveal his face, but the giant S blazing across his chest was unmistakable.
"Holy crap—it's Superman! We're saved!"
Every head turned upward, hope blazing in their eyes. No one else wore that sigil.
ZZZZZZZZT!
Heat Vision ripped through the dark, slicing monsters apart like paper.
"Since when was Superman this violent?"
For one stunned heartbeat, both Guardians and Teen Team forgot their fear.
...
BOOM!
Before anyone could even process what was happening, the black-suited "Superman" came crashing down like a meteor. His fists rained down in a blur, pounding into the massive arthropods that had been seconds away from ripping into the Guardians and Teen Team.
Creatures the size of Godzilla—beasts strong enough to hold their own against the Immortal and War Woman—fell apart like wet paper under his blows. Hundreds of them, gone in an instant, their bodies bursting apart in showers of green ichor.
"No!"
"My babies!"
"Stop, Superman! You can't do this! I'll report you to the Insect and Arthropod Preservation Society!"
Doctor Seismic clutched his head and howled as his beloved monsters were wiped out before his eyes, screaming like a man whose heart had just been ripped out.
The man in the black battlesuit didn't so much as glance at him. He just kept killing everything that stood in his way.
"Superman, wait—these Subterraneans… they seem intelligent," War Woman shouted from where she was bound to the cross beside the others. "They could be reasoned with. Maybe they were just tricked by Seismic, maybe—"
CRACK!
The black-clad figure ignored her, tearing through every single one of the Subterraneans without hesitation. When their bodies burst apart, glowing magma poured from them, spilling across the floor until the whole underground palace burned with molten light.
War Woman's throat locked. She couldn't get another word out.
"Doesn't anyone else think… this Superman feels off?" the Immortal asked. His eyes narrowed at the man who had never once spoken, never once acknowledged the Guardians or Teen Team, only worked methodically to slaughter every last enemy.
"He's not Superman," War Woman said flatly.
"Facial recognition error. Facial recognition error. Facial recognition error."
Robot's scanners kept trying, but every attempt came back null.
"He's hiding his real face," Robot concluded after a beat.
And still, the killing went on. Less than five minutes later, silence fell. The black-suited Superman stood alone in a pool of blood and molten rock, a grim reaper from hell itself. Both teams stared in frozen shock.
ZZZZZZZT!
Twin beams of Heat Vision cut through the webs holding them. Their bonds snapped and fell.
"…Either way, thank you… Superman," one of the Guardians said at last. Awkward, hesitant. But what else could they call him? That S on his chest was undeniable.
The black-suited figure said nothing. He didn't need to.
"Ruined… it's all ruined!"
Doctor Seismic staggered back into view, raving as he raised his quake gauntlets again. "You destroyed everything I built! I'll bury every last one of you!"
Too slow.
Before he could even trigger the device, the black-suited Superman was there. One strike—and both gauntlets, along with Seismic's arms, were gone.
The villain's world spun. He looked down to see his own body, headless and still standing, white lab coat drenched in blood.
"This… this can't be. I'm dead? Superman killed me?!" His mind reeled in horror. "But Superman doesn't kill…"
That was why villains like him dared taunt Superman in the first place—because the man of steel was safe. Because Superman was good. Because Superman would never cross that line.
But Eden wasn't Superman.
And Eden wasn't good.
Because in this world, "good guys" just ended up with a gun to their head.
Doctor Seismic's life flickered through his mind in an instant, and his last thought was bitter regret: If I'd known Superman could kill, I never would've provoked him.
Thud.
His head hit the floor. One of the world's loudest villains fell silent forever.
"You… you killed him?" Rex stammered. His brain refused to keep up with how fast it all happened.
"You're no Superman," the Immortal growled. "Superman doesn't kill. Not ever."
"Then who the hell are you?" War Woman demanded, eyes locked on the figure in black.
"I'm the one who just saved your lives," the man said at last.
The voice was Eden's.
The silence that followed was deafening.
Eden smirked at their stunned faces, scooping Atom Eve up off the ground. She was battered and barely conscious.
"Hey! What are you doing with her?" Rex barked, stepping forward despite the fact that Eden could snap him like a twig.
"Taking her to a hospital. Twenty-plus fractures, internal bleeding barely contained. You should thank God none of those broken ribs punctured her organs." His X-Ray Vision flickered, confirming the damage, and then his Heat Vision cauterized the wounds.
Rex froze, swallowed hard, and muttered, "…Sorry."
Eden's gaze cut to the Guardians. "And you. If the so-called world's greatest heroes need rescuing every time trouble shows up, maybe you should disband. Let Omni-Man and Superman handle it."
Before leaving, his eyes swept the molten battlefield. "I'll be back in an hour. If there are any leftover eggs or survivors, I'll finish the job. I'm not leaving a single threat alive."
That was Eden—cold, pragmatic, thorough. Only by wiping out every last monster could he guarantee humanity's safety. Only then would Cecil stop calling him for cleanup duty.
"You shouldn't have slaughtered them," the Immortal snapped, striding up to block him. "Those creatures lived here for millions of years before us. And Doctor Seismic should've been arrested, tried, judged. Not executed."
"So you'll take responsibility for the thousands of attacks he caused? For the tens of thousands of people dead?" Eden shot back, voice sharp as a blade. "Or is it just easier to cry foul because you and those things both got long lifespans?"
"I—" The Immortal faltered.
"Listen carefully," Eden said, his voice low, dangerous. "Nobody else gets forever. Only you."
The Immortal's jaw tightened. He stepped aside without another word.
Eden carried Eve away, leaving the Guardians and Teen Team staring after him.
"I don't like him," the Immortal muttered finally.
"Same," War Woman admitted.
"Yeah. Not a fan," Rex added.
"Guy's a total asshole," another hero said.
But Robot spoke up, voice calm and unwavering.
"Regardless of what you feel, my calculations are clear. Every word the black-suited Superman said… was correct."
Silence followed. Both teams stared at Robot, unable to argue.