"And now on BBC One the 6 o'clock news with Fiona Bruce and Riz Lateef."
Headline Music
"Today there was an attack of epic proportions as Trafalgar Square became the centre of commotion as the Superhero Superman and three new unidentified heroes battled the christmas tree which came alive. We will be analysing the need for these heroes and at what cost they are to our safety and pockets. Also tonight, the Prime Minister has been having talks with the French president over Britain's contribution to the latest debates over the EU and there was a resounding victory for England in their Rugby match against World Cup winners New Zealand, one of their worst defeats in decades."
Switch to another studio
"And on BBC London, we will be getting more reaction to the attack on the capital and also what we can do to keep ourselves out of harms way."
Title music
"Good evening and welcome to the BBC's news at six. Today Trafalgar Square was the scene of an attack by the annual christmas tree on the superhero, Superman. Eye witnesses say that as Superman flew over the area, the tree suddenly became animated and started causing commotion. It seemed as the fight went on, that Superman was losing, but the tide turned when three unknown, lycra clad teenagers turned up. These previously unseen heroes then went on to join the battle and help Superman overcome the tree. For more we go live now to Trafalgar Square and join our correspondent Jon Sopel. Jon."
"Yes Fiona many people were amazed and excited at the sighting of these three new heroes, all wearing distinctive costumes and each acting as though they had been doing this for a long time. One of them who we can see on the screen now seemed to be the leader, giving orders to the other two on how to attack and defeat the rogue tree. We can see that he is dressed in a virtually identical suit to that of Superman's. Experts are wondering if this is Superman's own son or a protégé. Another was dressed in a Spiderman like suit, but with noticeable differences between the two, again suggesting a son or assistant. The last of the three is wearing a yellow and red suit with a large lightning bolt displayed on his chest."
Lois turned the TV off. She turned to face her son and husband who both stood in the middle of the living room, their suits covered in grass stains and bits of twigs and leaves poking out of various places.
"All I can say is I am really glad you are both alright."
The two lycra clad men looked at each other, a look of relief passing over their faces.
"Now go and get changed, you both look a right mess. I have also got Jimmy coming round tonight from work to talk about a story I am working on and I think we would prefer he doesn't find out your true identities. I have also said he can stay for dinner, if that is ok with you?"
"Of course dear, what time is he coming?" Clark asked.
"Around 7 o'clock he said, but knowing Jimmy he can be a little early so you best hurry up."
With that, they hurried out to get changed before Lois and Clark's Superman obsessed coworker would arrive. Jason emerged from the shower and wrapped a towel around his waist. He looked down at his suit and saw that its self cleaning process had completed and it was as good as new. However for Clark's low tech suit, a date with the washing machine.
"Jason can you hurry up, Jimmy will be here soon," Lois called.
"Won't be long mum," Jason shouted back.
"And put something nice and smart on, not your costume!"
"Yes mum."
Jason moved out of the bathroom, making sure he took his crumpled suit so Jimmy wouldn't find it. He headed to his room where he stuffed the suit into the 'bigger on the inside' box that the Doctor had left him. Opening his wardrobe, he pulled out a pair of smart trousers and a checkered blue shirt. He pulled on the trousers and shirt, leaving the top button of the shirt open and rolling the long sleeves up to just above his elbows. He grabbed a pair of black socks and pulled them on, before slipping his feet into a pair of slippers.
"Clark! Jason! are you both ready?" Lois called up from downstairs.
"Just coming," Jason shouted back.
"Almost ready dear," Clark followed.
The two men were soon downstairs, Clark helping Lois finish the dinner, whilst Jason sat in the study on the computer going through various YouTube videos.
As predicted by Lois, the doorbell went just before 7 o'clock. Jason went to open it and as expected Jimmy Olsen stood there. Jimmy was your typical west end Londoner and had lived there all his life. He worked at the office with Lois and Clark as their photographer, a hobby he had had from a young age. As usual, there was a camera around his neck.
"Hi Jason, how are you doing?" he asked enthusiastically.
"Yeah good thanks Jimmy, come on in."
Jason liked Jimmy because when he was younger, every time he came to the house, jimmy would bring Jason the latest Superman comic books and they would constantly talk about what it would be like to don a costume and go and fight crime with super powers. Now little did Jimmy know that what once was a fantasy for Jason, was now a reality.
"Jimmy good to see you," Lois said as she walked into the hallway. "Did you manage to go and get those photos you wanted at the palace?"
"Well, I had just got to Buckingham Palace to get the shots of the parade of the guard, when word came of the attack in Trafalgar Square. So I ran down the Mall and through Marble Arch and got the best view of the attack. I got some fantastic photos of those three new heroes. Did you see it on the news? I would give anything to talk to them, they were so cool."
Jason laughed internally at the fact Jimmy was standing closer to and talking to one of those new heroes than he ever thought he would.
"Yes, I am sure we will probably have a busy day in the office tomorrow trying to get interviews and stories about them," Lois replied. "Anyway, come through, dinner is almost ready."
They walk into the living room where Jimmy flopped down onto the sofa and Jason sat in one of the arm chairs. Lois walked back into the kitchen to give Clark a hand.
"Here you go Jason," Jimmy said reaching over, holding a comic book.
"Thanks Jimmy." It was the latest Superman comic. Jason loved the fact Jimmy always brought him one, but now he knew of his dad's powers and now his own, the thill and accuracy of the comics did slightly turn him off of them.
"So what do you think of those new heroes?"
"Yeah they look quite cool. It seems Superman has a son and so does Spiderman."
"Hmm, such a shame we haven't seen the original Spiderman for so long. He seems to have disappeared off the face of the planet."
"Yeah, I really wanted to meet him as a kid."
"I always thought Superman was the one you wanted to meet?"
"He is," Jason lied. He hated to lie to Jimmy, but it was necessary to keep the secret safe. "But I would quite like to meet Spiderman. I just love that he became a hero at my age and did so much to help people at that age, he was and is kind of an inspiration."
"Well spoken, I just wish your parents could have that attitude towards the heroes."
"I respect them for what they do Jimmy," Clark said as he walked into the room. " I just wish they would all be clever about how they help, some of them can be very messy and dangerous at times."
Jason could tell how his father found it difficult to maintain this part of his personality because although he did think that about some superheroes, he got on well with a lot of others, especially in his role at the Justice League.
"Clark good to see you, I didn't see you at work today, where were you?"
"I was out investigating a story, I can' treacly talk about it yet."
Jason of course knew that he was out on patrol until he got attacked by the tree.
"Dinner is ready!" Lois called.
"Excellent, smells fantastic," Jimmy said.
They went into the dinning room where Lois and Clark had laid out the food on the table.
"Ahh a classic British roast dinner. Roast beef, roast potatoes, carrots, broccoli, gravy and to top it off, Yorkshire Puddings. I love Yorkshire Puddings," Jimmy said, his mouth salivating. "It is good to see you Americans indulging in our classic food."
"When I first came to England when I was a teenager, we had a roast dinner as one of our first meals and I loved it," Lois said. "I have always loved English food, it is much better than some of the stuff we have back in the States."
They tucked in to the meal that had been prepared and had a conversation about each other's day, of course Jason and Clark leaving out the incident in central London.
When the main course and then dessert had been polished off, Clark and Jason cleared the table whilst Lois and Jimmy went to the study and had their work talk. After he had helped his dad, Jason went upstairs and flopped down on his bed. He picked up a book that he had on his bed side table and began to read. He had just finished reading the second chapter of the night when his phone rang. He looked at the caller ID and saw that Wally was calling him. He answered the call.
"Hi Wally, how are you doing?"
"Hey have you been on the internet in the last hour?"
"No, mum has Jimmy round and we were having dinner, why?"
"You better come round here, we need to talk in a more secure environment."
"Ok, I'll go and ask dad and see if he will let me come over."
With that Jason jumped up out of his bed and raced downstairs to the living room where Clark was sat on the sofa watching tv.
"Dad, Wally wants to know if I could go round, he says it is quite important?"
"Yes you can go, but if there is any trouble, I want you to call me straight away."
"Of course I will." He put the phone back to his ear. "Dad said I can come, I will be right over."
"Be quick, but don't use your powers, I think it will be dangerous if you do."
With that Wally hung up and Jason ran to grab his coat. However, this was not his normal coat. Jason often kept one of his costumes in the form of a random piece of outdoor wear, so just in case, he always had it with him if he wasn't wearing as normal.
Within five minutes, he was standing outside Wally's house ringing the doorbell. The door opened and Wally stood there.
"Come in," he said. "Let's go to the bunker where we can talk in private."
Wally's house had been built on top of an old World War bunker which his dad had discovered when doing house renovations. Being a history fan, his dad had worked to refresh it and restore it back to his former glory. It was now the most private room in the house, buried about 3 metres below the ground and no communication technology in there, apart from a very weak wifi signal from the main house.
Wally had his laptop sitting on a desk that was in the middle of the room with a YouTube video loaded up on it.
"What do you want to show me?" Jason asked.
"Here watch this video," Wally pushed play on the screen.
A figure appeared on screen wearing a skin tight black top and a pair of high tech goggles covering most of his face.
"People of Great Britain you have seen today the arrival of three new 'heroes' who came to the aid of Superman. They have thwarted my attempt at getting rid of the man of steel. I now issue this video as a warning that if you get in my way again then I will destroy you as well. Watch out, I will not be defeated."
The figure had clearly used voice altering software and spoke in a deep, threatening tone.
"So what do you think?" Wally asked. "Do we take him seriously?"
"I think we have to, you saw what he had in Trafalgar Square, if he really did that, we could be in some serious trouble."
"Do you think we should tell your dad?"
"Well if it is taken at all seriously by the media and the police, it will likely be on the Ten o'clock news, or in tomorrow's papers and considering he is a journalist, there is a high chance he will find out. Especially considering he is mentioned in the threat."
"When are you going to tell him?"
"I think now is probably the best time."
Jason reached into his 'coat' pocket and pulled out his earpiece and placed it in his right ear. He pressed a small button on it and spoke "Superman" out loud.
"Superman speaking," Clark's voice said in Jason's ear.
"Dad, we need to talk about something, are you able to come to Wally's house?"
"I will be right over"
"We will leave the secret entrance to the bunker open, you can fly in through there," Jason said as he signalled to Wally to go and open it.
"On my way now," Clark replied.
Just as he had finished saying that, a lycra clad Clark stepped into the bunker, making Wally jump a little.
"Still can't get used to that," he said. Wally shut the secret entrance up and walked back over to the table as Clark chuckled slightly at his fright.
"What do you want to talk about," Clark asked.
Jason showed him the video they had just watched and as it finished, stood there waiting for a reaction.
"Well it is good to put a masked face to the person behind today's attack, but I don't like his threat to the three of you. Whatever he used to make that tree come to life was some serious technology and it needed all four of us to fend it off. I mean even me, pretty much the strongest person on the planet, was struggling against that thing."
"Humble much," Jason said.
"Cheeky," Clark replied. "But seriously we need to be careful, goodness knows what he might plan next. Are you confident he has no idea of your true identities?"
"No one knows about who we are except for you and mum, Wally's parents, Ben's parents and the Doctor, but he is hardly here anyway," Jason said.
"Do you recognise him at all?" Clark asked.
"There does seem something familiar about him, but I can't picture what it is," Wally replied.
"I will talk to the Justice League about looking into if they can get any information on this guy and see if he has been doing any other acts of vandalism and terror," Clark said. "I wouldn't worry about it now, as far as I am concerned, you can all still go out and help in your suits, but if you do and come into any trouble, you must get in contact with the Justice League on the secure line and not try and battle on on your own."
"We will go out as a small team as well, keep each other safe," Jason said.
"Yeah, we are all still fairly new to this any way, it would be good to work together," Wally added.
"That is a good idea," Clarke nodded with agreement. "Now I am going to go and speak to the JLA and see Batman on his patrol. Don't be long before going home Jason, it might be Saturday tomorrow, but you on't want a late night. Plus your mum might worry if you stay out to long and sees the video at all."
With that Clark moved back over to the secret entrance, his cape billowing around his body as he opened it, letting the wind in. In a split second he flew out leaving a faint blue trail that lasted but a second, in his wake. Wally shut the door once more and moved back over to Jason.
"What about Ben, we need to talk to him about it?" he asked Jason.
"We can talk to him in the morning, I doubt very much that he will be going out in hero form tonight," Jason replied.
Wally shut down the laptop and placed it under his arm.
"Right, well I suppose I should get back home or mum will probably start to worry as dad said," Jason said.
"What time tomorrow should we go and see Ben?"
"What about 11 o'clock?"
"Yeah that should be fine, gives me a nice lie in."
"Right see you then," Jason said as he walked towards the door.
"Yeah, take care walking home, make sure no one is following you suspiciously," Wally added in concern.
With that, Wally accompanied Jason to the front door and they both finalised their good byes before Jason headed down the drive and out to the main path. Walking down it, he looked up to the sky and marbled at the beauty of the stars and thought of how his dad flew above the earth every day looking down at the activity below. With that thought, he decided he was going to have a little fly around himself before he headed home. He saw a row of bushes and scooted over to them and hid behind their protective cover.
He thought carefully in his head and his coat began to become like a liquid as it moved underneath his clothing, forming his suit. He began to remove his smart clothes and fold them neatly up, revealing the now formed suit below. He tucked his clothes under his arm as he leapt into the air and flew around the estate.
It was beautiful up in the sky as he looked around at the city that was starting to sleep. The lights from the houses and other buildings looking like the stars that lit the sky. The wind was quite cold up at this height, so Jason was glad for the thermal properties in his suit. He hovered for a moment over the street where his house was and looked at the city drifted more into darkness.
"Great isn't it?" a voice said behind him.
Jason turned and saw Clark hovering there. He must have lost track of time.
"I often come up here and just look over the city and how beautiful it is. It is such a nice change to Metropolis, the amazing old and new architecture blending together."
"I just couldn't resist it," Jason said.
"Well you better tear yourself away from it then, we need to be heading back down. Jimmy has gone home and your mum rang me wondering where we both were."
With that, father and son headed down towards the garden of their house, where they could slip in without any of the neighbours seeing.
"Thank goodness you are home," Lois said as they came face to face with her. "I was beginning to worry that something might have happened again."
"Don't worry dear, Jason just got caught up with the view over the city. I caught him in a little day dream," Clarke teased as he wrapped his arm around his son.
Lois gave a little chuckle.
"Right, I will go and get changed out of this thing and then Mrs Kent, I am all yours," Clark said.
"Don't bother Mr Kent I quite like it."
"Get a room the pair of you," Jason said in embarrassed disgust.
"Ooh, I think we might be embarrassing someone," Lois said.
"Come on them, let's go upstairs," Clark said.
With that, the two adults walked out of the room leaving Jason standing in the kitchen alone. He went over to the fridge and grabbed a bottle of orange juice out. Opening it, he took a long drink from it, before picking up the clothes he had put on the side and taking it all up to his room. He dumped the clothes next to his wardrobe and went to sit down at his desk.
Opening up his laptop, he logged on and pulled up his internet browser. He searched for the YouTube video and re watched it several times. Wally was right, there was something familiar about the figure, but even he could not work it out. He sat back in his chair and drank the last of the juice. He looked down at the suit he was wearing and thought about the responsibility and trust that came with wearing the symbol that sat on his chest. He felt that he was ready to join in with his dad's exploits and help people who needed him and counted on the support.
With that thought lingering in his head, Jason got up, stripped his suit off and pulled on his PJs. He folded his suit neatly and placed it into the wardrobe. He crawled in to bed and pulled the duvet over him. He reached over and switched the lights off. He lay back onto his pillow and closed his eyes. As he drifted off to sleep, the days events replayed in his mind. They were going to have to be wary of what was to come and how they were going to work together to prevent anything serious from happening. With that last thought, he left the land of awake and entered the land of nod.
At Wally's house he to was lying in bed, but had not yet gotten to sleep. The day's events were to playing out in his mind, but unlike Jason, he was worrying a little more about the masked figure in the video. There was definitely something about him that Wally had recognised, but whatever it was, he couldn't put his finger upon it. He replayed the image in his head, over and over. He re examined every inch of the image. The thing that seemed most familiar to him was his physique. Playing rugby and being around boys who wear skin tight thermal layers and rugby tops gets you used to seeing various torsos up close, especially in such a contact sport. That chest and black top seemed so like one he had seen before, but again he struggled to identify it. Maybe he was just being paranoid. Wow, thinking about other boys chests was something he probably shouldn't be doing, especially when he was trying to woo a girl at school.
Rachel Jenkins was by far the prettiest girl in the school in Wally's opinion. They had met when she had accidentally walked into him and dropped all her papers over his feet. They had been going out now for just over a month and everyone at school described them as the perfect couple. She loved to watch him as he played in the school rugby matches and he loved to sit and watch films with her. The one thing Wally hated about their relationship was that he couldn't tell her about his alternate life. He hated lying and keeping secrets from her, but he knew it was necessary for the very reason of keeping himself and the people around him safe. After the day's happenings, he knew more than ever that protecting those around him from his other life was a high priority.
With that thought in his head, he turned off the light and lay down onto his bed. He turned on his right side and shut his eyes. He had a strange feeling that from now on, things were going to be very different and never the same again. For good or bad, he hoped his loved ones won't be hurt.