"And if any of you would like to visit Ben in hospital, then please come and tell us in the office and we will arrange with his parents a time to visit."
Mrs Richards stood in front of Year 11 in assembly, several of them shocked at the news of Ben being attacked. She had called an emergency assembly to tell them about it, before rumours started to spread around school. Of course much of what she had told them, was lies, not that she knew that either. It was a cleverly concocted story by Jason, Wally, Ben and Clark to put people off of the scent. However there was one person in the room who knew that a lot of the explanation for Ben's hospitalisation was not true.
Alex Manning sat in the hall, but he wasn't really listening to what was being said. He was still trying to get over the fact that his new friend, was in fact someone who he was an enemy with. How he hadn't seen it baffled him. The clues had all been there, but clearly he wasn't clever enough to piece them together until the most obvious clue came along.
They were dismissed from the hall and Alex went straight away up to Mrs Richards. He needed to see Ben alone, find out how much he knew and eradicate him. Every time he thought of this plan, the more he hated it and the less he wanted to carry it out.
"Yes Mr Manning, can I help you?" Mrs Richards asked.
"Yes Miss, I would like to go and visit Ben please," he asked as innocently as possible.
That was one of the most unusual requests Mrs Richards had received from a parent. In the conversation she had had with Mrs Parker, there was a specific request that Alex Manning be sent on his own, but was not to be told that this was so. There was no other explanation given, but Mrs Richards agreed to follow through with the request.
"Certainly Alex, what time would you like me to put you down for?"
She presented him with a list of times.
"Five o'clock today will be great thanks."
"Ok, I will let Mrs Parker know."
"Thank you."
Alex walked away and off to class, tonight it was.
Back at the hospital, plans had been set in motion. Ben was moved from his room in the private part of the hospital, to one in the regular area. Some of the doctors had been brought from the Justice League area to cover for the normal doctors and they had been briefed on what was going on. Clark was on standby around the hospital, flying around and keeping an eye on people entering and leaving.
The time ticked by as they waited for the call from Mrs Richards as to who was coming to visit that day. Eventually it came. Mary-Jane picked up the phone. She was surrounded by Peter, Lois, Jason and Wally. The latter two had taken the day off of school, because they were still slightly shaken up from the incident, or at least that is what the school thought.
"Hello, Mary-Jane Parker," she said as she put the phone to her ear.
"Good afternoon Mrs Parker, it is Mrs Richards here from Rainsbrook. I am calling about the list of people who would like to come and visit today if Ben is up to it."
"Oh hello, yes he is fine to receive visitors today."
"Excellent. Well there are several people who would like to come and visit."
Mrs Richards read out the list of names of people who had requested to come and Mary-Jane confirmed that that was alright. Alex was on it, the plan could begin.
Later that day, the clock read 4:45, fifteen minutes before Alex was supposed to be going to visit Ben. Mary-Jane was ushering out the current set of guests, citing that Ben needed rest before the next visitors. As planned, she left the room with them and talked with them until they left the hospital. As they were walking out, she noticed Alex walking in in the opposite direction. Neither had met, but Ben had shown her a photo of him. As much as she wanted to go over and strangle that idiot, she restrained herself and carried on talking to the other guys.
Alex rounded the corner of the ward Ben was on and came to a standstill outside his room. He knocked gently, took a deep breath and walked in.
Ben lay there silently as planned, pretending to be asleep. Alex walked up to the side of the bed and sat down in the chair that was next to it.
"Hey Ben," Alex said. "Sorry about what that guy did to you, hope you are feeling better."
Ben stirred slightly to make it look like he was just waking up.
In a groggyish voice he said, "you mean you did. You did this to me Alex and I thought we were friends."
"We were, but then you started messing with my plans, destroying my hard work. You and your friends knew I was going after you if you tried to thwart my plans, but you didn't listen," Alex spoke, his tone getting harder and sterner. "And now i have confirmed you know about me, I am afraid you can no longer be trusted. I really don't want to do this, but there is no other way."
Alex stood and moved closer to the bed. He pulled out a syringe from his pocket and uncapped the needle. He pushed the sleeve of Ben's hospital gown up and placed the needle against his skin. Ben 'struggled' slightly to keep up the pretence.
"There is no point in struggling, you are to weak to do anything, let alone call someone."
Alex placed his thumb on the syringe trigger and began to slowly push the needle into Ben's arm.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you," a strong voice said.
Alex whipped round and came face to face with Superman. With lightning speed, Superman caught hold of Alex and slapped a pair of hand cuffs on him and flung him into the chair. Ben sat up and yanked the needle out of his arm.
"But you should still be weak?" Alex protested.
"I am, but I am healing faster than I thought I would," Ben replied.
"You have a lot of questions to answer," Superman said. "But not here, we are going somewhere a little more private."
Superman lifted Alex out of the seat and moved his hand down to his belt. There he pressed the 'S' symbol. In a flash of light, they both disappeared from the room, leaving Ben laying there on his own. Seconds later Mary-Jane walked in.
"Have they gone? Did it work?" she asked.
"It worked perfectly, he is now in League custody."
Thousands of miles away in the hollowed out Mt Justice, a bright light appeared and then as quickly as it came it went leaving Superman and Alex standing there. They moved through the mountain until Superman locked Alex in a room where there stood a table, two chairs and one wall was a mirror. The door simply read 'INTERROGATION'.
In a room next door stood Spider-man, Superman, Batman, Superboy and Kid Flash. They watched Alex as he wandered around the room, probably contemplating his fate at the hands of the League.
"So, who is going to interrogate him?" Superman asked.
"Me, I want to," Superboy said. Underneath his mask Jason's face was angry, furious in fact. He needed answers and he wanted to actually be the one to get them out of Alex.
"And me," piped up Kid Flash he to wanted answers.
"Good idea, he still doesn't know your identities yet, he might talk to people more of his age," Batman said.
"Bruce are you sure, it really should be one of us who does the interrogating," Superman said.
"No it has to be them. He doesn't trust you, Spider-man is the victim's father and he won't talk to me, so they need to have a go."
Superman relented and let Superboy and Kid Flash leave the room and head next door. When they entered, Alex jumped and sped to the table and sat down.
"Have you come to hurt me?" he asked, fear starting to find its way into his voice.
"No, but that is an interesting proposition," Superboy said. "We simply need to ask you some questions."
Superboy sat down at the table, leaving Kid Flash standing at the door.
"The first question is why?"
"You want to know why I did it?" Alex repeated.
"Yes, why all the attacks and threats?"
"Revenge, plain and simple. I wanted to get back at the person who killed my father."
"And who killed your father?"
"Superman."
"And when did Superman kill your father?" Kid Flash asked.
"Two thousand and eight in Chicago, he was the villain behind the attacks there."
Behind the mirror Batman and Spider-man turned their heads to look at Superman.
"I was there, but I didn't kill him. We fought for a while, but in the commotion I lost him. I presumed he had escaped, I didn't think he had died."
"What was he called?" Batman asked.
"The Tinkerer. He used advanced technology to to aid in his crimes. Like father, like son."
They turned their attention back to what was going on next door.
"So let me get this straight. You decided that because your father was 'killed' by Superman, you would go after him and endanger many innocent people along the way?"
"He killed my father!" Alex shouted angrily. "Of course I was going to get revenge."
"And you are trying to kill my father!" Jason responded as he ripped his mask off, to the shock of Kid Flash and the adults in the other room.
Alex sat there, mouth open in amazement.
"You, another friend of mine out against me." He turned to face Kid Flash. "Let me guess, we have had Ben, now Jason, so you must be Wally."
Wally removed his mask.
"Well deduced, but it still doesn't mean you are going to get away with what you have done."
Suddenly a loud beeping noise filled the room.
"What is that?" Jason asked.
They all looked towards the source of the noise, Alex's wrist. The door burst open and the three adult heroes rushed into the room. Batman went straight over to Alex and removed his watch, the source of the beeping. He laid it carefully on the table.
"What does this mean?" he demanded in his short tempered way.
"I, don't know. It has never done this before."
The screen of the watch had gone from an analogue face to that of a small LCD screen displaying a green button.
"Press the button," Batman ordered Alex.
He didn't need to be told twice. He reached over and pressed the screen with his index finger. When he had done, a small holographic figure appeared, floating above the watch. It began to speak.
"Well done son, I see that you have kept the watch that I gave you in New York. It has confirmed that your DNA was present in accepting this call. Hopefully by now you will have discovered my secret lair where I came up with my plans to take over the world. I am alive and well, getting ready for you to get rid of Superman so I can enact my plans. They are brilliant and require the eradication of these so called heroes, especially Superman, to be successful. You and I will rule the world together, destroying anyone who will stand in our way. You will be able to use your superior technological knowledge to improve my weaponry to maximise the submission of the world to our way. I will contact you again when this watch receives confirmation that Superman is dead."
The hologram flickered out of existence, leaving the room in silence.
"Did you know anything about this?" Batman asked, breaking the silence.
"No, please I am telling the truth. I only wanted revenge against Superman, I thought he was dead."
"We need to get the league together and have an emergency meeting," Superman said.
"You two lads stay here and guard the prisoner and we will be back soon," Batman ordered.
The three men left the room and shut the door behind them.
"Jason, Wally," Alex began. "You have to believe me, I didn't know anything about this. I don't want to rule the world. I was only after revenge. Please I don't want to be like him, I don't want to destroy the world."
Alex's eyes were streaming with tears as he pleaded with the two teenage heroes.
"He is telling the truth," a voice said inside of their heads.
They all turned around to see the Martian Manhunter floating through the door and into the room.
"He means well and is full of forgiveness for the actions that he has taken," Manhunter said aloud.
"I really am. If I could turn back time I would stop myself from doing those things," Alex burst out again.
Jason thought for a moment about what both Alex and the Manhunter had said, before he gave his opinion.
"Although I can't forget what you have done and may take a while to ever trust you again, Martian Manhunter has helped me see what you truly think, so I am prepared to forgive you. If what your father says is true, we are going to need your help in disabling his weapons."
"I will do whatever you ask me to do." His face then suddenly fell. "How am I ever going to face Ben again after what I did to him? I can't even forgive myself of what I did, let alone what he would say."
Wally walked over to the mirrored wall and pressed a hidden button. After he had done so, the mirror changed to become a giant computer screen. On display was a Skype video call to Ben himself. He had heard everything. Wally activated the speakers.
"Alex," Ben began. "After all you taught me and how nicely you accepted my presence at the school, I am really struggling to believe what you have done. However, I forgive you completely as you never know, I might have done the same."
"I am so sorry Ben, I don't know how you can forgive me. What I did was terrible, there is no excuse for it."
"Well you can redeem yourself by helping us catch your dad and stop thousands of innocent people being hurt, or worse killed."
"I will do. I hope to show you that I am a good friend and someone who can be trusted."
"Right, I think we better go and tell the adults of our plan," Jason said.
"No need, we already know," Superman said behind them.
"And?" Wally asked, turning to face him.
"It's a good plan, but we will be there in case anything goes wrong. We would also like Alex to wear this," he held up a small device attached to a strap. "It is a monitoring device, that will allow us to track your every movement. You will always be in our sight as you can't take it off. Trust me, even the strongest people, such as myself, can't rip it off so there is no chance you would be able to."
"Whatever you want me to do, I will comply with," Alex said.
Superman walked over, his cape billowing around him and attached the device to Alex's right wrist. As he did so, a green light appeared and an automated voice said "ONLINE".
"Right, we leave the plans in your hands. Go and catch this idiot," Superman said.
He walked out of the room, leaving the three teenagers and Ben via Skype to come up with a plan.