Justice League!

Wayne Manor, the Batcave.

Bruce sat before the main console.

Data raced across the screen.

"Master Bruce." Alfred approached with a cup of hot tea. He glanced at the screen, his brow furrowing. "Public opinion has taken a strange turn. Someone is pouring enormous resources into promoting that... Tyrant."

Bruce's fingers flew over the keyboard.

"It's Lex," Bruce said coldly. "But why?"

"Has Luthor gone mad?" Clark's weak voice came from the Medical Pod.

"He hasn't. The only explanation is that Luthor is being controlled." Bruce stopped typing. "It seems Chu Men can do more than destroy bodies. He can also... control minds."

Bruce swiveled his chair toward Clark in the Medical Pod.

"We're no longer dealing with a mere brute."

Boom!

Thunder cracked above the manor.

The monitors gave a short warning beep.

Bruce immediately pulled up the feed from the manor gates.

Through the driving rain, a black motorcycle tore across the screen and stopped outside Wayne Manor's towering iron gates.

A tall figure dismounted.

Bruce watched the feed, and his clenched jaw finally eased a fraction.

"Alfred." Bruce stood. "Open the gates. Our ally is here."

The lift platform descended into the Batcave with a dull mechanical grind, carrying Diana, soaked in cold rain.

She yanked off her baseball cap and tossed it onto a nearby lab bench, then unzipped her coat. Beneath it, her red-and-blue armor reflected the console's cold light.

Bruce turned his chair toward her, fingers interlaced beneath his chin. The screen lit his expressionless face.

"You saw it," Bruce said, his voice flat.

"I did." Diana walked up to the console and planted a hand on its metal surface, leaving a spreading patch of water. "A one-sided slaughter. LexCorp's cutting-edge weapons were scrap metal against him. His body is tougher than an armored vehicle."

She paused for two seconds and looked at Bruce, her eyes grave.

"Don't bother looking for a weakness. I used divine perception. There's nothing in the direction of the Iceberg Lounge."

The corner of Bruce's eye twitched.

"Even a true god of Olympus would be crushed by his bare fists." Diana straightened, resting a hand on the Magic-Breaker dagger at her waist. "My blade might not cut through that invisible force field. And even if it did, I couldn't withstand a single blow from him."

"Cough..."

Diana whipped around.

A faint but steady blue glow of solar energy appeared.

Clark emerged from the shadows, bare-chested, a cold metal brace fixed across his chest.

"You should be lying down," Bruce said.

"We don't have that luxury." Clark's voice was hoarse. His hands curled into fists.

"You'd die out there too." Bruce turned back and tapped the keyboard.

The main screen split into hundreds of smaller windows.

Every one showed Chu Men hovering high above the ground, dark red beams shooting from his eyes.

Comments raced beneath the footage, messages in countless languages overlapping.

"Look at this." Bruce brought up several photos of East End alleys. "Homeless people are kneeling before graffiti of him and praying. Thousands of communities have sprung up online. They're calling that massacre 'divine punishment.'"

Bruce pressed Enter. The screen switched to a replay of Luthor's televised address to the world.

"Lex Luthor spent a billion dollars buying front-page coverage from every major media outlet in America." Bruce pointed at Luthor's fervent face on the screen. "He's turned a tyrant into a savior who purges evil. To people at the bottom, Chu Men is a god now."

Diana stared at the fervent messages from his followers, her face darkening. "Has Luthor gone mad? His own army was wiped out! He's promoting the man who killed them?"

"Luthor hasn't gone mad." Bruce pulled up blurry long-range surveillance footage from outside the Iceberg Lounge.

In the footage, Luthor lay in the muddy water, kissing Chu Men's boots.

"Luthor has been enslaved," Bruce said, his voice icy.

"What do we do now?" Diana released her sword hilt and clenched her fists.

"The war has only just begun." Bruce pushed the keyboard aside and pressed a hidden red button, his face cold.

Two files appeared in midair.

On the left, a red-and-yellow streak of lightning raced through the streets of Central City, moving so fast the cameras caught only an afterimage. Space around it seemed to warp.

On the right, a heavily tattooed, powerfully built man wielded a trident, stirring furious currents in the deep sea. With a casual swing, he smashed through the hull of a nuclear submarine.

"Barry Allen. Superhuman speed. Arthur Curry. Superhuman strength and control over water."

Bruce stood and looked from Clark to Diana. "I have a plan."

"You're building an army?" Diana saw through him at once.

"An alliance." Bruce's voice was ice, his decision absolute. "Find everyone on Earth who's breathing and has a special ability, then bring them aboard. It's our only chance."

Clark had kept his eyes fixed on Chu Men's indifferent face on the screen.

Rip.

He tore the life-support lines connecting his chest to the Medical Pod free.

"Clark!" Diana stepped forward.

"Bruce." Ignoring Diana, Clark turned to Batman. "Look after Lois for me."

"Where are you going?" Bruce frowned, his hand moving to the Utility Belt at his waist.

"You can't heal me here." Clark looked up at the cavern ceiling. "I'm going to space. The sun can give me an answer."

Before he finished speaking, Clark bent his knees and launched himself upward.

Boom!

Clark became a streak of light and smashed through the rock ceiling.

Bruce looked up at the gaping hole, the corner of his eye twitching.

The blue streak burst through the thick storm clouds and shot straight toward the depths of space.

Bruce turned to Diana. "We split up. Find that speedster kid in Central City. I'll go to the Port of Mercy."

At the same time.

Fifty meters underground, in the A.R.G.U.S. command center.

The large screen was playing restored high-definition footage of Chu Men slaughtering Lex's private army.

It was the version Luthor's Public Relations Department had just pushed across the internet, clear enough to show the mocking curve of Chu Men's mouth as he sliced open an armored vehicle.

Amanda Waller stared at the screen. The pen in her hand had bent under her grip.