Sorry about the delay.
Last time we left Lois in the air.
Before she could even scream, she felt someone grab her.
"Don't worry, miss, I've got you." The voice was warm and low and full of power. Lois blinked.
"Hey, Smallville." She held him tightly, and he smiled at her and began to carefully descend until he landed softly on the sidewalk. He helped her stand.
"Is that called being careful?" He smiled at her. She stuck her tongue out at him. He was about to take off.
"Wait! The power plant!"
"Sorry?"
"The nuclear power plant! The earthquake must have damaged it, and when I was up there, I thought I saw smoke coming out of the huge chimneys. I'm pretty sure that's not a good sign."
"Excuse me." He took off towards the power plant.
Lois felt weak in her legs and almost fell, but she managed to hold on to a nearby phone booth and stay standing, continuing to look in the direction he had disappeared. He was just...super...superman...superman!
Lois turned around, ignoring the medics who wanted to check her, and ran towards the jeep she had stolen earlier. She has a story to write! And she has to get to that power station, like yesterday!
The control station of the nuclear reactor was abuzz with activity, engineers working hard to release the pressure and lower the temperature in the reactor. It was not yet clear what the damage was caused by the earthquake and although the emergency protocol was working properly when the big earthquake started, something was wrong and the reactor continued to heat up. The chief engineer was not sure that the reactor casing could continue to withstand the pressure. They released some radioactive steam, well below the level allowed by the regulations of the Oversight Committee and with the governor's approval, but it was not enough, and Mr. Williams was no longer sure that he would be able to prevent the situation from getting worse. Who the hell builds a nuclear reactor in an earthquake prone area?
"What exactly is the problem, sir?" said an authoritative voice behind him.
Jess Williams stood up and wiped sweat from his forehead with a handkerchief. How many more times will he have to explain it? Who is bothering him now with questions?
"The reactor is heating up..." He turned towards the voice and the continuation of the sentence died in his mouth when he saw the unknown man standing in front of him.
He looked the man up and down. It was a tall man, his hair was black, his eyes were an out-of-this-world blue colour and his face was sincere and concerned. He stood in an authoritative stance that managed to cast a shadow over the medal-laden general who was standing in the room looking stunned at the man who suddenly appeared in the room. A red cloak that on anyone else would have been ridiculous fell from his shoulders. He wore a blue fabric suit that clung to his body. On his chest was a red and yellow pentagonal shield with the letter S. Williams' gaze dropped to the shapely body that displayed power to the red boots and then back up.
"And the cooling systems don't work?" The man ignored the stares fixed on him. "Mr. Williams, the reactor!"
"Uh, yeah, hmm... not really in-"
"Don't add a word, Williams!" Commanded General Ashton, "...this man does not have the necessary security clearance to..."
"In less than an hour it won't change a thing, General Ashton! Not if we can't cool the core!" Williams yelled at the general. he moaned. "I'm sorry, General. I shouldn't have shouted." He looked at the cloaked man, "Something's gone wrong, and we can't figure out what. The reactor is heating up, but apparently the cooling systems are working because it's not heating up too fast, but they're not doing all the work because the temperature continues to rise and hasn't stopped for several hours. If we can't do something in soon, the heat will destroy the cooling systems themselves and then nothing will prevent an explosion. The only thing that can be done is to send engineers there to take care of the cooling systems." The man looked at the control panels. "But the radiation is so high inside right now they won't survive. They'll die of radiation poisoning."
The man in blue and red approached the systems and went over the blueprints and diagrams of the reactor and the systems inside it that were projected on the large screens in the control room. After five minutes, he turned to the doorway and took one step forward to it. An entire unit of National Guard soldiers entered. The soldiers pointed their guns at the stranger, and General Ashton smiled triumphantly, pulling Williams to his side behind the soldiers.
"And you're not moving from here until I get answers." said the general authoritatively. The soldiers put down their weapons. "Let's start with who the hell are you?"
The man examined the twenty soldiers and their equipment, and then he blew as a child blows out birthday candles. Within seconds, the guns were covered in ice, sticking to the soldiers' hands.
"If you'll excuse me..." he disappeared.
Williams pushed the stunned soldiers out of his way and rushed to the control panel.
"We wasted precious time!" Then his eyes widened. He pressed one of the buttons and on the big screen in front of him came up a video that one of the few cameras still working was filming in real time from inside the reactor. The cloaked man opened the armored lead door of the reactor and entered the cooling system itself. "What are you doing? Are you crazy?!" Williams screamed into the microphone. "The radiation will kill you!" General Ashton gaped at the man on the screen.
"Perhaps we should send someone with a suit there?"
"It won't help, and it's already too late."
The man stood and examined the area where he was standing, and then noticed the camera and smiled calmly. In front of the eyes of Williams, Ashton, the soldiers, and the other engineers in the control room, he turned and went out of camera range.
"Can you follow him with the camera?" Ashton asked. Williams didn't answer, but one of the technicians pressed a few buttons and the camera followed the man. Williams and Ashton paled.
"Oh god!" whispered the technician who moved the camera.
The man with the cloak stood with his back to the camera, and in front of him was the cooling system. Red and green pipes flowed from place to place, and steam came out of the main red pipe.
"The cooling system..." Williams said in horror. "The heavy water, it..."
"The core, Mr. Williams! Look!" the technician called.
A crack ran along the armored shell of the core. It wasn't supposed to happen. It was a disaster that not even Chernobyl could match. The man on camera did not lose his cool.
"What is he doing?" said the technician. "Doesn't he know it's...?"
The man went directly to the main red pipe that carried the heavy water that cooled the core to the reactor's heat transfer system. It looked like he was just looking at the pipe, but before the dumbfounded eyes of everyone in the control room the column of steam shrank until it disappeared and the crack, actually the hole, in the pipe disappeared. He went on to do the same with the rest of the damaged pipes, and then looked at the crack.
"Hmmm... Sir?" said the technician into the microphone. The man turned and looked at the camera questioningly. "There's a phone over there, we can talk through it." The man nodded and walked over to an old-fashioned looking yellow phone that was attached to the wall.
"Can the shell of this room withstand the radiation from the core?" came the voice in the control room.
"No."
"Is the cooling system working better now?"
"Yes, you probably fixed most of the damage to the pipes, but it's too late. The temperature in the reactor continues to rise. Although slower but still rising and with this crack..."
"I can try to wield the crack. The question is, will the heat cause a chain reaction and an explosion?" Williams grabbed the microphone from the technician.
"It's close to a foot of concrete and then half a foot of steel and then a foot of lead. Can you do that?"
The man hung up the phone and approached the crack again. He returned to the phone after a moment.
"The lead isn't damaged from what I can see, but the steel is. I can wield the steel, it will take a long time."
"We will blow cold air into the room you are in, but that means radioactive air will escape." The man shook his head.
"No need. I'll do it myself. Turn off the reactor."
"It's not your decision!" shouted the general. Williams turned off the microphone and looked at the general.
"He's in there alone. He's fixed the cooling system, and he believes he'll be able to fix the core casing. I'm not going to argue with him."
"You trust him!? The radiation must have blown his mind!"
"He makes a lot of sense to me, General." Williams turned and turned on the microphone. "Sir, shutting down the reactor will take time, more than an hour. We are starting the process right now." He gestured with his hand and one of the technicians pressed the red button for the emergency shut-off, hurrying and entering the special password as well. The man nodded. "Are you sure you can withstand all this radiation?"
"It's not exactly my favorite pastime, but I'll be fine. I better get started."
"Sir, I... I don't even know how..."
"It's okay, Mr. Williams." The man hung up the phone.
The last thing the people in the control room saw before the camera broke was the man blowing cold air all over the room. The technician looked at Williams.
"We don't even know his name."
"Superman." said an unfamiliar female voice behind them. All the people in the control room turned around. At the entrance to the room stood a woman with wild dark hair wearing jeans and a t-shirt that had seen better days. "His name is Superman. Hi, Uncle John." She smiled at the general.
"Lois Lane."