Chapter 26: Impossible Choice

The explosion was violent but satisfying. A gulf of flames reached surprisingly far up into the sky, releasing a green, misty cloud into the air. This was just the beginning, yet General Lane could not help but feel victorious. Soon the alien invaders will be dead, and the Earth will be free from any further danger. "Well done, men! Everything worked perfectly."

"Uh—sir," One of his young soldiers spoke out. He had tried to warn him before, but the General was not willing to listen to him.

"What is it, cadet?"

"I'm afraid we were not as successful as you would've liked."

General Lane was ready to rip the young man to shreds for intruding on his celebration. If there was a problem, then he should have been made aware of the situation sooner. "What do you mean, soldier?"

The boy was afraid of the General and what he might do to him. For all he knew, he could find himself dishonorably discharged even though he had done nothing to warrant such a punishment. Rumors had run amuck among the cadets that General Lane was the hardest man to serve under. Fail him, and you could find yourself in mess hall for the rest of your military career. "None of the other stock piles were ready to detonate."

"What? Why not!"

"Sir, all the other stockpiles have mysteriously been sabotaged. "

The general wanted to hit something at that moment. Why can't these stupid politicians get it through their thick skulls? It wasn't just the American politicians either. They views Superman as some sort of savior to be worshiped. No man should have that much power and influence.

So now, he was faced with the fact that only one stockpile was detonated. It would only cover half the United States, starting with Metropolis. At least half this nation would be protected from the chaos, making it a little easier for him to do his job. He still would have preferred for a complete success of this operation. "So why wasn't this one sabotaged unless..."

Somehow that rouge Kryptonian found out about his plans and sabotaged everything, but how? He wanted this stockpile to go off to use it against Superman. The blasted Kryptonian hijacked his weapon and made it his own; there was no way of undoing what had been done. There was no choice but leave the hostile alien for Superman to take care of, but that didn't mean that there was nothing he could do about the alien android. "If we can't deal with this rouge alien, we can at least do something about that damn android when he shows up. I want the jets carrying our soft bombs ready to attack upon my command."

Lana shouldn't have been surprised to see another holographic recording of Lex Luthor. These things have been popping up quite a bit as she discovered new hidden secrets throughout this office. Somehow, this recording had a different feel to it; the image was looking straight at her. There was no mistaking the agitation in his facial expressions.

"Well, Miss Lang, I can't say enough how disappointed I am. I had such high hopes for you as my replacement as CEO of Lexcorp. You have violated that trust I had in you by going against the very principles I set for this corporation."

"What principles?" She could not decide whether to take heed to this recording or not. There was no way he could terminate her employment from beyond the grave.

"You've given assistance to my enemy, Superman. In this corporation, that's a violation of confidentiality, and is immediate grounds for termination."

Was the image replying to her question, or was it part of the recording? Even more importantly, was the sinking feeling that she was not going to like what was about to happen. She shouldn't have underestimated the ingenuity of Lex Luthor. Only he could find a way to run a corporation even after he had died.

The fire alarm system sounded throughout the entire tower. Now, she knew she was in trouble. The entire building was starting to evacuate by now, and she had somehow activated a trap that locked her in this office. She should have guessed that this secret office was booby trapped. Everything she did, and everything she said on the phone must have been monitored by an advanced artificial intelligence program. It must have monitored her conversation with Professor Hamilton and detected key words in their conversation that alerted it of their attempt to save Superman.

The technology to create such a program was beyond anything the world had ever seen. Lex had been hoarding many things that could have greatly benefited the public. She recently learned that he had actually found the cure for cancer, but had decided to slow down the research so it would not be discovered for over twenty years. He wanted to milk it for as much money as he could. Even worse, the moment she was made CEO of Lexcorp, his research on the cure self-destructed. The world was being cheated out of some Earth-changing, technological, and medical breakthroughs.

Now, he was at it again. The whole building was being evacuated while she was locked in this office which had become her high-tech prison. An urge swelled up inside of her to find a way out of that office. Her instincts were telling her that she had to get out of there now.

"Your services, here at Lexcorp, are no longer needed. As of this moment, you are terminated… permanently." Her fears were confirmed with that last statement. It was confirmed, yet again, when the monitor beneath the glass desktop went blank and displayed a LED-displayed, digital timer with ten minutes on the clock. The countdown started as soon as the timer appeared. "Farewell, Miss Lang. At least people will say that you went out with a bang!"

The holographic image disappeared, leaving her alone for the final nine and a half minutes remaining of her life. She immediately raced around the office, desperate to find a hidden exit. Her search did not last long; it didn't take her long to convince herself that Lex would not make that dumb of a mistake. There was no escaping from this prison.

When that understanding took hold of her, her emotional state started to sink like a rock. Tears strolled down her face as she ran for the steel door that prevented her from reaching the office door. She pounded on it with both of her fists. "Somebody help me, Please! Clark, please help me!"

Once again, Superman had quickly gained the advantage over General Zod. This time around, his powers were much more developed; he had gained an appreciation of what he could of, but he still lacked control. No matter what he did, the general could not match Superman's entire life-time under Earth's yellow sun. Still, he could sense his abundant supply of confidence. That was when he knew Zod was up to something; this was either just a distraction or him buying his time.

Zod was able to get in a few good moves using his brilliant, military, strategic mind. That definitely gave him an edge. His long career as a brilliant military leader on Krypton was proof that he was an intelligent man. Superman could only be grateful that he was the one that spent a life time here on Earth rather than rouge general. If he could ever gained his full strength and add that to his military tactics, then Superman doubted that would be able to defeat him.

The two of them found themselves high above the city, trading jabs. Zod displayed his military intelligence by shooting heat beams towards his face. He protected his face with his hand only to find the general taking advantage by delivering a hard blow into his gut. The man, who had recently been nicked name 'The Man of Steel', realized that he should have anticipated such a move. This mistake just handed his advisory the momentum.

The general realized it, and took full advantage of it. He brought down both of his elbows onto his back, pushing him downward. Before giving him the chance to recover, Zod flew up higher and then came back down like a missile, with his feet implanted into his back. There was nothing he could do to stop his descent. He was forced to take the blow, as the crashed into the middle of the street, leaving a giant crater in their wake.

All the cars on the road narrowly missed them, as they swerved to either crash into another car in front of them, or into the windows of nearby shops. The pileup of continued to increase, as the chain reaction spiraled out of control. A few cars even found themselves flipped onto their hoods or on top of another car. After a solid minute of chaos, the traffic catastrophy came to an end.

Before the dust had the chance to settle, Superman went on the offensive. He spun himself onto his back, positioning himself for the attack. By the time the general knew what was happening, he grabbed him by the leg and pushed it up so hard, that it caused Zod to fall backwards and hit the ground with his head.

Keeping on the offensive, he launched the second step to his three part attack. He leaped to his feet and grabbed Zod's ankle. Using a mixture of his super strength and speed, he spun around in circles, lifting the general off the ground and floating up above the ground. The dizzying speed that he was being spun prevented him from being able to focus and break himself free. When Superman was ready, he threw him into a deserted two-car pileup. The impact nearly caused the top car to slide completely off the other car.

For the final step of the attack, Superman unleashed his heat beams from his eyes, hitting the gas tank of one of the cars behind Zod. The result was an instant gigantic explosion. Superman knew that the attack would do nothing to harm his fellow Kryptonian; he opposed killing out of cold blood. Superman was only fighting to buy himself time to think of a way to send him to the Phantom Zone. It was the only way he could see to end this stalemate.

Therefore, he was not surprised to see General Zod walk out, unscathed by the hot, burning flames. He remained as passive as always. He wore a crooked smile as naturally and as good as anyone he had ever seen. He had the face of a man who truly believed everything he was doing was right, no matter how misguided he really was. The Kryptonian general was not going to be intimidated again; he was not going to run away for a second time. "Zod, this is your last chance; end this chaos, now!"

Zod looked up into the sky and his face become even more confident, if that was possible. He returned his gaze back towards him with new life in his eyes. "No, Kal-El, this is your last chance. Kneel before your new master."

Superman looked to the sky to see what Zod had seen to give him this new found confidence. A green cloud was floating towards the city. It was anything but a natural occurrence. There was no doubt that it was a cloud of Kryptonite dust that was expanding over the city of Metropolis. General Lane had detonated the stockpiles. He actually went through with his audacious plan.

What didn't make sense to him, however, was why the Kryptonite cloud coming towards them was making him more confident. Surely, he was smart enough to know that he, too, would be killed by it as well. A sudden realization suddenly came rushing into his confused mind. Mercy Graves had been with him up at the Daily Planet. With her former ties to Lexcorp, she must have discoverd what Lana Lang and General Lane was up to. If she had resources to discover that plan, then she probably knew about the alternate use for the solar generator.

"I know what you are trying to do; I will not allow it to happen."

"Really? How are you going to stop me? Listen carefully, can you not hear the situation over at the—what did she call it—the Lexcorp tower, is it?"

He immediately knew that he was talking about Lana. Mercy and Zod had planned this trap from the beginning. This was what he was waiting patiently for. He focused his enhanced hearing in the direction of the Lexcorp tower. He could hear her frantic voice calling out to him by his human name. She was on the verge of tears due to the loss of hope. From this distance, he could not determine what kind of trouble she was in, but he could sense her fear of death playing a drastic role in her condition.

"So what will it be, Kal-El? Will you stop me or save that pitiful female earthling from being blown into her next life?"

From the other side of Metropolis, a blinding yellow beam shot up at the Kryptonite dust. The dust began to catch fire and soon, the green cloud started to turn into a billowy, red, cloud of fire. Professor Hamilton was using the solar generator to burn the Kryptonite with an intense yellow solar radiation. Superman now realized that Mercy Graves was more than just an assistant to Lex; she was very capable of manipulating the world around her just as well as her late boss.

Zod wasted no time taking off towards that beam of light. Superman realized, for the sake of Metropolis and the world, it would be wiser if he focused all of his attention on stopping Zod from acquiring full control of his powers. The problem was, he often listened to his heart, rather than his head. He was not willing to sacrifice anyone for the greater cause, even if it meant making things harder for himself. He was willing to sacrifice his life, and no one else's. He decided long ago that he would never play god and chose who should live or who should die. Everyone had the right to live and be saved, if at all possible. He had no choice but go the other way and save Lana. Things were about to get very complicated.