Disclaimer: No I don't own anything.
Atlas
Book 1: Rise of Atlas
Arc 1: Heroes of Tomorrow, Today
Part 6
Doc's Bar and Diner,
Metropolis, Delaware,
United States,
Prime Earth
"This is a disaster Jim." Clark looks extremely worried as he digs into the breakfast sat in front of him. "I slept for a day, and suddenly Glenmorgan is all over the news, screaming about how everything he said was under duress."
Gesturing towards a television in the corner of the dinner, the muted television shows the face of the silver-haired media mogul in front of almost 2 dozen cameras as he gives a press conference.
Clark's red headed companion gives him a look of pity before turning back towards the television to read the closed captions from Glenmorgan's interview. "Maybe it's God's way of trying to get you to stop Clark, you and Percy keep punching this high above your weight, and eventually it's all gonna come crumbling down."
Clark opens his mouth to interrupt Jimmy, but Jimmy holds up a hand silencing him. "I know, I know." Dropping his voice a few octaves Jimmy does a bad impression of Clark. "If we don't, who will? People need us to report the truth, no matter who it's about." Going back to his normal voice he gives Clark a look of concern. "All I'm saying is that I asked you to come to Doc's for a reason."
Clark isn't even paying attention to what Jimmy is saying to him, he's too busy also watching the press conference. "He literally looks like he owns the television station Jimmy, how am I supposed to compete with that?" Clark looks defeated as the press conference continues. "He's playing the victim card perfectly, he's got everyone convinced that he's the victim of a pair of monsters from space. Every five minutes now someone on television is talking about Superman being an alien invader."
Shoveling eggs down his throat Jimmy looks up at Clark. "Mphm mmmphm mmmphmmm mppphhm." Pausing for a second Jimmy swallow the rest of his eggs before apologetically looking at Clark. "Sorry about that, what I was saying is, that he sure doesn't sound like he's from Kansas do they?" Pointing to a clip of a red blur rushing by the camera, followed closely by another clip of a man using water as a pair of jets to push into a wrecking ball play. "I mean seriously look at them, those types of thing being real sound impossible, so people like to pretend that they're just hallucinations, then it's hoaxes, then failed medical experiments and now aliens. It's the natural progression of these things."
Clark slams his fist against the table, the plates shake and cracks begin to spread where his fist had landed. "I had hard evidence, witnesses, facts. He's using this alien excuse to draw the attention off himself, and pass the blame onto someone else." Clark pulls out a thick manilla envelope out of his satchel and passes it over to Jimmy who begins to flip through the stack of photos. "Percy literally slept for 2 hours a day for almost 2 weeks to get all of those photos, now no one cares, innocents died because of all the costs that got cut and no one cares."
Reaching across the table Jimmy pats Clark's shoulder in a consoling manner. "That's why I'm here, forget all this. Perry is literally sending Lois to charm you to join The Planet. He's willing to offer you an escape route, free from all this."
"And I appreciate it Jimmy, but I owe Mr. Taylor everything, he and The Star were the only things that took Percy and I seriously when no one else would." Shaking his head in a declining manner he takes Jimmy's hand off of his shoulder. "Plus Glen Glenmorgan owns The Planet, and Perry White. He's trying to shut me down."
A beat pauses between the both of them before Clark gets a puzzled look on his face. "Wait just me? Not Percy?"
"Nope, just you. Perry think's that if we get you, Percy will fall in line."
Coffee rushes out of Clark's nose as he laughs at what Jimmy tells him. "So Perry just forgets everything he ever learned about Percy?"
"Exactly, speaking of Percy shouldn't he be back soon? I mean how long does it take to get a drink from the bar?" Jimmy wonders as he begins to strain his neck around the diner trying to locate the other photographer.
As Jimmy continued to search for him Percy stepped up to the bar in the diner before taking a seat at one of the barstools. "Hey Doc." Percy greets the old man behind the basically empty bar.
The old man looks Percy over, before giving a sigh and smiling at the sight of the young man. "Percy, it's good to see you. But it's not 1 in the morning, what are you doing here right now?"
Laughing at Doc's joke, Percy shrugs before gesturing over to where Clark and Jimmy were seated. "Jimmy is on his bi-monthly attempt to get Clark to join The Daily Planet." Shaking his head back and forth Percy looks back at Doc. "So, I gotta wait that out, but while I'm here can I get my usual?"
"Your usual? Coming right up." Doc laughs as he goes to pour Percy a draft of the cheapest beer he's got.
As Percy waits for Doc to hand him his beer, a shadow grows over him. Turning his attention to it he's greeted by the sight of a new person looking down on him. "Lois Lane, what a pleasure." Sarcasm drips through Percy's voice as Lois meets up with him.
"Now now, don't be like that Percy." She looks down at the draft beer Doc just placed in front of Percy. "It's 9 in the morning, isn't it a little early for you to be drinking this early?" Crinkling her nose she takes a seat in the barstool next to him.
Raising his hand with an outstretched finger Percy signals for her to pause for a second as he takes a big gulp of his beer. Sighing as he places the glass down he wipes his mouth of the foam that had built around his lips. "Listen, I've had a rough morning. Now what can I do for you?"
Looking over Percy's disheveled appearance Lois nods her head in agreement with Percy's sentiment. "I wasn't gonna say anything, but you look like something even a goat wouldn't eat."
Snorting as he laughs, Percy drops the glass down after taking another drink from it. "Charming as always Lois, now I'm serious, what can I do for you?"
Lois slides a stapled stack of paper over to Percy. "Perry has been very happy with what you've been doing for us." She points to the top of the stack and begins to read it out to the photographer. "It's a job offer, he'll protect you from anything Glenmorgan will want to do to you, along with being able to provide you the resources to continue digging deeper." She stands up and pats Percy on the shoulder. "Look Jackson, it's a great offer for you, Kent isn't getting the same deal…."
"Yeah why is that? He's the actual reporter, I'm just the Dyslexic Photographer." Percy cuts her off as he gestures over to Clark who's escaping from Jimmy as he reaches into his pocket and fishes out his old flip phone.
"That's a question for Perry, not for me. I'm just here to give this to you, the rest is up to you." She slings her bag over her shoulder before throwing a few bucks cash onto the bar. "Next one's on me." Walking away she stops one last time before turning on her heel and looking at Percy again. "And this time, get something that's actually drinkable, not whatever crap you're drinking now."
Turning back towards Doc Percy shrugs. "Well you heard the lady, get me something that won't make me grimace just from touching it." Doc nods and walks over to the taps as he reaches over and unmutes the televisions due to another bar fly's request. While Doc goes to pour Percy his beer, Percy begins to flip through the documents that Lois had given him, reading about the job that The Daily Planet is offering him.
The media mogul Glen Glenmorgan's rant now plays at full volume all throughout Doc's. The man's face is stark beet red as he seems to be shouting with anger at everything that has occurred to him. "I was threatened, beaten, tortured to such an extent that I would've admitted to anything just to get it to stop" Spit flies out of the mogul's mouth as he speaks with such conviction and vitriol, truly trying to sell anything that he says. "And the resulting slurs, accusations, insinuations and libel from organizations such as The Daily Star will certainly not be overlooked by my lawyers as we work to bring the true menaces to justice. The so-called Superman and his buddy Atlas." Slamming both of his hands down onto the podium in front of him Mr. Glenmorgan pauses for a moment, as if he's trying to regain his breath before he finishes his impassioned speech. "I have it on good authority that not only are they monsters and menaces, but are in fact actually Aliens." Camera flashes light up the TV as the reporters begin to snap photos like crazy of the man claiming that he knows who are aliens, as his bodyguards step forward and pull him away from the stage and back into their protective cover
Jimmy gestures over to the television, drawing Clarks attention away from the stack of pancakes in front of him. "Look at this man, the whole world's changing, aliens on the news, what's next, the creature from the black lagoon?" Raising his mug up Jimmy downs the rest of his coffee continuing his train of thought. "The world keeps getting weirder and weirder, you know what that means? Opportunities, serious opportunities." Jimmy gestures with his hand as
"My sister's response to it all?" Lois starts off as she nudges Jimmy to move over before sliding into the now available spot in the booth. "So there's a whole planet of these hot super guys somewhere?" She then takes in Clarks disheveled appearance. "Jesus Kent, you look like you fell off a truck."
"Charming as always Lois." Clark shoots back as he flips through the envelope that was still laying on the table. "Did Percy shoot you down already?" He quips while focusing on the information in the file as he pulls out specific photos to show Jimmy.
"Shows what you know Kent." Lois scoffs as she drinks from her Coffee. "Jackson's actually looking at the offer right now." She then gestures her head over to Percy at the bar, who is still going through the papers Lois gave him, the ones that hold his job offer.
Clark raises an eyebrow as he looks at Lois, a skeptical glint hiding behind his glasses. "Jimmy told me that I was the only one getting an offer."
"You're right, you were the original offer." Lois concedes to his point before she gestures towards the papers that hold Clarks offer, now thrown off to the side in favor of what Clark brought down. "But Jackson's got a special offer from Perry himself."
"Was I not good enough?" Clark snorts as he begins to collect the papers and pictures back from Jimmy and shove them back into his manilla envelope. "Don't answer that Lois, he's the angry hotheaded one, I get it."
"So you'll convince him to accept the offer then?" Lois asks as she watches Clark finish collecting his information.
"That's not up to me Lois." Clark then gestures to the seat at the bar that once had been occupied by Percy, was now empty, save for two things, the first being a manilla envelope, the same one that Lois had given to him earlier, the second being a full untouched beer that Percy never touched. Walking over to the folder Clark chuckles to himself as he picks it up and shows the cover to Lois. With a hastily scrawled "No Thanks" covered the entire front of it.
While Clark leaves the Diner after giving Doc the money that he owes, he stows the folders under his arm and walks out, leaving Lois and Jimmy watching the tv, just as Glen Glenmorgan comes off it, being replaced by a much poorer looking man takes over the media attention.
"Laws going after those two freaks." He starts off, letting his cigarette hang out of his mouth, its ashes going all over the place as he taps it. "So what, we're squatters, yet they didn't care at all about how we were left homeless after they went on their rampage?" He takes another drawl from his cig, as a man behind him begins to make sickly hacking noises as he coughs into his cupped hands. "Especially that water one, Atlas was his name or whatever, he blew six hydrants around the buildings my friends and I called home." He gestures around to the rest of the guys that are looking sick around him. "Now we can't even get clean water to drink."
7 Blocks Away,
Millennium Park
Metropolis Delaware,
United States,
Prime Earth
Percy walks through Millenium Park, the entire last few days weighing heavily on his mind. "I can't believe this Glenmorgan fuck." He mutters to himself, the news reports of him and Clarks escapades having dragged him down some. "I saved them all from the buildings, and yet I'm the freak." He complains as the videos relay through his mind.
"Atlas es una muy mala persona." The family that he had rescued from the wrecking balls now sat front and center in his mind, the Galaxy Broadcasting Network symbol burned into Percy's mental image of the video. "Él es un bicho raro." The man continued, pausing as the heartless people who worked for the news company translated his messages to the English speaking audience.
Percy's time of mental loathing is broken short as a little girl's scream reaches through his self pity. "Jack!" The little girl yells. "Come on down boy." The girl stands in the middle of the road, as a semi truck comes barreling down at her, something that she misses as she's too busy focusing on the orange cat that's standing on the tree branch overhanging the street.
Feeling a rush of adrenaline within himself, Percy yanks on his necklace, as a rush of mist overtakes him. His brown hair darkens to a black, while his eyes lighten and change from a bluish brown, to a bright sea green. Feeling the oh too all familiar tug in his gut, a rush of water surrounds him, allowing the Superhero, to launch himself towards the girl, he snatches the cat out of the tree, before landing with a crash in front of the girl, holding out his hand the water rushes into a pillar that the semi truck crashes into, leaving the girl unharmed as Atlas holds Jack the cat out to her.
Giving her a lopsided smile, he reassures her while he gestures around themselves. "Careful little girl." Atlas says as he gestures the cat towards her.
Instead of being happy and thankful that the hero had saved her cat, the girl instead screams in horror at the sight of him. "AHHHH! FREAK!." She yells as she runs away from Atlas leaving him holding the cat.
Sighing in defeat Atlas bends down and lets Jack onto the ground. The cat gives him an appreciated mew and rubs against his leg before running off as an angry mob begins to gather around Atlas. Throwing bottles at him, the crowd shows their hate towards Atlas, as instead of being seen as the hero that he is for saving the cat, he's instead being attacked for what he is.
More and more people build into the crowd as Atlas begins to raise his arms in defense from the items that they're throwing at him. As more people grow the items get larger and larger, the bottles turn into bricks and rocks as they start launching more stuff at Atlas. Signs begin to be held up to reading terms such as "Alien Go Home" or "Unwanted Flying Object.", the shouts of anger from the mob begin to get to Atlas as the water spike falls and wraps around him pushing him off into the air away from the mob.
Percy and Clark's Apartment
Metropolis, Delaware
United States
Prime Earth
"Yeah, I hear you, Icarus." Clark mutters into his flip phone as he runs a hand through his messy hair. "I'm just getting frustrated."
A robotic sounding voice speaks back to Clark through his phone. "I know how it feels, so close yet still needing more." If possible the robotic voice even had some compassion in its tone as it spoke to him. "But the tipping point is coming, you're close Kent, soon all your hardwork will be rewarded. All you have to do is keep pushing hard on him, you continue to push as hard as you have been, and he'll go down like a house of cards."
"What's his next move then?" Clark asks as lowers his voice as the front door to his and Percy's apartment opens.
""Mr. Metropolis" as his media companies call him had rigged the bullet train to crash, taking out Grundig and anyone else who could flip on him." The robotic voice lets out a low chuckle of amusement at the paranoia of the rich. "Now watch, he'll replace the so-called dangerous system with a robotic system of his own invention."
Clark catches on to what Icarus is referring to, the same thing that he and Percy had been combating as both their super powered alter egos and their jobs in journalism. "Which he built using cheap labor, and illegally shipped in from his asian sweatshops." Clark hears the hum in confirmation from Icarus, proving that his hunch was right. Clark then asks a question that has been eating at him since he began to work with Icaurs. "Who are you anyways, give me anything, anything at all I can use to help back up your claims as my source."
Icarus ignores Clark's insistent questioning, instead choosing to focus on the matters of Glen Glenmorgan at hand. "The factory for tomorrow, robot trains. Don't lose your nerve Kent, focus on the big picture." Then before Clarks can speak at all to respond, his phone clicks as Icarus ends the call from his end.
Clark sighs in frustration as he shoves his phone in his pocket, annoyance reading all over his face as he hated the end of the call.
"Mmmhhad cammmhh?" Percy manages to shove out of his mouth as he has a slice of week old pizza hanging from his mouth. Raising his hand he gives Clark one finger as he quickly finishes the slice before gulping his mouth as he swallows. "Sorry. Bad call?"
"It's Icarus, he's being secretive." Clark says as he begins to rub his head to alleviate his upcoming headache.
"Yeah when isn't he?" Percy says with a shrug as he has a nonchalant look on his face. "I still don't fully trust him." Percy grabs the last piece of pizza from the plastic bag in the fridge before highlighting his point by pointing the slice at Clark. "But i'll give him that, Icarus is a great fucking name, way better than Deepthroat."
"Don't insult Woodward and Bernstein." Clark says as he raises an eye at Percy's change of subject. "They're American patriots."
"I'm not saying they're not Clark, what I'm saying is that their lead informant was literally using the name of a sex move as his cover name." Percy reaches over to his backpack and pulls out his beat up old camera, hooking it up to his barely running laptop, its fan sounding like an airplane taking off. "But come look at this, I got some great shots of the shipments that Glenmorgan has been bringing in."
Clark, now having his interest fully peaked, makes his way across the main room of the apartment. Looking down at Percy's screen, he sees what Percy had been excited to show him. Right on the screen are pictures of two ships that came into Metropolis Harbor earlier that morning, Percy managed to get faces, license plates, even a serial number on one of the boxes that they were loading into the moving vans at the Docks.
"Percy, this is great." Clark's problems with Icarus are now forgotten, as the photos bring him a renewed sense of accomplishment towards the crusade that the two of them had been fighting within the city. "This is really great." Clark repeats as he begins to write down the serial numbers from the photos that Percy had taken into his pocket reporter's notebook.
Raising an eye at Clark's actions Percy shows him some more photos, these having more numbers for Clakr to keep track of. "What's that you're doing? Did you finally get an in?" Percy asks, alluding to their problems finding a legal way into any of Glamorgan's properties.
"Yeah, Icarus provided some great help." Clark says as he takes over the laptop to log into his email account, showing Percy his newly received reporter's field press pass and a scheduled interview dated for tomorrow. "Looks like it's just for me." Clark mentions out loud as he finished reading the information. "Sorry Percy, I know how much you want to be involved in the takedown?"
Looking sad for a second, Percy ends up shrugging his shoulders after a few seconds of deliberation. "I actually have to meet with Perry, over at The Planet around that time anyways, plus the two of us together would raise too many eyes."
"What do you have to meet with Perry about?" Clark asks with heavy confusion in his voice. "I saw that you turned down his job offer earlier at Doc's."
"I have to meet with him about some freelancing stuff, he wants me to go down to DC with Lois, something about an exclusive interview with this Sergeant." Percy explains as he takes the laptop back from Clark and begins to search for the Sergeant. After a few minutes of google Percy brings a web page up, showing a blonde male about 6 foot 1, and seemed to be in his mid 20's, next to him was a taller woman, with raven black hair and eyes that were a piercing electric blue. Underneath the picture it read, Sergeant Steve Trevor, seen returning home from a mission gone wrong over the Mediteranian, the woman has yet to have been identified, yet she is being help by US Government Custody.
"So, why are you being involved in this interview?" Clark asks as he read's over the page about Sergeant Trevor's return.
"Something about my charming personality, and my ability to make everyone like me." Percy responds with a smirk.
Snorting Clark exits out of the page and instead goes over current news from within Metropolis.. "Yeah, and I'm a corporate shill."
"It was worth a shot." Percy shrugs as he stands up to go get his bag ready, as Perry has him leaving in the morning. "Nah apparently Lois requested me personally, I guess she really wants me working on this with her."
"Or she wants to make sure that you agree to join the Planet."
"Either way, a paychecks a paycheck, and I needed to get out of the city anyways, I have to stop by the Gazette either way, apparently I have a paycheck to pick up from them too." Percy then makes his way to his room shutting the door, as he grabs his clothes from the dresser to shove them into his beat up backpack.
Clark smiles as he scrolls through a new Atlas sighting, mirth in his voice he calls out to Percy. "Hey Percy, whats this about Atlas being a cat thief?"
"God Damnit." Percy moans from within his room. "They called me a thief?"
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