The sun was beginning to set just behind the dam.
The bay was full of boats. There were now seven Metropolis Police Department Ships, six fire and rescue boats, and two very large barges, the decks of which were now covered with the remains of the LexCorp ferry.
As far as the plant itself, everyone but a skeleton crew of workers had been sent home. Both the remaining ferries had been taken out of service and were currently being thoroughly inspected. Now, the only way to and from the plant was the surface road. LexCorp had been kind enough to book a fleet of charter buses; each ready to carry its load of passengers to the Ferry dock parking structure. Conversely, the Metropolis Department of Transportation had suspended all tram service until further notice; not satisfied until every tram and every inch of track could be inspected. Every employee had been brought in for questioning and were now undergoing criminal background checks.
The fleet of buses was to remain in place of the ferry's and tram until such time as they both could be deemed safe for travel.
The traffic nightmare had returned.
In the bay, another nightmare altogether was playing out…
Superman was standing on the bow of one of the barges. The deck was a mess. An organized mess, but a mess nonetheless. Superman had personally recovered each and every salvageable piece of the ferry he could find. He would disappear beneath the surface of Metropolis Bay for minutes at a time, reemerging hefting a huge section of the destroyed vessel for deposit on the barge's deck. Some fragments were the size of a large truck or SUV. Others were the size of a baseball. But as far as he could tell, he had gotten every piece that hadn't been destroyed in the explosion.
Then there were the bodies.
Superman saw to them first. He had dove in and emerged over and over again; a lifeless form cradled in his arms each time. Some were horribly burned, some disfigured, some dismembered. And as with the boat, Superman took time and special care to find every piece.
To his dismay… there were a lot of pieces of both.
While the first barge was all but covered in the recovered debris from the ferry, the second barge had a large amount of room left. The space that had been filled, a relatively small section towards the ships bow, was where they had been laid. Forty-three in all. Men and women of various ages, various nationalities, various backgrounds. They only thing they had in common was the fact they all had to be at work at nine am.
All of whom now lay inside black body bags, which had been organized in neat rows; each body about four feet apart; six rows in all.
A large team of medical examiners, fire investigators, police detectives, and even federal agents were now crawling over the remains, looking for clues, trying to identify the victims, searching for answers.
For the most part, none of them were talking to Superman. Many of them tried their best to avoid looking at him.
One man, however, walked up and stood beside him; both looking out over the deck and its activity.
He was about six feet in height, a lean two hundred and twenty pounds. His well tailored suit showed that he was muscularly built, with broad shoulders and a wide chest. He skin was dark and smooth; his head was shaven bald, a thin, well groomed mustache and goatee encircling his full lips. His intense dark brown eyes struggled to take in every thing he was seeing.
"You know…" he began, his voice low and smooth. "In the bureau, we call this a bad day."
Superman didn't respond.
"What do you guys in the 'League' call days like this?" he asked.
"We try not to have days like this often enough to name them." Superman answered dryly. "Is there something I can help you with, Mr.?"
"Davison. Special Agent Davison. FBI. Meta-humans Division. Recent transfer to the Metropolis branch."
"Well, Agent Davison…" Superman said, turning to look at the shorter man for the first time. "I'm a little busy at the moment, so unless you need me for something…"
"I'd say you've done enough already." Agent Davison responded still not looking at him.
Superman turned very slowly to face him. "Excuse me?"
"Did you really recover every piece of that ferry?" he asked, his eyes still scanning the decks of both barges.
"Every piece I could find." Superman answered defensively.
"Probably would have taken a dive team a month and a half to find every piece…" Davison said absentmindedly. "And the bodies…" he continued. "That couldn't have been a picnic…"
"Agent Davison," Superman said, anger creeping into his voice.
"Who could do such a thing?" Agent Davison interrupted him.
Superman blinked. "What was I supposed to do?" he fumed. "Leave them at the bottom of the bay?"
"No." Davison answered, shaking his head slowly. "No… not that. The ferry. Who could blow up a ferry full of innocent people?"
Superman blinked again, some of the anger fading from him. He turned back towards the deck of the barges. "I wish I knew!" he whispered, his hand balling into a fist.
"Any ideas?" Davison asked, turning towards him for the first time.
Superman was silent for a moment. "None of the criminals I've faced fit the M.O." he answered finally.
"You sure?" Davison pressed.
Superman looked at him. "No one I can think of." He answered. "Believe me, if I had any idea who was responsible, I'd be talking to them right now, instead of you."
Davison didn't answer. He turned back towards the barges deck as well.
The stood there in silence for a long moment.
"We ran the recording from the radio station. CD; delivered standard mail to the station this morning; addressed to the station manager. No other markings or labels. In fact, the CD was clean as a whistle. No fingerprints, DNA, distinguishing marks or logos. Not so much as a scratch. It's was your garden verity recordable CD, available at every ninety-nine cent store and Wal-mart between here and Timbuktu. "
"I'd like to listen to it." Superman said in a tone that said plainly it wasn't a request. "Maybe I can pick up something you missed."
Agent Davison glanced at him with a half grin. "Of course." he replied.
Silence again.
"Heartless bastard." Davison whispered.
Superman turned towards him so fast, the gust of wind he created nearly knocked Davison over. "WHAT DID YOU CALL ME?!" he fumed.
"Not you! Whoever did this!" Davison answered, raising his arm to protect his face.
Superman quickly regained his composer and took a step back. "'I'm… I'm sorry." he breathed.
"You always this touchy?" Davison asked, taking a step back as well.
"I'm sorry." Superman repeated. "I just… I…" he looked out at the barge. He looked at the bodies laying there. "There's just so many of them…" he sighed. "I was so close to them… but I still didn't… couldn't save them…"
Davison retook his position on the barge and scanned it as well.
"Yeah," Davison sighed as well. "I supposed that'd put anybody on edge, even you." He glanced at the taller man. "He had to know the schedules;" he began. "The tram. The ferries. And if he knew that, he had to know how many people would be on board. It takes a heartless bastard to kill this many people, and for what? Just to get your attention?"
Superman looked at him, then cast a downward glance.
Davison took a deep breath. "In any event, it's a shame you didn't recover the device. It might have helped."
"Actually," Superman said, regaining his height? "Anything?" he said, seemingly to no one.
"I haven't seen anything like it before?" a deep, gravely voice answered.
Davison nearly jumped out of his skin.
He turned and saw Batman standing right beside him, a small piece of twisted plastic and metal in his gloved hands.
"Very sophisticated." he continued, eyeing the piece. "It must have been planted in the ships engine. Remote trigger. I checked the tram. There was a transmitter built into the intercom system. It had a timer attached. Presumably, when the tram fell into the bay, the entire electrical system would have been shorted, including the device. When it wasn't…"
"It sent a signal, detonating the bomb." Superman continued.
Special Agent Davison was staring; mouth wide, at the Dark Knight as if he just appeared out of thin air.
"…if Superman saves the tram, if he saves the passengers onboard, a number equal to that of the passengers on the tram will be killed in their place…" the words echoed in Superman's ears.
"There's no incendiary residue." Batman continued.
"It was underwater. Should there be?" Superman asked.
"Dynamite. C-4. TNT. Nitroglycerin. Gasoline. Nearly every form of flammable or combustible substance leaves behind a residue; a chemical burn-off. Even with the ferry being submerged, there should be some trace of chemical residue. But every piece I examined was clean. There was nothing at all. Whatever made the explosion, it was something we haven't seen yet."
"I went over every inch of the ship, down to the molecular level." Superman added. "I didn't see anything that pointed in any one direction."
Agent Davison blinked. He cleared his throat as if relearning how to speak. "That's evidence." he said at last, pointing at the small fragment on Batman's hands.
Batman looked at him for a moment that seemed, to Agent Davison, to last for a very long time.
"Here." He said finally, handing it to him.
Davidson took it, and held it as if he expected it to bite him.
"You really have no idea who's behind this?" Batman asked Superman.
"None." He answered. "ToyMan, LiveWire, Metallo; it just doesn't fit any of them. It's not there style. They're flashier than this. They like the spotlight more. They would have reviled themselves by now." His brow creased with concentration. "Wait a second… You said that almost every form of explosion leaves behind some type of residue. What doesn't?"
"Well," Batman began. "There's magic, if you believe in it," He said it as if just saying the word left a bad taste in his mouth. Superman frowned as well. He was nearly invulnerable to every weapon made by the hands of man. Magic, on the other hand, was a completely different story. "There's also a few other forms of weaponry I've seen; mainly Thanagarian and Martian in nature. The only other thing I can think of that's man made is a nuclear explosion."
"A nuke?" Superman questioned.
"A nuclear blast," Batman explained. "Wouldn't leave behind any residue, per say, but it does leave radiation. I did pick up traces, mid-level rads, but then again, this is a nuclear power plant."
Superman ran his hand through his hair and sighed.
"You're thinking to big." Batman said flatly.
"What do you mean?" Superman asked.
"Whoever's behind this," Batman continued. "There not some new super-powered thug trying to prove how big and tough they are. There not after money. There not seeking fame or notoriety, or else they would have taken credit for this by now. The device is new; sophisticated. This indicates they're smart. The targets indicate planning and precision. They wanted something public, but they choose something remote, something hard to reach by the authorities, in the off chance they're message was received early. That shows careful planning and patience. Baring magic, I'd guess this is the work of your average human; someone who feels you have wronged them in some way or form. Whoever this is; what ever their motivation for all this; it's personal. They hate you more than anything else. And they don't care who they have to hurt just to show you how much they hate you. But they don't want to be alone in all this. What they want… is to turn the whole city against you."
Superman's eyes narrowed as he looked at the dark clad man across from him. They seemed to be thinking the same thing.
"But even he wouldn't go this far." Superman said finally. "Plus, it was his ferry. His tram! His employees!"
"Exactly." Batman said plainly. "Who has better access? Who else could order certain… changes to the trams electrical system; additions to the ferries engine system?"
Superman thought long and hard about it.
"But what does he get out of it? What's the benefit?" he puzzled.
"Same thing he always wants, I suppose. A city that hates you as much as he does."
Superman frowned.
"Wait a minute." Agent Davison chimed in finally. "You're not talking about who I think your talking about?" he asked, looking at Superman. "Not Lex Luthor?!"
Superman didn't respond.
"Why would Lex Luthor destroy his own tram line and blow up a ferry full of his own personnel?" he asked. He turned towards Batman, but found that he was now speaking to nothing but air.
Agent Davison looked around frantically, but for all intents and purposes, Batman had vanished.
"He does that." Superman breathed.
Davison blinked his eyes, and shook his head frantically. "Okay…" he began. "I've read all about the dozens of run-ins you've had with the guy; indictments, criminal investigations, lawsuits… and guilty or not, the guy always seems to come away scot-free and smelling of roses! But it just doesn't make any since! Why would he do this to his own company; his own plant; his own people?" Davison asked, his voice still smooth and low, but slightly more excited than before.
Superman took a deep breath, and slowly began to rise into the sky. "Can't hurt to ask." he said as he flew away.
Special Agent Davison watched him disappear into the darkening sky, his head now filled with more questions than answers.