Clark realized that he was in an absolute hopeless stalemate: His hearing was out of control, he was in pain, his powers still fluctuating, and a thug full drowned with X-K was holding a friend of his son as a hostage. All this in front of hundreds of witnesses, here in Ketchikan, Alaska, filming them with their phones and hearing how this man just revealed his identity. What Clark not only didn't hear, but also wouldn't have realized since his mind was still dazed from the red Kryptonite.
In Metropolis, Lex Luthor was furious that the situation got out of control, but glad that it happened far away from this building, so that nobody could get a connection to him. In TV, the reveal was not to be seen. But soon all social media sites will be full of footage and information. Lex rushed out of his private rooms to see how far they are in studio…
In Ketchikan, Clark was desperate to not to freak out and not to say anything that might turn anything worse. He knew he had to stay calm, or his hearing will just get worse. With both hands over his ears, Clark carefully got up on his feet to stagger one step closer to the killer.
"LISTEN… I DON'T KNOW, WHAT LUTHOR PROMISED TO YOU… BUT THIS IS NOT WORTH IT…" Clark yelled. Trying to do what he was good in: appealing on people's good site and their humanity. "…YOU ARE NOT YOURSELF ANYMORE! AND THE MORE X-KRYPTONITE YOU TAKE THE MORE YOU WILL LOSE YOUR MIND! YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU ARE SAYING ANYMORE!"
"REALLY, MR. KENT? AND THAT FROM THE MAN WHO FOOLS EVERYONE EVERY DAY…"
Timmy meanwhile realized that this was going to do nothing. This was a classical stalemate. And to make it worse, it was cold, it was raining hardly, and his legs start to fall asleep. Unable to move or to say anything, the boy wondered how he could get out of this terrible situation. Instinctively he put his hands into his pockets to keep at least them a bit warm, when he suddenly felt the small spay can with the mace again…
"LISTEN TO ME… I HAVE SEEN WHAT HAPPENS WHEN PEOPLE OVERDOSE X-KRYPTONITE! IT IS AN HORRIBLE FATE…"
"OH, SHUT UP, KENT! AS SOMEONE WHO IS NOT RESPECTING HIS SUPPOSEDLY HUMAN SON, YOU ARE NOT… AGHHH…"
While yelling, the killer suddenly took his hands off Timmy's shoulders. Timmy saw this as his one and only chance to pull the spay can out of his pocket and give the killer another dose of mace into his darn face…
"TAKE THIS!" Timmy yelled while the man starts to scream in pain again.
The spray can was almost empty. But the little remaining rest was enough to force the killer to hold his eyes in pain again and distract him long enough to give Clark a chance to attack.
"SUPERMAN, NOW!" Timmy yelled again and Clark realized that this was his chance.
Timmy could only feel a heavy gust of wind blowing over him, when Clark flew at high-speed just inches over his head and pushed the killer away, over the crowd of shocked people and directly into the cruise-ship's hull. Leaving a big hole just two feet over the waterline…
The remaining passengers and the hundreds of crewmembers that were still on the ship could feel how the whole ship was pushed 5 feet away from the pier. The extracted gangways collapsed, causing two people to fall into the water, while Clark and the killer crashed into an engine-room below the waterline. A tank with diesel fuel got damaged. Stinking diesels start to spill over the floor below them.
But Clark was able to tackle the man, hold his hands behind his back and using a chain, that was laying right next to them, to tie up the man's hands behind his back before he would use it to tie the rest of him.
"As soon as the X-Kryptonite is out of your system, you will thank me for this!" Clark said.
"FUCK YOU, KENT!" the man said before using his heat-vision to attack.
But instead… he caused something terrible…
The diesel fuel that was spilled over the floor and his own clothes. The moment he used the heat-vision, was the moment he set first himself, and then the rest of the scene on fire. He was too dazed by X-K himself to realize how dumb he was to use heat-vision now. Clark, who was full of diesel, too but still invulnerable, had no time to react before suddenly everything around him was on fire.
A huge explosion tore the hole in the ship's hull much bigger, sending flying burning debris across the whole pier and into the town…
Timmy was thrown off his feet when a huge flash-flame shoot out of the hole and big pieces of debris crashed into the building behind him, setting it on fire. In horror, Timmy watched the hole in the ship getting bigger before thousands of gallons of water start to flood the ship and extinguish the worst flames immediately…
Clark had no chance to react. But that was not everything. The red Kryptonite still impaired his powers. While he was still invulnerable, his other powers where still fluctuating. He got tossed against wall, hit with his head violently against it and got knocked out before falling directly into the ice-cold water that was flooding in. The killer meanwhile had no chance to survive, since he crumbled into ash before the incoming water could have saved him…
All alarm-sirens on the ship start to howl. Trapped passengers and crewmembers who were not able to leave the ship over the damaged gangways, stormed into the lifeboats while the ship quickly got a list to the left. The panic on board got bigger and bigger.
Timmy rushed back on his feet as soon as there were no more debris flying around and ran to the edge of the pier to see how thousands of gallons of sea water per second flooded the burning ship. Wondering if Superman is okay? He was with them in the fortress, so he knew that his powers were impaired and probably not fully restored.
The ship began to sink, while more and more water flooded in through the big hole in the hull. Timmy tried to see anything, but there was no trace of Clark, who was unconscious and got his next big hallucination…
Clark opened his eyes and found himself on the farm again. Lois' old Volvo station-wagon was parked in front of the house. It was a bright and nice day. Lois came out of the house, followed by Jonathan who was carrying a backpack.
"Why can Jordan fly with dad, and I have to go to school?" Jonathan asked with lowered head.
"Stop complaining! It's better Jor-El doesn't know about you!" Lois complained.
Clark was shocked when he heard that terrible offense. He wanted to interfere but suddenly he got pulled around by Jordan, who was wearing winter clothes.
"DAD…come on! Take me to the fortress again, before Jon cries about his fucked-up life again!" Jordan complained.
Before Clark could complain he heard a terrible scream again. He turned around to see Jonathan being tied up with duct-tape on a tractor by Coach Gaines and the football team.
"This is for being a powerless loser QB2! For having a deadbeat father and a brother who is much better than you! You LOSER!" Gaines said sadistically.
"LOSER… LOSER… LOSER…" the team roared in a chorus while Jonathan cried more and more.
In shock, Clark tried to run to Jonathan to safe him but suddenly Sam appeared in his way.
"Clark, Jonathan doesn't matter! He has no powers and has no use for me! Go and train Jordan further. I want my weapon to be ready!" Sam ranted.
Clark tried to push Sam aside, to get to his suffering son. Trying to yell on Sam how he could dare to say that. But this was useless anyway. Everything that happens here is only his fault…
"Clark, I can't tell you how disappointed I am in you…" a well familiar male voice suddenly said.
Clark turned around in shock and saw his adoptive father Jonathan Kent Sr. standing behind him. His hands placed on his hips and looking down on him, as if Clark was a little child again to be scolded.
"Everything your mother and I taught you… everything we gave you on the way… and after everything you went through… If I had known that you ignore everything your mother and I once taught you, we would have left you in that pod there and called the army instead. You always wanted to be normal, now you got a son who is normal, and you show him openly that you don't love him. Let me tell you that I will never accept Jordan as my grandson, now! Because you have proved me… that you are not human. You are just Kryptonian! The public opinion on your kind being arrogant and selfish is right!"
"Pa, I…" Clark was able to cry out, but his mouth seemed suddenly full of salty seawater. Unable to talk.
"Look what Jordan did to his grandmother!" Jonathan Sr. ranted and stepped aside to present Martha sitting on the wooden floor of the porch. A huge bruise covering her face and her nose and mouth were bleeding. Her face full of horror…
"I want you all to leave my house!" Martha ranted. "You are not my son anymore! Jordan is not my grandson anymore! And I don't want to see anyone of you, or the DOD, or anyone else from Smallville anymore! I deserve to go to hell. I am a sinner! I didn't sell the farm. I gave you the terrible advice to more out here! Why I was so stupid! I burn in hell for my sins! It is my fault… I burn in hell!"
Everything around them was suddenly on fire. Clark starts to scream again, while his mouth seemed to be full of seawater again. Martha vanished in a flickering light. Just like everything around him suddenly seemed to be fire.
Clark was full of fear and horror. Wondering if this is his fate? He failed as a father! He failed his parents! He failed everyone! What Clark didn't realize, was that he was still aboard a sinking cruise-ship and that in his panic, he fought his way through the ceiling to a not flooded deck, before crashing through a passenger cabin, and then through the ship's hull again. 10 feet over the waterline.
Timmy looked up to see Superman in his half-burned suit crashing wildly kicking through the ship's hull and tossing through the air before smashing violently against the pier's wall right below him and falling into the water again. Far away enough from the big hole in the ship to not to be sucked in immediately again.
Timmy didn't think and jumped into the water to help him, despite the protests of nearby people who wanted to convince Timmy to get to safety, too.
Clark opened his eyes again and realized that he was under water now. He didn't know what was real and what was fake anymore. It was dark. He could barely see anything. He spotted something that looked like a ship, that was sinking slowly into the water, too.
The moment, an arm was wrapped around his throat to pull him up again, was the moment he realized that he was alive. Alive, in Alaska, weak and still in trouble.
Timmy's mind went black when he instinctively jumped into the icy water of the Tongass Narrow to pull Jonathan's dad back to the surface. Just thinking about everything he learned during his lifeguard course he attended while living in Germany. After a few seconds, both gasped for air when they got back on the surface and Timmy wildly trampled with his legs to get away from the ship. He could feel the suction already and knew that he will be dead if he gets pulled into the ship.
Luckily, he was able to grab a metal handle of a nearby ladder and hold on until anyone of the panicked people on the pier will be smart enough to help them back up…
"Aghh… Tim… Timmy… are we dead?" Clark wailed.
Timmy didn't respond. It was too cold for him to think clearly.
"HELP!" the teenager yelled just a second before a man in a police-uniform climbed down the ladder to help them…
One of the camera-teams at the hospital had a camera drone. After the fight relocated to the tourism-district, the operator flew it straight over there and so the fight, the explosion aboard the cruise-ship and Superman's crash into the sea were all filmed and aired life.
On millions of TV-screens, people watched live a hurt Superman being saved by the teenager he presumably kidnapped before and a bunch of police-officers, tourists and locals pulling the famous Superhero with his half burned suit out of the cold water…
"…we don't know how Superman is, or who was the other superpowered individual that he fought. But it looks like Superman is hurt…" the reporter told.
In Metropolis, Lex watched the entire fight and the aftermath of it in TV…
He had no idea what to think about it…
On one side, he was satisfied about all the damages, Superman caused and his obvious current condition. But he was not satisfied about that it didn't happen in Smallville.
Lex was torn between destroying Smallville for being the place to raise Smallville and for supporting that place for turning Superman into a bad person. After everything Jonathan told him about Smallville, Lex wondered if it is not better to turn Smallville publicly into the 'place that turned Superman evil'. It would be punishment and support at the same time.
But Lex also realized that this incident caused him to run out of time. He turned off the TV and went straight to the studio, while Otis and Eve brought his luggage downstairs. The faster they leave, the better for his plans.
His phone was beeping constantly with new notifications and messages about Superman…
'Superman's civilian identity: Is he really Clark Kent?'
'Superman a farmer? What is true and what is fake?'
'Moldova declares Smallville-Samaritan persona-non-grata.'
'Russian government demands answers from Smallville.'
'Smallville-Samaritan supposedly son of Superman. More information will follow!'
'UN Security Council announces emergency-meeting.'
'Terrorism attack in Ketchikan, AK! Cruise-ship sinking!'
'White House announces press statement about supposed citizenship of Superman.'
'Smallville back in Superman-focus.'
These and countless of more news were popping up on Lex phone. Lex shook his head and entered the studio, where his hypnotized Kryptonian pet was sitting on a chair in front of a black curtain. Three professional cameras pointing on him from different ankles.
Jonathan was wearing a white t-shirt now, grey jogging-pants and white dirty trainers. He had make-up in his face that let his face look as if someone beat him. Lex wanted him to look like a scared abused teenager, that just fled out of his terrible home in panic. Filming an interview where he tells the world about his terrible life.
Filming was difficult. Lex hypnotic calls let Jonathan play the scared, terrified, desperate teen but in-between were always his red Kryptonite triggered outbursts. Causing a lot of footage to be either unusable or not like Lex wanted.
Lex appeared next to his 'director', who had tears in his eyes…
"Oh… Mr. Luthor…" the man said surprised using a tissue to clean his face to not to show his tears. "Ehm… This is not what you think…"
"Your story let you cry, isn't it?" Lex asked.
"Ehm… yes! Honestly… this is pretty much…"
"Excellent! That's what those dumbheads out there need! The sad truth that their beloved so-called hero is not the one he always claimed to be! How much do we have?"
"We have about 45 to 50 seconds of usable footage!"
"THAT LESS? You are filming here for two hours?" Lex ranted.
"I am sorry Mr. Luthor, but his outbursts come unpredictably. He already destroyed two cameras…"
"I want a full block for the prime time, tonight!" Luthor ranted. "And we need it ready for all big TV networks to prepare a special bulletin."
Lex looked at Jonathan who looked over to him. His eyes seemed to glow red again for a brief moment. Lex was a bit surprised if it was a glimpse of actual superpowers…
Suddenly a call from Amanda McCoy distracted him.
"What?"
"Lex… it's already in all news! The press is coming back and demands a statement from you, too! Superman yelled your name during the fight in Ketchikan and people are curious. We have to leave! NOW!"
"I'll be downstairs in five minutes!" Lex said and hung off before turning back to the filming stuff. "Take everything you get and use AI and Deepfake to extend it to at least 5 minutes of footage. I want it so sad and devastating that little kids throw away their Superman-action-figures, people losing faith and more governments declaring Jordan Kent to persona-non-grata. Use found footage and YouTube clips if necessary… I want it to be done quickly…"
Lex harsh order let everyone present rush back to work. With a wide grin Lex turned back to Jonathan who was silently sitting there and once again looking at Lex as if he wanted to kill him with his glare.
"Jonathan, you know what: Your brother messed up again!" Lex lied. "He has made some really terrible mess in Moldova and your father has taken your friend Timmy on a trip to Alaska. I think he already plans to blame you for your brother's bad behavior again."
"You fucking piece of bullshit you baldy!" Jonathan ranted.
"Come with me, Jonathan!" Lex ordered, forcing Jonathan to stand up and handling him an electric shaver… "…you get a restyling. And then we make a nice journey…"
In Smallville…
Despite the best efforts to prevent it from spreading, people in Smallville start to gossip more and more about it. The latest reports from Alaska just seemed to confirm everything.
People were upset. Superman… the worlds greatest hero… role-model, mightiest being in the universe, idol… was he really one of them? Growing up in this terrible town? The dorky, clumsy loser from once who never fought back? The one who 'presumably failed' in Metropolis and just forcefully moved back to the run-down farm and not as an act of family-bonding? Well, maybe it was good that he never fought back, since he would have killed a lot of guys back in High-School!
"Maybe Superman is not the Clark Kent from once! Maybe that loser got killed in his first week in Metropolis and Superman took the opportunity to take over his identity?"
This and countless of more things were discussed, while people hide at home, closed their shops, and waited for the next big disaster happen in their town.
"Do you think the Smallville-Samaritan is Jonathan or Jordan?"
"It must be Jordan! Jonathan Kent wouldn't need to take X-K just to keep up with others?"
"Jonathan Kent would be much cuter as the Smallville-Samaritan. I mean his brother is so weirdo!"
"Maybe that's part of being a superhero: Being a weirdo in your civilian identity? I mean look at their father?"
"Do you think Sarah Cushing knew it?"
"She is missing! Like her whole family!"
"Have you seen the Sheriff? He was so scared…"
One of the few people, not knowing what was happening was Ruby Gaines, wife of Coach Gaines, who was busy to use a sponge to try to clean the spray paint from their garage-door…
She was not surprised that her husband rather goes out and blames that boy for everything again. Even before the X-K-scandal, she remembered him complaining unjustified about that boy and plotting how to bully him out of the team. Why didn't she leave him long ago? Four times they had to move in the past, because he managed to get fired from his previous schools for bullying, abusive behavior, and other mistakes. Smallville was such a messed-up place, it was no surprise that he managed to stay here so long?
When he came back, the first thing he did was complaining why the word 'Loser' was still visible.
"I am doing my best, Harold! Sorry that I only have two hands!" she complained back when he turned away, not daring to help his wife.
Gaines wanted to get inside when he suddenly spotted the Sheriff racing in his private car, that was fully loaded with baggage, furniture and personal belongings across the street and out of town. His wife and his son sitting in the car like scared little kids, not knowing why their husband and father is so scared himself.
"What is going on here?" Gaines asked, while remembering that he saw a lot of odd behavior in town. He turned off the radio while driving to think about how to blame Kent for it.
Gaines turned around again when he suddenly spotted the big brown envelop laying in front of the door.
'Confidential- Coach Harold Gaines!' was written in big red letters on it.
"RUBY… What is this?" Gaines yelled.
His tired and sweating wife turned around annoyed to see her husband standing on the porch, holding the envelop.
"Ten minutes ago, there was a man here! He said it is about your football-team and it is important!" his wife answered annoyed before continuing scrubbing.
Gaines opened the envelop and was shocked to find a lot of cash, a passport with his picture but a different name, multiple golden and black credit-cards for that name, a boarding pass for a LuthorAir flight from Metropolis to Zurich, Switzerland tonight and a letter explaining to him that he should use this chance and leave Smallville before everyone figures out that he bullied the powerless son of Superman and used the powered one to cheat. The letter was simply signed with: 'a grateful friend'.
Gaines didn't hesitate, stormed into their bedroom, grabbed their emergency suitcase, took his wife's purse, put all cash out of it, too ran back to his car and left.
"Harold, this would be done faster if you would help me!" his wife complained before she could suddenly hear her husband's car starting again. "HAROLD?!"
The woman turned around to see her husband's Chevrolet Colorado racing backwards out of the driveway, crashing into the parked Honda of their neighbor's daughter, and racing away with squeaking tires.
"HAROLD!" his wife yelled and ran down the driveway to see her husband's pick-up racing away, directly out of town. She was shocked, when she realized that for a brief moment, she could swear that she saw the 'we have to flee-suitcase' laying on the passenger seat next to him.
Full of fury, Ruby Gaines pulled the wedding ring off her finger…
"THAT'S IT! I GO BACK TO MY MOM!" she yelled and stormed into the house to get her own belongings and leave…
In Ketchikan…
Clark coughed hardly when he was surrounded by countless of curious people. Police officers had to shoo away the hundreds of onlookers and the arriving press. Only a bunch of paramedics was allowed to get close to him and Timmy, who was wrapped in a thick blanket but still freezing.
The paramedics would have never dared that they treat Superman one day. Right next to a burning and sinking cruise-ship, surrounded by hundreds of people while lifeboats from the cruise-ship pass them to dump the evacuated people at another pier. Some people congratulated Timmy for his brave act.
A weird humming was everything Clark was able to hear while he saw the people around him bombing him with questions. His eyes wandered to the ship, that was slowly but steadily sinking deeper and deeper into the Tongass Narrow before he turned his head to Timmy, who was wet, freezing but at least wrapped into a warm blanket.
"Superman, can you hear me? Can you hear me?" the female paramedic asked ever and ever again. Clark could see her lips moving but still only heard humming. "MISTER KENT…"
"Leave him alone!" Timmy complained. Knowing that it was out and that it was his fault, too. Why did he not insisted on getting brought to Metropolis?
Clark gasped and suddenly sat upright forcing everyone around him to shy away from him. Expect Timmy, who went closer to face him.
"What happened? Who was that man?" Timmy demanded.
Clark could only hold his ears to show to that he couldn't hear him.
"Timmy, I can't hear anything! The red Kryptonite is still messing with my powers!"
"Concentrate! Do you know what a disaster is going on right now? When Luthor sees this, he kills Jonathan!" Timmy said, holding Clark by his shoulders and shaking him lightly to get him back to senses. "Wake up!"
A camera filmed everything, and a microphone was nearby to record them.
"This is all my fault… If I had been a better father to him, nothing of that would have happened." Clark cried.
"Shut your mouth, before you bust yourself!" Timmy complained desperately.
"Jonathan is right to hate me. He is right to hate Krypton. I never showed him that being Kryptonian has nothing to do with powers! I never took care of his problems. I was so totally focused on his brother because of his powers that I totally forgot why I really moved to Smallville…"
"Smallville?" some people around them murmured.
"FOCUS!" Timmy yelled, shaking Clark a bit again.
"It was a mistake to move there! They used him as a scapegoat… it ruined his life… it let me become a bad father…"
"NOW WAKE UP! IT'S NOT THE TIME FOR DESPAIR, MR. KENT… AWW…" Timmy cried up and hold his mouth before he let out a loud: "…FUCK…"
Timmy looked around to see a lot of people looking on them with big eyes. But at least he could say that they already knew it before, so he was not the one who busted the Kent's secret. Timmy turned back to Clark to use his thumbs to open Clark's shut eyelids to force latter to look at him.
"…FOCUS! LUTHOR PLANS TO TRAVEL TO CHISINAU! THAT WHOLE EVENT THERE HAS TO BE STAGED. YOU HAVE TO STOP HIM… WHAT EVER HE IS PLANNING… DO IT FOR YOUR SON!"
This seemed to turn a switch inside of Clark who suddenly stopped sobbing and got Jonathan back into his mind. Without thinking he grabbed Timmy by his shoulders and shoot with him up into the air at high speed.
People on the ground looked up to see Superman and the screaming boy shooting away like a rocket. Leaving a destroyed town behind… a lot of shocked people and much more shocked viewers on their screens…
Luthor was not shocked when he saw everything on the big screen in his stretch limo on the way to the airport…
"Miss Teschmacher, send the file 2.1.4 'denying statement' to the media agencies…" Lex ordered to Eve, who was sitting right next to him. "…of course, I will claim that this are all baseless and unjustified accusations from that boy."
"Yes, Lex!" Eve responds.
"Otis, how long we need to the airport?" Lex asked Otis who was in the front at the wheel.
"Expected arrival in 10 Minutes!"
"Excellent!" Lex said, before he turned to the young man, with the brunette hair (a wig), the glasses, and the green contact-lenses, wearing a nice and neat business suit and looking like a businessman in his mid-20s. And not like the human-Kryptonian teenager he was just a few minutes before. "Your time to shine… will come soon… Jonathan…"