Word Soul: DARKSEID Chapter 1: Reborn to Burn.(Weekend Limited Series)

(I know y'all waiting for that Anodite update...and it's coming. Just stuck on some research.

That aside, here's this weekend's short fic. Expect 5 chapters over the next few hours. And then...you tell me whether you want it to continue or not.

Oh, and check out Undead Unluck Anime if you haven't already. The story gets sooo good and the MC's undead/Super Extremely broken Regeneration powers are awesome. Awesome enough to perhaps warrant a fic.

Anyway...enjoy.)

-0-

Arc 1: Word Soul Slave.
Chapter 1: Reborn to Burn.

(??? P.O.V)

He woke choking on smoke.

Ash caked his throat, thick as tar. His skin felt flayed, raw from the furnace-breath of Apokalips. Heat pulsed through the air like a living thing, pressing against his lungs with every breath. It wasn’t fire—not yet—just the promise of it.

-A predator coils in the dark. Watching. Always watching-

The ground beneath him was uneven, fused into jagged black glass from millenia of flame. Around him, the cavernous chamber stretched into shadow, its ceiling lost in a swirling haze of embers and exhaust. Great iron pillars, pitted with corrosion, rose like the ribs of some long-dead beast, supporting nothing but the weight of despair.

He was already on his knees. Everyone was.

-Humans. Aliens. Creatures that defy common sense. You're not home anymore.-

A horn blared from somewhere above-guttural like a dying machine gasping its last.

Rows of hunched bodies stirred in response, their movements synchronized by exhaustion and fear.

He watched as they lifted giant fans—rusted metal slabs the size of doors, edges warped from heat—and swung them forward in a steady, merciless rhythm.

The flames ahead roared in answer, surging up from the pits like serpents of living light. The air shimmered with distortion, and for a heartbeat, he thought he saw faces in the fire—screaming, melting, reforming. He flinched.

The overseer’s lash cracked beside his ear, carving the air with a sound like splitting flesh.

"Move or burn!" the Parademon snarled, saliva dripping from its jagged maw.

-Slaves. That's what they all are. Including you. Survive.-

So he moved.

The fan was heavier than it looked. The handle was cold metal, but the edges were melted, reshaped by careless hands. It had clearly belonged to the original owner of the body he now inhabited— he doubted they needed it wherever they were.

-Mind broke. Soul Devoured. Absorbed. By you.-

His arms shook as he lifted it, muscles screaming in protest.

He didn’t remember how he got here. Not clearly. There had been... death? Or something close. A hospital bed. A gunshot. The scent of antiseptic and blood. But the memories slipped through his fingers like smoke.

-Apokalips doesn't care where you came from. Just that you serve-

His new body was weak and malnourished, screaming with every swing. The heat was constant, the rhythm brutal. Around him, no one spoke. There were no names. No introductions. Just ash-covered slaves fanning flame for a god who never looked down.

-Time means nothing here. Just the next swing. And the next-

Then—

"Look out!!"

The scream hit first—high and desperate—followed by the metallic shriek of a hovercart snapping loose from a maintenance lift above.

The cart tumbled down, its anti-grav failing, tons of raw ore spilling from its ruptured belly.

He was slow to lift his head, eyes widening at the rusted underside of the hundred ton metal descending.

No warning. No time.

Just impact.

Except—

"STOP!" he shouted.

The word left his mouth without thought, sharp and full, vibrating in his chest like a struck bell.

Undeniable.

It echoed off the scorched walls, pulsed through the air—and the cart froze.

Midair.

Just above the slaves it would’ve crushed.

Still. Suspended, as if reality itself had flinched.

Gasps rippled through the chamber. A single fan clattered to the ground.

He stood, wide-eyed, staring at what he’d done.

-What did you just do?-

Someone ran. Someone else dropped to their knees in prayer.

Then came the sound he really feared.

Not the cart crashing.

Not the roar of the flames.

But the click of boots. Heavy. Measured. The drone of beating wings.

-Parademons-

He turned, slowly.

"Parademons." His face changed to a grim expression.

Three of them stood there, wings folded tight, plasma rifles already charged and humming. Behind them, a fourth held a leash.

At the end of it was a thing—part machine, part nightmare, its exposed gears clicking as it sniffed the air. Then its glowing optics locked onto him.

-Persecutor Hounds-

No words. Just the clink of shackles hitting the ground.

Then the voice from the lead Parademon: flat and cold.

"Granny wants you."

The leash around his neck was tight enough to bruise but loose enough to remind him.

-You’re not supposed to die yet. Survive.-

They didn’t cuff his hands. They didn’t need to. The Parademons walked ahead and behind like walls of meat and metal, their insectoid eyes scanning for any sign of resistance. One of them dragged the leash lazily over its shoulder, as if hauling trash to the incinerator.

He didn’t ask where they were going.

He knew.

-The Terrorspire.-

'The Terrorspire.' The name rose from a memory not his own.

-Can only share important bits. About to fade. Survive.'-

According to the memories trickling in, Apokalips was made up of sections. And this was the core, where the slaves fanned and provided kindling for the three massive fire pits that powered this abomination of a planet.

Above him, was an endless ceiling of smoke, churning like a storm that never broke.

No streets either—just catwalks bolted over rivers of molten slag, where the desperate and the damned scurried like rats.

But above it all, cutting through the smog like a blade and standing prominent was the Terrorspire—Granny Goodness’s stronghold.

Half prison warden office, half torture and interrogation chapel, all hell.

They marched him through gates lined with broken machines—old war drones, their limbs torn off, their cores gutted for scrap. More slaves slumped against the walls, their faces hollow, their eyes reflecting nothing.

Some watched him pass. Most didn’t. One blue scaled kid pointed. His mother pulled his hand back fast and his hissed at him.

-Reptoids. Stringy flesh roasts well-

No one spoke.

The Parademons pushed him through a narrow corridor lit by red pulses in the walls—a slow, rhythmic throb, like a dying heartbeat. The deeper they went, the more the air smelled like burnt nerves and ozone.

Finally, the leash yanked him into a large chamber.

Clean floors. Spotless tools. Hooks on walls. Everything too organized. Too prepared.

-Not good. Survive. SURVIVE-

At the far end, Granny Goodness stood by a table, wiping something dark off a curved metal instrument. Her back was to him.

"Leave us," she said.

The Parademons filed out without a word. The doors shut. Silence, except for the low, alien hum of her Motherbox on the table with a pair large silver War Hammers floating above it.

She turned around.

Short. Broad. Wrinkled like a raisin left in the sun too long—but not frail. There was nothing soft about her. Her eyes were coin-flat. Her smile, empty.

"You stopped the cart," she said.

He didn’t answer.

She crossed the room slowly, the instrument in her hand glinting under the harsh light. It looked like a scalpel, if a scalpel were designed to peel screams from flesh.

"You saved your fellow slaves. That was kind. Brave." Her smile sharpened. "Stupid."

Still, he said nothing.

She walked a slow circle around him, measuring his posture, his silence. "It’s always the quiet ones who break the rules of reality. Why is that, I wonder?"

She stopped behind him.

Click.

Cold metal pressed against his spine.

The tip of the instrument.

"Speak, slave" she said. "How did you do it?"

"I don’t know," he muttered.

Wrong answer.

Pain stabbed into his back. Not deep—not yet—but sharp and hot, like metal fresh from the forge. He jerked. She pressed harder.

"Try again."

"I said STOP. That’s it. I just said stop."

"Hm," she whispered. "Fascinating."

She moved to the table, traded the tool for a larger one—something between a cleaver and a branding iron.

"You didn’t use a Motherbox. You didn’t channel the Source. You just...spoke. And matter obeyed."

She grinned.

"That’s dangerous."

He swallowed. His legs wanted to shake, but he locked his knees. He wasn’t giving her that.

"What are you going to do?" he asked.

"Teach you what happens to dangerous things," she said sweetly.

Then she swung.