[Dwemer] 4 – Escape Part 2

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One by one, the three men and the dwemer slowly awoke in their new prison, surrounded by the strange monsters and the unknown humanoid in white, with the symbol 'S' emblazoned in gold on their chest.

"You...what do you want?! Quit staring! You're creeping me out!" Kid Flash shouted from his tube as he struggled against his constraints.

"Uh, KF? How about we not tick off the guy that can who can fry us with just a look?" Robin tried to calm Kid Flash down.

"We only sought to help you," Aqualad spoke, trying to be diplomatic, only to be interrupted by Kid Flash, who jumped in, "Yeah! We freed you, and you turned on us! How's that for gratituted."

"Kid, please, quiet now. I believe our new friend was not in full control of his actions." Aqualad tried to calm Kid Flash down.

Suddenly, the man in white spoke, "What if I...What if I wasn't?" 

"He can talk?!" Kid Flash shouted in surprise.

"Yes, he can," the man in white replied angrily, insulted.

Before Kid Flash could say anything more, Aqualad spoke, "The Genomorphs taught you telepathically, correct?"

"They taught me much," the man in white nodded, "I can read and write. I know the names of things."

"But have you seen them?" Robin suddenly asked, with a lower tone of voice.

"Have they ever actually let you see the sky? Or the sun?" Kid Flashed jumped in.

"Images were implanted in my mind, but no. I have never seen the sky or the sun; I have remained here, waiting, learning, and training," the man in white shook his head.

"Do you know what you are? Who you are?" Aqualad asked.

"I am Superboy, a Genomorph clone made from the DNA of Superman. I was created to replace him should he perish...and destroy him if he strayed from the light," 'Superboy' introduced himself.

 “To be like Superman is a worthy aspiration,” Aqualad admitted, “but like Superman, you deserve a life of your own. Beyond that Solar suit, beyond your pod, beyond Cadmus. Superman can do what he does because he’s independent from every nation or organization outside of the league.”

“I live because of Cadmus! It’s my home!” Superboy refuted, mad.

Aqualad shook his head while Kid Flash argued, “You live in a test tube…we can show you the sun, the world outside of Cadmus, who only wants to use you.”

“The sun likely went down, but we can show you the moon,” Robin helpfully jumped in.

“We can introduce you to Superman, let you see for yourself if Cadmus is telling you the truth,” Aqualad offered. 

That’s when the fourth of the group began to stir, their amber eyes whipping across the room as they analyzed their situation.

“I-“ Superboy began, only to be interrupted by the cell’s round door sliding open. 

“They won’t be able to show you anything, activate the cloning procedure, and get that damned weapon back in its pod,” a scientist shouted at a man with a golden helmet by his side.

“How come they get to call him it?” Kid Flash asked. 

Superboy looked between the prisoners and the scientist approaching from behind.

“Help us,” Aqualad pleaded.

“Don’t start thinking now,” the scientist rudely remarked as one of the small horned Genomorphs leaped onto his shoulder.

Before the others could continue, a sudden green wave of power shrouded Superboy’s form, infusing him with boundless courage.

Looking over to his left, Aqualad saw that the unknown ‘elf-like’ man had awoken and cast some kind of spell with a flick of his hand, before summoning countless tentacles that began to thrash against his bindings, tearing at them with superhuman force and fury, before finally the bindings broke, freeing the elf. 

Without any wasted movement, the elf lunged forward, the tentacles coiling against his form and forming a sort of armor around his body as he charged and struck a coiled fist directly into the masked man, sending him flying back as Superboy also charged forward to attack the larger Genomoprhs. 

Unlike the trio of heroes, the two before them struck with lethal force, tentacles piercing through every Genomorph in their way while Superboy’s fist crushed the chest of every Genomorph they punched.

Within a minute of breaking free, the masked man was out cold against the wall with all of the Genomorphs in the room dead or dying. Slowly, the Elf walked toward the scientist and grabbed them by the throat. 

The scientist struggled against the tentacled fist of the elf before suddenly screaming as the elf raised a hand and spoke in a language unknown to all in the room. 

His hand glowed a sickly green as streams of energy flowed out of the scientist’s head and into the elf’s palm. 

Within a few moments, the scientist stopped struggling before collapsing onto the floor, limp and pale, dead.

The elf looked to the heroes and waved his hand, casting some kind of spell that released them from their bindings, and they broke out of their tubes.

“You…what is wrong with you?!” Robin shouted angrily after witnessing the elf kill the doctor.

Seemingly ignoring the heroes, the elf bent over and grabbed a strange-looking vial from the doctor’s lab coat that gave off a faint glow.

“He was a threat. You do not leave a threat to their devices, you end them before they can try or come up with something,” the elf spoke, his voice sounding deep and strange to their ears.

“But, but you didn’t need to do that!” Kid Flash shouted beside Robbin. 

Aqualad shook his head, “He did what was right, the doctor went for something in his pocket after he was grabbed, whatever that vial is,” Aqualad spoke, pointing to the vial now in the elf’s hands. 

“This…serum would have changed him. He believed that it would be enough to survive against all of us; it would be better to eliminate him before he could get the chance to inject it,” the elf spoke harshly, looking down at the cooling corpse at his feet.

“How…how do you know that?” Robin questioned, voice still a bit shaky.

“It was his last thought before I drained the knowledge from his mind with my… patron's spell,” the elf spoke, the tentacles receding back into his body.

“Come, within his mind I discovered the way out of this…lab,” the elf spoke, testing the word on his tongue.

While this all happened, a voice whispered telepathically into the ear of Superman. 

“Thank you, brother. Because of you and your companions…we are finally free. I am directing my kin down into the tunnel network beneath Cadmus, where we will take shelter and…heal,” a voice spoke into Superboy’s mind before fading away. 

“Wait!” Superboy spoke aloud, much to the confusion of everyone around him.

“Do not worr,y brother, we will meet again, you are family,” the voice spoke softly before fading completely from Superboy’s mind.