Life Is But A Game: Emergence 2.20a

Silence hit like a brick to the teeth.

A second ago, they’d been standing there, the aftershock of getting their memories back still rattling in their bones, and then Zeke opened his mouth, and it all crashed. "Where’s Kaldur?"

Robin’s jaw twitched. Kid Flash—Wally—shifted his weight, scanning the empty horizon like Kaldur was about to just pop back in, maybe brushing off his suit like he’d just stepped out to stretch. Any second now, he’d be back, looking at them all like why do you look so confused?

Nothing.

Zeke’s stomach clenched.

Miss Martian pressed two fingers to her temple, the green of her skin looking paler, like something had already scraped through her before she even got deep. Five seconds. That’s all it took.

Her breath hitched. "...Oh."

Zeke’s pulse kicked.

"Oh?"

Oh wasn’t good. Oh was never good. Oh meant problems. Meant something broke, something went sideways, something just got worse.

"What?" His voice came out sharper than he meant, but screw it. He stepped closer, watching her face, how her fingers twitched, like whatever she was pushing into was pushing back.

She parted her lips, then pressed them shut again. Then, finally: "He’s… he’s not here."

Breath uneven. "I can feel him, but… something’s wrong."

The desert stretched wider.

"Define wrong."

Her throat bobbed, golden irises flicking open, wary and wide. “He’s not in control of himself.” A shiver ran through her shoulders. “His thoughts—” A sharp inhale, like a shock, like something bit. “—they’re being manipulated.”

That snapped everything into place before she even finished the sentence.

Zeke’s head shot up. "Queen Bee."

Nobody disagreed.

Robin’s jaw worked tight. "You're sure?"

Zeke exhaled through his nose. "Lemme think. Who else in Bialya is running the ‘brainwash superheroes’ scam? If it ain’t her, I’ll eat my boot."

Robin’s mouth pressed shut.

Zeke flexed his fingers, trying to shake off the weight pressing against his chest. “Kaldur’s already a tank. Slap mind control on top of that, and we’re screwed. We need to move. Now.”

"Hold on." Robin’s voice cut through, sharper now, pulling control back into his hands. "We just got our memories back. We don’t have a full grasp of what’s been happening these last few hours. If we rush in blind, we could make things worse.”

"Yeah?” Zeke shot him a look. “And if we sit around, Kaldur gets turned into Bee’s personal attack dog, and then we gotta deal with him and whatever army she’s got waiting. He’s already compromised. The longer we wait, the worse it gets."

Robin didn’t answer right away. Just stood there, gears turning. 

Good. Let logic sink in.

"Who else can go?" Zeke cut in. "Bee's pheromones work on you." He jerked a thumb in Robin’s direction. "And you." A look at Wally. "And you’re still recovering." His gaze flicked to Troia.

She hadn’t said much. Just stood back, arms crossed, blood still wet across her armor. Her chin lifted at his words, all Amazonian pride, like she was ready to argue.

Then she stepped forward.

her legs wobbled.

Then she caught herself, palm pressing against her stomach, breath hitching like oh, right. Bullet wound.

Zeke’s mouth pressed flat. "Sit down."

Her glare could’ve stripped paint. "Watch your tongue," she bit out.

"Yeah, yeah, later." He was already turning away, dismissing the fight before it could start.

His eyes landed on Superboy. The only one left standing. 

The only one who might be immune. "Alright, Kon—"

Superboy’s eyes flicked toward him, the bare-chest clone’s head tilting just slightly, like he wasn’t sure if Zeke was serious or if he was about to get hit with another one of his weird analogies.

“…You said those G-Gnome things back at Cadmus tried to get in your head, right?” Zeke prompted, rolling a hand like he was speeding up Superboy’s thought process. “And you fought it off?”

Superboy gave a slow nod. “Yeah.”

Zeke clapped his hands together. “Boom. Same deal. Queen Bee’s just running an organic version… y’know, pheromones instead of psychic slugs.”

Superboy’s face did that thing where he processed something for a beat longer than normal, like he was running physical buffering time. Then he nodded, turning toward Robin. “He’s got a point.”

Zeke threw up his hands. “Thank you! See, that’s a guy who gets it.”

Robin looked like he wanted to keep arguing, mouth pulling tight like he was weighing all the reasons why this was a bad idea, but Miss Martian stepped forward, her nod deliberate. “He’s right.”

That sealed it.

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

Fifteen minutes later, Zeke crouched in the dunes, sand gritting in his gloves, staring at the base through the thick desert heat waves curling off the ground.

It wasn’t just some low-rent Bialyan outpost.

Spotlights swept through the dark in overlapping rotations, cutting sharp through the shifting dunes. Guards moved the walls in tight formations, not lazy, not casual—trained, weapons slung but ready. Automated drones cut through the air at measured intervals, their silhouettes throwing jagged-edged shadows across the terrain. Layers of defenses.

This wasn’t a base. This was a fortress.

Zeke let out a slow, deliberate breath. “Wow. If only someone had warned us Bialya was stupid paranoid.”

Superboy’s knuckles popped. “We go through the front.”

Zeke’s head tilted toward him, slow and deliberate. “Right. Love the enthusiasm. Hate the plan.”

Superboy frowned. “I can take it.”

Zeke threw up a hand. “Great, awesome, very cool, except I can’t, dude.”

Superboy’s frown deepened. “You’ve got shields.”

“And I’d like to keep them at 100% integrity,” he shot Conner a narrow-eyed glance, “instead of testing how many bullets I can eat before I tap out.”

Superboy crossed his arms, unimpressed. “So?”

Zeke exhaled hard, rubbing his temples. Not doing this again. Not having another “Superboy decides to tank through enemy fire like a Call of Duty NPC” moment.

“We need to do this quiet," he muttered aloud. "Not ‘cause I care about stealth, but because I don’t feel like playing Dodge the Bullet for forty straight minutes.”

Superboy’s expression barely shifted. “You got a plan?”

Zeke grinned. “I always got a plan.”

Superboy raised an eyebrow. “You gonna share it?”

“Not if you keep talking.”

Superboy squinted.

Zeke clapped him on the shoulder. “Relax, big guy. You’re the muscle. I’m the brains. We’ll be in and out before anyone even—”

A sharp mechanical click sounded beneath Superboy’s foot.

Zeke blinked.

Then blinked again.

Then very slowly turned his head toward Superboy.

Superboy was standing exactly where he had been ten seconds ago—only now one foot was pressing down on a live landmine.

Zeke inhaled sharply through his teeth. “You have no idea how much I wish I could hate you right now.”

Superboy’s jaw tensed, eyes flicking down. “It hasn’t gone off.”

“Yet.”

Superboy lifted his foot slightly—

Zeke lunged forward and shoved him back, just as the mine popped up from the sand with a metallic thunk, primed to explode.

Zeke didn’t think.

His hands snapped forward, glowing hot with energy.

“MANA BOLT!”

The blast slammed into the mine mid-air, detonating it away from them in a fiery explosion.

Sand and debris rained down, the shockwave rippling through the ground, and Zeke staggered back, coughing as the dust settled. The siren blared through the night, piercing and immediate.

Zeke pressed both hands against his temples and inhaled, like he was trying to absorb patience from the surrounding air.

Superboy dusted himself off. “Not my fault.”

Zeke hissed between his teeth.

Up on the towers, floodlights flicked on, sweeping toward their position. Guards were already shouting, rifles rising, boots pounding against steel walkways. He had maybe thirty seconds before things got worse.

Zeke’s eye twitched. “You,” he snapped, pointing an accusing finger, “do not step on things unless I say so, big guy! That’s the whole deal!”

Superboy huffed, still 100% unbothered. “I can take a landmine.”

Zeke flung his arms out. “And I CAN’T. You know what I become when a landmine goes off? A RED-TINTED MEMORY.”

Above them: bolts slid into chambers.

Superboy’s expression did not shift. “Okay, yeah, that’s a problem.”

Oh, now it’s a problem?

“Shut up, shut up, shut up—” Zeke’s eyes snapped toward the nearest tower guard just as the guy locked on, rifle already half-raised. No time.

Zeke moved first. “Mana Bolt!” Blue-hot energy lanced from his palm, cracking against the guy’s chest like a cannon shot. The guard hit the wall with an audible crack, his rifle knocked loose, spinning—

Superboy caught the gun midair and hurled it like a javelin into the next guy’s torso. The impact folded the guy clean over the railing.

And then it all exploded.

Spotlights converged on them, the air splitting with voices shouting orders, weapons clicking ready. Zeke barely had time to throw up his shield before bullets started flying.

Superboy squared his stance, rolling his shoulders, completely unfazed. “Forget the stealth.”

Zeke exhaled through his nose, slow and deliberate, already bracing for what came next. "You already did."

Superboy didn’t wait. He never did. No hesitation, no second-guessing, just movement—pure forward momentum as he shot across the sand in a blur of muscle and intent, closing the gap before the soldiers even registered what was happening. The first guy had time to blink before Superboy’s fist folded him in half, sending him airborne in a brutal arc, limbs flailing like a ragdoll caught in a hurricane. Dude…
The second soldier had half a thought to run, boots scraping against the sand, before a hand fisted in the back of his vest and launched him with all the care of someone throwing out last night’s trash. He hit the dune hard, rolling bonelessly down the slope before stopping in a heap.

Zeke sighed, stretching his fingers, energy crackling just beneath his skin, itching to be used. “Welp,” he muttered, letting out a breath, tilting his head from side to side as mana curled warm against his palms. “Might as well make it fun.”

And with that, he moved.

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

By the time they reached the entrance, the alarms were screaming, their mechanical shriek cutting through the air in sharp, grating waves. The entire base was on high alert now, security fully locked in. No hesitation, no confusion—just immediate engagement, soldiers moving into coordinated positions, commands snapping sharp through radio chatter as boots thundered against concrete.

Superboy punched through the reinforced doors without breaking stride, metal crumpling under his knuckles like it was paper-thin. The door screeched as it ripped from its hinges, warping before it crashed onto the floor with a hollow, echoing clang.

Zeke stepped over the twisted wreckage, his head tilting just slightly, mouth curling into a dry smirk. "Yeah. Sure. Real subtle."

Superboy barely glanced back. “You wanted quiet. I wanted in.”

Zeke didn’t bother arguing. No point. 

Instead, he bolted for the nearest terminal, fingers flying across the screen, dragging files, flipping between camera feeds, processing information at breakneck speed. The security footage flickered through different angles, walls of pixelated gray and dull orange lighting flashing by in fast succession. Soldiers moving one floor above, positioning fast, tightening formation, but not moving in. They weren’t rushing to intercept.

Zeke barely spared them a thought. He wasn’t looking for them. He was looking for one person.

There.

Sublevel. Large chamber. Not alone.

His jaw locked. “Found him.”

Superboy stepped closer, watching the screen. “Where?”

Zeke jerked his head toward the hall. "Sublevel. Move."

They covered ground fast, their movements sharp and precise, a contrast of destruction and control. Superboy plowed through whatever idiot got in their way—soldiers folding under impact, hitting walls, crumpling to the ground in groaning heaps—while Zeke flicked between barriers and counterattacks, shield flaring up just long enough to deflect gunfire before dropping again, his mana levels ticking lower every time a bullet came too close.

The walls blurred past, concrete corridors stretching in endless lines of dim orange and steel gray, shadows twisting in the overhead fluorescents. The deeper they went, the heavier the air sat in his chest, something dense pressing against his ribs like the walls were closing in. Zeke wasn’t claustrophobic, but something about this place—the recycled air, the way sound sat wrong, how the temperature didn’t match the desert heat outside—it felt like it was folding inward, trapping them inside.

Superboy moved ahead of him, posture squared, weight shifting like he expected something around every turn. And he wasn’t wrong. Zeke could hear the guards shifting above, the boots, the chatter, the sudden silence when they passed certain points.

They weren’t engaging.

They were guiding.

This is a trap.

Didn’t matter. They weren’t stopping.

The hall widened as they took the last turn, opening up into a chamber too large for its position in the compound, lined with towering pillars that made it feel more like a throne room than a bunker.

Zeke stopped dead.

Queen Bee stood at the center of it all, poised like she owned the air they were breathing, golden eyes half-lidded, posture perfectly lazy, a ghost of a smirk settling on lips that weren’t quite curved enough to be called a smile.

Behind her, Aqualad stood motionless. The dark-skinned Atlantean wasn’t restrained or shackled. Just standing.

His waterbearers were still strapped in place, but his expression was wrong—a blank slate, void of recognition, void of anything.

Zeke’s stomach twisted.

Queen Bee watched them the way a cat watched a mouse that hadn’t realized it was already in the trap.

“Genesis,” she said smoothly, stretching out the syllables, each one carefully shaped, perfectly placed, like she was savoring the taste of his name. “You are a most intriguing child.”

Zeke didn’t blink. “You done?” Observe.

Queen Bee Lv 13 

Royal Pain in the Beehind

A narcissistic ruler with the power to literally make people fall head over heels for her (as long as they're into women), this self-styled monarch runs Bialya through a mix of mind control, propaganda that would make Rhelasia blush, and good old-fashioned tyranny. She's basically what would happen if you combined a beauty pageant winner with a dictator and threw in some discount supervillain powers for good measure. For someone who claims to run a constitutional monarchy, she sure has an interesting definition of "constitutional."

The flicker was small, barely there, but he caught it—the half-second shift in her brows, the quick flick of her gaze. She was used to reaction. To people flinching, leaning in, engaging. The fact that he didn’t?

That pissed her off.

She covered it quick, smile smoothing out, voice settling into its usual honey-drenched lilt, but it was there now, woven beneath the surface, curling around the edges of her words like a new puzzle she hadn’t expected to solve tonight.

“Oh, now this is interesting.” She tilted her head just slightly, blonde hair slipping over one shoulder, gaze gleaming as she considered him anew. “Not even a flicker?”

Zeke let his head tilt just slightly, arms loose at his sides, every inch of him radiating casual boredom. “Maybe you’re losing your touch.”

Superboy was tensed beside him. Not moving yet—smart. He was waiting. Waiting for the moment she tried something.

Queen Bee only smiled, shifting just enough to rest her chin in her palm. "Or perhaps," she mused, voice rolling out slow and warm, smooth as honey, "you are not so different from me." Her golden eyes gleamed in the dim light, studying him like he was some rare insect pinned beneath glass. "Immune, yes... but still so eager to dominate. I can see it in your eyes."

Zeke’s gaze didn’t waver. “You don’t see anything.”

Superboy moved.

The crack of the floor breaking under his feet was Zeke’s only warning before the room exploded into motion, Superboy launching forward, fist cocked back, about to take her head clean off—

The doors slammed open.

Zeke’s brain barely had time to register two massive figures entering the room before they were already swinging.

The Kobra Venom soldiers hit like a wrecking ball made of human muscle, their sheer bulk warping the air around them, their eyes glowing that sickly, unnatural hue that set off every alarm in Zeke’s brain. They weren’t just big. They were enhanced.

Superboy barely had time to pivot before the first one slammed into him like a runaway truck, catching him mid-air and driving him straight into the ground. The impact sent spiderweb cracks through the floor, a shockwave kicking dust into the air.

Zeke spun on instinct, just barely ducking as something whipped past his throat. His breath stuck in his chest.

“Jee—SUS.”

His heart kicked into overdrive.

Aqualad was already on him. Moving too fast, too precise, too mechanical. No hesitation, no restraint. Just pure attack.

Zeke barely rolled out of the way before the next strike came, his mind scrambling to keep up.

He’s not holding back.

Another lash of water snapped toward him, slicing through the air with lethal precision. He barely managed to throw up a mana shield, the impact slamming into his ribs hard enough to rattle his bones.

Above the chaos, Queen Bee’s voice slid through the air, smooth and weightless. "Hurt him.”

The moment the words left her lips, Aqualad’s attacks redoubled.

Zeke gritted his teeth. "Oh, screw this."

He planted his foot and launched forward, dodging another whip of water as he closed the gap. If Kaldur was all offense, no hesitation, then the only way to survive this fight was to change the pace.

Aqualad feinted left, then twisted, his arm snapping out faster than Zeke expected—

Shit.

The water whip coiled around his wrist, yanking him off balance, and in the same breath, Aqualad’s free fist snapped forward.

Zeke barely managed to throw up a last-second barrier, but the punch still connected, sending him skidding backward across the floor, boots scraping against the stone.

Pain lit up his arm like a live wire, but he wasn’t down yet. He spat blood, shaking his head, planting his feet. “Kaldur, boss man, honorable leader,” he gritted out, voice raw. “I know you’re in there, man.”

No response.

Queen Bee’s laughter curled through the air like perfume in a locked room.

“Oh, dear. You think talking will bring him back?” She leaned back, golden eyes half-lidded, voice thick with amusement. “He is mine, Genesis. His body, his mind, his loyalty.” Her gaze flicked toward Superboy, who was still grappling with the Kobra Venom soldiers, locked in a battle of sheer brute force. “You may break him," she mused, voice slow, considering. "But he will never betray me.”

Zeke’s jaw locked.

“Cool story,” he muttered. “Try telling it without the mind control next time.”

And then he moved.

The second Aqualad struck out again, Zeke stepped into it, letting the water lash past him—

And dropped low, slamming his fist into Aqualad’s stomach.

It wasn’t enough to take him down, not even close, but it made him stumble, his body reacting on instinct, even if his mind wasn’t.

Zeke sucked in a breath, centering himself.

Kaldur was stronger. Faster. Better trained.

But Zeke had something else.

“Mana Impact!”