Chapter 1: Grundy of the Evergreens

"Solomon Grundy is more powerful than a locomotive!" roars Solomon Grundy.

"Say now, that's my line," remarks Superman over the roar of a passing train.

From the cars, passengers peer amazed at the scene outside compartment windows. They whiz toward and then past a remarkable pugilistic contest. Slugger Solomon Grundy stands seven feet and six inches tall. The giant sloppily throws wide haymakers that could knock an adversary's head off. Superman—although certainly stocky—is smaller than his opponent. However, he literally dances on air, and he evades Solomon's severe, swiping blows. Like Willie Pep, Superman moves with such speed that he is nigh untouchable while rapidly ringing his foe's bell again and again. In a blur, his jabs jostle Grundy's jelly brains, and his crosses crack "concrete" cranium back and forth. When the riled revenant reacts to counterattack, the Kryptonian cobra dips down and successively decks the unliving ugly like a heavy bag.

Superman is so grateful that fellow Justice Societarians Wildcat and Batman have taught him some boxing. Clark Kent feels like Ted Grant right now. For the moment, fist-fighting Solomon Grundy is more fun. And, what makes the melee even more fun is its location, for the two titans are not tussling in thronged Metropolis or Gotham. Rather, they are on a backroad in the Minnesota boonies. Besides the rail briskly passing, there are no bystanders to be seen, perhaps even with super-vision. The crossing bisects a timber track surrounded by thick forest.

The Man of Tomorrow tucks to deliver a tremendous uppercut upon the awful ogre. A stupendous sock knocks Solomon over the clipping carriages and catapults him ninety feet up and ninety feet northward. The hurtling hulk hits every balsam bough on the way down. However, too dumb to quit and too dull to quail, Solomon Grundy expediently stands up snarling and scowling.

X-ray vision sees surly Solomon. "Up, up and away!" Superman flies in pursuit.

The Man of Steel swoops in like a blue bomber. Like the Brown Bomber, superb combinations buffet a big brute, and a coup de grace slams Grundy through several spruce pine trunks. Ten trees and a terror are knocked down.

Ever a good sport, Superman says, "All right now, Solomon, stay down. Don't get up."

"Nineteen forty-eight," replies the roughed revenant unexpectedly.

"What?"

"The year is 1948," clarifies Grundy, "Solomon Grundy does not have a concussion—yet."

Supes smirks. "Let us keep it that way," the Blue Boy Scout suggests, "I seem the better boxer this bonny day."

Solomon snatches a downed stalk. "Bah!" blurts he, "Let's play baseball instead!"

A fifteen-foot bat swats Superman aside. Several spruces shatter and splinter as a blue and red ball blasts through. The hero thumps on the soil and skids along like a grounder. Obviously, he was a brave when he should have been a dodger.

Instantly, Superman recovers and changes the game. Faster than a speeding bullet, he flies like a beelining linebacker. Blue uniform impacts ungirt beltline and impels buckled abominable adversary backwards. More branches briskly break throughout a patch of timber. Paul Bunyan looks to have been through.

Suddenly, Superman spots a barn up ahead. The Man of Steel stops short and releases his burly burden. With a grunt, Solomon Grundy slams against red slats. He sneers, and stares down the barnstormer intensely. Then, he spots, to his sinister side, a farmer and his family. Black boots swivel to stomp toward innocent bystanders. In a blink, Supes steps in the savage scoundrel's path such that Solomon stops several seconds. Superman stoops to throw another extraordinary uppercut. However, Grundy locks his hands overhead like a hammer and hurls his fists down in an "upper down", as he would call it (it counters an uppercut). Locked fists meet forehead, and Superman falls—fleetingly-flat. The monster moves toward the farmer and son again.

Bravely, the teen boy takes a pitchfork and charges. Brazenly, Solomon Grundy simply allows the bold adolescent to stab him. See son, that didn't hurt me. The terror slaps the tyke aside, nearly snapping his neck. The farmer father makes for his insensible, supine son. Solomon Grundy makes for the farmstead's tractor, hopefully to have it before Superman gets up. The horror would like to throw it at the hero.

However, the Man of Steel is already standing. "Great Scott!" says he surveying the scene.

A mighty arm shotputs the machinery maliciously. Ma Kent's boy catches the precious equipment, for a good row-cropper is expensive—as "Smallville" knows. He sets it down nicely.

Growling, Grundy puts up his dukes. "Come on," his index signals, "Solomon Grundy can outbox you. He sees he has the longer reach."

"Yokel, you had the longer reach before too," Supes shakes his head, "But, we should cease our slugfest anyway."

"Oh? Why should we?" wonders the monster.

"Because I do not need fists to tan your hide," states the Man of Tomorrow.

Superman's heat vision gives the ghoul's pale flesh a fiery burn. Solomon screams, He almost squeals liked seared pork, such as from yon pigsty. Soaring in an arc, Superman divebombs Solomon Grundy and grabs him under the armpits. Up, up, and away

The Son of Jor-El zooms for the stratosphere and space beyond it. Superman supposes to set Solomon Grundy on the Moon, a suitable prison. Although, it has been done before by Green Lantern (see All-Star Comics #33) and by Degaton (see All-Star Squadron #3). And, it will be done again (see Superman #301).

Strangely, Superman has to smile at this moment although, granted, Grundy struggles and protests, perhaps foolishly. If free, the drop is a real lulu. However, the Last Son of Krypton knows that Kal-El is a lucky fellow, for the average earthman yet dreams of doing his present activity. In all of history, only so many men have ever visited the upper atmosphere, and all humanity anticipates the day that it knows outer space. For now, late-40s society can only speculate about the beyond as mankind has done for millennia. Superman actually encounters these extraordinary reaches whenever he wills.

Exposed to space, Solomon Grundy experiences also the exceptional. The cold is unmitigated, and the vacuum is endless. Unchecked forces transfix and freeze the ghoul stiff as an entombed mummy. Only his angry eyes, by some hoodoo, continue flitting. Otherwise, horror Solomon Grundy flies helplessly from Earth's atmosphere.

Beaming a smile, Superman streaks away from Earth, fun etched across his face. However, he then remembers that he left Lois in Fawcett City, Minnesota. Clark Kent and Miss Lane were investigating odd sightings of some kind of Scandinavian-American troll there when Clark's sharp hearing discerned a radio broadcast reporting a robbing and rampaging monster just north of them. The rogue ogre was Solomon Grundy, who is now handled. Thus, Superman should return to Lois expeditiously. That is what a gentleman should do.

Therefore, Superman stops in space. He commences spinning rapidly, and his centrifugal force builds well. Having calculated the right path along which to cast Solomon Grundy to the moon, Superman releases the rowdy lummox toward Luna. The super-villain should make it there eventually, after travelling three hundred megameters. Casually, the Kryptonian u-turns back toward his adopted home.

The hero makes a benevolent fly-by at the Minnesota farm. The bounced boy and his father are beside a byre that boards a bull and other browsing bovines. The farm folks are fine.

For a piece, Solomon Grundy pirouettes peacefully through the void betwixt the Earth and the Moon. He mutters and moans to himself while meeting nothing.

Then, a flying saucer sneaks toward the suspended villain.