The air inside the caving walls of the warehouse buzzed with urgency and a fierce determination. Zatanna, her face drawn with strain, started to chant, her voice a low, vibrating hum that reverberated in the dust-filled air. Magical power around her burned with growing ferocity, a jarring contrast to the claustrophobic blackness of their burial.
"Retcarid nosirroh dna ytilaretiL," she chanted, the words of magic resonating with an intention to break the established magical state, to cause a localized discontinuity which would briefly cut through the tenuous thread of connection between Umbra and the emerald beast. The spell was a dangerous move, an intentional jolting of the ambient magical frequencies that might have unanticipated and potentially catastrophic effects, further destabilizing the already volatile environment.
As the last syllable escaped her lips, a burst of wild magical energy flew from Zatanna, not as a contained blast, but as a wild ripple that unfolded outward, warping the very air that they breathed. The emerald glow pouring from the creature trembled wildly, and Umbra reeled backward, grasping at her head, a hiss of agony escaping her shadowed mouth. The quiet dominion that she had achieved over the wild energies faltered, the fine wire of her dominion over the reshaped Conner briefly broken.
Now!" Michael shouted, grabbing the brief window. Overriding the creaking fall of the collapsing building and the crushing mass of the debris, he concentrated his will, reaching out with his Libriomancy not to alter the outside reality, but to connect with the broken pieces of Conner's own inner story. He didn't try to take command, but to send a lifeline, a spark of recognition through the maelstrom boiling inside the altered clone.
He cast but one image in the emerald creature's mind: a recollection of Superman's arrival at Cadmus, the moment of recognition, the budding sense of connection to one who shared his birth. It was a spark of hope, a promise of belonging in the din of conflicting influence.
The emerald creature, its focus briefly shattered by Zatanna's magical interference and Michael's telepathic projection, halted its menacing stance. The berserker fury in its radiating eyes blinked out of existence, replaced by a brief flash of confusion, a primal identification of something known amidst the alien devastation.
"Conner, it's us!" Aqualad shouted in urgency from inside his aquatic bubble, trying to fix that flash of identification. "Remember who you are!"
Wally, although still in fear, joined in, a plaintive cry. "Yeah, Super-bro! Pizza! We promised you pizza!" The ridiculousness of the proposal lingered, a desperate reach to cling to any moment of their past friendship.
The emerald monster gave a low, grunting moan, its great head wagging as if struggling with an inner turmoil. The emerald glow in its eyes flared wildly, the wild energy clashing with the faint remnants of its original self.
Umbra, recovering from the magical trauma, growled in rage, her mastery over the storming energies re-established. "No! Don't heed them! You are above them now! You are the chaos itself!" She stretched out, her shadowy hand seeking to re-establish the physical link to the beast, to reassert her mastery.
But the short moment of opportunity had sufficed. The seed of acknowledgment had taken hold in Conner's mind, a thin strand of his original story creeping back from the turbulent redo. As Umbra's hand approached, the emerald monster flinched, a low growl in its chest, but this time, not one of blind rage, but one of confusion, of battle within.
Taking advantage of this pivotal juncture, Michael moved. Concentrating his will with a desperate precision, he aimed for the subtle chaotic energies still adhering to Conner, the vestiges of Umbra's original enhancement. He tried a subtle act of narrative severance, not to cancel the change, but to break the direct connection to Umbra's manipulation, to establish a buffer between the sorceress and the tainted clone.
It was a risky game, like doing intricate surgery with a blunt tool. The wild energies were unpredictable and unstable, and one miscalculation would have disastrous results, maybe destabilizing Conner further or triggering a backlash of wild magic.
With a concentrated mental effort, Michael spoke, his voice a low, vibrating whisper that seemed to resonate directly within the emerald beast's mind. "The tether thins. The borrowed chaos recedes. Your tale… is your own."
As the words resonated within Conner's mind, a palpable ripple of energy rose from the emerald beast. Its fierce emerald aura pulsed and faltered, giving way to a weak, uncertain red flame that glowed in its eyes – a brief, distant echo of the Superboy they remembered. The emerald-blooded bond of shadow had been briefly shattered, its discordant note of chaos broken by a wild gamble and the tenuous, but lingering, echoes of an old struggle. The fight for Conner's very existence, and their own life, was hardly yet won, but a slender strand of hope had been clutched in the crushing darkness.