XXXII
New World Order
By noon, sixteen people had been quietly assassinated by the order of Lex Luthor. No one could be left to tie LexCorp to the nuclear weapon that had detonated in the deserts of Kahndaq hours ago, or as he liked to call it, 'Clark's Regret'. Of the six Bialyans in Luthor's employ, two had been captured by their government… Unfortunate. This told him that Muhannad had betrayed him. He expected no less of course. The important things now were evidence and credibility. Muhannad had neither and Bialyan assassins were incredibly cheap.
His files had built-in auto-destructs. Any evidence of the LexCorp involvement had gone up in electronic smoke an hour ago. Already his PR team was putting together the news release that – as he had maintained from the start – Kahndaq had been working on their own atomic weapons. His analysts were reshaping the meme relativity index to his favor. This tragedy was the result of a faulty detonator combined with inadequate storage and covert transportation in the wake of UN inspectors as requested by the president. Kahndaq was trying desperately to hide the weapon in the desert with no experience on the care and handling of such a dangerous and sensitive weapon. If only the UN and America had moved faster on their request for inspection and intervention…
He had considered arming himself with concealed Kryptonite, but that would have shown a lack of faith in the whole process. He would not fear the alien. If Lois was able to tie him to the weapon, so be it. He would concede. But if his information was correct, she had precious little time to make her case.
But now it was time for Muhannad…
In Kahndaq, Commander Kadar Muhannad was busy putting together his speech to the darkened nation. As he penned his final touches at his desk, a man quietly entered his office from the darkened hall behind him – and quietly raised his pistol – aimed - then fired at an oblivious Muhannad… a mere fifteen feet away.
The shot was heard throughout the compound. The assassin expected his commander to collapse across freshly penned papers, blood mixed with liar's ink, but instead he was stunned when Muhannad calmly grabbed the pistol from his writing desk, turned in his chair, and stared back at him... Had he missed?! He fired again. This time, Muhannad smiled, unharmed.
"General Al-Rawy, my old friend," spoke Muhannad to his general. "I had suspected, of course. Did you think I learned nothing from great Caesar? Never give your senators knives or your generals real bullets. Allah be with you, old friend."
With that, the leader of Kahndaq shot one of his oldest friends in the gut. Seconds later his guards poured in, pointing their assault rifles at the wounded general, defeated, moaning on the floor.
Muhannad lit a new cigar, looked up and addressed his guards.
"If he lives… strip him and return him to his family. The time has come to assemble the rest of my generals in the board room. I will present my speech to them, and show them how the champion of Kahndaq will step from the ashes of time to tear out the throat of Satan across the world. When the last word is spoken, each of you is to kill the remaining generals. If Al-Rawy could be bought, so can any other. The time of generals is past, my friends.
As Allah wills, it is time for a new world order."