Chapter Two – Whatever's Happened To The Men Of Tomorrow?

It was many years later and Superman was flying towards yet another encounter with his arch-foe Luthor, when suddenly, in the blink of an eye, everything changed. Superman was no longer flying, but standing in the middle of Metropolis, surrounded, as far as the eye could see, by Supermen. What was happening? Was this yet another fiendish plot of Lex's? And then he realized that none of the Supermen were wearing glasses - they looked just like Clark Kent, give or take a kiss curl. He looked at the Supermen in horror - his secret identity was being revealed to the world.

At the same time, the other Supermen noticed him and looked at him in horror. What was he wearing his Clark Kent glasses for? Was he some sort of idiot?

Before Superman knew what was happening a red and blue flash appeared before his eyes and his glasses had disappeared. The next thing he knew Dr. Virgil Swann was standing in front of him in a Superman outfit.

"Dr. Swann. You can walk? And you're younger?"

"I can see that you're confused, Superman. I better explain... But first take a closer look at the Supermen here."

Superman (or rather Clark, for he no longer wore his identity-protecting glasses) looked around at the other Supermen. Now that his initial panic had subsided, he noticed that, while the other Supermen bore a resemblance to him, they were all slightly different. Some were taller, some were shorter, some were younger, some were older, and, most importantly of all, he had the best hair. "They're all different. Who are they?" he asked the man who he thought was Virgil Swann.

The reply came in a super-whisper that only Clark and the assorted Supermen with their super-hearing would be able to hear. "They're you. They're me. They're Clark Kent, Superman. As unbelievable and contrived as this sounds, we've been brought here from different times in different parallel Universes (or from different places in Hyper-Time as the local Superman put it) by a fifth-dimensional imp called Mxyzptlk." The Superman who looked like Virgil Swann pointed towards a short bowler-hatted individual in the sky who was fighting yet another Superman.

One of the on-looking Supermen was about to mention that Mxyzptlk had black hair and a beard but managed to restrain himself (he was just thankful that HG Wells wasn't behind it as he'd first feared). Another square-jawed Superman resisted the urge to point out that it was actually pronounced Mxyztplk.

"Here, you better hide these while you're here." Superman handed Clark back his glasses. "The local Superman, and every other Superman except you it seems, only wears the glasses when they're Clark Kent."

"So how long are we stuck here?"

"Until the local Superman works out a way to get Mxyzptlk to say his name backwards. Don't worry, he'll think of something - he always does. Maybe he'll ask him to do his Zatanna impression."

"Great, so what do we do in the meantime?" asked Clark.

"Mingle."

An hour of mingling later, and Clark was to be found moaning to yet another unsympathetic Superman:

"... So, whereas on other worlds Clark wore glasses as a teenager to hide his Superboy identity (or just disappeared to the arctic for ten years), on my world that never happened so it was Superman that ended up wearing the glasses. On my world, Lois is in love with Clark, but thinks Superman's just some ostentatious alien geek."

"So, what's the problem? All you've got to do is reveal to her that Clark Kent's Superman," reasoned the latest unsympathetic Superman.

"I tried that, but she refuses to believe it. Now she spends all of her time trying to prove that Clark Kent and Superman are different people... Hey, where are you going?"

"I'm off to find some kryptonite."

Another hour of mingling later, and Clark found himself back with the Virgil Swann lookalike. First they had a conversation about super-powers, where Clark found that the lookalike had all sorts of weird powers, such as time travel, that he'd never have even thought possible. Then the lookalike produced a drawing pad with a pencil tied to it.

"You might find this interesting, Superman. I've been getting all the other Supermen to use their super-artistry to produce photographic likenesses of their family and friends."

Clark flicked through the pad, and stopped on one of the pages. "Boy, this Lois Lane is gorgeous, but how come Jimmy Olsen changes from one picture to the next?" He flicked to another page. "Who's this? She looks like that girl off Seaquest."

"Apparently that's Lana Lang," replied the Virgil Swann lookalike.

"She's okay, but she's not Lana Lang. This IS Lana Lang," replied Clark, taking the pencil, and, within seconds, capturing the likeness of his childhood sweetheart.

He showed the picture to the other Superman. "Is she hot or what?"

"You think that's hot?" The lookalike grabbed the pad and pencil off Clark. "Wait until you see my Lana."

The lookalike heard one word as he showed off his masterpiece to Clark:

"Kltpzyxm!"