Chapter Sixteen: A Villainous Fire
Clark heard it before he saw it.
Fire.
Jumping out of his chair he looked around. A few kilometres away, in a chemical building, a fire was erupting. It was already starting to get out of hand. And Clark knew exactly who was needed for this job.
Scurrying towards the stairs, Clark dashed quickly to the roof, then, barging through the doors after making sure no one was around, he leapt out as Superman. The billowing of the cape as he rushed off was somehow relaxing, and yet also made him feel the burden he carried. He couldn't see the big red "S" on his chest. He didn't see the colours. He heard the cape, reminding him who he is, and the responsibility that accompanied it.
The chemical lab was already up in flames. The fire has also spread to a tenement building next to it. Wait, thought Superman, this is a secret chemical lab belonging to S.T.A.R. Labs. This is an ARGUS kept location for storing... Oh no.
Just as that thought occurred to him, he saw his opponent. Metallo. He was there, with a new and improved heart. How much Kryptonite can there be in the world? Metallo's new heart was shining. From this distance, almost ten storey, Superman was not affected, but at what range would he be? And Metallo was known for making a havoc whenever he was in town, just to challenge Superman.
"So, we have a new opponent. I must say that your life on this planet is never boring."
Emmet, just what Clark needed, another trigger-pulling person on the scene. But Emmet wasn't a killer, he only killed those he considered bad. So if Superman played it right...
"I've got Metallo, you go ahead and secure the buildings. Get the people out of there."
"I believe that is a bad management our abilities-"
"Now!"
Superman dove into the action, at near the speed of sound he rushed and delivered his first punch to Metallo, who had only taken three steps from the building, that was how fast Superman was. Metallo was a blond haired man in a huge metal suit. The metal suit put him a whole meter taller than Superman at least. There wasn't much left of his sanity, the transfusion of Kryptonite was the cause of that, but he could still think, that was for sure. And his hatred for Superman was bountiful. The punch sent Metallo two blocks away, enough distance for the Kryptonite to have little effect on him, but for a split second he had felt the change, this Kryptonite was very pure. Extremely strong. Long range attacks could do the trick here.
"John, you don't have to do this. Let me help you."
"Help me by dying!" And out came a blast from his chest. A Kryptonite infused energy ball hurtled at Superman faster than he could react. Superman moved but the ball still hit his shoulder, sending him flying to the side.
This makes things a bit tricker, thought Superman.
Emmet was in the building. The chemical lab was hoarding Kryptonite. Luckily it barely affected him. He had made sure that the amounts needed to affect him would be substantial. But the building was empty. At least in that they were efficient. The fire had spread further down the block, and got to a tenement building. He rushed over to the building. Rudimentary construction, it would not hold for long, and he needed to evacuate the building. Using his senses, he saw where each person was. Quickly he extracted the family that was trapped in their apartment. The man whose leg was trapped under a wooden beam, the young girl that was pinned down in her room. They were safe. Emmet turned back towards the building. The building was going to collapse, and he saw two more targets: a woman with a baby on the first floor, trapped by the wall that was starting to collapse and a street sleeper: a man dressed in rags and living in a cardboard box. No job, no use to society. How could they allow him to exist? Emmet flew into the building and saved the woman. He could have saved the street man, but his life was pointless, useless to society. He did not tolerate that on his world, and he would not tolerate it on his new world. Never.
Superman got up only to see Metallo's fist smash into his face. That sent him flying backwards. Which in his mind he knew was a good thing. He knew that he could beat Metallo without getting close to him. But that could mean much more destruction around the city. The only chance he had in making the damage minimal was to put some metal over the Kryptonite reactor on Metallo's chest and fight him in close quarters. There! A car roof that was a good size. He hoped they wouldn't mind too much. Superman swooped down and tore the roof off, with it he then rushed at Metallo, pushing the car roof onto his chest and, using heat vision and freeze breath, mounted it onto his chest, obscuring the Kryptonite. Some radiation was still leaking, but it wasn't nearly enough to make an actual difference. The pain from being that close to the Kryptonite was excruciating, but with the traces of lead in the roof it quickly subsided.
Superman punched Metallo's mechanical leg, severing it. It wasn't his real leg, and though there may be pain, destroying a machine was hardly something immoral. Using heat vision, Superman destroyed the cannons on his arms as they emerged to fire at him. With a well calculated blow to the head, Metallo was down. Superman looked around but Emmet was gone. The fire was out and the civilians seemed to be safe.
Superman took his leave of the scene, whilst he did that he saw Lois and Jimmy, already getting the interviews that they could and the shots that could be taken. He paused his flight for a bit, he decided to give Jimmy a good picture, seemed like the nice thing to do. He was reportedly Superman's pal, after all.
Zooming through the city, Clark stopped three muggings and a robbery. These crimes would always happen, there was no way to avoid them, people would be desperate, always. Bruce thought the best way was to make the criminals scared. Clark had a different idea: hope. Make the criminally inclined hope that they could make it without resorting to crime, make society hope that they could help these people make it, and maybe they wouldn't feel so desperate. Fear was only useful to an extent. Once people stopped seeing you as such a large threat, it'd dissipate. Humanity is smart, and that's why tyranny never holds, it's why Bruce will have difficulty at some point: he will either lose or take things too far.
Clark sat at his desk a few seconds later, typing the last bit of the Gaza story and sent it to editing. Looking over his shoulder, he saw the TV monitor talking about the fire. Once again he saw himself fighting Metallo, and he saw Emmet put out the fire by creating a vacuum into the bay. Simple and elegant.
"We have confirmation that only one person has died in this attack," said the reporter and Clark was glued to the set from that point, "an as of yet unidentified homeless person who was trapped in the alley in which the building fell. Eye witnesses say that the second Superman allowed this-"
"Thank you, Dorris," the line was cut to the newsroom, "but this just in: a video taken by a bystander has in fact caught the whole thing on video using their phone. This is amateur filming, but we will show it to you now." Then it was back to the scene, but this time through the eyes of a wobbly and shaking phone camera. The building was about to collapse, you could hear Superman's fight with Metallo. And then it showed the homeless guy, leg trapped under a piece of wood and he was unable to move. Emmet was on the screen. He rushed into the building and came out the other side with a woman and child. Five seconds later the building collapsed on top of the homeless guy.
Five seconds.
That was much more time than was needed to save him. Clark had trusted him. He'd trusted Emmet and now a man was dead. He was dead because Emmet decided his life was not as important. He couldn't see Emmet in the video after he saved the woman and child, could something have happened that hadn't allowed him to save the homeless person?
No, and you know it. There was no other call for help, no other site. Emmet left after that, you know it, Clark. He let a man die, but why? There was no need for him to die!
Then, like a bolt of lightning it hit him. Emmet didn't want to acclimatise to this world, he wanted to know how Clark operates first hand, to see all of Earth's defences. You could only know something truly by seeing it yourself. He was a conqueror, otherwise why would he allow himself to be caught on tape doing something like that? He knew that Clark was against violence, let alone killing. This act was as plain as an act of war.
Clark was holding his head, how could he be so naive to think that Emmet was here for other reasons? Because I have hope, it's what makes me, me. But Emmet had failed, and would have to be sent away.
But did that mean that Clark had failed with Emmet? Could Clark fall the way Emmet had?
"Clark! Are you listening to me?" Perry was two feet away and hammering about how Clark needs to get on this as soon as possible. He heard him loud and clear.
"I'm on it," and he left for the elevator to get to work.
As he got to the lobby his cellphone rang.
"Clark."
"Bruce."
"I saw it."
"I know."
"The League is going to handle this, with or without you." Batman's voice didn't betray any emotion.
"I'm in. Can you track him?"
"No, and maybe that's not a terrible thing right now. We don't have a plan."
"So what do we do?" Clark felt a bead of sweat roll down the side of his head while he waited for Bruce's reply.
"Meet us at the third meeting point. We will all be there."
"Got it."
Forgetting the assignment, forgetting everything he may have planned, he left the building and went into an empty alley. There he quickly changed and flew out. Bruce was right to have the meeting at a different place. It was the only way.
He flew over to his Fortress of Solitude, it was the third place they could meet after the Hall of Justice and the Watchtower. Luckily, Superman had never divulged the location to Emmet, there hadn't been any need for it. He got there in time to see that the Flash and Wonder Woman were already there. They couldn't get in without his clearance. Or rather they could, but were on the wrong side of the fortress to get in.
"Follow me," said Clark and they all went towards the entrance. As they got there, Green Lantern landed, as well as Kara. Supergirl.
"What are you doing here?" asked Clark.
"We're here to help, Superman," said a young voice from above. Superboy. So the whole family was here.
"How did you even know we were meeting here?"
"I told them," said Batman, emerging from a boomtube along with Cyborg and Aquaman.
"Is this necessary?" asked Clark, he hated putting these two in danger, he felt like he was the protector of the two, even if Kara had been sent to protect him.
"It's absolutely necessary. We will need all the big guns we can find. I also invited J'onn."
"And where is he?" asked Hal, impatient for a fight as always. Clark thought that Hal was seeing this as a way to prove that he could take out Superman, most of them were. Though for different reasons. They all wanted to make sure that they could if Clark ever went rogue...
J'onn landed a few paces away from everyone else, and walked towards them. His gait was heavy and uncertain, as if he wasn't sure that he belonged there. He'd been chosen by the government of the US to join the Justice League of America specifically to defeat Superman. But Clark never thought he liked, or wanted, the job.
Shazam landed next, his eyes were the expression of pure wonderment. "This looks a lot cooler than my place. How long you had it for?" asked Shazam, forgetting the reason why they'd come in the first place.
"A while," said Clark. Trust a younger person to make you feel like everything was under control. But in Billy's case it wasn't arrogance but innocence and good heartedness. Sometimes it was almost impossible to not see how Billy was the mortal with the purest of hearts.
They all entered the Fortress of Solitude, the great hall of ice would allow them to be completely invisible to the outside world. Even to Emmet.
They walked through Superman's mementoes, then through his zoo.
"What is that thing?" asked Barry, he'd never really been in the Fortress, and he'd definitely never seen a creature like that. It was furry like a husky, but it was in the shape of a lizard with fingers without nails and a tail that ended in a fan-like shape.
"It's called a Wikzokatzan," said Hal, "they were thought to be almost extinct. I didn't know you kept one of them, Supes."
"He tagged along one time. Felt wrong to just leave him," said Superman, stroking the furry creature.
"Can I take him for a walk?" asked Shazam.
"Ha. I doubt he'd like that. It's a bit of a lazy animal," said Superman as he returned to the group
"Well, petting him is cool. And he'd probably like my tiger," said Shazam.
"You have a tiger?" asked the Flash, who couldn't help but be dragged into the conversation.
"Sure," said Shazam, slightly puffing out his chest.
"We can discuss pets when this is over," said Batman, and they all fell silent. They remembered why they were there again.
But it was a moment that everyone was thankful for. Everyone but Batman. He had no time for distractions. For something that was insignificant. And everything that wasn't the end of the world was a distraction. This would take all of his acumen, his expertise. This was a Superman with little moral compass and a lot of training. This was a Superman that was not afraid of being super in every sense.
They reached the large hall where the fortress erected a great round table with chairs. The chairs were white as snow and with curved sides, they looked like eggshell. As the guests sat down the hollow seat filled with a comfortable gel-like substance to sit on. It hardened slightly, making all the chairs the most comfortable to sit that could be fashioned. The chair moved with the person so that shifting in one's chair was unnecessary. It even allowed the Flash to constantly move without it being noticeable.
"I have satellites trying to locate Emmet," said Batman.
"And I'm hooked up to their feeds, Batman. If they find him, I'll know," said Cyborg.
"Good. Now this is an opponent that is stronger than any we've faced, as Superman has managed to defeat most of them, if not all of them, alone. We need to match that raw power. We don't have to defeat him, we just need to subdue him. We don't kill our enemies, we drive them away whenever possible. That's the aim, but don't hold anything back. This is going to be an accumulative assault. We don't all go firing up-"
"And why's that?" GL seemed a little too eager to contradict Batman.
"It may allow him to defeat some of us quicker, this way the battle stretches on so his stamina will also be depleting." Once again, Batman's logic seemed to be sound, "our first priority," continued Batman, "is minimising civilian casualties. Flash, GL, Shazam, that's you three. You will be ready to join us when your turn comes. Superman will go in first. J'onn, you wait until they start fighting before you start using your psychic abilities. I want him off balance. Once you start that, then you can begin your physical assault. But remember: your primary objective is to attack psychically."
"Understood," said J'onn. His deep, powerful voice was almost devoid of emotion. He was really hating every single second of this.
"Wonder Woman, Aquaman, you're next. Your magic is needed so bring your weapons. Hopefully this will be enough. Shazam is next, along with GL and Flash once they evacuate the area."
"Seems simple enough," said GL.
"It is anything but simple. Emmet will be ready for this. He has studied us. He will know our weaknesses. Cyborg. You go on right after those three engage. I will be primary back-up. If all things go badly, then I'll come in."
"With what exactly?" asked Hal, "if all of our firepower won't stop him, what can you do?"
"Kryptonite. I want it as second to last resort as it will probably incapacitate Superman as well. It won't have an environmental effect after three minutes. That gives us three minutes if we need it."
"Why not open with it and pounce then?" asked the Flash.
"It will neutralise our biggest gun right away and I know Emmet has immunity, we need to wear him down first. If we can't after all of that, Supergirl and Superboy will come in as well."
"You think that won't stop him?" asked Hal. "It's much more than enough to take Darkseid."
"He is stronger than Darkseid." The silence that followed this statement was alive, freezing every person in the room. Darkseid was their most powerful opponent to date.
"When do we go? I can't sit here and wait forever," said Hal. Always the first to overcome his fears.
"Go. And be ready. I will summon you when we have a location," said Batman, and they all left for their cities. For their work. All but Clark, Bruce and Diana. All but the Trinity, as they were dubbed. They stayed behind in the great hall and waited until everyone was gone.
"Why Supergirl and Superboy? Are they really necessary?" asked Clark.
"Yes," was Bruce's answer.
"They're a last line of defence after your last line of defence," said Wonder Woman.
"I know," replied Superman, head in his head. "Then how are they necessary?"
"Because we need everything we have to fight this." Bruce's voice contained a tinge of anger.
"This is overkill. It's ludicrous." Clark slammed his fists on the table as he said that.
"It is not ludicrous!" And Batman started to lose his cool. "It is necessary. We are talking about a super-powered you. Not only is it necessary, it is essential. This is one of the few threats we get to prepare for, and I will not take any chances. They are needed. They stay. We need them!" Bruce was on his feet, his eyes glaring and his fist on the table. He never showed this emotion: fear. He was never this scared. He sat back down and controlled himself, but the effect was made. At last, even the greatest detective showed he can be afraid.
"Why are you so afraid?" asked Clark, not willing to believe that Bruce, the man that never feared, was afraid. If he was afraid, then... God help them all. Please Bruce, thought Clark, please say you're not afraid. Please say you just overreacted.
"You don't get it, Clark," said Batman, "you rarely do when it comes to you. If I was to combine my desire for improvement with Diana's years of experience and training and your powers, only then will we match his powers. He has been training to become the greatest he can be. That's what I've done. Diana trained as much as possible to ensure peace. We are fighters, Clark. We train to fight. You, you trained to be normal. To control your powers, never seeking to learn their full potential. Never seeking to understand everything you can about them. Why would your brain not be enhanced by the solar radiation? Why is telekinesis not a part of your arsenal?"
"I can't control what gifts I get, Bruce."
"You did, Clark, in a way," said Diana, "you didn't allow them to grow. You didn't allow them to reach their full potential. You never truly wanted to test them. That's why this plan is necessary. I agree with Bruce: this is more than necessary. You could've taken on almost every threat on your own, if you were inclined to train."
"But I don't want to risk becoming that a threat," said Clark, almost ashamed of the idea that he could be that powerful.
"I know, Clark, it's why I love you. It's what makes you who you are. But you cannot shy away from your gifts. You must accept that you are more powerful than you can imagine. And that this person has dared to imagine."
"What's your real issue with this, Clark?" asked Bruce.
"If we attack Emmet, kick him off the planet, then that means that I failed. It means that I can become that. And that if I do there is no turning back."
"He's not you-"
"HE IS ME!" The room rattled with that shout of anger and despair. They sat in silence. Superman was standing up, fists clenched tight and leaning on the table, his head bowed. It almost looked like he was trying to push the table down.
"You are not him Clark," said Diana, touching his arm.
"But I am. One of us is a perfect clone. We have been given the same opportunities. He told me that. He started out like me, and he went bad. If he can, then maybe I will too. And maybe then I can't be saved. Not from myself."
"Clark," said Bruce, "you're partially right. He is more you than a doppelgänger is. He did not, however, start like you. He tried to test his powers to the fullest from the beginning, encouraged to become as powerful as he could be. You were encouraged to be normal, to make your own decisions. You didn't look for power. You were only interested in justice and equality. It's why you didn't test out your strength. It's why you will not become him."
"And if you do," said Diana, "I will bring you back."
He looked at her, and her smile that was so hopeful, so loving. She was sincere, she loved him and she was going to save him from everything. He was the man she loved.
"In any case," said Superman, "I want one last conversation with him. Have this plan ready if you must, but I want one more conversation with him. IF he repents, if he says something that makes me believe that he is sincere in trying a new way, then you delay this plan."
"And if he doesn't?" asked Wonder Woman.
"Then we go ahead with your plan."
"No," said Batman, "it's too dangerous. You trust people too much-"
"And you don't trust them enough. I know what he did was wrong, and I see his actions as a declaration of his intentions. But, if he sincerely wants to try a new way, I will defend his right to a second chance."
"He already had a second chance," said Batman.
"This is not a request, Bruce." Superman and Batman stared at each other, and the tension was palpable.
"Fine. But don't blame me when this goes to hell," said Batman and walked away towards the Fortress' teleportation room.
"If that happens, I won't." Clark sat back down. Diana leaned over and touched his hand, there was comfort in that touch. A loving and supporting touch. Superman knew that, whatever happened, he had her on his side.