Disclaimer: DC Comics owns all rights to the characters within. They are used without permission and not meant to infringe on copyrights or meant to generate income.
Future Sins, chapter 1
For the twelfth time that day, Conner wondered about the wisdom of agreeing to participate in the JLA's training exercise. He was still feeling very self-conscious about being controlled by Luthor and forced to fight the Titans and the Outsiders. He noticed that the Flash, Wonder Woman, and Batman were all acting rather cool towards him. He couldn't blame them. He hadn't felt like he could face the Titans yet.
The one saving grace of the exercise was that Max was here with him. He had been the one to encourage Conner to break his self-imposed exile to the Kent's farm. Max had been a calming influence these law few weeks. He hadn't treated him differently at all; he was trying to return Conner to normalcy. Conner appreciated that, even if he felt awkward about it.
Max was proving to be vexing in the exercise though. He often made choices that were efficient without discussing them. Also, since his recovery, his power levels had returned to equal Conner's. When combined with his more advanced mastery of his powers, Conner couldn't help but feel a little jealous at how easy Max made everything look.
They switched to individual exercises in the training room while the rest of the team observed from the control room. Conner was pretty satisfied with his performance even though he didn't do as well as the JLA did. It was only to be expected since he did not have as much experience as they did. Finally, it was Max's turn to go.
After he entered the training room, everything in the control room froze. There was also some kind of barrier trapping them in the room.
Match saw the commotion in the control room out of the corner of his eye, but he kept his attention on a forming distortion in front of him. He had a feeling that something dangerous was going to come out of it, and he wanted to be prepared.
Despite all of his experience, he was surprised when a man stepped out of it wearing Superman's costume, only with the S-shield on a black background. The man looked very similar to Clark, but there were differences. Match listened to the man's heartbeat, and his eyes widened in surprise as he recognized it.
"Kon-El?" he asked.
"I'm Superman now," the man replied. "I'm from your future and have come back for a very important task."
"What is it? Does it have to do with the JLA being imprisoned? Is it an accidental discharge of your powers or whatever means you used to travel here? Did your journey through time injure you?"
The elder Kon-El gave Match a smile. "I've come back to kill you."
He unleashed his heat vision at Match.
"No!" Conner shouted. "We have to get out of here to help him!"
"We're doing everything we can," Superman assured him. "J'onn, can you phase through this barrier?"
"I cannot," J'onn said. "There's something that prevents me from going through it."
"This barrier has to have a weakness," Wonder Woman stated. "We'll find a way through it."
Match managed to throw up a shield, but the blast still knocked him across the room. He found himself telekinetically anchored to the floor.
"What's wrong with you?" he demanded. "Why are you doing this?"
The elder Kon-El advanced on him. "I'm doing this to prevent you from taking actions that will make my life a living hell."
His eyes narrowed as objects in the training room hurled themselves at him. He deflected them all, but doing so occupied enough of his attention so that Match was able to break free of the force that was keeping him on the floor.
"You can't be from the future of this timeline," Match said. "I'm your brother here."
"I know. You took down the Groups and were buried alive for weeks. I brought you liquid from a Lazarus Pit to heal you when your body was degenerating. I know what you are; I've lived it."
Match used his force eyebeams on the man. He shrugged them off.
"I'm glad that you're resisting. I want this to hurt."
He unleashed a burst of force that emanated in all directions. It threw Match up against the wall. As he struggled to get to his feet, he felt his shoulder being grabbed and wrenched out of its socket. He gritted his teeth to prevent from gasping out in pain.
"You can't beat me," the elder Kon-El said. "I'm more powerful than you and have more experience."
With his good arm, Match gave a vicious chop to the man's throat. This caused the older man to gag slightly and let go of Match's arm. Match snapped it back into place and ignored the pain. He let loose with a full telekinetic blast at the staggered man that pushed him back.
"I...I can't believe you did that," the future Superman rasped. "I'm not going to play around with you anymore!"
Match felt his telekinetic field be ripped away from him. He could tell that his opponent was doing this with a technique that Match didn't know. It was one that clearly took him a great deal of concentration.
"I'm going to rip you apart," the time-traveler promised.
Kon felt the barrier keeping the JLA and him in the control room weaken. He focused his power and ripped it apart. The exertion caused him to sink to his knees, but the JLA sprung into action.
The elder Kon-El brought up a shield to deflect the Martian Manhunter's eyebeams. One of his arms was immobilized by one of Green Lantern's ring constructs. Wonder Woman tackled him to the floor.
"I can't believe that you're defending him!" the elder Kon-El shouted. "You don't know what he does!"
"Nothing justifies what you're trying to do," Kal-El said.
"You don't understand! I'm doing this because you could never look at me the same way after what he did to your wife!"
Kal-El was wide-eyed at this revelation, as were most of the JLA. The elder Kon-El took the opportunity to throw them off of him and slam them into walls.
"I'm going to end this now!" he shouted before gasping in shock.
Match stood there, glaring at him with sweat running down his face. "You shouldn't have showed me how to suppress your telekinetic field. Did you forget that if I see something I can usually figure out how to do it?"
"It's taking all your concentration and there's no one around to-" he began before Conner knocked him out with a slug across the face.
"We should restrain him here until we discover a way to send him back to his own time," Match said. "Can you give me a hand with him?"
Conner nodded and helped Max. As he was doing so, he couldn't help but notice that most of the JLA were giving Match looks.
---------
I hope this chapter is clear, as references to two different people with the names "Superman" and "Kon-El" might be confusing.
Any and all comments welcome!
