A/N: Please read and review! This is if the events of the Avengers and Thor: The Dark World never happened.


He came into the waiting room, pride clearly shown on his face as he announced the birth of his healthy son. His mother hugged him, and his friends all gave their congratulations before following him into his wife's hospital room. She was holding the little boy and gave them all a tied smile as they each saw the baby. The kid was more like his father than any would have realized, but right then, he looked like a small and innocent little thing who had no idea of the greatness that would come from him. The friends all made jokes about half the things his wife yelled at him during her labor. Most of which he just ignored.

"What's his name?" His mother asked.

"Jonathon," his wife answered. "Of course."


It took a long time for their little town in New Mexico to be rebuilt. There were many people who never came back and for good reason. What happened to their little town could make anyone a little skittish. A young woman with wavy mousy brown hair carefully picked her way across the holy road. She rested a hand on her lower back as she looked around her. Occasionally, her eyes would move to the sky overhead, and she would always have a pang of despair.

"I wish I knew why you couldn't come back," she said to herself.

"Jane," another woman's voice said behind her. "You know you shouldn't be walking around in all this."

The woman, Jane, rested her hands on her swelling stomach. She gave her friend and lab assistant a dirty look.

"Hey, don't shoot the messenger," she said. "Uneven ground. Your center of gravity being off."

Jane walked back to her friend, and they went back to their RV. She would go over her calculations and check the stars for almost hours on end, but she would never get past what she had a few months ago. There were no more strange rainbow colored lights in the night sky.

"You're going to work yourself to death, Jane," her friend said, grabbing her battered notebook from her hands. "You need to sleep. The stars will be here in a few months."

"I will find a way," she said. "I'm so close."

"He had to have a reason to not come back. He's probably off saving all kinds of worlds."

"Darcy," Jane sighed, trying not to cry. "Maybe. Maybe."

The second time that day, Jane rested her hands on her swelling stomach, and she at least had a piece of him.

A few months later, she had a baby girl, born in the middle of a thunderstorm. Jane thought that was his blessing over the birth of their daughter and with the help of her father's friend and teacher, she picked the name Touron or loved by Thor. Even then, she looked so much like her father.


Jonathon was about five years old when his super strength kicked in. He may have broken a door when he was running around their home. He stared at the broken door when his mother found him.

"Clark!" She called to his father. "I think there's something you need to tell Jonathon."

His father spent the time to explain, as well as he could, to Jonathon the history of their family. It might have been a bit too much for the five year old, so his father chuckled.

"I'm Superman," he told him quietly.

He flew with his father that night, and that was difficult to not believe. Jonathon realized that he had the coolest of families. His father was actually friends with Batman! And the woman who would occasionally come over to talk with his mother and father, was Wonder Woman, and his Aunt Chloe knew Green Arrow!

The story of how his father became Superman was one he always asked to listen to when he found out. He could not understand the significance of why his grandparents had to send him away, but he knew that his own parents loved him very much, and if they did that, he knew that something bad had to have happened. Jonathon particularly loved the last part when his father flew up to a planet and moved it away from Earth. It was the journey of him becoming that hero the world needed that always interested him. Not the later ones where he saved the world countless times from aliens with a group of completely different people. He liked the story of someone ordinary becoming great by his own actions.


It was the loud thunder that brought her to her mother's room, and she sat on her lap and immediately burrowed her head in her neck.

"The thunder isn't something to be afraid of, Tara," her mother said, using the nickname that everyone took to calling her the moment she could talk. "We're the safest right now." She hugged the little girl to her. "Did I ever tell you the story of the man who could control the lightning?" Tara shook her head. "I have to fix that, don't I?"

"There was once a prince in a far, far away land that knew only peace and prosperity during his childhood. He was given a hammer that only he could lift, and that gave him the power over lightning and thunder. With that, he became a great warrior and protector for his father, and with each victory, his pride grew. On the day that his father had declared him his heir, their palace was attacked by their old enemies, and the prince grew angered at such an act. He wanted to attack that enemy, but it would have brought war onto their people. His father ordered them not to attack.

"The prince gathered his four closest friends and the brother he knew he could trust, and they attacked the enemy. The six of them were so outmatched, and they would have died if the king had not appeared to save their lives. The fact that his son went against his wishes and almost brought war onto them, his father sent him to Earth, taking away his titles and his power. He did have a heart and hope, and he sent his son's hammer after him, knowing that if his son proved himself worthy, he would be able to lift it and come back.

"It was there where the prince met a woman who studied the stars. She promised to help him find his hammer, and he promised to help her understand what he knew about the stars. When he came to the hammer, he found that he could not lift it, and that was when his brother appeared bringing him terrible news. Their father had died, and he could not return unless they would go to war. They gave each other a final good bye, and the former prince was forced to grow used to the strange new world around him.

"He taught the woman what he knew of the stars, and he realized that the world would not be that bad for him." Her mother looked out the window just when lightning flashed across the night sky, and she looked so sad when she said that part.

"One morning his four closest friends came to find him, and that was when he learned that his brother was a traitor. His friends did not come alone. When his friends left for Earth, his brother sent a weapon after them to kill his brother and anyone else who wished to stand in his way. The prince and his four friends got the townspeople out of the town as the weapon made its way to them.

"His friends fought against the weapon, but it proved to be too much even for some of the greatest warriors. The prince had his friends retreat, and he faced the weapon himself. He knew that his brother would be watching him, and he apologized and demanded that if anyone would have died that day then it should be him. The weapon struck him, and he laid dying in the woman's arms, knowing that she was safe." Her mother's voice cracked a little when she said that last part.

"Something happened. The sky darkened, and it began to thunder and lightning as the hammer flew to the prince's hands. He faced the weapon as the prince he was once and easily destroyed it. He and his friends would deal with his brother once they returned home, but before he left, he promised the woman that he would return to her. He could not come back."

Tara opened her eyes when her mother finished the story. "That's not a very happy ending."

"No," her mother's voice cracked once more. "No, it's not."

"Did I make you sad?" Tara asked, hugging her mother. "I'm sorry, Mommy."

"No, honey," her mother said. "You make me happier than you could ever imagine."


His father drove into the small town in the desert, and even after almost twenty-two years, the place looked like it had been through a lot. From what he heard of what happened to that town twenty or so years ago, it was no wonder that it would take a while for it to be as it once was if that. It was just the two of them as his mother was busy with a story on the other end of the country. The two of them went to that small town in New Mexico for his father to write about a researcher were very few people on the streets that morning, and the few that were seen eyed them warily. Whatever had leveled most of the town, it made the survivors suspicious of any outsider.

On the roof of a building close to the repaired motel was a blonde woman writing something in a notebook.

"Can you tell me where Dr. Foster is?" His father asked her.

She was startled, but she managed to stop herself from slipping from top of the building.

"She's out of town, right now," she answered. "Um. . .looking for a quieter place for her research last night. She should be back later."

She went back to whatever she was working on, a dismissal if there ever was one. Jonathon knew he would have to get to know her better during his stay in New Mexico.