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Superboy crossed his arms over the red S-emblem on his T-shirt as he dropped out of the air to face the two supervillains. "Okay, what's going on here?"
"Well, if it isn't Superman Lite," Lex Luthor replied, sounding bored. "This is private LexCorp property; you're trespassing."
"I haven't set foot on your property," Conner returned, tilting up his toes to keep them from brushing the ground as he hovered in place four inches above the packed earth. With those inches he was distinctly taller than Lex. "What are you doing?"
"None of your business!" squawked Lex's much shorter partner in crime. Toyman planted his hands on his diminutive hips, his mask still grinning its creepy fixed grin but his tone anything but cheerful. "Leave us alone, Superbrat, or you'll regret it!"
"I would," Conner said, "except that the neighbors are complaining about the noise. And by 'neighbors' I mean the shopping mall next door. And by 'noise' I mean, uh—that," and he nodded at the four-story-high metal and plastic hobby horse rocking idly back and forth, towering over the dilapidated LexCorp warehouse beside it. It actually wasn't that noisy, but for the creaking as it tipped to and fro, but forty-foot rocking horses couldn't be good news.
"That?" Lex Luthor said, as disinterested as before. He angled his head slightly to the side, so the sunlight glittered in his eyes—silver gray, like they always were when he was in character. "It's merely a prop for the fair coming into this lot tomorrow. I have a permit, of course."
"Sure you do," Conner said. "If it's just a prop, you won't mind me moving it, huh? I'll bring it back for your fair tomorrow."
Lex Luthor's eyes flashed in the sun, but he said calmly, "Be my guest."
"No!" Toyman shrieked, as Conner flew up into the air to stand on the horse's broad, red-saddled back. With his augmented hearing he clearly heard the little man protest to Lex, "It took all day to establish the proper resonance harmonics, we can't have it moved now!"
"Moved?" Conner called down. "You mean, like this?" and he braced himself on the red saddle in a surfer stance and tilted back and forth, making the horse rock under him in a new rhythm. Its heavy frame creaked louder, echoed by a deeper rumble, the grinding of stone and earth. Beneath the giant metal skids, the ground trembled. "Whoa!" Conner said, then grinned at his oversized steed and said loudly, "Get it? Whoa? Cause it's a horse?"
His Krypotonian eyes caught the minute furrow of Lex's forehead at the painful pun, too small a reaction for the Toyman to pick up on. The other supervillain was too preoccupied to notice anyway, flailing his short arms furiously. "If you're going to play with my toys," he hollered, "then I'll let them play with you!" and he pulled out a remote control and hit a button.
A panel on the side of the horse popped open, and a platoon of painted tin soldiers poured from it—or maybe a squadron; they were all equipped with little whirling propellers on their helmets, so they could fly. Each was only a foot tall, but there were a couple dozen of them, all armed with little rifles with little bayonets, firing off flaming and acid rounds with sharp pops, sounding like a bag of popcorn in the microwave as they swarmed at him.
"What the hell?" Conner yelped, swatting at his clothes—the rounds couldn't burn his skin but his jeans were another story, and these were his favorite Levis. His father hadn't said anything about a mini flying army—but when he glanced down, through the flight of soldiers, Lex Luthor was watching the show with his hands in his white slacks pockets, clearly unsurprised.
Conner grimaced. He should have known that getting in late and then not apologizing for missing the first ten minutes of their meeting would come back to bite him in the ass. It always did, with his father. His dad was a total softy next to his father—truth and justice, whatever; it was the supervillains who really knew how to lay down the law.
Twisting around in midair to put the neck of the giant horse at his back, Superboy faced the toy soldier squadron. "Okay, you little Trojan wannabes, this is Sparta!"
From below, he heard his father groan in not-quite-suppressed agony at his classical confusion, and smirked. Then the toy soldiers were coming for him, and Conner had to move fast to save his costume from scorch-marks and acid holes. One of these days he had to talk his dad into getting him some genuine indestructible Kryptonian clothes—there had to be some way to trick out the primary jumpsuit so it wasn't a total style catastrophe. A jacket instead of a cape, maybe...
The soldiers' looping flight paths were too quick for Conner to rip them apart with his TK field, but between his lightning-punch and the heat vision he'd been practicing, he made short work of the squadron. Not short enough, though, because by the time he had finished cleaning their tiny wind-up clocks (minus a few soldiers that flew away in a hurry; their A.I.'s I. must have finally kicked in) the giant horse was rocking faster, and the ground was rumbling again—softly but continuous, as if there were a thunderstorm in the distance.
The Toyman and Lex Luthor had taken advantage of the distraction to flee the scene, but since Conner hadn't seen anything drive off the lot, they couldn't have gotten far. The old warehouse's entrances were shut and locked, but no matter; he went in through the rusty garage doors, kicked them up hard enough that the corrugated metal screeched and bent (it wasn't like his father was going to sue; LexCorp had superhero insurance anyway), and strode in, Old West sheriff style.
It wasn't just noise; the ground was vibrating under his boots, like an endless convoy of trucks was driving by. "Hey," Conner said, "isn't there an injunction against LexCorp building any more earthquake machines? I think the Better Business Bureau is going to want a word with you guys—"
"Oh, I don't think so," the Toyman said. "They're not going to hear it from you, anyway," and he attacked—with a paddle and a green rubber ball on an elastic string, and Conner was just thinking that this guy was even more nuts than the toys and creepy mask let on—
Then the ball whacked him in the chest, and Superboy choked like he had been hit with a pile-driver, doubling over as he dropped to his knees. There was a throbbing in his head, throughout his whole body, not just the shaking ground, but the beat of his heart, suddenly thumping so loudly that it was rattling him apart, same as the crazy-ass rocking horse outside was rattling the foundation of the mall next door...
No, not his heart, Conner realized, slowly through the haze of unexpected pain. He'd been near kryptonite before, enough to recognize the nausea in the pit of his stomach, the searing pain along his nerve endings. Recognizable, but he'd never felt it out in the field, not on the job. Both his dad and his father had insisted that exposure be part of his training, but only limited, and his father been so careful—paranoidly so, Conner had thought at the time; green-K couldn't be that dangerous, not when his dad went up against the stuff all the time.
It didn't seem so paranoid now, Conner thought, curled up on the ground and shuddering as he fought to breathe. Through squinted eyes he saw the Toyman dangle the ball on its elastic string in front of him, the rubber studded with glowing green crystals. "Isn't this a pretty toy, Superboy? I was saving it for the Big Blue, but I suppose Junior will have to do," and he bounced the ball off the paddle, so it smacked Conner in the cheek. Conner flinched, bit his lip to keep from groaning at the surge of pain.
"You never mentioned you had kryptonite," Lex Luthor said, and oh, his father must be pissed—he liked to know exactly where all kryptonite anywhere was, and who had access to it. Someone was going to get fired for this.
Though his father didn't sound angry now, only irritated. Conner pried up his head—it hurt to move, and his vision was blurry, but he could see Lex Luthor standing a little behind the Toyman. The taller supervillain had taken his hands out of his pockets to fold his arms across his chest, but he still had the same gray-eyed, supercilious expression he'd had outside, impartial and slightly impatient, like he had better places to be.
"It was a surprise for you, Mr. Luthor," the Toyman said. "I thought you'd like it."
"I like knowing what assets are at my disposal," Lex Luthor said. "It's difficult to make plans with an insufficient accounting of resources."
"But we don't need a plan now," the Toyman said. "Just my little soldiers." With the paddleball in one hand, he took out the remote with the other, and pushed the button. Somewhere behind him, Conner heard the whir of the tin soldiers' propellers—the soldiers with their little rifles and their little bayonets, which would usually bend and break against his skin, but with the kryptonite weakening him...
"That can wait," Conner heard his father say—maybe just a little too quickly, or maybe not; it was hard to tell, what with the distraction of a whole lot of very unpleasant pain. "We've got more important things to do—if you want to bring down the shopping center, you'll need to make sure the tectonic frequency is precisely calibrated. Have your fun with the superhero later."
"No!" The Toyman stamped a small foot. "I'll have my fun right now!" He poked at the remote, and Conner felt something bang into the back of his head and fasten onto his short hair. The little flying soldier pulled back, dragging up Conner's head at a painful angle, and another of the toy soldiers zipped around to hover before Conner's face.
Conner looked from the Toyman's smiling mask to his tiny tin soldier, stared at its miniature metal bayonet, sharpened to a gleaming point, level with his eyeballs. He swallowed. This was going to hurt...
The toy soldier shot forward, and Conner uselessly shut his eyes—but nothing stabbed into them. Instead, he opened them in time to see the toy soldier swoop into a loop-de-loop ending in a tailspin dive that crashed it into the warehouse floor. A miniscule puff of smoke rose from the wreckage.
"What was that for?" Lex Luthor inquired, his tone a fraction more irritated.
"That's not how the game's played," the Toyman protested, giving his remote a hard shake. It didn't help; the toy holding onto Conner's hair let go and spiraled unsteadily up toward the ceiling, whirring crazily as it bobbed back and forth. "Something's interfering with my radio signal!"
"Let me see," Conner's father requested, extending his hand for the remote, but the Toyman pulled it away.
"No! It's mine!" Dropping the paddle with the kryptonite ball, he banged on the remote with increasing frustration.
"If you'd allow me—" Lex started to say, only to be interrupted by a resounding crash—far louder than the tin soldier's timely demise, and Conner thought he felt the floor heave under him—though maybe that was just the kryptonite pounding on his nerves.
—No; both the Toyman and his father started and looked around, even as another crash shook the warehouse on its concrete foundation, and another. Spiderweb cracks zigzagged across the nearest wall beside them.
"It's the horse!" the Toyman cried, and though the stupid mask kept smiling same as ever, his voice was panicked. "It's on the same signal, it's going haywire, too—it'll bring the whole building down. We have to get out of here!"
He started to run for the door, only to trip when the next thunderous blow rocked the floor. As the short supervillain struggled to his feet, a chunk of ceiling smashed down into the floor just shy of him, and he screeched in terror, ducked and kept running.
Conner pushed himself up off the floor—usually he could fly, and now crawling was an almost impossible effort, but he made it to his hands and knees. On the concrete floor in front of him he could see the kryptonite-laced ball, its green glow pulsing in time with the throbbing of his veins, standing out in ugly green relief on the back of his hands.
Then Lex Luthor picked up the ball and paddle and flung them into the farthest corner of the warehouse, and Kryptonian strength surged back through Conner's body as the pain vanished like a switch had been flipped. Conner sprang up—not onto his feet, but into the air—and flashed a grin at his father. "Thanks, Pops," he mouthed, unvoiced, then shot after the Toyman, catching up with him outside the garage door and swooping down in front of him to block the supervillain's way.
"Where are you going?" Superboy asked, smirking as the Toyman gasped behind his mask. "Playtime's not over—"
The giant horse rocked forward, its muzzle once more smashing into the warehouse. There was another thud, the loudest yet, and a terrible groaning, shattering rumble, like a car crash times a thousand. Then the building collapsed in on itself like a badly made architectural soufflé, ceiling crashing down as the walls folded in, concrete slabs cracking and crumbling like they were made of pottery and sand. Dust billowed up like smoke from the ruin.
Conner whirled around, staring at where the door used to be—but there was no one there, no bald man coolly brushing debris off a three-thousand dollar suit.
But he'd thought—he'd assumed—his father should have been right behind him. He would have had time to get out, even without superspeed; he would have been following Conner, he must have been...where was he?
"Oh God," Conner said, dropping out of the air onto the ground. It was still trembling, shaking under his boots as the idiotically enormous hobby horse continued to rock, and Conner knew he had to stop it, before any other buildings fell—he should have stopped it right away, before he ever went inside the warehouse, only now there was no warehouse, and no father, either, and God, oh God, this was just a stupid little confrontation, not even the main showdown, how could he have fucked it up—
"Oh my," said the Toyman behind him. "You left Mr. Luthor inside there, to get me? I don't think Superman would've done that..." He didn't sound mocking; he sounded impressed.
Conner ignored him, tearing forward—on foot until he reached the wreckage, and he heard it grind and shift as he stepped onto it. Immediately he withdrew into the air—had to be careful, he'd helped out with enough disasters to know that you couldn't just dig through wreckage like you'd dig a hole in the ground, not if there was anyone trapped underneath; any activity risked causing a further cave-in, making things worse.
Not that there was a hell of a lot worse to get, now. His heartbeat was pounding in his ears, like he was near the kryptonite again, except his father had thrown that far from him, and the veins on the backs of his hands were staying under his skin, invisible. But he could taste bile in the back of his throat, as he moved one block of concrete, then another and another, tossing car-sized chunks of building aside into the empty lot like he was going through a pile of dirty laundry. Like playing pick-up sticks, choosing the pieces on top that wouldn't disturb the ones beneath—he'd played it with trees once, with his dad; but when he was little he'd played it with his father with regular colored sticks. "Good hand-eye coordination practice," his father had said, "not to mention an important life lesson—it's easy to make a mess, takes a lot longer to pick it up," but Conner had proved him wrong; he could pick up the sticks faster than his father could drop them, catching them all before they even hit the ground, and his father had smiled wryly and remarked that Krypotonians always did wreak havoc on Earth metaphors...
"Superboy," someone said, and then, "Conner," and then, "Kon-El," and warm hands closed around Conner's shoulders, gave him a gentle shake. Conner jerked up his head from the wreckage, saw red and blue and black hair and green eyes—
"Dad," he gasped, then remembered the costume, remembered his own costume and where they were. Who they were. "Superman, he—L-Lex Luthor—"
"Over there," said his dad, pointing unerringly. "It will be safer with two of us, if you stabilize the rubble from above while I get underneath."
He sounded completely calm, strong and confident. Like a hero—like Superman should, no doubt and no fear; he wasn't smiling, but then he often didn't, not when he was on the job, not when there was work to do.
Conner swallowed. "He—is he—"
"Kon-El," his dad said softly, "x-ray vision?"
"Oh," Conner said. "Right." He blinked, a couple of times to get things into focus—the x-ray eyesight had been one of the last of his Kryptonian powers to materialize, and he still wasn't comfortable with the vertigo of being able to see through the world. But now he could see under the debris, and there, there was his father. Not near the door where Conner had been searching, but he'd been near a bearing wall, partly sheltered from the roof's collapse. He was trapped in a cramped pocket of space under a fallen support beam, and he wasn't moving, and Conner could see a couple of broken bones—but there was a heartbeat, he realized when he listened for it, steady if not too strong.
He could hear sirens, too, their wailing crescendoing as two police cars, a fire truck, and an ambulance pulled into the lot. Reporters and news vans wouldn't be far behind, Conner knew from experience, and he shook his head, trying to get it together. Hopefully they'd have his father out of here by then—it wouldn't do for Lex Luthor to be rescued by two superheroes on the six o'clock news; what kind of reputation was that for a supervillain? Conner could almost hear his father saying it.
"Conner," his dad said—and that was weird, hearing his dad call him that in costume, even if too softly for the cops to hear. "Are you ready?"
Superman had positioned himself midair above the rubble. Conner used his x-ray vision to check his place, seeing which slabs of concrete were bracing the others. He put one hand on the side of one chunk, worked his hand underneath the bent steel beam until he was supporting most of the mass, and nodded, not trusting his voice. The concrete wasn't all that heavy, but he was breathless anyway.
"Okay," Superman said, and then he dove, a blue and red blur even to Conner's eyes, plowing through the building's rubble like it was water. The wreckage grated and groaned with the force of the shockwave, and Conner strove to bear up his end, but he used too much pressure and the concrete slab broke up, collapsing into the empty space beneath with an echoing boom and stirring up fine powder of dust.
"No—" Conner gasped, but when he looked up, there in the air was his dad, red cape whipping like a flag in the wind, and in Superman's arms was Conner's father—Conner could see his limply dangling legs, the pale curve of his lolling head. Then Superman soared past him to the ambulance.
Conner followed, watched his dad put his father on the gurney, carefully, big hand cradling the bald head as he lowered it to the stretcher. His father wasn't moving, even though Conner could still hear his heart beating; and he was covered in dust, his white suit and his pink skin all the same shade of gray, not silver gray like his eyes when he was being Lex Luthor, but ash gray, dead—
"Superboy?" someone said next to him. "Are you all right?"
Conner blinked—blue but no red; a police officer. "I..." he tried to say, but there was more dust in his throat and he coughed instead.
"Luthor and Toyman had kryptonite," his dad said, coming up beside Conner and putting a hand on his shoulder.
"Jesus," the cop said. He looked around at the lot, the fallen warehouse and the giant rocking horse next to it. The horse had stopped rocking, Conner realized; it was standing in place, looming and ridiculous, with a hole smashed in its side. Conner didn't recall taking care of it himself, so his dad must have done it—fixed the problem before Conner even remembered it. Some superhero he was.
"What were they trying to do here?" the policeman asked.
"You can ask them yourself," Conner's dad said, indicating the rocking horse. "Or Toyman, anyway; he's up on top, waiting for you to take him into custody."
Which hadn't been the plan; the Toyman was supposed to have escaped, plot temporarily thwarted but scheme still in play—but that scheme would be scrapped now anyway, with Lex Luthor out of commission.
The cop grimaced. "Guess we'll have to talk to him, then—Luthor won't be up for questions anytime soon, it doesn't look like."
"Not that he'd be likely to answer them anyway," Superman replied, and he said it so calmly, not like he was gloating or anything, but not like he was really bothered, either.
"Is he—" Conner took a deep breath, tried to make his voice as calm as his dad's. "How is Luthor?"
His dad's hand gripped his shoulder—not tight enough to be a warning, but a solid grip, steady and comforting. "He'll be all right, I'm sure," he said. "We got him out of there in time."
"You superheroes," the cop said, shaking his head. "Saving everyone, even your worst enemies—you're bigger men than I'd be, I'll tell you that. Don't sweat it, kid, a cockroach like Lex Luthor is darn near impossible to squash."
"Yeah," Conner said. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the ambulance pull out, sirens on and strobes flashing, and it took most of his strength not to turn his head and watch it go, even if it'd seem weird, for Superboy to be so interested.
It was strange, that the hobby horse was stopped, and yet it felt like the ground was still vibrating under his boots, like he was still shaking, even though everything was stopped. The police were arresting Toyman, and his father was going to be fine; and yet if his dad's hand hadn't been on his shoulder, holding him still, Conner thought he might crumble and collapse in on himself, same as the warehouse. "Right."
Conner hadn't been in many hospitals, but he knew he didn't like them. This waiting room's walls were painted a particularly insipid shade of olive, which was probably meant to be soothing or something, but just reminded him of vomit. And his stomach didn't need the reminder; the smells of disinfectant and infection and other stuff were more than enough. The florescent lights were humming at a frequency that would probably be audible even to human ears and set his teeth on edge, and the magazines were all crap—old crap, campaign copy for elections already lost and photos from celebrity weddings of couples already divorced.
The waiting room in Metropolis General's private wing was way nicer, with hardwood furniture instead of metal and plastic, and stylish lamps shedding soft gold light—Conner had walked past the corridor and seen it through the sound-blocking and probably smell-blocking door. Mercy was waiting there, but they couldn't be—not Lex Luthor's husband and son, because everyone knew he had none. Supervillains didn't have time for families.
So Conner and his dad sat in the communal waiting room one floor down, unrecognizable in their civilian clothes, just another father and son squeezed into uncomfortable vinyl chairs in the corner, and the other people probably thought they were there for his mother or a grandparent or something. Or maybe they weren't thinking about it at all, Conner thought, looking at the faces in the room—the woman holding an empty styrofoam coffee cup as she stared blankly at the wall, the pair of gray-haired old men talking quietly in Spanish, the big Indian family gathered at one of the tables, all trying to placate two fussing toddlers. All of them with their own loved ones to worry about, painted clear as the green walls on their faces. It was an expression you got used to, being a superhero, all the different ways fear and concern looked on different people.
It was probably how he and his dad looked, too—or else the nurses would notice; they'd be as used to those feelings as superheroes, and none of them had come over to ask them what he and his dad were doing here, though a couple of them had smiled at Conner, encouragingly.
Though when Conner looked at his dad, he didn't look worried so much as thoughtful...no, his eyes behind the dumb glasses were farther away than that. Concentrating—listening, but not to anything in the room.
Conner had tried himself, but there were too many noises in the hospital for him to distinguish the important ones. If his father had been awake and speaking, he could have picked out his voice, but he couldn't tell one human heartbeat from another. His dad could, though, and Conner thought his dad probably knew his father's heartbeat better than anyone's, even when it was slow and weak.
"He's going to be fine, Conner," his dad said suddenly, looking at Conner. "Your father's strong."
"Yeah," Conner said, "I know," like he had the other five times his dad had said it. Conner wished he would stop saying it; every time it sounded a little less true. Especially when he wasn't Superman anymore, just plain old Clark Kent, his dad looking as human as his father—more human, really; Lex Luthor never looked like just anything.
But he'd been so still, hanging limp in Superman's arms—Superboy could have held him as easily, and his father would have weighed nothing, not when Conner could lift buildings. That'd always been true, really, but he'd never thought about it before. His dad was still stronger than him—not by much these days, maybe, they'd never tested it, but Conner knew he couldn't do everything Superman did. But that he was stronger than his father...he'd never really thought about it. He knew his father was human, no Kryptonian in him—but he was Lex Luthor; he was anything but weak.
Conner had been so sure that his father had been right behind him...he should have had plenty of time to escape, he shouldn't have been in the warehouse when it fell. But Conner never should have left him inside, should have grabbed his father and carried him out, carried him to safety, like a hero was supposed to...
"I'm sorry," Conner said, staring down at the ugly mottled carpet on the floor. He should have said it sooner; he didn't know why he hadn't. "I should've protected him—I'm sorry—"
"Conner," his dad said, putting an arm around his shoulders. It was solid and warm and Conner didn't deserve it; he shrugged it off, standing up to put himself out of reach.
"It was my fault, I screwed up, if I'd just stopped that stupid horse—"
"Let's get some air," his dad said calmly. Clear and strong, like he was still in a red cape instead of a cheap navy suit and glasses. He stood up, and Conner walked with him out of the waiting room, through the hospital's halls to the stairs. They headed up, and when they reached the top flight his dad turned the handle of the door leading up to the roof. From the brief squeal of metal as he turned it, it had been locked; but it swung open easily when he pushed it, and they climbed the last steps to the hospital roof.
Night had fallen while they were stuck in the windowless waiting room, and Metropolis's skyline was outlined in the glitter of a million lights against a cloudy sky. The wind between the skyscrapers was cool, fresh and damp with rain waiting to fall. It smelled better than the stale disinfectant inside the hospital, but it didn't change anything. "Dad, I'm so sorry—"
"It's all right, Conner," his dad said, and opened his arms to hug him, but Conner moved back, faster than he should when he wasn't in costume.
"It was my fault," he said. His stomach was twisting again and he didn't know if it was anger or fear or something else. "If you'd been there, Superman instead of me, then Papa—Pops—he never would've gotten hurt. You'd have saved him in time."
"Maybe," his dad said. "But maybe not. Kryptonite affects me, too. And sometimes things just go wrong."
"I thought he was safe!" Conner burst out. "I thought he was behind me, I thought he got out, I didn't even check—"
"Conner," his dad said, quietly, but something about the way he said it made Conner shut up. "That's the way he is. Your father," Clark told him. "He's very, very good at convincing everyone that he's got everything under control. Us included. But the truth is, what we do—no one can control everything."
His dad looked away, out at the city's lights. "The first time your father got hurt, after we'd started doing this—he was shot, a lot worse than this. A lot closer. I wanted to quit then. I wanted him out of the game, and I was going to stop myself, if it would stop him. Hang up the cape and forget about Superman."
"What?" Conner stared. The world without Superman—it was as hard to picture as the world without Lex Luthor.
But then he thought about his dad putting his father on the gurney, thought about the ambulance wailing away and they couldn't ride along, because they weren't supposed to be family, even though he'd listened to the sirens until they reached the hospital. "Why didn't you?" he asked. "Why didn't you quit then?"
His dad shook his head. "Lex—your father wouldn't let me. He said it was illogical, since I hadn't let him quit, the first time I got hurt."
"Oh," Conner said. If his father pulled logic, there wasn't a hell of a lot his dad could have done about it. Even if it was illogical logic—if Conner got hurt, or his dad, it was no big deal; they were strong enough to take it. But his father was only human..."But what if he gets hurt, worse than this time. Or what if—what if he..."
"Your father's strong, Conner," his dad said. "I'm not going to tell you that could never happen, because you know our lives are dangerous. But he's as strong as you or me, in his way. Maybe stronger." His dad smiled, a little wryly, like he'd had talking with the cop at the scene, though it looked different now in the shadows on the roof, with his glasses and the wind ruffling his hair falling over his forehead. "I think at this juncture your father would point out that between us, he's not the one who's died."
Which was true, though Conner had never thought of it like that—hadn't thought much about it at all, how he was born. The death of Superman. His father had talked about it—not before, so much, not when Conner first was around, but later, after. But while Conner himself could remember those first months with his father, before his dad came back, they didn't mean much to him. He hadn't really understood who his dad was, not until after he'd returned.
Now, though, thinking about it, thinking about his dad being gone, like his father could've been gone today, if they had been that much unluckier—it made his heart pound in his ears like the kryptonite had made his heart pound, so hard it hurt. "You better not do that again," Conner said. "Die, I mean," and he meant it as a joke, meant to sound sarcastic, but to his mortification he felt his eyes burn. He shut them to make it stop, before his dad could see.
When his dad hugged him, Conner almost shrugged him away again—but they were alone on the rooftop, no one to see, just his dad, and he wouldn't tell, even if it didn't really matter that Conner's eyes were shut, when Superman had x-ray vision anyway. So Conner put his arms around his dad and pressed his face to his shoulder for a moment. Scratchy cheap polyester suit, but his dad's arms were strong—stronger than usual; most of the time his dad was careful about only doing what a human could, when he wasn't in costume, but this embrace could have squashed an elephant. It was close, and warm, like being a kid again; it felt safe in his arms, like his dad wouldn't let anything take Conner from him.
"Not if I can help it, Kon," his dad promised him. "I won't leave you or Lex again ever, not if there's any way I can stop it."
And he wouldn't, either—he'd been there this afternoon, at the lot with the warehouse, as soon as Conner needed him. "How'd you know, anyway?" Conner asked, pulling away—hugs were great and all but he wasn't a little kid now, even if sometimes he missed it. "When you showed up today, how'd you know to come? Were you watching me?"
"No," his dad said. "I was on the West Coast, but I got there as fast as I could, when your father signaled."
"He whistled?" Conner could hear the supersonic signal which his father used to summon Superman—the dog whistle, Lex called it, much to his dad's disapproval—and in fact had a signal of his own at a different frequency, though he had a little trouble telling them apart—one annoying mosquito whine was as irritating as another. But he didn't remember hearing either of them today. "I didn't hear it..."
"You didn't?" His dad frowned. "That's odd—maybe the kryptonite interfered? We should ask Lex..." He reached out to put his hand on Conner's forehead. "Are you feeling okay now? You're sure—"
Conner batted the hand away. "I'm fine, Dad! Like I told you a million times already. You've been exposed to kryptonite before, you know what it's like—it sucks, but I'm not a total wuss."
"Right," his dad said. "Sorry," only he didn't really sound like he meant it. Unlike his father, who said it rarely but always meant it when he did. "Conner," his dad started to go on, but then he stopped, raising his head like he had seen something on one of the buildings across the street.
No, not seen, heard—but when Conner made to listen up he was nearly deafened by the opening chords of "Killer Queen" blaring from his pocket. Hastily he dialed down his hearing to a normal range and pulled out his cell phone. "Hey, Mercy."
"He's been moved from the ICU to a private ward," Mercy said. "Room 570. The doctors expect him to sleep through the night, but they only gave him a light sedative."
"Thanks," Conner told her, meaning it.
"I'll be outside the door," Mercy said, and hung up.
Room 570 was a room with a big window—Mercy would have made sure of that. Conner's dad's suit was navy, and Conner's jeans were dark and his t-shirt black, so there wasn't much chance of anyone seeing them even if they happened to be looking up at the wrong time, but they still moved fast, dropping off the side of the roof and flying down rather than falling, faster than most human eyes could catch. His dad slid open the window and Conner shot inside, his dad behind him.
His father was laid out on the single bed, white sheets instead of a white suit, but his skin was pink against them, not dusty ash-gray like he'd looked after the warehouse came down. His eyes were closed, but when Conner's dad took his hand, they fluttered open, and his fingers tightened around his partner's. "Clark?"
"Right here," Conner's dad said, smiling—not Superman's smile, white-toothed and assured, but a happy little closed-mouth smile that made him look weirdly young, like he wasn't much older than Conner.
Conner's father smiled back—maybe a little dopily, too, but he was on drugs. But only a second, and then he blinked and tried to sit up, only to be stopped by Clark's hand on his sternum. "Conner—there was kryptonite—"
"I'm here, Pops," Conner said from next to his dad. "I'm okay."
His father blinked again and focused on him—the light was low, but his eyes were blue. "Conner," he said, letting his head fall back into the pillow.
"Mercy made sure the kryptonite was collected," Conner's dad told him. "She scanned the area, but Toyman only had the one piece."
"On him, anyway," his father said. He reached for the switch beside him, raised the head of the bed to an angle so he was sitting up. "He might have more at his base of operations—"
"Then we'll find it. I can tell the League," Clark said. Conner's father winced, and his dad put his hand over the switch to stop him from raising the bed any further. "The Toyman's in custody anyway, so he won't have a chance to get back to his toybox."
"Arrested, hmm? I'll have to put the LexCorp lawyers on that. Get him out by the time I'm recovered, and we can carry on as planned." His father's eyes returned to Conner. "Or mostly as planned. You're off this mission."
Conner felt himself flush. He wanted to protest, but there was nothing he could say, not standing here in his father's hospital room, and none of them would be here if he hadn't screwed up so royally today. "I'm sorry," he said, gulping. "Father, I'm sorry I was late for the briefing, and I'm sorry I wasn't taking it seriously, and I made those stupid jokes and I went after Toyman when I should've made sure—"
"It doesn't matter," his father said. He was still wan, and Conner could see the outlines of bandages under the sheet over his chest, even without resorting to x-ray vision. But with the bed's changed angle his eyes were grayer, like stone. And his voice was Lex Luthor's in the boardroom, uncompromising. "You're not ready yet to handle allied supervillains."
Conner had begged for two months to be allowed this mission, and to not see it through now stung—but his father was right; what else was he supposed to say? Ask for a second chance and get his father hurt again—or worse? Being a superhero was dangerous, but being a supervillain was even worse, and his father was only a human being, strong maybe, but powerless. He couldn't afford to do what he did with any but the best. Couldn't risk his life like that.
If only Conner had understood that sooner—he never should have asked to do this at all. "I'm sorry..."
His dad put his arm around his shoulders. "Lex," Clark said, "Conner's fine. Really."
"What do you mean—of course I'm fine. Father's the one who's hurt—"
"Look at him," his dad said, like he wasn't even listening, looking straight at his father. "It was a single piece of kryptonite. How many dozens of times was I exposed more than to that, by the time I was his age?"
"Dozens more than you ever should have been," his father said in a low mutter, but his eyes were on Conner, not his dad, a long searching look.
"And Conner told me how it went down today—he went right after the Toyman as soon as he was up again, and let you handle your end. Would I have done it any differently, if I'd been there?"
"His heroing was exemplary," his father said impatiently. "Positively iconic. That's not the point."
"It was?" Conner asked. "It's not? But the kryptonite—I let Toyman get the drop on me—" And with a wooden paddle and a rubber ball, no less, how humiliating was that?
"You had no way of knowing he had any," his father said. "I should have known, and warned you; that was my error."
"Besides," his dad interjected, "sometimes it's good to let the bad guys think they can easily get the upper hand. It makes them sloppy."
"As long as the situation ultimately remains under control—which it should have," and his father's voice was grim, "if I hadn't miscalculated that the Toyman would be so moronic as to put the tectonic harmonic inducer on the same remote signal as those preposterous tin soldiers."
"Wait, you jammed the signal that made the rocking horse go bucking bronco?" Conner demanded. "And stopped the soldiers?"
"Conner," his father said reprovingly, "how many times have I told you—rule number one of any scheme is to always have a contingency plan."
"Sixteen," Conner said.
"Then make this seventeen times, And you would have known about the soldiers and the jammer if you'd arrived at the briefing on schedule."
"The point is, Lex," his dad said, "Conner can handle himself in your schemes. Even when they go south—he held it together well out there, even after you were down. You would have been proud."
"But I totally panicked!" Conner protested, shaking his head. "Dad, if you hadn't been there—"
"Conner," his dad said, "why don't you ask your father about the first time I got in trouble on a plot with another villain."
To Conner's surprise, his father looked away, mouth pursed. "Those were extenuating circumstances," he said, low like he was angry.
"He cried my name in front of thirty witnesses," his dad cheerfully related.
"We'd never seriously tested how long you could endure in a vacuum—"
"It took some major explaining after the fact, I can tell you," his dad continued, ignoring his father. "I think we ended up going with mind control. Or was that the time with the robotic clone? Awfully flimsy excuse either way, I'm not sure the Riddler ever really bought it."
"There was a learning curve," his father said through gritted teeth.
"And Conner's further along it than we were then," his dad countered. "He didn't reveal anything to the Toyman—in fact he thinks Superboy is an even greater threat, since he's not nearly as concerned with preserving supervillain lives as Superman is. Which I'm sure you could use to your advantage."
"I could," his father said, and his tone wasn't affronted anymore but thoughtful. Scheming, his dad would probably call it. Then he tilted up his head and focused on Conner. "But only if you feel you're ready, Conner. If you're having any doubts, if you want to wait, get in more practice, there's absolutely no shame in that—your dad and I wouldn't think any less of you."
"Seriously, Pops?" Conner asked, incredulous. "How long have you made me wait on the sidelines, just practicing? I'm not backing out now—not if you really think I'm ready," he added, because he wasn't quite convinced himself. If his dad had been there instead of him, would any of them be here now?
His dad didn't say anything, but Conner saw his fingers close over his father's, squeeze a little—not too tightly, not any more than a human could bear. But his father shot his dad a weird little glance, and then looked back to Conner and reached out his other hand. Conner took it—his father's hand was cool but not cold, and the grip of his fingers around Conner's was strong, like he wasn't in a hospital bed but shaking hands in his office, closing a deal.
"Conner," his father said, "you're ready. You were born ready—you were born to do this. I wouldn't let you do a damn thing in my schemes if I didn't know you could handle it."
Conner blinked, feeling for a second like he was hearing things—but no, those were his father's blue eyes, watching him steadily. Well, he was on drugs, Conner reminded himself—but he didn't sound it; he sounded like his father always did, certain, so sure of himself that the world wouldn't dare defy him. So sure of Conner. "Thanks," Conner said. "Thank you, Papa—Pops."
His dad put his arm around his shoulders again, pulled him close. "We're proud of you, Kon," he said. "Both of us."
"I believe that was implicit in what I just said," his father said.
"Doesn't hurt to repeat it, though," his dad said. "Now, we're going to let you rest, Lex, so you can get back to those schemes—when you're fully up to it." His tone brooked no contradictions, Superman's steel matching Lex Luthor's will.
"All right, all right," his father said, waving his hand dismissively. "Just send Mercy in for a moment, there's a few things I need to check on—"
"Things that can't wait until tomorrow?" his dad asked, with his eyes narrowing ominously, much like he was about to heat-vision something to a crisp.
"Only a couple. Conner, if you could please ask her in?"
"Got it," Conner said, because he knew his father well enough to know that by the time they got back he would've worked out a compromise with his dad.
He made sure there were no nurses or security people passing by the hall, then slipped out the door. Mercy was in the waiting room down the corridor—as sweet as the private room by the ICU, and the magazines were new, too, though his father's assistant wasn't reading them; she was busy on a laptop instead. This she closed when she saw Conner, rising to her feet. "Yes?"
She looked like she always did, dark blonde hair pulled back in a perfectly smooth and symmetrical bun, clear eyes steady and strong features firm, harder to read than his father's, even when his father was being Lex Luthor. She didn't look like she had been waiting in a hospital for hours, as if the smells and sounds didn't bug her at all. Conner wondered if he'd ever be as good at her at hiding what she was feeling. Probably not, when even his father wasn't that good. "Pops wants you," he told her.
Mercy nodded but didn't move. "Should I go in now, or give them a little more time?"
Good question. Conner cocked his head and listened down the hall. "Lex," his dad was saying, and his father answered, "I'm fine, come here," and then there was the distinctive wet squishiness of lips meeting and Conner hastily stopped listening and made a face. "Yeah, maybe give them a few minutes," he said. Really, he loved his parents, and it was cool that they still loved each other even being arch-enemies and all, but who did they think they were, teenagers?
In Lex Luthor's private hospital room, the supervillain slowly released Superman's lower lip from his teeth, but kept running his hand through Clark's black hair until it was disarrayed to his satisfaction. "There—convinced now that I'm intact?"
"I'm convinced that your libido's intact, anyway," Clark said dryly, but he didn't pull back, instead dropped his head to press his forehead's to Lex's bald crown and closed his eyes. "Please try not to do that again, Lex. Not to Conner, and not to me."
"Sorry," Lex said, hardly a whisper in his ear, and the quietness of the apology proved how heartfelt it was. Clark knew it was even more for Conner than for him, even if Conner probably wasn't listening now—he tended to tune out when things got squishy.
"What were you doing in the warehouse?" Clark asked. "From what Conner said, you should've been able to get out—don't tell me you were going for the kryptonite."
"No, not the kryptonite. I knew I could get that afterwards," Lex said.
"Then what?"
Lex's gaze dropped to a point on Clark's chin—for only a moment, and then he met Clark's eyes again, but it was enough. Clark pulled back and crossed his arms. "Lex. What?"
"The Toyman's resolve was rather sudden—I only had a couple days to arrange the set-up with the mall, but it had to be then or else he would've wanted a bigger target. Like the whole chain which refused to sell his toys, instead of just the largest store. But that meant I didn't have time to completely clear out the warehouse."
The old LexCorp warehouse. Which was supposed to have been vacant, Clark believed, but then Lex never could let a useful resource go, and uncatalogued storage was always useful. "What was in that warehouse?" Clark demanded.
"Only storage," Lex said. "Miscellaneous leftovers, nothing of interest. Unprocessed plastics, outdated circuit boards, the prototype for the salination destabilizer..."
"Lex, you said you destroyed that!"
"I said I destroyed the plans. This was merely the prototype."
"The prototype that could turn the Atlantic into freshwater—or the Great Lakes salty!"
"Which is why I had to make sure it was secure. Which it was, so no harm done."
"Except to you," Clark said.
Lex shrugged, then hid a wince at the motion. "A cracked rib and a fractured humerus, nothing that I won't recover from quickly. They'll probably send me home tomorrow."
"Home to rest," Clark said decisively. "No schemes for a week at least—not until you're actually recovered." When Lex opened his mouth he raised his hand. "I mean it, Lex. If Superman has to fly a constant patrol around your penthouse to make sure, I'll do it. Even if I have to write up ten exposés on LexCorp as an excuse. Toyman's in jail anyway, so you can take the time. Besides, how would it look if you passed out during a confrontation and I had to catch you? It'd kind of spoil the effect."
"You know, I think I prefer working with Conner," Lex said. "He has faith in my ability as a supervillain."
"Of course he does," Clark said. "You're his father. Even if you did freak him out today—he thought he screwed up, not getting you out of the warehouse before he went after Toyman."
"No, of course not." Lex frowned. "When there's another supervillain in the mix, they're always the priority. Conner knows that."
"Yeah, he knows that. He just didn't realize when it means, until today." Clark sighed. "It's not easy, Lex."
"Believe me, I know," Lex told him. "If you'd seen Conner, when the Toyman had that fucking kryptonite on him..."
"All you could do not to grab the paddle and smash it over his head?"
"I was envisioning far more extreme things that could be done with it, but generally speaking, yes. And if you'd been there, you could have done them—I don't know that I've ever envied you more, Clark. That you can be on Conner's side..."
"We're both on his side," Clark said immediately. "Always. Whatever it looks like in public—Conner never forgets it. Any more than I do."
"I know," Lex said, and he interlaced his fingers with Clark's and squeezed. "But honestly, you can't appreciate what it's like. I didn't know myself. With you it's one thing, but with him... I can handle it; I don't want to take Conner out of the game now, not when he's this good. I'll manage. But be glad you'll never have to understand, what it's like being on the opposite side from him..."
"Actually," Clark said, then hesitated. "Well, maybe this isn't the time. But..."
"Yes?"
"I've been thinking," Clark said. "Wondering...since I wasn't here when Conner was born, I missed a lot—and heck, you did, too, since you grew him up in a tank. But seeing how that worked out, seeing him grown up now, everything he can do... And LexCorp is going to need an heir someday, and you and Mercy can't do everything anyway..."
"Clark..."
"How do you think Conner would feel about having a little brother or sister?"
Lex's mouth dropped open—maybe to answer, but before he could say anything, a whoop sounded outside the door and down the hospital hall.
"What, really? Oh man, that'd be awesome!"
Clark wasn't sure at first how loud that exclamation was, since he was attuned to Conner's voice anywhere—but a glance at Lex confirmed that the shout had carried.
"I could be mistaken," Lex said dryly, "but I think he approves." He leaned back against the pillow. "Now get your son out of here, fast, before he wakes up the whole hospital."
"My son?" Clark repeated, grinning. Though Lex's concerns were not unfounded; Clark could hear the tap of heels on the hallway tiles, the night nurse coming to check on the disturbance. She wouldn't find anyone but Mercy, though; Conner was already at the door, and then shutting it behind him as he appeared in the room in a blur of blue and black.
"Sorry, guys," he said, but he was grinning as broadly as Clark.
No harm done; Mercy would probably already have a movie cued up on her laptop to explain the noise. And Lex's mouth was curving upwards, inevitably. Some feelings even a supervillain couldn't hide. "Get some rest, nemesis mine," Clark told him, "and then we'll talk," and he ducked to kiss Lex's smiling lips good night, before superspeeding out the window after their son.