The helicopter had arrived at the park within minutes. Special Agent Davison had climbed aboard, and was now flying through the air with a bird's eye view of Metropolis. But his attentions wasn't on the magnificent view of the city beneath him; rather on the laptop in his hands, a grid-like map on the screen, as well as the one hundred and nine dots that marked every school bus in the city.
As it happened, the Board of Education, in a joint venture with the Metropolis Department of Transportation, had recently had all of the school buses in the city outfitted with GPS navigation systems. The idea was to help establish better routes, ensure the students were picked up on time, arrived to school on time, got home from school at decent hours, and avoid traffic when possible; all while conserving fuel costs in the process. The GPS systems also acted as a form of tracking device, allowing the dispatch center to have and up to date location of any school bus, at any time.
It was seven twelve. Twenty-six minutes to the deadline. So far, fourteen school buses had been stop, evacuated and were now being searched. Those buses were marked in green on his screen, and the remaining buses were marked in red.
"This is unit thirty-eight." The call came over Davison's headphones. "We have bus number ten-eleven; McArthur Junior High. We're evacuating the bus now. I'll have a headcount in a second." The agent reported.
"Copy that!" Davison shouted over the roar of the helicopter engine. "Bomb-squad!? What's your twenty?" he called out.
"We're spread too thin." came the response. "We still haven't finished checking the first bus. I've broken my unit up into teams of two, but that's still only twelve teams. At this rate, we'll never get to all of them in time! It would sure help if we knew exactly what we were looking for."
"I sent the pieces we recovered from the ferry to your lab for analysis!" Davison shot back.
"Yeah, and none of us could make heads or tails of it!" was the response. "We couldn't tell if it came from an explosive, or a microwave oven!"
Davison cursed under his breath. "Just check every inch of those busses. If it looks like something that's not supposed to be there, let me know! Where are we on back-up?"
"We called in everyone we could. We got an extra eight people coming in, but they may not make it in time. Two, maybe three extra teams to cover the north end…"
"Sir." the pilot shouted.
"What!" Davison snapped.
"Three O'clock, sir."
He leaned forward and looked out the window to his right.
There, a little over a mile up in the sky, was Superman. He was about three hundred yards away from the small craft, hanging motionless in the air, his cape tossed behind him by the wind.
"What's he doing?" the pilot asked.
Davison narrowed his eyes and looked at the superhero floating in mid-air. "He's staying out of the way!" he answered.
Davison looked at the laptops screen. A small window with a timer was set in the upper left hand corner. It currently read "00:24:42".
"I don't care what it takes. Recruit civilians off the streets if you have to!" Davison ordered into his mic. "I want those kids safe and those buses secure!"
"Roger that!" the bomb squad supervisor returned. "I'll update you in-" He stopped abruptly.
"Bomb-squad?! Are you there?!" Davison shouted. Silence. "Bomb-squad! Respond!"
"Bloody hell!" was the response.
"What!" Davison asked, his voice near frantic. "What is it?!"
"The radio sir! It's all over the news!"
Davison turned to the pilot. "This thing got a radio?" he snapped.
"Yes sir!"
The pilot flipped a switch, and Davison earphones were filled with the last thing in the world he wanted to here at that moment.
"…my next lesson is harder… harder to teach; harder to understand. And for that, Metropolis, I am sorry. But you will all see that he cares not for you, this lion among lambs; but for his own glory and self-righteousness. He doesn't care who lives or who dies, so long as he is praised in the end."
"That short fat stupid sonava bitch!" Davison cursed.
"But the children… they will teach him. Those who sit on rooftops and look out of windows in hopes of catching a glimpse of blue and crimson wings in flight… those who tie towels around there necks and paint "S"'s on there tee's… the will teach him. For what teaches us more than that which is lost?
"There are currently one hundred and nine grade school, middle school, and high school busses in service in Metropolis…" the voice continued. "All one hundred and nine of them have been wired with explosives. One hundred and eight of them are decoys. The real explosive device is scheduled to explode at precisely 7:38 the morning of this transmission."
"While I have no doubt that the combined effort of the Metropolis Police Department, Fire Department, and perhaps even the FBI will have little trouble getting all the students to safety in time; I also have little doubt that Superman will intervene. But I warn you, Superman: Your involvement in this will be at the cost of bloodshed. The lives of the children are in your hands. Accept that you cannot save us. You can't even save yourself!"
"That was the latest threat against Metropolis and Superman…" the news-woman said, her voice more than a little shaky. "And based on yesterday's events, we can only hope and pray that the men and women of the Metropolis Police Department get to our children in time."
Davison couldn't see them, there, a mile in the sky over Metropolis. He couldn't hear them or feel them. But he knew. As sure as he knew anything in this world, he knew they were down there.
Hundreds. Thousands. Millions maybe.
Mothers. Fathers. Parents.
Grabbing purses. Slamming closed briefcases. Racing down stairs when the elevator proved too slow. Ripping cell phones from pockets and purses; flooding the emergency lines with thousands of calls. Jumping frantically into cars; fumbling with keys; cutting through traffic; slamming into other cars and not stopping. All in hopes that maybe, just maybe; they could get to their child in time.
And not a single one of them realizing that, in the end, the only thing they would do is make what was already a nightmare… a hundred times worse.
Davison closed his eyes for a brief moment and took a deep breath. He tried not to think about anything at all, save for the job at hand.
He opened his eyes and looked at the screen. A quick count told him the total number of buses stopped and evacuated was now close to thirty. The timer told him "00:20:18" remained.
The chatter that erupted from his headphones was like a bad cop movie.
"The 911 switchboard just lit up like a Christmas three. We got over a thousand calls holding!"
"I got reports of a hit and run in about eighteen different locations in the city. It's chaos out there."
"B.O.E. dispatch just got a report of a woman jumping onto the school bus, trying to get it to stop! They lost contact with fifteen drivers. All the rest are calling in and asking what the hells going on!"
Davison cleared his throat.
"Alright, everyone! Listen up!" he shouted into his mic. "The plan doesn't change! Have dispatch tag the buses we lost contact with a yellow marker. I want anyone that hasn't found a bus, or within two miles of one, to head towards the yellow marker closest to them! Get those kids off the bus! Period! I don't care what it takes! That's our top priority! That's our only priority! I don't care if every bus in the city blows up in nineteen minutes or not. We make sure theirs not a single child left on any of them! Is that clear?!"
"Roger!"
"Copy that!"
"Crystal, sir!"
"We're on it!"
Every unit sounded off.
"Sir?" someone asked. "What about the parents trying to stop the buses on their own?"
"You throw a pair of cuffs on them and toss them in the back of a patrol car! We'll deal with the litigation later. I'm sure they'd rather have a pair of sore wrist than make funeral arrangements for their kid!" he answered. "Again, the plan is simple, people: You see a school bus, you stop it, clear it, and set up a perimeter until the bomb squad shows, or the clock expires." He looked at the clock on the laptops screen. "Eighteen minutes, forty seconds, people! Clocks ticking!"
And a mile below him, an army of police officers, federal agents, and bomb-squad members continued their search.
Superman was only mildly aware of the tension in his fist. They had been tightly clinched ever since his confrontation with Special Agent Davison. Even now, floating a mile in the air over Metropolis, all he did was clinch them tighter.
He could see the streets beginning to fill with people. Frantic people. Scared people. Men and women. Fathers and mothers.
He heard the broadcast. Nearly every radio in Metropolis was tuned to Metro One; waiting to see if there would be another treat against the city… against Superman.
Their waiting had not been in vain.
But for many; the ones running frantically through the streets; the ones driving insanely down the roads; the ones crying hysterically on hold to "911"; it had been like listening to someone broadcast their greatest fears.
And Superman's as well.
He heard the sound of metal meeting metal at high speed. His telescopic vision quickly located the intersection where five, now six cars became locked together in twisted steel and carbon-fiber. X-ray vision showed no broken bones or serious injuries. He saw a woman crawl through the driver side window of the car that was the possible start of it all. Her head was a bleeding mess; her steps were shaky at best. She limped forward, determined to get to her destination; to get to her child.
Superman's heart went out to her, but he remained in the sky. Hers was one of a dozen accidents and growing. From his vantage point, and with his extraordinary powers, Superman could see it all. He could see all the school busses, all the police vehicles, all the federal agents, bomb-squad agents, and all the children. All of it.
He could even see the bombs on the buses
Special Agent Davison's warning notwithstanding, Superman instinctively scanned each and every bus. And each and every bus had a device on it; a small cylindrical shape, with metal caps and a series of wires running from either end to a small square circuit board placed in the center. It was hidden among the emergency equipment in the rear of each bus. Unfortunately, Superman admitted, explosives were more up Batman's proverbial ally, so he couldn't make out the decoys from the real thing.
Superman watched bomb-squad agents slowly crawl through the bus, checking under seats, combing through the engine, checking the tires, brake system, exhaust system, and electrical system.
Superman at that moment wished his abilities included telepathy. He thought of trying to contact J'onn, the Justice Leagues Martian telepath. He could easily tell the Martian Manhunter where the bombs were located and have him convey the information to the officers and agents below. He took a second to consider the possible ramifications of his actions, but realized that if the agents were too late in locating the bombs, than none of it would matter anyway.
He prepared to close his eyes and focus his thoughts in attempt to contact J'onn, but at the last moment, he noticed a bomb-squad agent open the emergency storage compartment and frantically raise his radio to his lips.