"Ugh."
Harley Quinn looked up at the two figures racing through the sky and frowned. "So, what exactly am I supposed to feel right now?"
"Whatever you want," Deadshot replied flatly, "but you'd better pray that missile does not fall. If that thing is nuclear, we are all finished along with Black Spider."
"I am not going to hell," Harley scoffed, sticking out her tongue at him. "You people will go to hell. A loving woman like me would never be abandoned by God."
Deadshot gave her a cold look. "This is the first time I have ever heard someone like you talk about having a heart."
"Of course I do," Harley said with a grin. "It just belongs to my little pudding and the kittens I like."
High above the city, Adrian flew straight toward the missile descending at a terrifying speed, well over Mach 10. A sharp explosion echoed through the air as he pressed himself against the outer shell. Using the power of the Homelander template combined with the biological field inherited from Doomsday, he forced the missile's movement under his control.
The moment he stabilized it, Adrian grabbed the missile with both hands and turned, flying back in the direction it had been launched from.
Whoosh.
Clark arrived a second later, moving at full speed.
The two of them tore through the sky side by side, both moving faster than sound.
"Adrian!"
Clark saw him gripping the missile and flying forward instead of upward. A sudden, terrible feeling rose in his chest.
"Where are you going? If you want to destroy it, just push it out of the atmosphere!"
Adrian only gave him a cold glance and continued to accelerate.
"I do not like accepting gifts for no reason," he said calmly while cutting through the air at incredible speed. "If someone sends me a present, it is only fair that I return it the same way."
The American government had sent a missile armed with a nuclear warhead. Adrian saw no reason not to send it back exactly as it came and let them experience the consequences themselves.
"No!" Clark surged forward to block him. "If that missile falls into a populated area, thousands of people will die!"
"You are always like this, Clark," Adrian said, his voice filled with contempt. "This is war. Why do you still think like someone who refuses to face reality?"
"It is not war. This can still be resolved!"
Clark's voice grew urgent. "People fear us because they do not understand us. If we show them what we have done for this world, the doubts will disappear. Just believe in them a little more. Believe in people."
Adrian shook his head slowly. "I am not you, Clark. I believe in something simpler. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth."
The next second, he struck.
Clark had no time to react. The punch sent him spinning downward through the air.
With Clark out of the way, Adrian tightened his grip and hurled the missile forward with all his strength.
The weapon shot away like a streak of light, heading directly toward the launch base in Washington.
Adrian stopped midair and watched calmly as the city below approached destruction.
At the last moment, a beam of light cut through the sky.
Clark caught the missile.
Roaring with effort, he pushed it upward with everything he had. The blazing trail behind it carved a bright scar across the sky.
Adrian watched silently as Clark forced the missile into space. He did not try to stop him. He only turned his eyes toward the distant White House, his expression cold and unreadable.
Inside the White House, officials stared at the monitors in absolute silence. When they saw Clark send the missile out of Earth's atmosphere, several of them finally exhaled in relief.
The man who had spoken to Adrian earlier was trembling. His hair was streaked with gray and his voice shook.
"If nuclear weapons cannot deal with them… then what can?"
A blinding flash erupted in the sky.
The nuclear warhead detonated in space.
Hope returned to his eyes for a brief second. Perhaps the explosion had worked after all.
Then the satellite feed zoomed in.
Clark floated in space, staring silently at Earth, completely unharmed.
The hope in the room died instantly.
Back on Earth, pain exploded through Captain Boomerang's body.
"Ugh!"
Electric light crackled around him as more than a thousand volts surged through his body. He was strapped to a bed inside Metropolis Central Hospital while doctors desperately tried to destroy the bomb implanted in his head.
An ordinary person would have died instantly. But his body was far stronger than normal, and he forced himself to endure.
As long as the bomb was removed, the pain meant nothing.
"Ahhh!"
He had tried to stay silent, but the moment the current surged through his skull, he could not hold back the scream.
"Sir… are you alright?" the doctor asked nervously.
"No, I am not alright!" Boomerang shouted. "Why do you not try being electrocuted yourself?"
He had believed the surgeons had a real plan. Instead, their idea was simply to overload the bomb with electricity and hope it failed.
The current rose from two hundred volts to five hundred, then to a thousand. His hair stood straight up, his muscles trembling violently.
"If it does not work, keep increasing it," he snarled through clenched teeth. "I can still take it."
The doctor swallowed and adjusted the controls.
"Ahhhh!"
A terrible pressure suddenly built inside his head. It felt like something inside his skull was trying to tear its way out.
He clutched his head and screamed again.
Then everything went white.
Boom.
In front of the stunned doctors, Captain Boomerang's head exploded.
The ward filled with a blinding light as the explosion spread outward in an instant. The doctors closest to him were reduced to dust before they could even react.
The entire room was destroyed. The shockwave tore through the hospital corridors, smashing walls, shattering windows, and throwing patients and nurses across the floor.
On the second floor, Lana had been sitting beside Jonathan's bed, exhausted after hours of watching over him. The sudden tremor shook the entire building, followed by a deafening explosion from below.
She barely had time to steady herself before flames and pressure rushed toward the ward.
Her eyes widened in disbelief.
Without thinking, she threw herself in front of Jonathan, trying to shield him with her own body.
The shockwave rushed toward them.
Lana closed her eyes in despair.
At that exact moment, a figure appeared in front of her. Strong arms wrapped around her waist while Jonathan was lifted effortlessly from the bed.
The three of them vanished an instant before the explosion consumed the room.
Not far from the hospital, people at an outdoor coffee shop were chatting quietly when the blast hit. The shockwave knocked chairs and tables across the pavement, and several customers were thrown to the ground.
They looked up in horror.
The hospital had turned into a sea of fire.
"Oh my God, the hospital exploded!"
"Call the police! Call an ambulance!"
People ran in every direction while others stood frozen, staring at the flames rising into the sky.
Deep inside a hidden government command center, Amanda Waller stared silently at the screen in front of her.
A red dot blinked on the display.
That dot marked the explosion.
The system confirmed that two bombs implanted in Task Force X members had detonated.
"So even I was used," she said quietly, her voice filled with cold anger. "I never pressed the detonation command. Yet the bombs exploded anyway, and the power was enough to destroy an entire building."
She turned slowly and faced the entire room.
"You planted stronger bombs without telling me. You sent them close to Superman and Adrian, planning to use those bombs to control them. That was the real plan, was it not?"
Her gaze swept across the silent staff members.
"You have started something you cannot control," she continued. "This is not an operation anymore. This is the beginning of a war."