Chapter 28: Kryptonian World War
Turpin was happy to hear that the upper levels of Lexcorp building had exploded; perhaps this time, the corporation would stay close. The only bad thing about this news was the possibility of hundreds of innocent people might have been injured in the catastrophe. Of course the great news about Lexcorp had to be a double-edged sword; it was just his luck.
Pushing his 2010-Chevrolet-Cavalier, company car as hard as he could, he abrasively drove towards Lexcorp. Sawyer was holding on to anything she could find; never had she been so scared of being a passenger in Dan Turpin's car. "Jesus Dan, I'd like to get there alive, if it's not too much to ask!"
Turpin grumbled underneath his breath. His attention was fully on trying to find a way through the traffic to get to the tower. It was taking every ounce of restraint he had to keep himself from going on a swearing fit; the darn people of Metropolis needed to learn how to drive. His aggressive driving nearly caused him to rear end a small, two-door coup as the traffic came to an abrupt halt. "Aw, what the hell!"
Sawyer'a nails nearly ripped through the leather on the door handle. She was glad that the horror had come to an end, at least for a minute or two. "What's the matter Dan, the sidewalk's not to your liking?"
"Yeah, I'm in a grumpy mood, today, and what of it?" he huffed. "We've still got a fire burning in the sky after some strange yellow beam shot up from the ground... we've got the explosion at Lexcorp—Luthorcorp—whatever it's called now. It's enough to ruin anyone's day. What else can possibly go wrong today?"
"Uh, Dan, I think things just got worse," Captain Sawyer said cautiously, as she opened her door.
"What now?" Turpin ventured to open his door and step out of the car, seeing that the traffic was not going anywhere. Down the street, it sounded like the echoes of thunder snapping. After one of the crackling of 'thunder' a red and blue streak raced across the sky, towards their direction. The blur hit a steal beam of at the construction site besides them. Superman was caught in the indentation of the steel girder, trying to come to his senses.
Everyone gasped as they began to climb out of their cars and star up at the stunned hero. Turpin looked down the street to see another person, like Superman, flying in their direction. This was the alien that Superman had manhandled several days ago. It would appear that, somehow, he was able to turn the tide. His eyes were drawn down, and everything became clear. The same android—Brainiac if he remembered correctly—was marching towards them, using some kind of energy to toss the cars out of his way. The alien and the android were working together. "Damn!"
He exchanged looks with Sawyer, and without trading words, they knew what they needed to do. "Let's move it, everyone! Clear out!"
The last hit caused him to see stars. Stuck in the indentation he made in the steel beam, he was still trying to shake the confusion. Not only did Zod's power increased, he was now fighting alongside of Brainiac. The odds did not look good. Superman knew that there would be consequences to pay for not stopping Zod when he had the chance, and now it was time to pay the debt.
Zod hovered in front of him with a smug look on his face. He grabbed him by the throat and pulled him out of the steel beam. "Now, the power is at its rightful place: in my hands." He unleashed his heat beams from his eyes, at full force, pushing the Man of Steel all the way down into the cement foundation.
Brainac finished the attack by releasing an invisible pulse from the palm of his right hand. All ten stories worth of steel began to groan until the stress caused all the steel beams to collapse. One of the beams pierced the side of the tower next door and began to rip tear through the glass and cement. There were more than a handful of unlucky people on that level who had no chance to prepare or save themselves. Without prejudice, the beam cleared everything, in its path, out of the way and swept them right out of the building.
Lana nearly screamed as she watched the steel frame come collapsing to the ground. It was bad enough to watch over a dozen people fall to their deaths from the tower next door, but to watch thousands of tons of steel collapse onto Clark was hard to watch. Lois, on the other hand, was much more calm and collected. Lana admired her strength. To be in love with someone who others wanted to kill took strength beyond reasoning. She didn't have that kind of strength; Lois did. "We've got to help him!"
"There's nothing I'd like more, but there's nothing we can do," She replied.
Lana knew she was right. Seeing as she was no longer was CEO of Lexcorp, she had lost all access to everything that could possibly even the odds out for Clark. Even if she was still authorized to enter the building, she doubted that she would be allowed to. By now, the rest of the skyscraper was evacuated and the fire and the police departments probably have everything taped off.
As she reeled to find any memory that she might have forgotten that may have a solution to her dilemma, she was interrupted by a loud thud. Before she could figure out what was going on, Lois was on the ground, unconscious. Lana turned to find herself looking down the barrel of a gun.
"Perhaps I should've taken Superman's precious girlfriend rather than you, but she's too much of an army brat for my taste," Mercy said slyly. "Besides, I've got a score to settle with you after what you tried to do to Lex's corporation. Lucky for me, Superman seems to value all life, so you'll just have to do as my gift to General Zod."
The wind was knocked out of him, which was all he experienced physically. Emotionally, over all the chaos of the tower come crashing down over him, he could still feel the deaths of dozens of innocent lives in direct result of the collapse. With his super hearing, Superman could almost hear the extinguishing of more heartbeats that he cared to count. With each heartbeat that faded into silence, the more rage welled up inside of him. It was through that rage, he was able to dig himself towards the top.
He stopped just short of breaking free, deciding to surprise General Zod with a retaliation attack. There was one steel girder between him and freedom, and it was perfectly placed for what he wanted to do. It pointed upward, no doubt in the direction where General Zod would be hovering. He placed his hands at the end the girder and with all the rage that he built up, he launched himself out of the pile, with the girdle, shooting upward like a missile.
His guess proved to be correct, and the Kryptonian general was right where he had hoped. Superman pushed the girder into the sky, ramming the other end of the beam into the chest of Zod, and pushing him high above the city as well. When he was at a safe height, he stopped his ascent and grabbed the girder like a baseball bat. He pulled the large girder back and swung without hesitation.
The impact was like the breaking of the sound barrier, and the Kryptonian was sent sailing far across the opposite end of Metropolis. The General ended up crashing through an electronic bulletin board. Spark spat out in all directions and began to rain down to the ground along with the debris of glass.
With Zod temporally out of the picture, Superman was ready for Brainiac. Unfortunately, he never had the chance to implement the next phase of the attack. He could see, what looked like a ripple all around him, as if he was looking at the surface of a disturbed pond. Before he knew what was happening, the girder was bending as if it had the flexibility of a snake. It wrapped itself around him, fastening his arms to his side before hardening again. He fought to free his arms, but he wasn't given enough time to work on it. That barely visible beam emanating from the ground pulled girder and him to the ground like rocket approaching its target.
He hit the ground with such force, it sent a small shockwave which flipped nearby cars like coins, and created yet another large crater which would mean more work for the road crews. After the dust settled, Superman found himself on one knee, looking up, out of the crater, at Brainiac. He stood at the edge of crater, looking menacingly down at him. He realized that the Kryptonian android had him right where he wanted him.
With the back of her head throbbing, Lois opened her eyes to find herself lying on the sidewalk. She had no recollection what just happened, all she knew was she had one annoying headache to deal with on top of all the chaos. As she worked at getting back onto her feet, she noticed that there were at least five men nearby; not one of them came over to help her or to see if she was even alive. Typical males.
As she stood up, the ground trembled softly followed by a soft breeze that flicked her long, black hair. She could only imagine what kind of damage that the battle was doing to Metropolis. "Lana, what..."
She looked to her right to see that Lana was no longer by her side. Her purse was on the ground, which was a sure-tell sign that she left unwillingly. She reached down and picked the purse up, hoping to god that she had a chance to get it back to her. As she was still hunched over, she looked to her left and saw the android flying backwards as if he had been thrown against his will. She stood and was about to find cover when she noticed a stocky, old grandmother watching the action intently, not even noticing how intrusive she was being in the process.
However, that was the least of her worries at that point; they were in the path of the Kryptonian version of world war. "Look out!"
Lois grabbed the elderly woman by the arm and tugged towards the revolving door of the tower behind them. Unfortunately, her weight added to her resistance, slowing her rescue attempt. She expected that they were going to die, but before the android crashed into them, it corrected itself by pulling himself down onto his feet as if his feet were magnetically drawn to the ground. Never in her life was Lois happy to see an adversary of Superman recover from one of his attacks. This gave her more time to pull the old woman out of the way.
However, it turned out only to be a few seconds of added time. She afforded a glanced beyond the android to see a mangled construction steel-girder coming in their direction. The few seconds that it did afford them was enough to wake the poor woman out of her shock. Without resistance, she was easily able to guide her into the tower just as the girder came crashing down on the ground, shattering all the windows on the ground floor. A wave of glass crashed upon their backs, but they were fortunate enough to be far enough away that the glass did not hurt either of them.
"Oh, thank you young lady, you saved my life," the old woman said, turning towards her and cupping Lois' right hand in hers.
"Don't mention it, Ma'am," Lois responded, wanting her hand back, but did not want to seem rude.
She tried to gently pull her hand free, but the elderly woman only gripped it harder. "Say, I know you, don't I? Yes, you're that Daily Planet reporter."
She wanted to tell her that there were dozens of reporters at the Daily Planet, but somehow it seemed like it wouldn't matter. Her name was usually the first name thought of when talking about the Planet. Chances were, she WAS the reporter that the grandmother was thinking of. "Yes, I'm Lois Lane"
"Oh, bless you, dearie. Thank you for all that you do. I have some girls that I wish you could meet; they mean the world to me." The woman finally let go of her hand as she let out a motherly chuckle. "They have this sweet name for me... Granny Goodness."
Lois looked outside to see that the battle had moved on from their area. She did not want to be rude, but the man whom she loved was in a battle for his life, and she had to be there to see what happens. She needed to be certain that he would be able to win this fight, despite what the odds were starting to look like. "That's nice, but if you'll excuse me, I really have to go."
"I understand. Oh, to be young and full of energy again. Perhaps I can introduce you to my girls another time."
Lois nodded, and ran out of the tower, happy just to get away from that kind, old woman who appeared to be ready to share her life's story with her. There was no time for her to waist; she had to get back outside. Daring not to look behind, for fear of giving her the impression that she actually cared to hear about her granddaughters, she raced out of the tower. The old woman watched with a devilish grin across her face.