| Central City - October 3
Hunter Zolomon, also known as Zoom, was a simple man.
His father was a serial killer who murdered his mother and was subsequently killed by police, leaving Hunter obsessed with understanding the criminal mind.
Later in life, he was paralyzed by Gorilla Grodd and begged Wally West to use the Cosmic Treadmill to go back in time and prevent the injury. When Wally refused—citing the dangers of changing the past, something his mentor had told him—Zolomon grew resentful. He felt Wally was arrogant and hadn't endured enough tragedy to truly understand.
Zolomon tried to use the Cosmic Treadmill himself. It exploded, granting him powers: the ability to manipulate time relative to himself, creating the effect of super-speed. He adopted the identity of Zoom to "teach" Wally through pain and suffering, famously causing a tragedy that resulted in Wally's wife, Linda Park, miscarrying their twin children.
But that was all in the timeline before. The inferior Flash, Barry Allen, caused Flashpoint and altered the timeline. Heroes and people who didn't exist in Zolomon's original timeline existed here—like Nova. Ages of some individuals had changed too; for example, Zatanna was older in his previous timeline but a child here.
That's the butterfly effect for you. He couldn't go into the past to change things or into the future to torment a more mature Wally because Barry Allen controlled who could access time via the Speed Force, and he currently refused other Speed Force users that ability.
Whether Barry's refusal was unconscious—after losing memories of the previous timeline due to the new one overwriting it—or whether he somehow retained those memories remained unclear.
Hunter himself was unaffected by those constraints because he'd been imprisoned in Iron Heights in the twenty-fifth century when his mentor ran in with a bullet hole through his head at the hands of an alternate Batman. That mentor dragged Hunter into the present before dying. He arrived when the Force Barrier had been freshly destroyed, allowing him to tap into and gain the Speed Force, Strength Force, and Sage Force.
While disappointed by some timeline changes—Wally being too young and immature, for one—Hunter still found it entertaining to play with their lives until they matured. Unlike his mentor Eobard Thawne, who acted from hatred and jealousy of Barry Allen, Hunter claimed a nobler motive: to "help" heroes by inflicting tragedy on them. He believed heroes who have not endured great loss cannot reach their full potential. So he would bring them pain.
And that is precisely what he did. He watched several buildings in Central City light up in flames—the work of Heat Wave—while Gorilla Grodd and Trickster ran amok, destroying property and killing civilians. Several members of the Flash's future rogue gallery had tapped into the Forces: Heat Wave gained the Sage Force, conjuring flaming skeletons; Trickster received the Strength Force, enhancing his strength; and Grodd—already telepathic—had his telepathy amplified by the Sage Force.
Hunter paid special attention to Grodd, still carrying hatred for the time the gorilla had paralyzed him, even though Grodd had no recollection. In this timeline, Grodd had been one of the apes Brain experimented on in Bwunda—dosed with Kobra-Venom, which increased his strength and left red scars across his body.
The gorilla had also been given brain enhancements that boosted his intelligence. The telepathic side effect was unforeseen by his tormentors, but Hunter knew it. He approached Grodd and took control of him mentally. Grodd possessing the Sage Force while he already had telepathy gave him an edge, but Zoom's Sage Force used in conjunction with the Speed Force allowed him to dominate whoever he wanted.
He did the same with Heat Wave and Trickster—though he didn't need to for the Old Man Turtle, who was willing to work under him. He could have ruled the world using his Forces, but he did not want an empire; he wanted to forge real heroes. He was, after all, a simple man.
When the Old Man called the Outsider asked him to join his cause, Hunter accepted without hesitation. It was even better that the Outsider had allied with the Light: together they would bring calamity to heroes so the heroes would grow stronger. He already knew the Outsider's goals because he'd already experienced them in his original timeline. Being from the future had its advantages. If the invaders didn't provide sufficient challenge, he would manufacture it himself.
He ordered the rogue gallery to end their minute-long rampage and join him before the Flash and Kid Flash could arrive. Using Strength Force geokinesis, he created a raised platform; with Sage Force telekinesis, he levitated it. He and his controlled rogues rode it away, the Sage-Speed combination propelling them.
This was only foreplay. He planned to torment them more in the future—but in the end, it was for their own good.
**
| Dream State - October 3
"You—" Klarion stammered, still reeling in disbelief. In all the millennia he and Doctor Fate had clashed, Fate had never defeated him so decisively. Their battles always ended in stalemates, Fate forced to react to his chaos rather than command it.
But this… this was humiliation.
No. No. No. This wasn't fair. This kid was ruining everything—his plans, his pride, his legend.
Klarion's face twisted in rage. "You do not know who you're dealing with."
His body swelled, his restraints shattering as his true form emerged.
"I am a Lord of Chaos—an elemental force of the cosmos, a leader of the Light! I cannot be killed or contained! I am KLARION THE WITCH BOY!"
The air rippled as his words became power. He grew into an eldritch titan—an impossible being of writhing limbs, shifting geometries, and non-Euclidean form. Mortals' minds would unravel merely by looking at him.
Drawing on the last of his chaos magic, Klarion unleashed it across the realm. The Dream State trembled as raw entropy spread like a virus, warping the landscape and cracking the fabric of the mental domain.
But the boy stood unfazed.
He bumped fists with the voxel humanoid beside him. The digital form dissolved and reformed into a golden suit. Klarion froze. He finally recognized him.
"And I am Nova."
Klarion expected madness. Any sane mind should have broken from witnessing his true form. His presence distorted color, bent sound, and carried an oppressive silence that snuffed reason.
But Nova didn't flinch—he sped forward and grabbed him.
That shouldn't have been possible. Klarion's form didn't exist in three dimensions. He was chaos incarnate.
Then realization struck him: this wasn't a mortal. This was a god.
"Shame I can't absorb psychic energy from you," Nova said, his grip tightening. "You're too… chaotic. I guess I'll just seal you forever."
The corrupted realm twisted again, reforming into the dark prison of Nth metal where Klarion had first been trapped. Nova still held him.
"Aight," Nova said casually, "I got an immortal to kill. Later."
"Wait!" Klarion panicked. He couldn't be sealed again—not for eternity. He'd learned long ago from humans that if you couldn't beat someone, you joined them.
He shifted back into his nine-year-old form to show sincerity—and to conserve what little magic he had left. He clung to Nova's arm, looking ridiculous but desperate. Pride was meaningless if he'd be trapped here forever.
"Wait, I can help you! I've got arcane knowledge—tons of it! And I know about the Light! Plus, there's a great danger coming. She's a bitch named Child—way crazier than me!"
Nova paused. "Keep talking."