Chapter 7: Invasion
Seeing Lana again brought back a lot of memories. Clark had all but assumed that he would never see her again. They were a hot item back in junior high and high school. He had been certain that they were going to spend the rest of their lives together, but all of that changed when his destiny took him in another direction. He was sent to learn about who he was, and what he was to become. Unfortunately, it was going to be a life without her. So he had written a note and left it on the front porch of her house. He did not have the nerve to end the relationship in person, and he regretted it even to this day.
To him, their relationship had only ended a half year ago. Shortly after leaving the note on her front porch, he had created the Fortress of Solitude, and was in a suspended animation-like state for many years. Those years of training felt like a day. Seeing her ten years older was almost startling to him. Even more shocking was how he still felt about her.
"Clark?" Lana's reaction to seeing him again appeared to be similar to his seeing her.
"Am I missing something here?" Lois interrupted the awkward silence.
"You two know each other?" Perry asked.
"You could say that," Lana said coldly, narrowing her eyes towards Clark.
"We used to date back at Smallville High," Clark replied, pushing his glasses farther up the bridge of his nose.
"So, you do remember me. I have to admit, I'm surprised," Lana said snidely.
"Awkward," Lois commented out loud.
"I just remembered that I have very important meeting with General Lane. If you'll excuse me, I'll take my leave." Lana walked between Clark and Lois to make her way for the exit.
Clark could feel the coldness about her presence as she walked past him. He could not allow it to end this way. If he did not take this opportunity to make things right, then he may never get another one. "Lana, wait!"
Lois watched as Clark had run off after his old flame. A very strange feeling hit her in the pit of her stomach. For some odd reason, she really did not like Lana Lang. Part of it was that she was now the CEO of the vile Lexcorp Corporation, but there was something more to it. The fact that she no longer had his full attention was very unsettling to her. Why she felt like she had to have his attention on her was something she could not explain.
"Hey Lois!" Lucy's voice interrupted her thoughts. "I really hope you don't mind, but can we postpone our dinner together until tomorrow? I've got a date tonight."
"What? With who? Jimmy?"
"Sure, why not?" Lucy smiled. "He's kinda' cute—whenever he's able to formulate an entire sentence."
"Lana, hold on!" Clark rushed to catch up to Lana, who had tried to pick up the pace to avoid him. As he sped up his pace to match her's, he tripped over his own feet and nearly fell flat on his face.
"Perhaps you should get rid of those ridiculous glasses. Lex is gone, so you don't really need them anymore, now do you?"
When they had started dating, Clark had told her that he started wearing these fake glasses to show emotional support to Lex who was being ruthlessly bullied by John Corben and his friends. Even after Lex had been taken out of public school, wearing them had become so natural, that he never really thought about not wearing them.
"Actually, these glasses are real now. Without them, I'm almost blind as a bat."
"Well, I must've been blind to, actually, think that we could ever have a life together. Boy, was I stupid."
He had always feared that she had taken their sudden break-up hard, and it appeared that his fears were right on the money. Apparently, time had done nothing to heal her wound. He was determined to settle their differences and earn her forgiveness. "I'm sorry about the note and the way things ended between us. I never meant to hurt you."
"But you did hurt me, Clark!" She turned to face him with a bitter look on her face. "Everything was beautiful between us; we had something so special, that no one in school could have comprehended it. You threw it all away! You left me a stupid little note and disappeared from the face of the earth, with no way to contact you, or to know where you were. For all I knew, you could have run off and joined a monastery. You gave me no opportunity to even fight to keep what we had alive, and that's what hurt me the most. You thought so little about what we had, that you thought you could just pick up and leave without saying goodbye, or explain to me why you had to leave. Hell, even with all the resources of Lexcorp, I still don't know where you've been the past ten years!"
"I know," Clark replied solemnly. "My life has been rather—complex."
"How complex could your life actually be? You're a lousy newspaper reporter!" she snapped.
"Lana, I wish I could give you the answers that you desire and deserve. I had no intentions of leaving you the way I did. For whatever is means to you, I've never taken what we had for granted." Clark turned and made his way back towards his desk.
Lana watched him walk away and found herself biting her lip. It was a nervous habit that she had always had. She had no idea that she still carried all that resentment towards him. She remembered finding the note on the front porch after finishing dinner with her parents. Her heart had been so torn, that she cried for days. At some point down the line, that sorrow had turned to anger.
Her initial reaction when he first saw Clark here at the Planet was that very same anger. After his apology, she found it hard to hold on to that anger. Yes, his apology felt rather empty, but for some reason, she still found it difficult to hold on to that rage. Could it be that she still loved him, deep down, inside? Lana shrugged that thought off, and made a quick exit from this tower.
Smallville was a small town in Kansas, which had become popular when a freak meteor storm struck the town thirty years ago. The damage that the meteorites had caused had all been repaired, but that did not stop a few tourists from driving through in the hope of seeing something significant. In a way, it had become another Roswell, New Mexico.
Martha Kent would never forget that day; it was the day Clark came into her life. She remembered it as if it was only yesterday. She and her late husband, Jonathon, had just gotten the report that she was never going to be able to give birth to a baby. That report had devastated her to her core. Her mourning had been cut short by an act of God. Clark had come to them in that meteor shower and their life had never been the same again.
They had never expected this young, strange boy was sent here with a specific purpose. Never in their wildest dreams did they ever think he would grow up to be Earth's greatest hero. Jonathon would have been so proud to see what his son had become.
Martha was sitting on the rocking chair out on the front porch. Relaxing on a pleasantly warm morning with nothing pressing that needed to be done, she enjoyed the morning by listening to the radio. She loved listening to the news to see if her son had been up to anything. They radio station was going through their weather report when she noticed a fireball falling from the sky. The fireball landed well beyond her property, somewhere near town. "My goodness, what was that?"
Flaming meteorites filled the morning sky over the small town. People who had been conversing outside ran for cover as fire rained down from the sky. It was like hell raining on earth, as balls of fire began to cause whatever damage it could. Several crashed through roofs or windows to set shops on fire. Another one nearly hit a pick-up truck, causing it to roll over onto its right side.
There was no safe place to hide, as fire ravaged through the strip mall and throughout Smallville. Among all the falling meteorites was one that was larger than the rest. This one was more controlled in its descent as it made its way towards an open cornfield. The giant meteorite came crashing in the heart of field, well away from any activity, leaving a giant crater among the corn stalks.
Deeply embedded into the ground, a giant, perfectly smooth object laid in the scorched crater, steam rising from its surface. After an eerie minute of silence, a slice of the strange round object lowered like a hatch. The gears sighed, as it slowly descended onto the ground to reveal a set of steps.
From inside, Brainiac stood from his chair and commenced walking out of his cramped shuttle. He took his first steps onto this strange colorful planet. "So, this is Earth."
His shuttle chimed an announcement, and automatically activated the communication holographic projector. Standing in front of him was the life-sized, white, holographic image of the dark lord. His face remained cold and callused. "Have you arrived at the planet?"
"I have," Brainiac responded.
"Excellent. I have two jobs for you. First, I want you to destroy the so-called 'Man of Steel'. Second, I want you to do whatever is necessary to spread the violence of the Intergang to a much broader radius. They have become too complacent with Metropolis, and too focused on killing Superman. That privilege does not belong to them."
"It will be done, Lord Darkseid. I have already begun turning my shuttle into a device that will create a portal into the Phantom Zone. I will use it rescue General Zod from his prison."
"I do not like how much trust you have in this rogue Kryptonian," Darkseid said coldly. "He has failed you on Krypton; what makes you think he will not fail you again there on Earth?"
"He will serve as a mere distraction. It will allow for me to calculate Kal-El's strengths and weaknesses. Zod will keep his attention on himself while I prepare for your arrival."
As usual, Darkseid showed no emotion on his literal stone face. After a few seconds of thinking about it, he finally nodded his approval. "So be it, but he is to die after the son of Jor-El is destroyed. Not one Kryptonian is to be alive by my arrival. Is this understood?"
"Perfectly."