The shift in the mansion's atmosphere was palpable. For Lex, the "Static" had finally settled into a comfortable silence. He had stopped looking for a god in the Kent farmhouse and started looking for a weapon in the school hallways.
But for Clark, the silence was deafening.
…
Clark stood in the center of the barn, staring at a rusted tractor axle. A week ago, he would have tossed it into the scrap pile like a piece of driftwood. Now, he gripped the cold iron, his knuckles turning white, his breath hitching in his chest. He hauled upward, his muscles screaming, until the metal groaned and settled—barely six inches from where it started.
He dropped it. The heavy thud echoed in the rafters, sounding to Clark like the closing of a tomb.
"It's heavier than it looks, isn't it?"
Clark spun around, wiping sweat from his forehead with a trembling hand. Jeremy was standing in the doorway, the late afternoon sun silhouetting his frame. He looked the same as always—composed, observant, and disturbingly calm.
"I can feel my own heartbeat, Jeremy," Clark said, his voice ragged. "I can feel the cold. I can feel... everything. Is this what it's like for everyone else? Every second of every day?"
"Welcome to the infantry, Clark," Jeremy said, stepping into the barn. He leaned against a wooden pillar, his gaze sweeping over the scene of Clark's struggle. "No heat vision. No invulnerability. Just bone, blood, and the constant pull of gravity. It's an adjustment."
"I thought I wanted this," Clark whispered, looking at a shallow cut on his palm from the rusted axle—the first scar he had ever earned. "But I didn't realize how loud the world was when you don't have the strength to push it back."
Jeremy walked over to the workbench, picking up a stray wrench and turning it over. "The world is about to get a lot louder. Lex has officially closed the file on you. He thinks you're a glitch in his memory, a side effect of a concussion. He's moved on."
"To Eric," Clark said, his face hardening.
"To Eric," Jeremy confirmed. "He's already sent a LuthorCorp legal team to 'assist' Mr. Summers with a sudden influx of property damage claims. He's buying Eric's loyalty by making his problems disappear. And in exchange, Eric is spending his afternoons at the mansion, letting Lex's scientists 'monitor' his vitals."
Clark stepped forward, his eyes flashing with a spark of the old fire, even if the power behind it was gone. "Eric doesn't have someone to guide him, Jeremy. He has a father who expects perfection and a billionaire who wants a pet god. He's going to hurt someone. I saw him in the locker room today—he cracked a porcelain sink because someone bumped into him."
"He's a mirror of what you could have been without the restraint," Jeremy noted. "And right now, he's the only one Lex is watching."
Clark looked at his bandaged hand, then back at Jeremy. "I need to stop him. If he keeps going, Lex is going to figure out where that power came from. He'll trace the surge back to the meteor rocks, and then he'll start looking for how or whom Eric got his powers from."
"You're a human being now, Clark," Jeremy said, his voice dropping into that low, resonant frequency. "If you step in front of Eric Summers, he won't just bruise you. He'll break you. You have no shield. No speed. Just a moral compass that's about to get you killed."
Jeremy reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, lead-lined case. He didn't open it, but Clark could feel the weight of the air shift.
"I can help you," Jeremy offered, his eyes glowing with a faint, emerald intensity. "I can find a way to reverse the conduit. We can hunt Eric down, find another storm, another stone, and I can pull that power back into you. You can have your powers back again."
Clark looked at the case, then out toward the house where his parents were sitting at the kitchen table, finally breathing a sigh of relief because their son was 'safe' from Lex's gaze.
"No," Clark said, his voice steadying. "If I take it back just because I'm afraid, I'm no better than Lex. I have to try to reach Eric first. Man to man. No powers. No miracles."
Jeremy tucked the case away, a thin, unreadable smile touching his lips. "A brave choice, Clark. A foolish one, but brave. Just remember: when a god hits a man, the man doesn't get a second chance to be 'average.'"
As Jeremy walked out of the barn, leaving Clark alone in the growing shadows, he knew the man who would be Superman was about to face his greatest test. Lex was watching a new star rise, while the real hero was trying to learn how to fight in the dark.