Superboy knew it was stupid.

Thinking these bad thoughts, especially with her so close, so within reach to do harm...and so willing to, no less. He could feel the tingle of mending nerves rush along every fingertip, from his nails to his knuckles...from his knuckles to his dual wrists; with every step from the kitchen, he could feel them snap with physical horror back in place, his face, though stoic, belying a pervasive discomfort that didn't ease, even when they stepped back into the main hub.

And all the while, his mind churned, flashes of rage echoing on still features that he refused, or rather couldn't express outwardly.

It was clear to him what he was feeling, and even when his body felt flash-frozen with fear at the prospect of her dealing out another round of her quickly apparent wrath, it still turned with hateful words and musings that gave his blood a rushing heat that made his shoulders tremble, even when the motion made his hands ache more.

I hate her. I hate her. I hate her. I hate her. I hate her. I -

"They're just over here! We're almost there, Konny!" She chirped in an irritating shrill beside him, and she gripped him tighter, holding close to them as they went down another hall with a turn. Superboy could make out a small fleet of elevators, likely a remnant of a time when more league members were about the place, with the four before them still in pristine shape, their stainless steel exteriors gleaming in the cold, overhead lights that graced every door. He didn't attempt to ease the discomfort, or rather, disgust on his face at her touch.

Perhaps he was too tired to.

Maybe there wasn't a point in trying.

It was quickly becoming apparent to him that there wasn't much yet that he could do to give her pause when it came to the sheer level of power that she was beginning to hold over him, no matter how much every fiber of his being fought the notion.

He wasn't giving in.

But one thing was clear, so clear that his skin itched with an emotion he didn't dare to name: her powers were...horrid.

Every bit as terrifying he figured that they could, or rather, would be, given what he knew now. Whether he refused himself the right to emote or not, it didn't seem as though there was much he could do to refuse what she had in mind for him...whatever that thing might be. Even more so when he considered his quickly healing hands, the pain having subsided to a mild throb that echoed along his arm slightly as the nerves healed...the most unpleasant part, barring his realigning bones. Flexing them ever-so-slightly, he winced, rendering them still quickly as the pain was reignited, a harsh pang of reminder forcing a breath from him, only the mildest of gasps that, if one weren't listening, likely would have missed. It trickled finely between his teeth as they came upon the set of elevators, and even more interestingly, he noticed, were precisely the ones he'd been looking for. He was given pause for only a moment as he looked upon Kaldur, Robin, and Wally, standing flush beside each other, though their statures were...strange, to say the least.

The two of them stopped short of the group, and beside him, he felt M'gann pull away, her soft smile still plastered upon her face as she turned to him, appearing unmoved by his thoughts, though Kon couldn't honestly tell if her being able to hear how much he loathed her made him feel vindicated...or more nervous seeing how...volatile she could be. Watching her open her mouth to speak, it was hard to tell just what would come out of her wretched throat, so he was at attention, even when he'd rather keep up his attitude disinterest, his wants for control, but his need for security, yanking at each other ceaselessly in his mind.

It was tiring.

More than he expected it to be.

"Wait here just a second, Konny. Let me just wake them up!" The young martian exclaimed, and with a turn, she headed over to the three, leaving Kon to watch as her hand was raised.

He tried to remain stoic, but something between horror and terrible fascination raced through him as she spoke.

"Rise and shine, everyone!" M'gann almost sang, and just like that, their close eyes opened.

Their slack expressions turned to ones of confusion and drowsiness.

As if reanimated dolls, they sparked to life in one wave of motion that by M'gann's hand, they were rendered awake once more.

Wally was the first to speak.

"Wh-what? What just - "

M'gann held out her hands, and spoke.

"We've been here the whole time, okay? It was as if we all walked together as I got Konny from the kitchen. Nothing happened. Everything is normal and you're excited to see what I'm going to show you, so smile." She told them, that casual, calm voice the vice that made their hazy eyes glimmer with unfounded clarity, and without a missed beat, without another word, they were smiling.

Laughing.

There were no more questions or thoughts, just her command as she doubled back, and only then, when she must have seen the horror on his face, shocked still with eyes unblinking, she turned a cold grin.

But said nothing.

She linked her arm with his again, but his mind wasn't there. He was lost to his thoughts even when he was all but pulled along into the elevator behind Kaldur, Robin, and Wally, their conversations fading out.

There's no way that she can just...just do that. To plant thoughts into people's head...to just...control them whenever she wanted..., Kon's breath hitched as he looked down.

M'gann was looking at him.

He looked back, swallowing thick, choking spit with a gulp, freezing cold sweat trickling down his brow when a thought crept through his mind, rendering him still.

Could she do the same to him? Make him do what she wanted him to?

...Would she?

Would she render him unaware that she was even controlling him, he wondered darkly, looking to the others as they seemed completely unaware of...all of it, and with a sudden awareness, he found himself staring at them from behind, averting his eyes despite the sounds of their voices tempting him to do so again.

M'gann beamed up at him.

He could feel her eyes, burning into him with knowing and insight before she stepped away, leaving him rooted to the spot.

Then he remembered.

She could hear his thoughts. She could -

"I wouldn't do that to you, Konny. I promise. After all..."She started in his mind, stepping before Wally and Robin with a soft smile that was warm bordering on loving.

He felt sick.

"...I want you feel everything."

And with that, the doors opened, and she raised her arms, leaving him to his thoughts, or, as was consequently becoming apparent, strokes of terror filling him at her words...these were their thoughts.

He...wasn't thinking just for himself anymore.

She was worming her way in. Slowly, deliberately, she was making every effort to take the one place that he had left for himself: his mind.

His blood ran cold.

"It's my Martian bioship." She exclaimed as if introducing someone new, but with his addled focus, he barely minded what looked like a gigantic, red pill of moderate size resting within the faint, scarlet ring that acted as the land perimeter that they were quickly walking into, though in Kon's case, he was stumbling absently along.

HIs mind was...everywhere.

"Cute." Wally began, placing his hands into his pockets, looking thoroughly unimpressed, a matched expression with that of Kaldur and Robin, and he elaborated succinctly why.

"Not aerodynamic, but cute."

M'gann smiled, gesturing to the pod again.

"It's at rest, silly. I'll wake it." She said, and with a wave, Superboy and the others were greeted to the sound of squelching, and within moments, what had only appeared to be a single, pill-like pod, it quickly grew and morphed in shape. From the pill's sides, shapely red wings broadened and sharpened, fitted with back and blue accents that slipped into intricate patterns complimenting the matching hues upon the main body. Like a blade, many portions were fitted with pointed outcroppings, giving it a more streamlined form that, in Wally's mind, would have been deemed more aerodynamic.

Resting now before them was a proper ship, and it turned, its back portion opening to reveal a bay within; a portion of it transformed, giving them a platform to walk upon and enter the ship. M'gann walked forward only slightly, but realizing that each of the boys behind her were still rooted in place, she paused, her face almost appearing smug when gazing upon their shocked expressions.

Superboy scoffed.

She was loving this.

"Well, are you coming?" The martian asked, though she was looking mostly to Superboy.

She was testing him, daring him to deviate from what she knew would be the groups' desires, and just like that, Robin, Wally, and Kaldur were already pressing on, led forward by their fascinated, if wary, motions, leaving Kon behind as if they didn't notice he hadn't moved.

His hands twitched.

Then he walked forward, meeting their pace, unsure if even staying with them was enough anymore.

Then it hit him as they walked up the branching extension of the ship and stepped inside, M'gann grasping his arm.

None of them were safe with her.

-(Elsewhere)-

He'd come as soon as he was able to, though he wasn't sure precisely what he was meant to do in situations such as these. Minding the ruined halls, the splotchy damage that came pressed upon once pristine halls from what could only be described as impact craters of a kind, his toiling mind knowing only one that could produce that sort of power and not collapse from the force alone. In fact, before he'd even set foot into the empty chamber where his masterwork should have been, he knew what had transpired, much to Guardian's sputtering explanation's folly.

And that was precisely, exactly, the last thing he wanted to hear.

"Sir, now, we've been making efforts to locate him and - " Guardian was quick to be silenced when he noticed Luthor's face tense with displeasure, the glass display that had only recently housed one of the most powerful products that he'd been able to create, the very magnum opus of The Light, now lying empty before him. He looked to the deep indentations overhead, the rubble, the debris, the clear struggle that had taken place here, and he could imagine that he'd been attacked, or worse, he'd been told to do the attacking.

Much sooner than he was supposed to.

Which means something or someone was here that shouldn't have been.

And worse, no one informed him of this.

This won't do.

"Right. And I imagine you weren't very successful, seeing as he isn't here?" He answered swiftly, noting the following footsteps of others at the entrance of the broken chamber, and turning to face them, he was met with Dubbilex, the gangly creature he'd seen every now and again during his scant visits to the sight. More often than not, he'd seen the creature directing the hoards of little abominations that this place seemed wholly intent on using, though he figured he shouldn't be so eager to cast stones in the oh-so-fragile glass house that he'd constructed this project within; Kon-el wasn't so different from this lot after all.

"We've been making note of his bio-signature, but it's faint...distant. Wherever he is now, it's far away. Much further than my psionic powers will allow me to pinpoint...I do apologize." He announced, though if Luthor listened closely enough, and wasn't imagining it, he didn't sound terribly remorseful. In fact, there was almost sort of transient relief heavy upon his grey features, and for what, the man couldn't guess, though the result was clear. It was only partly matched by the frantically nervous, but equally placid, look on Guardian's helmeted face as, even with the beads of sweat rolling from between gleaming metal, he didn't look sorry for what was clearly a failure on each and every one of their parts, but instead...simply braced for whatever consequence would be thrust their way.

No, this wouldn't do at all.

"And his tracking chip?" Luthor asked, eying them suspiciously.

It should still be in his arm where they left it, so why hadn't they just defaulted to that...unless...

Guardian was ready with an answer.

Perhaps too ready.

"Ah, well, we checked and it's been registered offline since the incident, so we haven't been able to - "

"Hmm." Luthor said simply, turning away.

He crossed his arms, pondering the situation, everything that they'd told him.

There was a struggle. The product is gone. They can't locate him. His tracking chip is offline.

So many little inconveniences, compounding into a rather unfortunate problem. It would be an understatement that this was a very expensive, very costly error, and if it weren't for his stellar composure and his unflinching default to dignified silence, he'd be a cursing fool at moments such as these. There was no mistaking the rolling fury that crept up his neck and licked his shoulders with such blistering heat that slight shudder twitched through him before he went sill as a statue, thinking...thinking.

Thinking about the implications of such an error. How having what was essentially the manifestation of their efforts running amok wherever he was, unmanaged, unknown...it was enough to make any composure he had melt at this sheer level of negligence...or perhaps something worse than even that.

Intent.

But to what end he couldn't know or confirm. For as far as he knew, this could have just been a string of very unfortunate, ill-timed mistakes made by those specifically trusted to keep the product safe.

Those things, for as undesirable as they were, happened sometimes, no matter how much he wished they didn't.

Sighing, he didn't turn back at them, looking over the empty pod, calming himself with a deep inhale, holding it for a moment before he exhaled again.

Getting angry and unruly wasn't productive.

He was a thinker, a ponderer, a planner; getting muddled with furious thoughts would only cloud his judgement, and as far as he was concerned, he'd stewed in this fury long enough. Luthor understood better than most that the only way to avert a crisis was to act with consideration and haste, not petty emotions, and with what he had so far, the situation, that is, he knew the WHAT.

What the occurrence was. What happened. What they'd done.

But there were things he didn't know.

TheWHY.

Why he escaped. Why his chip was offline. Why they couldn't find him.

TheWHERE.

Where he was. Where they lost him. Where he would be in future.

TheHOW.

How he was awakened. How they lost him. How he was taken.

His mind flickered with interest to the last question, and most notably the first and most important in his mind.

TheWHO.

Whohas him?

"Who was it, then?" He asked finally, feeling them shift behind him. The question lingered in the silence for a long moment, and he could tell they were thinking, and hard, too.

Maybe to gather the truth?

Perhaps to form a lie?

Luthor couldn't tell.

"Ah...I'm sorry, sir. I don't understand what you're asking - " Guardian asked, Dubbilex remained staunchly, uncharacteristically, silent. He thought maybe the genomorph would have more to say, but he'd been only sparing with his words...a point of interest for the man as he scoffed slightly under his breath.

He had not the patience for asinine questions.

"You know full well what I am asking." He started, and for the first time in a bit, he turned to meet them, bright, green eyes flashing coldly in the dark.

"Who has Kon-el?" Luthor asked again, sparing not a second of consideration before he stepped forward, granting Guardian little space where he'd been so distant over the course of the conversation, but the man had to admit it: his patience was wearing horribly, painfully thin. Even standing here, having this menial, and frankly meaningless, conversation, was reason enough to be made irritable. No leads, no surveillance, not a record of what, or who, might have barged in and upended likely their most successful project to date, so he felt, in his honest opinion, that it was their obligation and responsibility to have even that barest shred of information. Anything that could even remotely redeem their staunch incompetence would be a start to possibly redeeming themselves, but when both of them, still, had nothing to give, his cold eyes ran frozen.

This was all a waste of time.

" , we assure you that we have done our best to scour our vast resources to locate the product, but - " Guardian was interrupted again, something that was quickly become normalized as the scientist's frown deepened.

"Let me guess: it turned up nothing, right? You expect me to believe that every bit of the efforts we've put forward to not only contain but safeguard our most important asset has failed, and all in one night, no less? Is that the story you intend to stand by? That both of you swear on?" Luthor hummed ruefully, raising a pensive, suspicious eyebrow, but his words didn't carry any less than malice at the question.

He refused it, the reality that after all the resources they'd spent on this project, the many failed attempts, the things he had to do,the way he had to sully his hands to see this through...there was no way that this was where it ended.

With an empty chamber and dashed dream all because a handful of idiots couldn't keep tabs on a single clone.

It was...absurd. Utterly,totally, absurd.

But seeing their faces, though bordering on unreadable, another thought bloomed.

Luthor had never seen the point to being paranoid as he thought conspiracy was the landing and home of madmen searching for answers in what was nearly always happenstance in some regard, he knew. He was staunchly empirical, rooted so deeply in the realm of reality that very seldom did he stepped into the annals of baseless consideration, for the notion, the very idea of stooping that low, was beneath him. However, looking upon the two before him, something felt...different, in him, in them, he couldn't tell; for reasons he couldn't understand, staring long and hard into their still faces, the man couldn't begin to describe the strange pressure at the back of his skull as just one thought seeped into his mind.

Something was off here.

It wouldn't have taken a rocket scientist, or someone as remotely as intelligent as he, to know without a shadow of a doubt that something had transpired here that neither one of them wanted to admit.

And even worse, it was something that they were both willing to lie for. Though for what reason, he couldn't begin to guess.

Luthor himself was almost shocked as soon as the thought arose and faded from his mind, a spot of inky imperfection to the typically cold, scrutinizing light of perfect logic he tended to employ, even more when it was akin to conspiratorial nonsense he couldn't even prove was true. A fact of his intuition, he scoffed incredulously to himself as the idea was unbelievable.

Luthor wasn't a man of intuition or "gut feelings". He was a man of science.

Such assumptions were baseless and stupid.

And baseless and stupid he was not.

Not when there were other ways to disprove such suspicions...or perhaps pay them credence through the only means he thought worthy of him: the truth.

And he knew just where to start.

When neither of them seemed to have anything else to say, Luthor sighed deeply, then started past them, leaving the chamber to make his way back to the elevator leading back the man floor of their broken lab, their broken project. Reaching the beginnings of reconstruction, the man paid little mind the many construction workers make efforts to rebuild the mass of rubble and damage that had been left in the wake of whatever had transpired here, but he kept his mind forward, ignoring the quiet looks he would receive in passing from the various workers about.

He had bigger things to concern himself after all.

Before the building, a dark limousine was waiting for him, along with a long, gangly man, clad in a black tuxedo, flanked by two guards that watched their boss with eagle-eyed interest before opening the door, ushering him in carefully and discreetly before the door was closed, his butler sidling in across from him on the seats across from in the dimly little chamber. When each guard had made their way into the front seat, he tapped the screen beside them, summoning their ear as he was handed a stem glass by the attentive hand of his waiting staff.

Taking a quiet sip, he leaned into it to speak.

His voice was calm.

"Take me to Belle Reve."