Prime Meta

Empty Hand sat on the throne of Heaven comfortably. He felt no pressure, no fears, merely absolute power…

"Hey. Where the hell do you think you're sitting?"

…for a grand total of two minutes.

"You…how in the world are you alive?"

Empty Hand couldn't believe it. Despite sitting on the throne of God, he felt astonished and slightly tilted.

It was motherfucking Superboy Prime. The Kryptonian stood there, bleeding profusely, eyes burning red from lingering usage of his heat vision. Purple and black goo was splattered all over him and he was panting like a lunatic.

"You left my corpse in the sun, motherfucker!!"" Superboy Prime put a hand on his face, cackling wildly. "Even though you destroyed my brain, you left the rest of my body and so I healed! I healed, motherfucker!"

Disbelief, then a laugh from Empty Hand. "Ha…hahahah! Seriously!" He rose from his throne. "How the fuck did you even get here!? Wait, don't answer that question, I know! You shattered reality, didn't you!?"

Superboy Prime gave him an insane smirk. His teeth were wet with blood. "That's right! I broke the Speed Force wall and whatever fuck else was between us! Then I killed your stupid Gentry!"

Empty Hand blinked and closed his eyes. Indeed, his minions were gone. In the two minutes Empty Hand had been adjusting to his newfound power, Superboy must have slaughtered them. That also meant…

"You helped Elaine and Arik escape…" Empty Hand sighed and shook his head. "God dammit."

"Who?" Superboy stared at him, then laughed again. "Whatever! I don't give a shit! Let's just do this! Round two!!!"

The maniacal Kryptonian charged at him while blasting him with his heat vision. While still seated on the throne, Empty Hand countered with his Omega Beams. Superboy flew after him. He chased him. But no matter how far he flew, the distance between them never closed.

"Heaven is my realm to control now," Empty Hand declared. "Meaning…I can shape it however I like!"

All of a sudden, the Throne Room began to rumble and break apart. From the cracks of the Throne Room, hundreds of thousands of angels came down at Superboy. A red light burned every single winged creature flying at him but they simply kept coming.

"You fucking shit! Come out here and fight me!" Superboy Prime roared, incinerating the countless angels as if they were ants. "Empty Hand!!!"

But they kept going. Despite leaving no trace of the angels, they would somehow come back to life and charge at him again. They would regenerate from particles that didn't seem to exist. It didn't make sense. It was an impossible swarm of enemies.

Eventually, Superboy weakened and a hundred angels engulfed him. More and more started to pile up on him. Hundreds, thousands, millions of angels, all focused on stopping Superboy Prime. All working to Empty Hand's whims.

There was peace and quiet.

The Divine Throne Room was gone, replaced by clouds of darkness. No grey, no white, only darkness.

The levels of Heaven were crumbling away. The barriers and emerging were swirling and smashing against each other. The Valley of Eternity, a place of transcending energies, was a tsunami that destroyed and wiped the other realms. Particularly the Fountain of Harmony, which was supposed to be a realm of peace and fun, turned into utter chaos.

As everything underneath him burned, Empty Hand laughed. Only the Throne remained. Only the Throne stood as the rest of Heaven was wiped out–as God's creation was twisted.

The throne which Empty Hand sat on remained.

"See, the Anti-Death Equation is the idea that comic book characters are never allowed to die. They're always brought back to life to be strung along like lifeless puppets. A never ending story, a never ending act…" A bright red light crept through the darkness. Empty Hand smirked. "And I formulated the Anti-Death Equation. Meaning, no matter how much you try to kill me or the Gentry, we will always come back."

A scream penetrated the void and Superboy Prime came bursting out. He was lathered in blood, hair dripping with the holy red substance, and charged at Empty Hand again. Through the void, it felt like an infinite distance yet he crossed it in the fraction of a second.

But then he was stopped and hurled back. The angels had returned and were swarming him for the second time. Blasts of heat vision incinerated them as Prime persisted. He kept killing and killing and killing until there was a hole in the dimension. A light that penetrated the darkness. The light from outside Heaven, from the Sphere of the Gods.

"Nah, you're one craaaazy motherfucker, Superboy! Really, you are! And coming from ME? That's saying something!" Empty Hand slapped his thigh. "I created you. I manipulated you into causing Infinite Crisis! You were a finger I used like a puppet! Yet here you are, defying me like no other!"

The Gentry were also piling up on him: Dame Merciless, the femme fatale; Intellectron, the evil genius; Demogorgunn, adding another infinite number of angels to fight: Hellmachine, a multi-eyed purple monstrosity; Lord Broken, who functioned as a cage.

"Is that the best you can do?"

His challenging scream came through the horde of zombie angels and the abilities of the Gentry. Lord Broken's asylum was torn apart. Hellmachine was launched like a baseball and flung outside Heaven. Demogorgunn's swarm was annihilated. Intellectron was frozen with his super breath and Dame Merciless was punched beyond recovery while he screamed of his true love, Laurie Lemmon.

Un-fucking-believable.

He successfully broke through the countless angels and flew at Empty Hand again. Empty Hand gestured and sent another swarm of zombie angels.

With searing red heat vision ten times larger and potent, he burned through the zombie angels. Grinning, Prime announced: "Hahahah! What are you gonna use next? A Susanoo? Maybe a Domain Expansion? A Bankai? Ooh, or…maybe you're out of tricks now, Empty Hand!"

He punched using his entire body weight.

An Empty Hand stopped it.

"No, unfortunately not. See, the whole gaining abilities through killing is only in my possession due to the narrative with the Chosen One. My real power, therefore, isn't anything as flimsy as that."

"What?"

"My true power is literally bringing the narrative to my whims. In this case…I'm pulling out the Greater-Scope Villain."

A light began to engulf the dark entity. A blue hue, then a holy yellow. Prime's hand started to burn and he tried to break from his foe. He couldn't. Empty Hand's fingers were tightened over his fist.

"W-what in the name of bullshit–"

Superboy recoiled in pain.

The power of narratives, the power to control them and use them to his advantage…it was how he created the twisted archetypes that were the Gentry. While the Gentry existed, he couldn't exhibit this power at its fullest capacity but with the Gentry gone, he could do as he pleased. He could wield the narrative of the story in his favour. In this instance, he was the villain. Therefore, he summoned a narrative that would boost his power: the Greater-Scope Villain.

With this, the narrative demanded Empty Hand be stronger than Superboy Prime, another villain. Therefore, that shall be.

He had concentrated the Throne's power, the dimension of Heaven, into himself and was now capable of overpowering Superboy Prime with ease.

The light. The yellow holy light began to burn Prime. His body started to disintegrate. Prime's expression went wide and he attempted to break free.

"I will admit," Empty Hand began. "Amongst all the kryptonians and gods I've fought in my existence, you were the strongest. So there's no need to die with such an expression on your face. Be proud. You are indeed worthy to hold the mantle of Superman."

The blinding light blasted Prime away and melted away his arms, legs, and head.

Superboy Prime's corpse lingered in the vacuum of the void.

Silence returned to the world. The holy light attack that Elaine had used on him was partially imitated and to great effect.

As much Empty Hand wanted to revive Superboy under the guise of the Anti-Death Equation, he didn't want to risk it. Superboy was STRONG. Unfathomable power lay in the cells of his body and his willpower was in another dimension. He decided to burn his corpse to cinder rather than deal with him again.

He wasn't alone though. As Omega Beams eviscerated Prime from existence, Empty Hand felt the cold eyes of Death. Silent, peering from the edge of Heaven…

…afraid.

"Hey, Death. I know you're watching. You hate me for creating the Anti-Death Equation, don't you? Aw, well, don't you worry, once I regain control of Heaven, I'm coming after you."

Empty Hand chuckled as the presence of Death disappeared. As long as he sat on this Throne, she could do nothing to him. It wasn't a matter of power but rather authority. He was her boss by technicality and authority. Death meant nothing if there was no afterlife, no Heaven, to go to.

And with the Throne, he would destroy the confines of the multiverse. But first, he needed to revive the Gentry and completely Gentrify Heaven and New Genesis. The damage of Superboy's Retcon Punch could not be underestimated. Even with the power of the Throne, it would take a while to bring back his minions.

But Anti-Death would take hold. It would twist and torture the souls of this forsaken realm.

And eventually, the Chosen One.