"So the situation is basically this situation, and what exactly the situation is depends on the situation…"
While Joey was using his heat vision to carve a path underground, he also took a moment to briefly explain the situation to everyone—what exactly this sudden Superman was about, and some basics about parallel universes.
Batman, Superman, and this Watchtower were basically the only remaining parts of their universe. At least, that was all that had come out of the fragments spat out by Barbatos.
However, Joey still left out Barbatos and the Dark Multiverse.
The idea that their universe was merely a nightmare projection of higher realms—that everything they knew would inevitably collapse into ruin from the moment of its birth—was not something he thought everyone could accept.
After finishing his explanation, Joey suddenly remembered something important:
"One more thing—Cyborg. I've been watching you. You've been staring at Batman this whole time. Let me give you a warning: no matter how curious you are, be polite, and don't ask him anything!"
Joey didn't need to think to know Cyborg was curious about the younger Batman of this parallel universe. After all, in their own universe, Cyborg had dealt with the old Batman plenty of times, and they had something like a strange working relationship.
To prevent him from immediately asking something like 'Why are you so much younger than our Batman?'—a very impolite question—Joey had to shut that curiosity down in advance.
In reality, aside from Cyborg, no one cared much about Batman. Wonder Woman, Aquaman, and Starfire had never even really known what Gotham City was before.
Cyborg, however, was genuinely curious about this Batman who was so different from the old one.
Perhaps because his attention was split across rescue operations and dealing with Billy, the drone system lagged for a moment—and Cyborg blurted out:
"Oh, why?"
Batman frowned almost imperceptibly—not because the conversation suddenly involved him, but because this universe's Superman was strange.
For example, the corpse he was carrying still had a kryptonite bullet lodged in its skull, constantly emitting radiation, and yet the man carrying it acted as if nothing was wrong.
Or the fact that this Superman clearly knew things beyond the scope of this world, and his gaze was wrong.
If eyes were windows to the soul, then this Superman's eyes were more like a mirror from the past—Bruce could directly see his former self reflected in them.
Although the man's calm demeanor carried no obvious sense of danger, beneath that calm surface was a very clear desire for revenge and violent impulse. It resembled PTSD far too closely—too similar to his own past self.
This was a Superman completely different from the boy scout Clark he once knew. Or perhaps… had his Clark been like this at this age?
Bruce mentally raised the priority of investigating this Superman's origin to second place.
If this had been the Superman he originally encountered, he would never have so easily trusted him over years of fighting side by side, and things would not have deteriorated to this point.
If he had realized earlier that the Clark Kent he trusted was already gone, he would have been more decisive—more willing to take away his ability to harm others.
If he had done that, at least Barry and Diana would still be alive, and Gotham would not have been dragged into this ruined state…
"We're almost there."
Joey saw the buried Watchtower up ahead and interrupted Batman's self-reflection. He turned to the two most important people present:
"Batman, you don't have to come. I promise we'll give them a proper burial."
"And Diana—are you sure you want to go?"
Joey's idea for dealing with the corpses was actually nothing new: simply dump them into the remaining Justice League Watchtower.
Although the Watchtower had long been viewed by readers and various supervillains as something like a public restroom—coming and going as they pleased—it was indeed a high-tech fortress built with cutting-edge technology from across the world.
In that universe, the Justice League had already defeated many powerful enemies such as General Zod, Darkseid, Doomsday, and Brainiac. The technological foundation of the Watchtower had long surpassed the native heroes of this world.
To put it bluntly, it was a considerable inheritance.
Joey didn't want to sound like a morally corrupt scavenger profiting from the dead, but he didn't have the luxury of time. The Kryptonians were coming, and he needed the Watchtower—immediately.
He would still have to keep an eye on the old Batman anyway, so watching over the Watchtower at the same time wasn't much extra trouble. For now, it would have to serve as a storage site for the Kryptonian corpse… probably.
Well, that was definitely not an ideal choice, but Joey didn't have many options left. At the very least, storing it in the Watchtower was safer than leaving it in the Fortress of Solitude at the North Pole.
A Kryptonian Fortress of Solitude plus the corpse of a dead, evil version of Superman—that combination would almost certainly lead to disaster.
Of course, all of this depended on whether the original owner of the Watchtower agreed.
Batman, at least, had already given his consent. As for the others—aside from Superman—they had no real say anyway.
Their immediate priority was to ensure these fallen heroes could be laid to rest with dignity.
"No. I've already granted you most of the Watchtower's access permissions. You can store Clark's body in cell E-3 on the third level. That chamber can be set to red-sunlight mode. As for them…"
When speaking of his comrades who had died at the hands of Superman, Batman's expression beneath the cowl was disturbingly calm, even as crushing guilt weighed on him.
"Leave it to me. I'll bury them myself."
Batman felt that it was his own excessive emotional attachment to Clark that had led to this tragedy—and caused him to cross a line he had always refused to cross.
Joey reached out and patted Batman on the shoulder.
"This isn't your fault."
Wonder Woman had also now realized that when Superman said "I killed you once," it was not nonsense.
That Superman had indeed killed another version of her before she arrived.
But she still chose to come here.
She showed Batman the two drachmas wrapped in her hands, believing she should give that Amazonian sister from another world a return to her homeland.
"She died bravely in the way of an Amazon. If you agree, I can take her back to our world and bury her on Themyscira."
In ancient Greek tradition, two drachmas were placed over the eyes of the dead as payment for passage. They were meant to bribe Charon, the ferryman of the River Styx, so the deceased could cross safely into the underworld.
Wonder Woman had prepared these two drachmas at the outbreak of the war, but after Joey forcibly ended it, she had believed they would no longer be needed.
She hadn't expected that she would still use them today. That realization left her with a complicated feeling.
If Joey had not stopped her and the war with Aquaman had continued, she might have eventually used them anyway.
Batman stared at the coins for a long time. After a long internal struggle, he finally nodded.
He had to admit that for his Diana, Themyscira was a far more fitting resting place than Gotham.
While wandering Gotham's shadows the night before, he had realized that this city was still as chaotic and lawless as his own—if not worse.
Diana should not be buried in a place like this.
"Wait!"
Starfire suddenly sensed something unusual with her Tamaranean sensitivity to emotion.
She grabbed Joey's red cloak tightly, pulling with enough force to nearly topple him as he was discussing burial arrangements with the others.
"That Thanagarian—she's still alive!"