"Swig" was the type of bar people went to for one of two reasons. The first was to drink. The second was to get drunk.
Jeremiah walked into it with his mind set on the latter; the tall, thin man in round glasses right behind him.
The bar was the size of the average living room, roughly twenty feet by fifteen feet. The actual bar took up most of the space; the counter top stretching the length of the room, with a fold-up section at the far end, currently in the 'up' position. Stools were lined in front of it. A large man with a larger pot belly was standing behind the bar. He was holding a clip board and was looking over the large collection of bottled alcohol that lined the wall, and spread over three shelves.
The opposite wall was lined with small booths; four in all, each with a small square table in between sets of back to back two-seaters. There was a jukebox, and a small flat-screen television hung over the shelves of liquor. In the rear of the bar were two doors, one marked "Private", the other marked with a unisexual bathroom placard.
The bar was nearly empty, save for the bartender and an older man that sat near the bars center, his head slumped over his crossed arms.
Jeremiah and his taller companion took a seat opposite one another in the furthest booth. The bartender watched them as they walked; eyeing them suspiciously.
Jeremiah didn't look at him, and when he sat he didn't speak. The other man didn't speak either, but looked at the Jeremiah compassionately.
"Stacy!" the bartender barked.
A few moments passed and the door marked "Private" swung open. A woman of early twenties, with dark black hair and even darker eye shadow walked out. She was wearing a black t-shirt with the symbol for anarchy in white across the front. Her skirt was a micro mini, dark blue plaid in color, with black and white lines. Black leggings and black knee high platform boots with bright silver buckles completed the gothic look. It was all topped off with the bright pink highlights streaking through her hair.
She looked first at the bartender, who had unceremoniously gone back to his inventory, then over to the two men seated at the booth.
She walked over to them; her boots making her appear over six feet in height. She looked down at them, here face bland and emotionless.
"What'll it be?" she asked after a long moment.
"Jack. Two glasses." Jeremiah answered. "Leave the bottle…"
"Actually," the other man began. "I was just going to have a glass of water… with a slice of lemon if you have it."
The waitress glared at him.
"Damnit, Noah!" Jeremiah said looking at the man across from him.
"It's three in the afternoon, Mai." Noah pleaded.
"Noah, I just buried my wife and unborn son!" he took in a deep breath and let it out with a shudder.
"Fine." Noah surrendered. "But only one. You know I'm not a drinker…"
Jeremiah looked at the waitress, his eyes a mixture of pain and anger. "Jack." He repeated. "Two glasses. Leave the bottle."
The waitress looked at the man with naked emotion etched across his face for a moment, and then quietly went to get their drinks. She returned quickly, placing two shot glasses in front of each of them, filling each with whiskey, and finally placed the half full bottle on the table between them.
Jeremiah grabbed his glass and devoured the contents quickly. He held the glass to his mouth and he winched at the burning sensation running down his throat. He closed his eyes, breathed the fire out of his lungs, and then placed the glass back on the table. He looked at the man across from him.
Noah sighed. He grabbed his glass and eyed it cautiously. He looked from it, to the man across from him, and back again. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and took his drink to his lips.
A moment later, he was coughing harshly.
Jeremiah took the bottle and poured himself another drink. He drank it quickly, the burning less intense than the first time.
Noah looked at him through red, teary eyes. He cleared his throat and swallowed hard. Jeremiah was working on his third drink by then.
Noah wiped his mouth, and took in a heavy (and still rather fiery) breath. "How's your hand?" he asked.
Jeremiah put his now empty glass on the table and was silent as the whiskey worked down his throat. He raised his hand before his eyes and tried to ball it into a fist. Pain shot up his arm. He winched. "Fractured, I think."
"I still can't believe you hit him." Noah remarked.
Jeremiah tried again to make a fist, and again, the pain was instant and intense. He lowered his hand and looked at the man across from him.
"Mom say's hello." He said.
"I was hoping to see her." Noah responded. "Why didn't she come?"
"She's on oxygen now." Jeremiah explained. "The doctors said it was probably best if she didn't fly."
Noah nodded. "That's too bad. She would have liked to see 'big blue' in person."
Jeremiah laughed slightly. "Yeah. She always asks me if I ever see him whenever she calls."
Silence then. Long and tense. Jeremiah had another drink. Noah didn't.
"She say's you never call." Jeremiah said finally.
"She told me not to." Noah explained. "After I got arrested in Gotham, she told me I was dead to her and not to call her ever again. Couldn't handle me being a criminal I suppose."
Jeremiah laughed. "It wasn't that. She was too embarrassed about that damn costume you were caught in! A damn giant calculator! Where the hell did you find number buttons that big anyway?"
Noah tried not to, but began to laugh as well. "I made them, thank you very much." He retorted.
"And purple?" Jeremiah laughed harder. "Why the hell was it purple? What the hell did you expect people to do when they saw a guy dressed up in a giant purple calculator outfit; cower in fear and terror?"
"Go to hell!" Noah spat, still laughing himself. "I thought it was a good idea!"
"And what the hell was that thing on your head?" Jeremiah continued, slapping the table and nearly falling over in his seat. "What the hell was that hat supposed to be?"
"It… it…" Noah tried to explain through his own laughter. "It was supposed to be an asterisk!"
Jeremiah and Noah both roared with laughter at that. They laughed long and loud. Tears ran freely from their eyes. Tears of joy. Tears of pain.
"You know what the worst part of it was?" Noah went on. "When Batman; you know, the biggest, baddest, hard-ass of them all; when he turns me into the cops; I swear I caught him laughing at me as they took me away."
They laughed for another few moments, and then regained their composure.
"Mom asks if I ever talk to you." Jeremiah offered; the laughter fading. "Have you heard from 'Mai'? Is he staying out of trouble? Has he gotten a real job yet?"
"What do you tell her?"
"I told her you're a drug dealer."
Noah smiled. "I guess that's not bad; considering the alternative."
Jeremiah poured another drink, devouring it and placing his glass back on the table rapidly. He stared at the empty glass in front of him. "Noah, I need your help." he said finally.
"Anything!" Noah offered. "Money, a place to stay, you name it."
Jeremiah poured another shot, took it, and slammed the glass on the table with a winch. He looked at the man sitting across from him; a man with the same eyes, the same lips, a nose like his moms, and his fathers chin. His younger brother, Noah Kuttler; known to the criminal underworld as "The Calculator"
"I'm going to kill him." He said softly.
Noah glanced over towards the bar. "I'm getting a little hungry. This whisky's going straight to my head. I wonder if they serve food here. Where'd that waitress go?"
"Noah." Jeremiah pleaded.
"I could really go for a burger," Noah continued, still searching for the waitress. "Hell, I'd settle for a plate of nachos."
"Noah, I'm serious!" Jeremiah fumed.
"No you're not!" Noah replied sternly, looking squarely at the other man. "What you are is grief stricken!" he said, lowering his voice as he spoke. "You're angry, you're frustrated, you're hurt, and you're lost. And you want to lash out and take revenge on the one person you think you can point the finger at. But trust me when I tell you, big bro, that's a road you don't want to go down! Not with him. Not with any of them."
"Noah, he let my wife, my child; he let them die!"
"The forensic results were inconclusive, Mai. They can't tell if they died before of after Superman got there."
"HE LET THEM DIE!" Jeremiah slammed his hand down with enough force to shake the glasses and tables. Pain shot up his arm. He winced and pulled his hand into his lap.
The bartender was looking their way now, as was the man that was previously asleep.
Noah turned and looked at them both evenly, his eyes filled with warning and dark intentions. Both the bartender and the other man turned away.
Noah then turned the look on his older brother. "You know what I do for a living, right?" he asked. Jeremiah hesitated, and then nodded. "Then let me make this very clear: Many people have paid me a lot of money… a lot of money… to find a way to do it: to kill him. I'm talking research, experiments, limitless resources; the works! I hired every evil genius and mad scientist on earth, and even a few that weren't. I spent seven months in an underground lab, with monkeys spliced with Kryptonian genes and enough kryptonite to make a scale model of Mt. Rushmore. And do you know what I discovered?" Noah asked, rubbing his hands together and sitting forward.
Jeremiah licked his lips leaned forward eagerly.
"It. Can. Not. Be. Done." Noah said plainly.
Jeremiah blinked. He looked at his younger brother in disbelief. "What are you saying? He's immortal?"
"No. Just the closest thing to it this world will ever see."
Jeremiah pressed on. "What about Kryptonite?"
Noah snorted. "He's soaked up so much yellow sun radiation that the only thing 'K' does to him now is make him dizzy and nauseous. Sure it weakens him, but to kill him; you'd need three thousand grams of liquid 'K' pumped directly into his heart. Of course only a diamond tipped syringe attached to a five hundred ton hydraulic piston would pierce his skin, and that's only after you had him directly exposed to a red sun UV lamp for over seventy-eight hours." Noah looked at Jeremiah. "Do you have a diamond tipped syringe?" he asked. Jeremiah frowned at him. "No? What about three thousand grams of liquid 'K'?" Jeremiah looked down at the table. "Or a plan to lure him away from the rest of the League for more than seventy-eight hours while you expose him to a constant barrage of red sun rays, from a high powered UV lamp, which you don't have either; all the while keeping the rest of them occupied long enough to prevent them from putting out an all points bulletin when he goes missing? Which should be the easy part, since there's only, what, forty, maybe fifty members now."
Noah grabbed the bottle of whisky, poured a drink for himself and downed it quickly. He rasped as his throat and lungs burned, wiping the salivation from his lips as it formed.
"It can't be done." He repeated once his lungs and eyes cleared. Jeremiah continued to look blankly at the table. "For better of for worse…" Noah continued. "Superman is here to stay. Stupid glasses and all." he breathed.
Jeremiah looked at him. "What did you just say?"
"I said 'Superman is here to stay.'"
"No." Jeremiah urged, sitting up in his seat. "After that! You said something about glasses."
Noah blinked. "No I didn't." he said, a little quicker than he would have liked.
Jeremiahs eye narrowed. He leaned forward. "You know who he is, don't you?"
"What are you talking about?" Noah replied, leaning back as he spoke. "He's Superman."
"Everyone knows he's not Superman all the time. That he walks around as someone else."
"I-I don't know… I don't know w-w-who he is…" Noah reached for the bottle of whiskey and Jeremiah grabbed his hands.
"You only stutter when you lie, Noah." Jeremiah said evenly.
"T-that's n-n-not true…" Noah answered, and then cursed. "It's the alcohol. I haven't eaten all day!"
"Damn it, Noah! Help me!" Jeremiah pleaded.
"I am trying to help you, for God's sake!" Noah spat. He sat back and eyed his brother.
"He's an alien, Mai; from a planet hundreds of light years away from here. You get me? He can fly! He has super strength! He's virtually invulnerable! Super speed! Super hearing! Super breath! X-ray vision! Telescopic vision! Microscopic vision! Heat vision! Hell, I'm still trying to figure out a power he doesn't have!"
"What's your point?" Jeremiah asked fiercely.
"My point is that he's not human! He's the closest thing this planets seen to a living God. He's a kid with a magnifying glass on a sunny day and we're all ants! But everyday, he's out there, saving as many of us as he can, doing what ever he can to make the world a little brighter, when he could be burning each and every one of us for his own personal amusement. And there wouldn't be a damn thing any of us could do to stop it. None of us! Not the good guys. Not the bad guys. He could wipe them all out and barely break a sweat."
Noah poured a drink for himself and downed it, the harsh affects barely registering.
"There's a reason Gods were worshipped in ancient civilizations." he went on. "To keep them happy! To keep them appeased. Because, even back then, they knew: it's better to have God's blessing, than to feel a God's wrath."
He leaned forward and spoke low and even. "Do I know who he is when he's not Superman? Yeah I know." He admitted. "A client figured it out and that little tidbit of information was that price he paid for a service I provided. And it was at that moment that I realized what I'm about to share with you…"
Noah glanced around the bar, and then licked his lips and leaned over the table. "The man that's walking around out there when Superman's not, the people he loves, the job he goes to everyday; that's him being human. That's him connecting to us tiny, little, insignificant ants. That's him keeping himself in check. Because he knows, just like I know, that it's better for him to be a normal, average human part of the time; than Superman all of the time. Being human keeps him grounded. If he loses that, if he loses his humanity, if he loses the people close to him, the people who matter the most, then he loses touch with all of us. Then, all you have left is that mean little kid with the big magnifying glass and a sunny day that never ends!"
Noah took another drink and looked at the man sitting across from him. His older brother. The good one. The man whose eyes were dark orbs; the man with the slumped shoulders; the man who's spirit was broken.
"I know what your feeling, Mai. I know it hurts. It hurts so bad you just want to take a knife to your chest and carve out your own heart, just so you won't feel anything anymore. You want to just crawl into a hole and cover yourself with every rock you can find." Noah grabbed the bottle and poured another drink. He looked at the clear caramel hued liquid for a long moment. "You feel like I felt… when dad died."
He drank.
Jeremiah looked at him as he did; looked at him as if seeing him for the first time.
"As far as I know, and I know a lot, there's only two, maybe three of us, who 'know'. And you know what? There's a reason we don't go after him; in or out of costume. It's because we know we can't beat him. We all know it." Noah thought for a moment about the client that revealed Superman's secret to him in the first place. "Well… most of us." He looked back to his brother. "Let it go, Mai." Noah said lowering his glass to the table. "Please… just let it go."
Jeremiah thought long and hard about what his younger brother had just said. If he was right about anything, it was the pain. Raw, unyielding, and all consuming. Jeremiah did, in fact, want to carve his own heart out. He did want to crawl into a deep dark hole and never come out again. He did want to just lie down and die.
And he did, more than anything else, want revenge on the man responsible.
"You still with me there, big bro?" Noah mused, his words slurring slightly.
Jeremiah blinked, and then looked at him. A smile slowly spread across his face. "You're right, Noah." He said finally, his voice low and even. "You're right… I… It just hurts. It hurts bad, Noah."
Noah reached across the table and grabbed his brothers' hand and squeezed. "I know, man. I know. But you just have to get through it. And I'm here for you, Mai. I'm right here."
"Just do me two favors." Jeremiah began.
"Anything." Noah answered. "Almost anything…" he corrected himself with a lopsided grin.
Jeremiah returned his smile. "First, let go of my hand…" Noah quickly released his grip on his brother's hand. Jeremiah winched and flexed his hand instinctively as he did.
"Sorry." Noah offered. Jeremiah smiled. "What's the second thing?"
Jeremiah grabbed the bottle of booze, filled his glass and his brothers to the brim.
"Have another drink with me." Jeremiah requested. With almost no hesitation, Noah grabbed his glass and lifted it into the air. Jeremiah lifted his own glass as well.
"To Lisa!" Noah proclaimed.
"To Lisa!" Jeremiah repeated solemnly. "And Jeremiah Jr.!"
They drank. And they drank. And they drank.
Noah awoke the next morning in a hotel bed that was partially covered in vomit. He sat up quickly and instantly regretted it, the spinning room a reminder of the night before. Bits and pieces floated back to him; flashes of him singing, a glimpse of both he and Jeremiah crying, him saying something rude and suggestive to the waitress. But everything else was a blur; how much had he drunk? How did he get back to the hotel? Where was Jeremiah?
He looked at the bedside table, the blur on the small clock making him aware of his missing glasses. He searched the bed and found them finally; also partially covered in what was left of whatever Noah had eaten last night.
He used a clean part of the bedspread to wipe them and looked at the clock again. It was almost two in the afternoon. Noah sighed. How long was he out? He couldn't tell or remember. His head felt as if the" Atom", a microscopic sized super-hero, was stuck on the inside of his skull and was trying to punch his way out.
He closed his eyes and took a series of slow deep breaths. It didn't help; a wave of nausea washed over him and he had to put his hand over his mouth to battle it. He opened his eyes, now slightly teary, his vision blurry even with his glasses.
It was then that he noticed the small note.
It was on the floor, next to a trashcan full of things Noah didn't want to look at. He concentrated on the small piece of paper, leaning forward with a moan and another wave of nausea, grapping it quickly, and sat back upright, taking a few labored breaths…
"I'm never drinking again…" he thought to himself.
The note was written on a piece of hotel letterhead in Jeremiahs handwriting:
"Noah,
Thank you for the information. You really are the best 'information broker' in the world… And you're a really great little brother.
I know what I must do.
Don't try to contact me.
Love always,
Jeremiah"
Noah's head was spinning for reasons that had nothing to do with alcohol. "What the hell is he talking about?" Noah wondered. "What information? What the hell did I tell him? Oh God, Jeremiah… what are you about to do?"
His vision swam and his stomach somersaulted.
Noah grabbed the trashcan, lowered his head, and realized that, much like the contents of his stomach, Noah may have just lost his brother.