Chapter 40: The Rescue — Part 2
The facility's corridors had become a war zone.
I sprinted back through the chaos, following the sounds of combat—impacts, shouts, the distinctive crack of Clark moving faster than human eyes could track. Guards lay scattered in my path, unconscious but alive, testament to Kryptonian restraint even under pressure.
Where is he?
[TRACKING ALLY POSITION. SOUNDS INDICATE: CENTRAL JUNCTION, 40 METERS AHEAD.]
I rounded the corner and found Clark surrounded.
Eight guards, all heavily armed, all keeping their distance. They'd learned that getting close to the blur meant getting knocked unconscious. But they had him pinned at the intersection, cutting off his escape routes.
"Cole!" Clark's voice carried relief. "I told you to—"
"I know what you told me." I hit the nearest guard from behind before he could turn, sending him into the wall. "I'm not good at following orders."
The formation broke. Clark moved, and suddenly three more guards were down. I handled the rest—enhanced strength making quick work of body armor and trained reflexes. In seconds, the intersection was clear.
"The exit—" Clark started.
"Is that way." I pointed toward the drainage tunnel. "Kara has Hannah. We need to go."
We ran together, Clark matching my pace instead of blurring ahead. Partnership. Brotherhood. Neither of us willing to leave the other behind.
The facility's main corridor stretched before us, fluorescent lights flickering from the damage we'd caused. Alarms still wailed. Red emergency lighting painted everything in shades of blood. And at the far end, between us and freedom, stood a figure I recognized.
Earl Jenkins.
He looked different than the last time I'd seen him—at the LuthorCorp fertilizer plant, before Clark had stopped his attempt to expose Lionel's secrets. The wild desperation was gone from his eyes, replaced by something controlled. Calculated. The meteor scars on his neck pulsed with faint green light.
"I remember you," Earl said, his voice carrying across the distance. "Both of you. You ruined everything."
"Earl." Clark's voice carried genuine concern beneath the wariness. "What did they do to you?"
"They fixed me." Earl smiled, and it was the smile of someone who'd been broken and rebuilt into something new. "Made my abilities stable. Made me useful." His form flickered, going transparent for half a second before solidifying again. "Now I get to return the favor."
[THREAT ANALYSIS: EARL JENKINS. PHASING ABILITY ENHANCED. CONTROL SIGNIFICANTLY IMPROVED. RECOMMEND: EXTREME CAUTION.]
Earl charged.
He moved faster than before—faster than any baseline human, though not as fast as Clark. But speed didn't matter when you could phase through attacks. Clark's first punch passed through Earl's head like it wasn't there. The second passed through his chest.
Earl went solid and hit Clark with a haymaker that sent him stumbling.
"New trick," Earl said. "I choose what touches me now."
I moved while he was focused on Clark, throwing a Power Strike at his back. Earl phased at the last second—my fist passed through empty air, momentum carrying me forward.
He went solid and grabbed my arm.
"And you," he hissed. "The meteor freak who thinks he's a hero."
His grip was crushing. Enhanced somehow, beyond what he'd shown before. 33.1 hadn't just stabilized his powers—they'd augmented them.
Clark hit Earl from behind, and this time Earl wasn't fast enough to phase. They went down in a tangle of limbs, Earl shifting between solid and transparent, Clark trying to maintain a grip that kept passing through empty space.
Then Earl did something I'd never seen before.
He phased—and took Clark partially with him.
Clark screamed.
The sound was unlike anything I'd heard from him—pure agony, the cry of someone experiencing something fundamentally wrong. Half his body had gone transparent with Earl, caught between states of matter, atoms vibrating at frequencies they were never meant to occupy.
Earl laughed.
"Hurts, doesn't it? Being in two places at once." He released Clark, who collapsed to the floor, gasping and trembling. "33.1 taught me so much. Want to see what else I can—"
Vines erupted from the floor.
Green tendrils burst through concrete and tile, wrapping around Earl's legs, his arms, his chest. He tried to phase, but the plants followed—organic matter somehow disrupting whatever process allowed him to become intangible.
"What—"
I turned.
Hannah stood at the end of the corridor, hands raised, eyes glowing faint green. Tears streamed down her cheeks, but her expression was set with desperate determination.
"Leave them alone," she whispered.
More vines. Earl thrashed against them, phasing partially but unable to break free completely. The plants grew as fast as he could escape, constantly wrapping, constantly binding.
"Hannah." My voice came out steady despite my shock. "You have powers."
"I don't—I can't—" She was shaking, terrified of herself. "I don't want to—"
"It's okay." I moved toward her slowly, hands raised. "You're helping. You're saving us."
Earl screamed in frustration, tangled in a cocoon of green. Clark was recovering, pulling himself to his feet, but Earl was effectively neutralized.
[OPPORTUNITY DETECTED. WINDOW FOR ESCAPE: NARROWING.]
"We need to go," I said. "Now."
I scooped Hannah into my arms—she weighed almost nothing, and she was still trembling, but she didn't resist. Clark grabbed my shoulder.
"Can you run?"
"Can you?"
He smiled grimly. "Let's find out."
We ran.
The drainage tunnel was chaos.
Kara waited at the entrance, expression frantic until she saw us emerge from the darkness. Behind us, the facility's alarms still wailed, but the sounds were growing distant. We'd made it.
"Go," I gasped. "Vehicles. Now."
The drive back to Smallville was silent.
Hannah curled against my side in the back seat, eyes closed, breathing shallow. The vines that had saved us had exhausted her—using powers for the first time always took a toll. I knew that from personal experience.
Clark drove, hands tight on the wheel. Kara rode shotgun, occasionally glancing back at us but keeping her distance. She'd seen Hannah's power manifest, understood what it meant.
Another meteor freak. Another person whose life had been changed by rocks from the sky.
[MISSION ASSESSMENT: PRIMARY OBJECTIVE ACHIEVED. SECONDARY OBJECTIVES: PARTIAL. CASUALTIES: ZERO. LEVEL UP: 9 → 10.]
The System's cold analysis couldn't capture what I felt. Relief that Hannah was alive. Horror at what Earl had become. Pride in the team that had made this possible.
And underneath it all, exhaustion. Bone-deep weariness that went beyond physical fatigue.
We'd won this battle. But the war was just beginning.
Dawn broke over the Kent farm.
Martha met us at the door, took one look at Hannah's hollow eyes, and ushered her inside without question. "Come on, sweetheart. Let's get you cleaned up and fed. Are you hungry? I have fresh bread."
Hannah looked back at me once—a silent question. Is this safe?
I nodded. "You're home now."
She went inside, and the door closed behind her.
I made it to the porch steps before my legs gave out.
The adrenaline had finally worn off, leaving behind nothing but pain and exhaustion. My hands were bleeding from the fight—I hadn't even noticed. My ribs ached from a hit I didn't remember taking. Everything hurt.
Kara sat beside me, close but not touching. Her presence was enough.
"You did it," she said quietly.
"We did it."
"You went back for Clark. After I told you to stay."
"I know." I looked at her—at the worry in her eyes, the love beneath the fear. "I couldn't leave him."
"I know." She smiled, tired but genuine. "That's why I love you."
The words hung in the air, heavier than they'd ever been. We'd said them before, in moments of peace and passion. But saying them now, covered in blood and exhaustion, fresh from a battle we'd barely survived—that was different.
That was real.
"I love you too," I said.
She leaned against my shoulder, and we watched the sun rise over the corn. Behind us, the farmhouse stirred with the sounds of Martha preparing breakfast and Jonathan asking quiet questions about the girl who'd arrived in the night.
"What happens now?" Kara asked.
I thought about the facility we'd left behind. About Earl, still tangled in Hannah's vines when we escaped. About the prisoners who'd been moved, the evidence that remained, the war we'd officially declared.
"Now they know we're coming for them," I said. "And we don't stop."
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