"Whoa! Barry—you're actually the first one here?" Ben blurted out.
Inside the Justice Mountain conference room, Ben was already seated when Cyborg had just sent the alert. The very next second, the Flash was standing in the room.
Which was shocking, for one simple reason:
Everyone knew the Flash was the fastest man alive—and somehow still late to everything. Especially work.
"Is it weird that I got here first?" Barry didn't catch Ben's meaning at all. He wore a confident grin. "It takes me two seconds to run here from Central City."
"You could've used the Boom Tube like everyone else," Cyborg said calmly, smiling as he helped open a portal for Shazam.
"Not faster than running," Barry insisted, still smug even as the Boom Tube expanded behind him.
Right on cue, Shazam stepped out of the portal, grinning at the room.
"Hey! Bros—looks like I'm not late. Where's everybody else?"
"Okay, I'll go get them," Barry said immediately. For this incident, he seemed more anxious than anyone. Seeing Cyborg's expression and confirming the lack of responses from the others, he volunteered on the spot—and vanished.
After Barry left, Ben and Cyborg turned to Shazam, who was settling into his chair.
"Glad you made it, Billy," Ben said.
Shazam smiled. Being ten years old had its perks—he was thrilled to have an excuse to ditch homework.
Of course… ditching class was only fun occasionally. He still couldn't understand why Ben—who didn't look much older than him—never went to school at all.
"Ben," Billy asked, genuinely curious, "don't you get bored staying in the base all day? We could go to school together."
"No. Absolutely not." Ben's refusal was instant and intense. "I would rather die, jump off Justice Mountain, and shatter every bone in my body than step into a school ever again."
As they talked, a red blur sliced into the room—
And the Flash reappeared, dragging Green Lantern in with him.
Hal Jordan was mid-complaint the moment his boots touched the floor.
"Barry! You can't just grab me like that! I was about to take my pants off—and you yank me here for a meeting?!"
Barry scratched his head, embarrassed, but he didn't look amused. If anything, he looked shaken—like something about this case had hit a nerve.
"Sorry," Barry said quickly. "This might be serious. We need everyone."
Hal frowned. That urgency wasn't normal.
Barry was usually impatient because he was fast—but in a crisis, he was almost always composed. This level of anxiety was new.
"Darkseid again?" Hal asked, eyeing Ben and Cyborg. "Already? It hasn't been that long."
If Darkseid had returned this quickly, Hal would need to call in the Green Lantern Corps.
"No." Ben shook his head.
Hal visibly relaxed—until Ben added, bluntly:
"It's Atlantis."
Hal blinked. "Atlantis? You mean the lost Atlantis? That's… a myth. Are you mixing stories again?"
Ben didn't budge.
"The same Atlantis you're thinking of. Their people just sank a U.S. nuclear submarine. They claim the U.S. struck first—and the sub's missiles are missing."
He summarized what he and Cyborg had confirmed: Atlantean attackers, a torn-open hull, missing ordnance, and evidence of multiple separate fights.
Hal's expression turned serious.
"Okay. That's a problem."
He rubbed his chin. Atlantis came from Poseidon myths, and if that wasn't just folklore, they needed someone fluent in Greek mythology.
"Where's Wonder Woman?"
"Superman's supposedly teaching her how to blend into normal society," Barry called back—already moving. "I'll go find them!"
And he was gone again, leaving only his voice hanging in the air.
"They're not… together, are they?" Shazam asked with wide-eyed curiosity.
Hal ignored him and looked straight at Ben—the one guy in the room who "knew the plot."
"Ben. In the story… who does Superman end up with?"
Ben answered without hesitation.
"In this version, Superman and Wonder Woman do date for a while. But he's supposed to end up with Lois Lane. In other versions, they even have a son."
Now that everyone had accepted Ben's meta-knowledge situation, he'd stopped feeling guilty about spoilers.
Besides, the ending of the original New 52 animated run was a mess anyway—Ben wasn't worried about "damaging canon."
If the world-ending scenario ever hit, Ben trusted the Omnitrix's failsafes. Worst case, it would force a transformation into something like Alien X and rewrite reality.
Hal scanned the room again.
"By the way… where's the bat?"
Cyborg had just finished reading Batman's response.
"He's tracking a case in Gotham. Scarecrow poisoned the city water supply. He says he'll join by video."
Hal's eyes widened in pure offended disbelief.
"F— Batman!"
The imbalance hit him immediately: Barry had yanked Hal out of the middle of flirting, but Batman got to stay home and "call in."
Hal's ring flared green.
"If I'm here, he needs to be here too! Cyborg—open a Boom Tube to Gotham. It's just some psycho. I'll handle it. Nobody misses this meeting—nobody."
Ben laughed and offered a practical tweak.
"Wait for Diana. Borrow her Lasso of Truth. Batman scares Gotham criminals into talking… you can use magic."
…
Join here to read ahead.
In Star Rail, Ultra-Beast Armored — Have I Caught "Equilibrium"? l (Chapter 80)
Uma Musume, But I Only Have Five Years Left to Live (Chapter 80)
Zenless Zone Zero: I'm a Doctor, Not a Bangboo (Chapter 80)
Ben Tennyson Wants to Join the Justice League (Chapter 74)
TYPE-MOON: Redemption Beginning with the Holy Grail War (Chapter20)
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