The massive zombie had long since abandoned anything resembling thought—only pure instinct remained.
Sensing the rush of wind from his flank, it didn't even hesitate. A pale, colossal hand lashed out and caught Superman's punch mid-swing.
A feral grin twisted across Grundy's corpse-white face.
Superman tried to pull free—once, twice—nothing. The monster's grip didn't budge.
"Its strength just spiked!" he shouted, surprise cracking through his usually calm tone.
In his mind, Grundy had to be some grotesque byproduct of human science gone wrong—a Frankenstein's monster birthed by Gotham's madmen. Surely the locals knew more.
But Batman and the others had never fought it head-on before; they'd been too busy running, retreating, surviving. No one had any idea what had triggered the sudden power surge.
Fortunately, Thea did. She vaguely remembered something about Grundy's "decaying gray aura."
She focused, narrowing her spiritual sight—and there it was.
A faint haze of ashen mist curling around the zombie's body, flickering like smoke.
"Tell Superman not to aim for the head!" she said quickly. "Remember what Gordon said—the Court of Owls implanted a false personality to control him. Look—those gray wisps! His rising power means the original mind might be waking up!"
Batman blinked. "What mist? I don't see anything."
Thea froze.
Oh crap… don't tell me I'm the only one who can see it.
Two tiny versions of herself popped up in her mind's eye—a black-clad Thea furiously slapping the white-clad one.
'Serves you right for running your mouth! Smack! Smack!'
She wiped imaginary sweat from her brow and coughed lightly, saying nothing more.
Batman gave her a long, suspicious look, but said nothing either.
"Then we stick to the plan," he decided at last. "We immobilize it."
He murmured something into his comm.
Far ahead, Superman suddenly adjusted his movements—then changed his strikes to target Grundy's legs instead of his head.
So they have a private channel now, Thea mused. What a weird friendship—half rivalry, half bromance.
Batman spoke again, low and clipped.
"Take Selina and Freeze—get up there and lock him down."
"On it," Thea replied.
She motioned to Catwoman and Mr. Freeze, hopping back onto her board and soaring toward the chaos.
Superman, following Batman's instructions, avoided the head entirely. He hammered at Grundy's limbs—legs, arms, joints—forcing the gray miasma to waver and withdraw back into the creature's body.
Soon, the power dynamic shifted again.
The Man of Steel regained the upper hand.
Once Superman fought at full strength, the difference was staggering.
Punches, kicks, searing heat vision—Grundy's limbs were breaking faster than they could heal. Even his prodigious regeneration couldn't keep up under the sustained assault.
"Now!" Superman called, waving toward Thea's group.
"Go, go!" Catwoman yelled, brandishing the remote detonator at Freeze. "Do it!"
Freeze hesitated, reluctant to get that close, but a hard shove from Selina's boot sent him stumbling forward.
He landed near Grundy's massive form, aimed the cryo-cannon at its head, and fired.
A wave of white frost engulfed the zombie's body. Freeze could hear the muffled rumble of Grundy's growls beneath the forming ice, and the sound alone drove him to panic. He kept firing, spraying faster, covering every inch he could reach.
Superman followed up immediately, his own freezing breath joining the assault—a roaring blizzard blasting from his lungs.
Not to be left out, Thea loosed an ice arrow for good measure.
Freeze didn't stop until his tank ran dry, the last vapor hissing from the cannon. He stumbled back, panting, eyes wide with fear but alive.
Above them, Batman had turned the half-destroyed Batwing into an improvised Bat-Helicopter. From Wayne Enterprises, he'd hauled in a massive ten-cubic-meter metal crate—pure solid tungsten, capable of withstanding three thousand degrees Celsius.
With surgical precision, he lowered the box over the frozen giant.
Then came the concrete.
Truck after truck of high-density quick-drying cement poured in, filling every crevice until the creature was completely sealed away.
Before long, Solomon Grundy vanished from sight—entombed in steel, ice, and stone.
Thea hovered quietly above, watching the makeshift burial with mixed feelings.
Somewhere inside that monstrous corpse, she had felt it—a spark of immense, ancient power. Not brute strength, but something deeper, more… transcendent. If she could have studied it, maybe it would've advanced her own magic.
But this wasn't the time.
Not with Superman and Batman both standing guard, and her control over her own abilities still shaky at best. Trying to siphon that energy now would be suicide.
Her musings were cut short by a voice behind her.
"Are you… Kara Danvers? My cousin?"
Superman hovered closer, brow furrowed in confusion.
There was something deeply strange about her, he realized. His x-ray vision couldn't penetrate her body. Every second, solar energy flowed into her like a current, just as it did into him—only… different.
It reminded him of Krypton, of Kara.
Batman's head snapped up instantly.
Wait. Cousin?
If she was related to Superman… and also Ra's al Ghul's daughter… did that mean Talia was an alien too?
For one horrifying second, he seriously considered strangling his son on the spot.
Meanwhile, Thea's face went pale green.
"No! Absolutely not! You've got the wrong person!"
Seriously, could these people stop giving her random relatives?
Being mistaken for Superman's cousin—right in front of Batman, of all people—her reputation just tanked by a few thousand points.
Superman, realizing he'd embarrassed her, simply nodded.
"Understood. My mistake."
He turned to Batman, exchanged a curt word of farewell, and then—boom!—broke the sound barrier as he rocketed away, disappearing into the horizon in a streak of red and blue.
Batman, ever composed, turned back to Thea with his usual stoic tone.
"You all right? Tired? Any physical discomfort?"
"…"
Thea wanted to scream. Great, she thought bitterly. He's making small talk like I'm his kid after a field trip.
Her reputation was definitely dented—but thankfully not beyond repair. Maybe she could ask Catwoman to whisper some nice things in Bruce's ear later. If not… she'd bring Talia in too. Double the pillow talk, double the recovery rate.
"So what now?" she asked finally, nodding toward the sealed coffin of tungsten and ice.
Even Freeze looked relieved. A monster like that didn't belong in Gotham—a city where most battles were fought with wit and intellect. Something that big and dumb and invincible broke all the unspoken rules.
"We bury it," Batman said simply, voice low and firm through his modulator.
And so they did.
Commissioner Gordon arrived soon after, ever the unkillable bug of Gotham. He brought a fleet of diggers, cranes, and construction crews. After a brief exchange, the work began immediately.
Batman's order was clear: the deeper, the better.
Thea privately thought it was a colossal waste of effort, but she had no real argument against it. The project supervisor, however, made the final call.
"Ten thousand meters," he said. "Any deeper and we'll hit oil. Drill bits can't take it."
At that, Thea lost all interest in watching.
Ten kilometers down? she thought incredulously. You're not burying a zombie—you're starting an oil company.
With that, she made a polite excuse about needing rest, waved to the team, and took off into the morning sky—
leaving behind Gotham's latest disaster, finally sealed beneath the earth.