Clark and Lana sat at a table at the Talon, a popular Smallville coffee shop. Lana checked the watch on her wrist and glanced over at the door.

“Are you sure he’s going to come?” asked Clark.

“Of course,” she said. “There’s no way he would miss this.”

“Yeah, but he’s a pretty busy guy.”

“True, but so are you. What with the Planet and your extracurricular activities with your new super friends.”

Clark smiled and sipped his coffee. Lana studied his face. There was something she’d wanted to say, but she was afraid to bring it up. She told herself that this weekend would be the time to have this discussion.

“Clark…”

“Hmm?” he asked, looking up at her.

Lana opened her mouth but then closed it. “I—it’s nothing.”

His brow furrowed. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah, I just…”

“Well, if it isn’t Smallville’s very own Romeo and Juliet.”

Clark smiled and stood from the table. The man who approached him was the same age as him, with a bright smile, a navy-blue suit and perfectly styled blond hair.

“Good to see you again, Pete,” said Clark, hugging his best friend from his childhood. “Or should that be Senator Ross?”

“State Senator, actually,” said Pete. He hugged Lana and gave her a quick kiss on the cheek. “I’m not in Congress…yet.”

“Might be closer than you think.” Clark sat back down and motioned to the empty seat at the table. “That filibuster against the education bill is being talked about everywhere. I keep telling everyone at the Planet that I know that guy.”

“Well, I can’t take all the credit. Have to give some to our idiot governor and his backwards ideas.” Pete placed a hand on Clark’s shoulder. “So how about you? Working for the Daily Planet? What the hell have you been doing since you disappeared?”

“I didn’t disappear,” said Clark. “After college, I just decided to do some traveling.”

“For the better part of a decade,” said Pete. “Where did you go?”

Clark sighed and shrugged. “Everywhere, I guess? Spent some time in Kasnia, covering the civil war there. Also Qurac and Bialya. A few other places.”

“What was it like?” asked Pete.

Clark shrugged. “I…mostly stayed out of the hot spots.

He was lying, of course. His time spent abroad taught him a lot about the carnage humanity was capable of. But it also showed him the resilience the human spirit was capable of. He didn’t want to worry Pete, though. Or Lana for that matter. She’d heard some of his stories, but far from all of them.

“And Metropolis? How’s life up in the big city?” asked Pete.

Clark thought about some of his recent adventures. Becoming Superman, joining the Justice League, facing off against threats like the Toyman and the Atomic Skull. But he just offered a smile.

“Not nearly as exciting as you might think.”

“What about…Lex?” There was a pause in Pete’s sentence. He and Lex Luthor had never gotten along very much during the years Lex spent in Smallville. Time had apparently not changed that.

“He’s…different,” said Clark. “I met him once, but he didn’t seem like the same Lex. He was distant, cold.”

“Because he used to be such a fun guy?” asked Pete.

Clark chucked and took another sip of his coffee. But then he could hear sirens. As a force of habit, he focused his superhuman hearing, listening to the report over the police band. The address the Smallville Police were heading to was one he knew well. And he had to see just what was going on.

“Oh wow, look at the time.” Clark held up his watch and stared at it. “I’m really sorry to cut this short, but I promised my mom I’d help her with something.”

“Hey, no worries. I’ll see you at the reunion, right?” Pete stood alongwith Clark and the two old friends shared a quick hug.

“Absolutely, wouldn’t miss it.” Clark placed his hand on Lana’s shoulder, who remained seated. He knelt down and she smiled as he kissed her cheek. Clark quickly left, a brisk walk taking him out the Talon’s front door.

Pete sat down aside from Lana and stared at the door. “Ahh, Clark Kent. Always running off somewhere. Guess the more things change…” He looked Lana in the eyes. “Now that he’s gone, you ready to tell me what’s bothering you?”

Lana’s eyes widened.

SMALLVILLE

Part II

By Dino Pollard

Clark flew high above Smallville, moving through the clouds to the address he overhead on the police radio. It was a small house amidst a cluster of others, and it looked like it had definitely seen better days.

He stayed in the air, using his telescopic vision to zoom in on the scene. There was an ambulance and a squad car. Two paramedics pushed a gurney out the front door, and on the gurney was a body in a black bag.

He also saw Kenny Braverman standing outside, looking despondent as the officer questioned him. Clark focused his hearing to listen in on the scene.

“He’d been feeling pretty down lately, but I didn’t expect he’d…”

The young soldier choked up and turned away. Sheriff Nancy Adams placed a hand on his shoulder, trying to reassure him.

“It’s okay, Kenny. Just tell me what happened.”

“He was already drinking when I got into town. In kind of a mood, so I thought it’d be better if I took a walk. Then when I came back…I saw him hanging from the balcony.”

Adams sighed. “I hate to be the one to tell you this, but he spent more than a few nights in the drunk tank. Wouldn’t peg him as the suicidal type, but guess you never really know what’s goin’ on in someone’s head.”

“Yeah. I-I guess not…” Kenny turned away. “I’m sorry, Sheriff. This is all a bit much for me. If you don’t mind, I think I’d like to be alone for a bit.”

Adams nodded. “Of course, son. I think we’ve got everything we need here anyway.”

Clark flew off towards the Kent farm. There was something about this whole situation that didn’t feel right to him.

“What do you mean?” asked Lana.

Pete rolled his eyes. “Oh come on. I’ve known you your whole life. You think I can’t tell when you’re upset?”

Lana sighed. “Guess you’re the only one then.”

“What is it?” he asked.

“I don’t know.” Lana sipped her coffee. “Clark and I just always seemed to be passing each other. Never coming together at the right moment. Then we had those two really good years in college. But after graduation, he decided to go on his world tour. For six years, we were on pause.”

“And now?”

“Now? Now he’s in Metropolis. And it seems like he’s always too busy.” Lana scoffed at herself. “I can’t believe I just said that.”

“Why?”

“He’s got a lot to deal with. His—his job, it’s really important. And right now, I feel like the most selfish person in the world.”

“You don’t mind me stating the obvious?” asked Pete.

“What’s that?”

Pete took a drink of his own coffee and set the cup down. “When we were kids, all you ever talked about was leaving Smallville. Now here we are, the night before our high school reunion, and you’re still in Smallville. Even when your boyfriend is living in Metropolis.”

“It’s…not been easy,” she said. “I had responsibilities here. It’s not that I haven’t thought about moving to Metropolis, because I have. More times than you can imagine.”

“So what’s the problem?”

“Maybe I’m just scared. When Clark came back, it was like he’d discovered this whole other world that he’d never known about. His travels, they changed him. He wasn’t the same man I fell in love with. And I don’t mean that in a bad way. In some ways—in a lot of ways, actually—he’s a lot better than that man. He’s matured, he has purpose.” Lana looked down into the surface of her coffee. “And I…I just don’t have that. I feel like if I pushed him, I’d be holding him back.”

“From what?” asked Pete.

Lana shook her head. “I don’t think I even know.”

Pete reached a hand across the table and set it on her wrist. Lana looked up at him, meeting his blue eyes. He offered her a friendly smile. “If this is something that’s eating at you, then you have to talk to him about it. You can’t keep this stuff inside you like that. It’s not good for either of you.”

Clark walked inside the front door of the Kent house. “Hey Mom? You around?”

“Clark?” Martha called to him from the living room. She turned off the TV and looked over her shoulder as he walked in. “I thought you were out with Pete and Lana?”

“Something came up.” Clark sat beside her on the couch and removed his glasses, resting them on the coffee table. “You remember Kenny Braverman, right?”

“That disgusting bully who used to pick on you?” asked Martha with a scowl. “How could I forget?”

“His dad just died,” said Clark.

Martha’s hand went right to her mouth. “Oh my. How do you know?”

“While I was at the Talon, I heard sirens and listened to the police radio. As soon as I heard Kenny’s address, I flew after them to check it out for myself. They found him hanging by a rope from the balcony. Calling it a suicide.”

“That’s awful!”

“Did you know him?” asked Clark.

“Andy Braverman was never exactly in our social circle, even before Kenny started picking on you,” said Martha. “Once a month or so, your father would go down to the bar with some of his friends and they’d have a few beers. Andy was almost always there, apparently trying to see how drunk he could get. He wasn’t always like that. Did you know his wife died giving birth to Kenny?”

Clark shook his head. “I didn’t.”

“Yeah, the night of the meteor shower,” said Martha. “Story I heard is Andy was working late at the factory. Samantha was home alone and her water broke. She got a taxi to take her to the hospital, but a meteor struck the car. Driver was killed but she managed to hold on until the paramedics came. By the time Andy got to the hospital. Samantha was already dead. But the baby survived. Barely.”

Clark lowered his head and rubbed his hands together. “The meteor shower… That’s the same night you found me?”

“Ohh no,” said Martha, placing her arm around his shoulders. “I know what you’re thinking, Clark Kent. And don’t you dare think this is your fault. You had nothing to do with the meteor shower.”

“A meteor shower hits Smallville the exact same night that my craft lands. You think it’s a coincidence?” asked Clark.

“Even if they are connected, you were just a baby. There’s no way you had any control over what happened.” Martha pulled her arms away. “Anyway, Samantha’s death, it changed Andy. He became very bitter. Fly off the handle at the smallest provocation. At the very least, gave the police in Smallville something to do, keeping him in line.”

“Can you imagine growing up with a man like that for a father?” asked Clark. “Might make you into a pretty unpleasant individual.”

“You think that’s why Kenny was always bullying kids?”

“Worse,” said Clark. “I think Kenny may have killed his own father.”

Then

Kenny sat in his Marines uniform, looking around the office. The American flag hanging from a pole in the corner, a photograph of the current President framed on the wall, and another wall holding numerous commendations for the man in whose office he waited.

The door opened and Kenny stood up immediately and saluted. The man who stepped in had short, silver hair and wore a uniform with the stars indicating his rank. He held a folder in his hand.

“Private Braverman, I presume?” he asked.

“Sir, yes sir,” said Kenny.

“At ease, soldier. My name’s General Wade Eiling.” The general motioned to the chair. “Sit.”

Kenny followed the command. Eiling circled around the desk and sat behind it, setting the folder on the surface of his desk. It was stamped CLASSIFIED. There was also a logo on it, a red circle with what looked like a stylized eye in the center. Kenny could see his name printed on the folder’s tab.

“Do you know why you’re here?” asked Eiling.

“No sir.”

“Your medical examination turned up something interesting,” said Eiling. “It seems your cells are saturated with a form of radiation our scientists have never seen before.”

Kenny blinked. “Radiation, sir?”

“That’s right.”

“Then how am I alive?”

“That is a very good question.” Eiling opened the file. “We looked into your records. Discovered something very interesting. The night you were born, your mother came into close contact with a meteor.”

“What about it?”

Eiling folded his hands and set them on the open file. “Private, what I’m about to tell you is highly classified. It’s about the meteor shower that night.”

“If I may ask, sir, what’s classified about that? I mean, everyone knows about that meteor shower.”

“Yes, but what they don’t know is that the military took every fragment of every meteor we could find. They contained radioactive material not of this world.”

“This radiation…it’s dangerous?”

Eiling shook his head. “Not so much. The effects on humans seem to be minimal at best. It would take years of close contact before symptoms of even minor radiation poisoning would appear.” He pointed at Kenny. “But you’re different. Near as we can tell, the exposure your mother had to the radiation interacted with you in the womb, resulting in a mutation. When you were born, you were extremely weak. Doctors expected you to die before the end of your first month. But you survived. And instead of killing you, that mutation made you stronger. Your physical attributes are far beyond those of normal people. You’re like a conduit for this radiation. Private, you’re a metahuman.”

“Metahuman, sir?”

Eiling leaned back in his chair. “It’s the term we use to refer to people like you. People with certain abilities. I represent a special organization, the Advanced Research Group for United Support. And we’d like to offer you a chance to serve your country in another capacity.”

“What capacity, sir?”

“You’ll be working closely with me. We’ll train you so you can perfect these abilities, use them for the good of the nation. And, by extension, the entire world. What do you say?”

Kenny rubbed his chin as he thought about the offer. A chance to be more than a simple soldier. A chance to make something of his life. To prove his father wrong when he said he would never amount to anything.

“When do we start?”

Eiling smiled and extended an open hand across the desk. Kenny accepted the hand and the two men shook.

“Right now,” said Eiling. “Welcome to ARGUS, son.”

Now 

“You sure no one’s coming?” asked Lana, her arms crossed over her chest as she glanced nervously down the hall.

Clark shook his head, working the pick into the lock on the door to the Smallville Hospital morgue. “The night watchman is patrolling the second floor.” He struggled a little as he continued trying to pick the lock.

“Why don’t you just break the door open?”

“Because then they’d know we were here. And I’d rather not draw any attention to this.”

“Where’d you learn to do that anyway?”

Clark looked up at her and flashed a smile. “Something I picked up in Qurac from some separatists I covered.”

Lana smirked. “Boy scout my ass.”

“Got it!” Clark stood and opened the door, holding it open for Lana to enter first. He followed after her, lowered his glasses and scanned the morgue with his x-ray vision. “Over here.”

He walked to one of the drawers and opened it. Clark pulled out the body, still in the bag, and pulled the zipper down, revealing Andy Braverman’s corpse. Lana looked away, but Clark stared intently at the body. He examined the neck with his x-ray vision and saw the fracture.

“His neck was broken, presumably from the fall when he hung himself,” he said.

“So that’s it then, right?” asked Lana. “Clark, I think this is a bad idea.”

“A man’s dead, Lana. And I don’t think it’s because of a suicide.”

“How do you know that?”

Clark shrugged. “Just a feeling. Something about this doesn’t smell right.”

“You can say that again…” She sighed, stepping back to avoid the stench. “Not everything is a job for Superman, you know.”

Clark felt dizzy. He shook his head and stepped back. Lana recognized the grogginess and stepped closer.

“What is it?”

His legs became weak and he toppled over, falling to the ground.

“Clark!” Lana dropped down to his side, lifting his head up. “Are you okay?”

He shook his head. “No, I feel…weak.”

Clark blinked a few times, trying to focus his vision. But he found that he couldn’t use his superhuman eyesight. It took some struggle and he finally was able to focus. Clark climbed to his feet, Lana helping him up. He took a few steps back and examined the body from further away, his vision now working again.

“His body…” said Clark. “There’s some kind of radiation in it.”

“What does that mean?” asked Lana.

“I don’t know,” said Clark. “But one thing I do know? The last time I felt this weak, it was when Kenny and I fought back in high school.”

“What are you saying?”

“I’m saying I think Kenny might be…different,” said Clark. “And I think he killed his father.”

To be continued…