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Post by jonclark on Jun 21, 2019 9:22:21 GMT
Many great minds had examined the barriers that separated the Multiverse. Powerful wielders of magic like Doctor Fate and Zatanna. Physicists like Ray Palmer, Ted Knight, Maximillian Arturo and. Even organizations like STAR Labs. Odds were that in the depths of space in at least 5 other universes there were millions of others who had tried to breach the barriers and all had failed. But none of them were Lex Luthor.
Lex had taken a few earlier stabs at it. He'd looked at it as a distraction. A way to clear his mind when other problems didn't offer fast solutions. But until recently he hadn't really put much effort into it. After all, Superman, Kobra and the Invasion were enough problems without opening the door for more trouble. And it wasn't as if he'd had great success with alternate worlds previously. He'd met two counterpart Luthors- one had been a bleeding heart do-gooder and another was every bad trait Lex possessed turned up to maximum with none of his more appealing traits. And the only thing worse than his genetic counterparts had been a slimy wanna-be Luthor named Sivana whose Superman was a magically powered school boy. For a while he'd considered these barriers more of a defense than a prison.
But the last few months had made him reconsider the potential offered by places where things had gone differently...
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Post by jonclark on Jun 21, 2019 9:55:04 GMT
Six Months Ago
Sometimes, being the smartest man alive was a curse. Lex had hoped that this year he might actually forget, but his eidetic memory was as sharp as ever. It was five years since Superman had destroyed Lexor. Sixty months since his foe had killed Lex's wife. One thousand eight hundred twenty seven days since Lex's son had been atomized because of that stubborn Kryptonian. The loss had driven Lex mad. The guilt at how his family, his people, would still be alive if Luthor hadn't returned to them and brought the Man With A Heart of Steel back to Lexor in pursuit. At points he almost imagined the explosion itself had been his fault, that Lex for all his brilliance had miscalculated something, but then he remembered who was really at fault.
For a long time after the destruction of that planet Lex had sought revenge. It was a stronger desire than anything else. It easily dwarfed the hatred he had felt as a teenager when the Kryptonian had snuffed out Luthor's greatest creation, a totally unique new lifeform. Then Lex had simply thought Superboy resented Luthor's intellect. The lifeform had been something Lex had labored on, but his feelings for it, at the time, were more detached. He viewed Superboy's actions as a betrayal by one of the few people Lex had let down his guard for. And in the aftermath of losing his family and world he had connected the two incidents as the start of a killing spree of things Lex loved that culminated in Lexor.
It was Superboy that had killed Lex's first "child". It was Superboy who had caused Lex's parents to leave Smallville in shame which led to their deaths in that car accident. In the same moment Superboy had taken the first person Lex had loved from him, his adoring sister, Lena. She had grown up not really remembering him. And thanks to the persecution of Smallville's favorite son Lex had been in no position to reconnect with his sister. She grew up believing that she was alone in the world. Grew up in an orphanage while the brother she had forgotten grew up in reform school. And as a result Lex had feared for years disturbing the peace Lena had found by dragging her into the type of life he'd been forced to live.
Now as an adult the damn Kryptonian had kept on stealing Lex's life. He'd found a place he was accepted on Lexor, a woman who truly loved and understood him. But Superman wasn't content to just leave their rivalry die. He had pursued Lex to his new world. Tried his old trick of convincing the people that Lex was some sort of crook. And though that had ultimately failed, it still resulted in Lex being unable to stay on Lexor for any length of time. Though he returned numerous times. Married his darling Ardora. Even apparently fathered a child. Despite all that he never could rest on Lexor, always looking over his shoulder knowing that somewhere Superman would come to drag him off again. Whatever the calendar said his marriage had been mere months- a week here, a week there, stolen time that was never long enough. Lex wasn't there to see his son's birth. Didn't even discover his wife had been pregnant until his last visit when the boy was nearly 3 years old. All those firsts: words, steps, holidays … all taken by his foe.
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Post by johnreiter902 on Jun 21, 2019 11:53:43 GMT
I like how this is going
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Post by jonclark on Jun 30, 2019 9:03:12 GMT
Although he had taken a bit of a sabbatical from public life recently, Lex had kept abreast of the news. Not just the big stories either. His mind had noticed patterns. Reports in the Northwest that brought back early memories of snippets heard when visiting Smallville with his father. Others closer to Metropolis that struck the same tone. Not to mention the prominence of Superwoman and that annoying Olsen's story about a Super-marriage. Lex's foe now had a family of his own, it seems. After robbing Lex of one, the Man of Steal thought he could have a happily ever after with a wife and kids. NEVER!!!
As a teenager, Lex thought he hated Superboy. Then in the immediate aftermath of Lexor's destruction he'd discovered that feeling had been only the tip of the iceberg that encompassed hate. Now at this moment Lex understood that he'd never even come close to understanding what hatred was. Killing Superman, once his ultimate goal, would be mercy now. It would be the one thing Lex would refuse to allow. He was going to dismantle everything that made up Superman's life but spare the man himself. He swore it on the memory of his dead wife and son. This time next year Superman would be the one standing powerless and alone over his family's graves.
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Post by johnreiter902 on Jul 1, 2019 1:02:13 GMT
Lex still has a little ways to go before he can reform, it seems
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Post by jonclark on Jul 1, 2019 4:46:20 GMT
Lex still has a little ways to go before he can reform, it seems Yeah, I wasn't planning on going the way this story is heading. Lex seems to have a few issues he wants me to help him work through. I'm hoping that light up ahead is a good sign and not a housefire.
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Post by jonclark on Jul 2, 2019 9:42:58 GMT
It was just before noon on a March day. It was the first day this year that the temperature had topped 70 degrees.
Mrs. Blake's 4th grade class was enjoying lunch in the park outside the Superboy Museum where they had come on a field trip.
Mr. Jones was preparing a sandwich in the place most people still referred to as the Kent Store even though Jonathan Kent had passed on over a decade ago. Fred Jones had turned the place into a deli/diner during the main Street revival a few years back, but somehow SuperSubs had never caught on so Kent's it remained.
Officer Rick Parker was napping at his desk. Things in the town were quieter than they'd been in his uncle's day. In fact they were so quiet now that when Chief Douglas Parker had retired a few years back, it had been decided that the local police department would be folded into the surrounding county with only one or two rotating officers stationed in Smallville.
The first explosion occurred exactly at noon, under the section of highway that now sat on the spot Superboy had built Lex Luthor a lab almost twenty years before. A second followed 10 seconds later taking out the famous and recently refurbished sign announcing that Superboy had lived there. A third explosion leveled the wall and cut all electrical power at Soames Juvenille Rehabilitation. This was followed by dozens of simultaneous detonations across the county levelling water towers, power lines and the goal posts at Smallville High Stadium.
People were just catching their breaths when a rocketing red and blue object crashed through the wall of the Superboy Museum levelling the building and most of the surrounding block. Mts. Blake's class never knew what hit them. At the center of the blast zone all that remained was a rocket ship that slowly opened ...
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Post by johnreiter902 on Jul 2, 2019 13:26:09 GMT
This looks great so far. Shame about Smallville. It was always one of my favorite spots on Earth-1. But I guess they can rebuild later. Please keep going.
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Post by jonclark on Jul 4, 2019 6:38:38 GMT
At 11:59 AM EDT Hank Heywood III and Wally West (aka the heroes known as Steel and Flash) noticed the space outside the JLA Satellite change to a brilliant amber. None of their communication devices incoming or outgoing worked although the internal com system worked fine and even their own personal devices still allowed them to speak, to each other at least. Wally also quickly discovered that his own speed powers were affected. He could still move at lightning speeds but his ability to pass through solid matter by vibrating at a certain frequency no longer worked. Unfortunately for him he discovered this when he collided with the door of the monitor room which left him with several bruises, nausea and a loud ringing in his ears for the next several hours.
At 12:02 PM both New York and Gotham suffered major power outage which not only affected the electrical grid but also automobiles, trucks, portable radios, and the systems of any planes currently on the ground. Officials were baffled as to the cause but gave a silent prayer of thanks that the phenomenon bypassed any plane in the process of landing or currently in flight.
At 9:03 AM PDT Hal Jordan wasn't as lucky when his power ring suddenly cut out while he was in flight. His fellow GL John Stewart was forced to rely on courage and human ability when his own ring faltered while he was dealing with an apartment building fire. John also discovered that the JLA signal device he carried as a reserve member was as ineffective as his ring when he tried using it to contact Jordan for back-up.
Nubia of Paradise Island was recalled to her home by her mother Hippolyta as the Amazon's defensive barrier was becoming unstable. Her lover J'onn J'onzz and the Atlantean Aquaman came to assist. Though neither man could set foot of the island, Arthur would patrol the surrounding waters to deter any enemies approaching by sea while J'onn used his mental abilities to do the same for the air. J'onn also planned to use his powers to prevent or erase any accidental sighting of the island.
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Post by johnreiter902 on Jul 4, 2019 14:11:57 GMT
I really hope Hal didn't die. I can't see the connection yet, but I am loving this story.
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Post by jonclark on Jul 4, 2019 14:19:14 GMT
I really hope Hal didn't die. I can't see the connection yet, but I am loving this story. No, killing off non-Superman characters (especially headliners) during a cameo in a Superman story would probably be frowned on. I was going on the principle that the exact nature of the ring failure still left the "emergency life saving" feature working. At worst Hal gets some scrapes, strains, or bruises out of this- nothing that would be noteworthy by his next appearance.
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Post by jonclark on Jul 5, 2019 8:29:00 GMT
Superman wasn't sure whether he was annoyed by Stanley Argos or if he actually had some admiration for the man. Today marked Superman's fifth encounter with the so called Armoredillo. Despite their first encounter ending with the destruction of the man's alien battle suit, he'd returned several months later after a prison break wearing a less sophisticated version of the equipment that Argos had assembled from discarded household appliances. It had taken Superman all of 30 seconds to defeat him that time. Unfazed he'd managed to return twice more, each time with less effective results. Technically Superman hadn't even defeated the villain last time as the suit had shorted out leaving Armoredillo as a road hazard that Superman had removed.
And yet Superman was now looking at a 30 foot tall battle machine piloted by Argos. If nothing else the man didn't give up trying. Superman recalled Batman once joking that if half these tech-villains had simply applied for patents or gone to work in the defense industry they'd be billionaires many times over. Superman responded that it would free his mornings up, if nothing else.
It was 11:45 AM when Superman dropped Argos off at the local precinct and 11:52 when he deposited the remains of Argos' creation at a local scrapyard.
By 12:05 Clark Kent was handing in a write-up of the battle to Perry White.
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Post by jonclark on Jul 26, 2019 5:46:43 GMT
Clark weighed the pros and cons of having lunch at home.
Technically, Clark Kent couldn't get home, let alone home and back, on his lunch break. And he knew Gerta might have scheduled a last minute play date, so it was a toss-up whether coming in unseen was a good idea or a bad one. But his Superman duties the past two nights had cut into his time with Jasma and Kristen. It was a beautiful spring day. And while she'd never admit it, Gerta could use a little time to herself.
Who was he kidding, the choice had been obvious from the start. He'd call Kristen from the house or use super-ventriloquism on the way to let her know to join him.
Clark was halfway to his house when he hit the force shield.
The impact stunned him enough that he actually was knocked from the sky. He looked up from the roof of the parked car he landed on.
"Hello, old friend. Sorry, I couldn't be there in person, but I'm sure we'll meet later." announced the projected image of Lex Luthor.
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Post by jonclark on Jul 26, 2019 7:25:18 GMT
In a hidden lab just outside the boundaries of Metropolis, Lex watched the prone Superman through the eyes of his drone. A screen off to the side displayed the arrival of his presents to Smallville. He punched a few keys to ensure his plans for that town and a few special people there were not overlooked. Various other devices in the room ensured that various side-effects of Lex's actions were causing enough chaos to keep his old foe's fellow heroes occupied.
He pressed the communications button and announced "Initiate Stage 2" as he donned his newly assembled armor. Responses from Midvale, Pittsdale, the Amazon jungle, Sardonia, the Arctic, and several seconds later interdimetional space assured Lex things were going on schedule. He put his odds of total success at maybe 10% but knew that even the smallest of victories would cut like a knife at Superman's heart. And even if he totally lost this time Superman's code would ensure Lex would be around to make more attempts. The law of averages was on Lex's side in the long run.
He turned on his detection gear and set out for the three Kryptonian signatures he located together less than a mile from Superman's known location.
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Post by jonclark on Jul 27, 2019 6:20:08 GMT
At the former site of the Superboy Museum a figure arose from the rocket in the middle of the collapsed building. He surveyed the broken displays, smashed statues, and damaged artifacts. He stumbled forward as if his legs were having trouble supporting his weight. His blue eyes seemed slightly unfocused. His jaw trembled. Then his eyes focused on a child's hand holding a stuffed toy. The scuffed toy was dressed in the same costume as himself. The child's hand was all that was visible above a pile of debris. Within the blink of an eye the young man took in the full scene. Bodies lay, some partially buried by rubble like the child, others bent at unnatural angles. As sound began to register again, he heard screams, sobs, and moans.
The boy in the red and blue uniform fell forward onto his knees and released a scream of his own. One which did as much damage to the windows of Smallville as anything else in the past few minutes.
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