E8: Superman #9

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The Multiverse Presents...

EARTH 8

Issue #9

The Return of Superman

Part 4 of 4:

The Metropolis Kids

Written by: Russell Burlingame

Edited by: Gabriel Vargas

Multiverse Logo created by Tony Peterson

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The Steelworks.

John Henry Irons hunched over his work bench, peering with confusion into the computer screen that displayed Lois Lane's sonogram. The baby appeared to be developing normally for this point in the term. And since she hadn't displayed any symptoms since arriving there, John had to assume that maybe it wasn't the Kryptonian fetus inside her, but something entirely different that had caused her the trauma at the office.

“Do you realize that you came closer to revealing Clark's identity than the crappy 'horn rims and slick hair' civilian costume ever did?” John said with a smile.

“Yeah, you'll excuse me if I'm not at my most guarded when I think I might be dying from the super-baby in my belly,” Lois said curtly. “What's going on with me?”

“I don't know,” John admitted, finally looking up from his reports and monitors and into Lois’s eyes. “Since you had all your symptoms before you got to me, I can't tell you very much. I think you should remain here at Steelworks for observation. It may be necessary for me to put you under a red sun lamp for the duration of the pregnancy. That would stop the baby from damaging your internal organs—I hope—but there's really no telling what that kind of prolonged exposure might do to you. It's not unlike...” He stopped himself.

“I know where you're going, Dr. Irons,” Lois glowered at him. “It’s not unlike the Kryptonite ring that Luthor used to wear, before it ravaged his body. The bottom line is, Kryptonians are uniquely suited to survive on this planet and those of us who aren't so fortunate, can sometimes pay the ultimate price for trying to keep up.”

John looked down at his shoes. He was hoping that she wouldn't have finished his thought before he could think of a more delicate way to put it.

“So what you're telling me,” Lois continued, “is that if I don't abort the last biological vestige of my dead fiancé, there's only a fifty-fifty chance that I'll survive the pregnancy?”

John looked her in the eye. “I'm sorry, Lois. What I'm telling you is that if you don't abort the last biological vestige of the man who loved you and protected you his whole life, there's only a ten to twelve percent chance that you'll survive the pregnancy.”

*

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Centennial Park, Metropolis

The enormous, almost-shapeless green form of Brainiac towered over the SCU, Superman, the powerless Green Lantern and Jupiter's Children. Conner was trying to think of a way to break free of the hold that Brainiac had on them, while Superman's crypt rebuilt itself around them.

“Here's how this will go, people,” Brainiac beamed directly into each of their brains. “I will rebuild what you have destroyed. I will restore the city's appearance. And then, you will all die.” A wave of dread and pain blew through the crowd, and Conner wasn't sure if it was simply the shared experience of dread pulsing through some kind of psychic link, or something that Brainiac had done intentionally. “The story, which the media and the public will believe because they are so eager for Superman's return—and because I will erase from their minds anything that contradicts it—will be that the government spooks and the SCU went after the new, evil Superman and that he slaughtered them before Kal-El valiantly had to put him down.”

“Real James Bond villain moment for you here, huh, Brainy?” Iron Munro stammered out, as spittle rolled out of the corners of his immobilized mouth and down his cheeks.

“It is a luxury I can afford,” Brainiac cooed. “Thanks to the Lantern, I have all the power I ever need. It is, after all, limited only by my own—ahem, limitless—willpower.”

“YELLOW!” Green Lantern hollered as loudly as he could, given the circumstances. “The ring talks to me—it's in my head now, and it's keeping Brainiac out. The ring's power is weak to the color yellow!”

“Impossible,” Brainiac stammered. “The Guardians would not have been so foolish as to--”

He was interrupted by a brilliant bolt of yellow light, seeming to emanate from Superman's crypt and careened into the heart of his emerald-hued torso. It was only a momentary setback for Brainiac's physical form, but it was all that Conner and Iron needed to break free.

“What was that?' Conner asked Munro, as they ran in opposite directions. “Is God on our side?”

“Nope,” Munro said, and for the first time, his gruff exterior revealed pride in one of his children. “That was Prysm. It's just about impossible to hold somebody who can ride the light right to you, especially when all she needs to break free is a little color.”

A blast of green energy careened wildly between the two of them and each narrowly ducked it.

“Alright, you take flank, I'll get him looking my way,” Conner said. “We gotta get the little green guy to reclaim what's his!”

“You got it, little blue,” Munro said as he a smiled and drew a couple of energy blasters from shoulder holsters. He fired them in rapid succession at Brainiac, the tomb, and—oddly, Conner thought—at Risk and Green Lantern. Yellow bursts of light burped out of the end of the gun and, in addition to distracting and weakening Brainiac, they managed to knock GL and Risk free of Brainiac's influence. The two stumbled on the ground for a moment, weakened, but it only took a second for Risk to figure out what was going on, grab GL over his shoulder, and run for cover.

“Owwie,” Green Lantern said. “Does that dude even know what he's doing?”

“I guess he does,” Cody told him. “You lived, didn't you?”

“I guess...! My head...” Green Lantern looked like he was ready to pass out, but suddenly, his ring kicked to life again and almost instantly he seemed rejuvenated.

“What the hell?” Green Lantern and Risk said in unison. Risk tossed Green Lantern off his shoulder and took a defensive stance behind a tree located between Brainiac and GL.

*

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Conner and Prysm began to work together. Using his tactile telekinesis, Conner grabbed hold of Prysm—who glowed the most brilliant shade of yellow anyone on earth had ever seen—and made a projectile of her. He tossed her hard enough, and with enough of his aura protection, to pierce through Brainiac's ring-powered form and out the other side.

Munro, meanwhile, fired seemingly random shots into Brainiac's form from behind while the villain's shape became progressively less defined. What had once been green, humanoid arms became amorphous tentacles that reached wildly around, looking to luck into grabbing Munro or Superman and regain control of the situation.

“Just keep hitting him!” Munro shouted. “I can't think of anything better right now.”

*

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Green Lantern started to float a little, and stare at his fist.

“Are you, like, under a spell or mind-control or something?” Risk asked. “I thought you were out of juice. And I thought you--”

Green Lantern cut him off. “Please, dude, I'm communing with the ring?” He paused for a second. “I totally didn't mean for that to sound so lame. Give me a minute, though, I'm getting something.”

With the battle going on behind them, Green Lantern and Risk continued to stand around, waiting for an idea to strike, until finally GL grabbed Risk by the underarms and flew him skyward.

“Okay,” Green Lantern said, “So apparently the ring is smarter than I am. It cut me off, so that I wouldn't keep juicing up the bad guy.”

“Awesome,” Cody interrupted.

“Yeah, spaz, now hold on a minute,” GL said. “Apparently I can't be killed while wearing this thing, and Iron knew that somehow--”

“He's a super-spy.”

“Again with the holding on, please," Green Lantern said, sounding frantic. "So anyway, the ring can take all that power back now that I'm prepared for the bad guy. He just was able to get into my head because he's a lot better at this mental stuff than...well, than anybody really.”

“Goody,” Risk said, rolling his eyes.

“Right, but what we gotta do now? We have to trap him inside the ring.”

“Come again? Won't that just put him closer to your power source?”

“I guess there's some kind of dimensional prison," Green Lantern explained, "like a 'Phantom Zone,' if you will, that the ring can tap into to trap guys like this, who are all energy and so they're impossible to keep in a regular jail.”

“So how do we do that?”

“Well, I have to be on the sly. He can't think I'm attacking him, cause he'll just go after my brain again.”

“Right," Risk answered, "and?"

“And so we drop you into the middle of it while I come up with something,” Kyle said, and let go of Risk, dropping him directly into the emerald vortex of Brainiac's body.

“Sounds like a really crappy plaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan!” Risk yelled as he fell.

*

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“Alright,” Prysm said, bouncing back toward Conner. “I'm doing something weird.”

“What's that?” Conner asked. “Besides bouncing back and forth through the bad guy, I mean.”

“I'm...” she paused. “I'm connected to the ring somehow.”

“What ring?”

“The Green Lantern ring. What's Parallax? Who are the Guardians of—Oh, my God! It's just like home!”

“Focus, sweetheart. Bad guy regrouping at six o'clock!”

“Alright, alright. I've got to make the light in the area yellow. All of it. And then GL has to—nevermind, he knows! Wish me luck, I've never done this before!”

It took a second, but the sky all around them burned yellow. In a few moments, the SCU and the remaining Jupiter's Children were up and moving around, looking substantially worse for the wear. Green Lantern charged madly, headlong into Brainiac's chest, his ring-arm outstretched. The air around them turned cold as Green Lantern started sucking up an enormous amount of energy into his ring. There was an audible boom, and when the smoke cleared, Prysm was unconscious; the sky was blue; and there was no sign of Brainiac anywhere.

*

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Forty minutes later, Chase was still looking after Prysm and Iron Munro was huddled in a corner behind the grave, talking in hushed tones to Conner. The rest of the Jupiter's Children had long since fled the scene, hoping to avoid the media circus of a fight at Superman's grave

“...I mean… what the hell, man?” Conner said. “I didn't even beat the bad guy; it took a teenage girl and some guy who didn't even know his powers well enough to know he's not weak to yellow.”

“Yeah,” Munro pressed him, “But GL's ignorance was a real blessing. Chances are good that if he knew the truth, Brainiac would have been able to see through what was up. It was yet another example of how perceptions really shaped the battle more than reality did.”

“Still… how am I supposed to be Superman? This guy--” he gestured at the statue of Kal-El, with the eagle on his arm that towered over them-- “This guy could do anything.”

“You know what I think?” Munro said. “I think that being Superman is about more than just the powers and more than just stopping the bad guys. GL can stop bad guys like nobody's business, and he's on the cover of some teen magazine this week pimping his powers to make himself famous. My kids? They've stopped more bad stuff than you'll ever know—and that's on purpose. We don't want people to know that the H'San Natal are out there.”

“The what now?”

“That’s classified kid. The point is? You're Superman. You don't have to be able to do it all on your own. You just have to be able to do the thing that your uncle always did best.”

“He's not my--”

“I know.” Munro pointed a thumb up into his own face. “Clone-wizard here, remember?”

“Oh yeah.”

“The reason that Cadmus was able to make such a convincing argument in the first place that the world needed a Superman after Kal-El died, had nothing to do with the fact that he was the strongest guy in the room. I mean, he was, don't get me wrong, but there are things more powerful than the ability to bend steel and change the course of mighty rivers.”

“Like what?” Conner asked.

Munro motioned at the hushed crowd of media and onlookers that had gathered near the entrance to the park.

“Like them. They aren't looking for salvation anymore; salvation has come and gone. And they aren't just rubbernecking. The 'sexy' superhero went back to LA or New York or wherever he's got a photo shoot already.” Munro fixed Conner with a serious stare. “They're here looking for hope. That's what the big, red S on your chest is about, and that's why it pissed me off like nobody's business to see that dome-headed creep abusing it. There ain't enough hope in the world, man, and you have to get used to the fact that a big part of your job is providing it.”

Conner took a deep breath, and looked down at his boots, then back up at Munro. “Yeah.”

“Yeah?”

“I think I get it.”

“Good. So?”

Conner turned around and started to walk away from Munro, toward the crowd. Then, thinking better of it, he floated slowly into the air above them instead.

“Citizens of Metropolis,” Conner started. “I'm sorry that I haven't done this sooner. I am Superman. I know, I'm not the Superman that you're all used to—and believe me when I say that more than anyone else, I owe him my life and wish he were here with us now—but I promise you that I will never let this city come to harm....”

As the speech continued, Munro couldn't help but think that Conner looked like a king, backlit by the golden sun in his red robe, delivering the defining oration of a new royal era.

“Good for you, Kid,” he said, and disappeared into shadows.

The End.