Shadows Behind the Throne
The explosion ripped through the palace like a thunderclap from the underworld.
General Rick Flag Sr. woke from the lightest edge of sleep to alarms screaming through the ancient stone halls. The floor beneath him trembled, dust raining from the ceiling as torchlight flickered wildly. Years of combat conditioning snapped into place instantly—he was already moving before his mind finished processing the sound.
He rolled from the narrow bed, boots on, sidearm in hand, vest buckled in seconds. Whatever had just detonated had come from the wing where Circe was being held.
"Damn it," Flag muttered.
He stepped into the corridor—and froze.
Bodies.
Too many.
Royal guards and palace soldiers lay scattered like broken dolls, throats slit with surgical precision or crushed beyond recognition. The blood wasn't fresh. It was dark, tacky. Old.
Flag's stomach tightened.
These men hadn't died in the blast.
They'd been dead for days.
He moved forward slowly, senses screaming. Every instinct he had was telling him the same thing: this palace had been compromised long before tonight.
Flag followed the trail of death toward the inner security wing—the chambers of the royal family's head of security. The man who had personally overseen palace defenses. The man Flag had spoken to not even three days ago.
He kicked the door open.
The general's body lay neatly on the bed.
His throat was cut clean, ear to ear.
His eyes were wide open, glassy and lifeless.
And his skin—gray, brittle, cracked—looked like it had been dead far longer than it should have.
Flag stared for a long second.
Then understanding hit him like a bullet.
"Clayface…"
The real general had been murdered days ago. Replaced. The impostor had walked freely through the palace, opened doors, redirected guards, fed information straight to Circe and her followers.
This entire operation had been compromised from the inside.
Flag turned and ran.
Five Minutes Earlier
Deep beneath the palace, inside a reinforced containment chamber, Circe knelt within glowing magical restraints. Runes burned along the walls, suppressing her power, binding her to the cold steel platform beneath her knees. Heavy doors sealed the chamber, guarded by elite soldiers handpicked from the royal guard.
The head of palace security entered calmly.
"Leave us," he said. "I need to question the prisoner alone."
The soldiers hesitated.
"Sir, protocol—"
The general's expression hardened.
"You should listen to me."
And then his body melted.
Flesh turned to clay in an instant, swelling, twisting, reshaping. The uniform dissolved into the mass as limbs thickened, stretched, reformed into blunt weapons. The soldiers barely had time to scream before Clayface struck—arms turning into jagged blades, crushing skulls, slamming bodies into walls with horrifying ease.
In seconds, the room was silent.
Clayface turned to Circe and grinned—a grotesque, shifting parody of a human smile.
"Told you I'd get in," he said.
Circe chuckled softly, even weakened. "You took your time."
"Had to play the part. Kill the general. Wear his face. Open doors." Clayface shrugged. "Worth it. You promised a bonus."
"Triple," Circe replied smoothly. "Once I rule this kingdom."
Clayface smashed the magical restraints with a heavy, clay-formed hammer, then helped pry open the containment coffin. Circe staggered to her feet, injured but far from helpless.
With a whispered incantation, she formed a shimmering shield around herself.
"Now," she said coldly, "kill the rest. Distract the… freaks."
Clayface nodded. "With pleasure."
Circe raised her hands, chanting. The metal coffin exploded outward, the blast tearing through the wing and shaking the entire palace.
Present
Rick Flag Sr. burst into the main hall alongside the remaining Creature Commandos.
What he saw made his blood run cold.
Clayface was tearing through the last palace defenders, his massive form reshaping with every strike—arms turning into axes, maces, concrete slabs. Soldiers died screaming.
Beyond him—
Circe.
She hovered above the floor, magic swirling, while in front of her stood a towering mechanized suit of armor.
Inside it—
Princess Ilana Rostovic.
The armor moved with brutal precision, alien power source glowing in its chest. It hit Circe hard enough to send her crashing through marble pillars, the sorceress barely blocking the blows with flickering shields.
Flag's eyes widened.
They had a weapon capable of fighting Circe.
"Clayface!" Circe shouted. "Deal with them!"
The monster turned, roaring, and charged.
The Creature Commandos met him head-on.
At first, they held their ground. Bullets, claws, brute force—Clayface was pushed back, chunks of his body blasted away.
Then he adapted.
His arms split into rotating blades. His torso hardened into reinforced concrete. Spikes erupted from his shoulders.
One by one, the team fell.
The Bride was slammed through a wall, her leg shattered.
Doctor Phosphorus was struck by a massive slab of hardened clay and sent flying into another chamber, his radioactive glow vanishing into the distance.
Within minutes, only two remained standing.
Rick Flag Sr.
Dr. Nina Mazursky
Clayface expanded, towering over them.
"Fun's over," he growled.
He lunged.
Flag dodged, fired, rolled—emptying his magazine into Clayface's face. It did nothing.
A massive clay hand snatched him mid-dodge.
Clayface compressed, reshaping into a near-human form, holding Flag aloft.
"You fought well," Clayface said mockingly.
Then he smashed Flag into the walls—once, twice, three times—before slamming him down with both hands.
Flag felt his spine snap.
Pain exploded through his body.
He couldn't scream.
Clayface raised his arms to finish it—
And electricity surged through his chest.
The Bride came crashing through the wall, holding an exposed power cable, leaping into Clayface's mass. The current surged violently, destabilizing his form. Clay exploded outward as she was thrown clear.
Clayface staggered back, roaring.
The Bride crawled to Flag, bloodied but conscious.
"Evac," she said into her communicator. "Now."
A voice responded instantly. "Chopper inbound. Five minutes."
She lifted Flag despite the pain screaming through her own body and dragged him toward the exit.
Behind them—
Circe screamed in fury.
The mechanized armor split open as Princess Ilana activated a final protocol.
The alien core destabilized.
Circe realized too late.
The explosion engulfed the hall in blinding light.
The Creature Commandos barely escaped the blast radius as the chopper lifted them away from the burning palace.
Five Hours Later – United States
Rick Flag Sr. was rushed into surgery the moment the aircraft touched down.
Doctors worked frantically.
"The spinal damage is severe," one said grimly. "He may live—but walking again? Unlikely."
Outside the operating room, the remaining Creature Commandos sat in silent cells. They weren't surprised. They never were.
Elsewhere—
The President stood pale-faced beside Amanda Waller.
Princess Ilana Rostovic was dead.
Circe was gone.
A foreign nation had possessed a weapon capable of incapacitating a sorceress who once fought Wonder Woman.
And the only man who could explain it lay broken on an operating table.
Amanda Waller said nothing.
But for the first time in a long while—
She wasn't the one in control.