บท 19: Chapter 19
Part Two: Man or Superman?
Location: Smallville, Kansas – Earth – 2003
Smallville slowly recovered from the meteor shower. That summer the town rallied and rebuilt aided by sizeable donations by Stark Industries and Hammer Industries. Hammer Industries began building various plants throughout Smallville and Stark Industries had started its Intelli-Crops initiative in Smallville. The money from both helped Smallville recover as did the newfound tourism as Smallville was quickly labelled 'The Meteor Capital of the World' and had gotten a lot of press. Smallville went from a town nobody heard of to a town that had the world's attention, as scientists and agencies flocked to understand the unprecedented meteor shower.
Even Apollo's Ma and his Aunts and Uncles didn't fully understand what happened. Never before had so many meteors struck the same area. Ajak told Ikaris to investigate it so he flew into space to find out more and see if it was some kind of attack or cosmic test. Ajak wanted to call Phastos but was unsure of whether or not he was willing to part from the life he was building for himself for her after so many years of no contact. The last time she saw him after the bombings he was heartbroken at what the gift of technology lead humans to. Humanity had such ingenuity and intelligence yet seemed dead set on using it to create weapons to hurt and conquer one another. Phastos like Druig couldn't take it and they were times were even Ajak felt their pain, seeing a people you've nurtured for millennia constantly fall to violence, bigotry and discrimination was difficult. However, moments like those she saw in the last few months' filler her with more than enough hope. Seeing the town of Smallville unite in order to help each other and seeing the world coming to aid those in need. Those moments made her see why her and her family loved humanity in the first place, their capacity for kindness, for compassion, for empathy and for love could be truly awe inspiring at times.
Apollo saw that too and was filled with new resolve to help those in need, he however promised himself and his parents that he'd try to lead a normal teenage life and so he was doing that also. Apollo was currently watching a helicopter standing next to his Dad on the terrace. The two of them watched the helicopter pass overhead yet again. Third time in the past twenty minutes.
This didn't sit well with Apollo.
He'd always felt protective of the farm. It was the only place he felt he could truly be himself. Here he wasn't a freak or an alien but a member of a family who was loved.
Helicopters were a rare sight in the area. Most farmers no longer dusted crops by air. But what really bothered Apollo was the way the chopper weaved across the gray sky in a distinct pattern—flying over their small farmhouse, past the pond and the cornfields and the chicken coop, and then dipping lower near the large crater that butted up against their old barn.
Whoever was up there was looking for something.
But what?
When Apollo had brought up his concern earlier, his dad shrugged it off.
"Can't say I appreciate it either, Apollo. But there's no law against flying over someone's property" Jonathan simply said to his son.
So Apollo stuck with the other law-related subject they'd been discussing: the controversial new stop-and-search issue on the ballot in Smallville. It had already been passed into law in a couple of neighboring towns because the influx of tourism and business to the area because of the meteor shower also lead to an influx of migrant workers and seemingly that was a problem. The law was being debated here but Apollo refused to believe the residents of Smallville would support it. Would they?
"So the police would be able to stop anyone?" Apollo asked his dad. "At any time? With no cause?"
Wiping his brow on the shoulder of his flannel shirt, Jonathan Kent turned to Apollo. Apollo studied his Dad. He looked like he was trying to find a pragmatic answer to tell Apollo but struggling to find the words.
"The population's changing, son. And some communities…I think they're scared about where this change might leave them" Jonathan told Apollo.
"But it's racist." Apollo replied a little flippantly causing his father to chuckle
"On that we agree but a lot of people view it a little more complicated than that. But still, I'm voting no on the issue." Jonathan replied
Apollo nodded and drove his shovel back into the ground. Even in his annoyance, he was careful not to use too much force. He remembered when he was younger and he kept snapping them on accident. Even now Apollo regretted the things he broke with his strength when he was younger. He knew his folks didn't have money for that kind of extra expense and so he always tried to be extra careful if he was using the farm equipment but he also wasn't perfect and he could get angry or emotional and slip so right now he was trying very hard to not slip and break his shovel. However, it seriously depressed him to think that anyone in Smallville could vote for a law that allowed police to make traffic stops based solely on the color of someone's skin.
And what happened if the people in the car didn't have documentation? Could the police just throw them into the back of a squad car and whisk them away?
"That storm's closer than it looks," Jonathan said, peering into the sky again. "This really isn't a great time to be flying."
"What do you think they're looking for?" Apollo asked his Dad.
Jonathan repositioned a loose fence post in one of the holes Apollo had dug.
"Whatever it is, they should think about heading in soon" Jonathan replied simply focusing more on the farm work than the helicopter.
A drizzle began falling, and the sky swiftly grew more sinister. The helicopter overhead looped away from a dark cloud, then came back around for yet another pass as the rain picked up. Apollo expected them to go towards the shelter and hold off whatever search they were doing but they kept flying up there. Whatever they were searching for seemed important enough to brave the elements. Apollo's Dad seemingly noticed the change in weather and stopped what he was doing, he started to wave his arms to get their attention so he could direct them inside but it was too late. The whir of the helicopter blades was drowned out by a loud clap of thunder. The sudden silence that followed made them both look up. Helicopters weren't supposed to just stop making noise. It was plunging toward the ground near the barn. Swirling unnaturally in some kind of death spiral.
Apollo's body surged with energy as every thought in his body told him he had to intervene, he had to save them. Apollo looked to his Dad who simply nodded understanding what his son needed to do and then he dropped the shovel and took off.
Apollo tore across the field, hyperaware of everything around him: the thick drops of rain suspended like teardrops in the sky, the deafening silence cocooning his body, the breath suspended in his lungs. In instances like this one, when his powers took hold and his thoughts receded, Earth felt smaller and more fragile, as if its rules no longer applied. Yet Apollo knew this was only an illusion. Gravity would still yank down the chopper. The collision with the ground would still be catastrophic. The people inside would die. He was the one who could break the rules and that meant he was the one who had to save those that couldn't save themselves.
Apollo leaped into the air and flew underneath the copter grabbing hold of the landing skids careful to not completely stop the copters descent but rather slow it down and direct it in a manner that wouldn't arise suspicion but still save the people inside. He clutched the thick steel in his hands and braced himself with his feet. Apollo's feet touched the ground as he braced himself to slow the helicopter and he instantly felt all of the chopper's immense momentum. The full force of the freefalling four-ton helicopter flowed through him as he slowed it down. His feet skidded through the dirt and his glasses fell off his face as he tried to come to a stop. Apollo gritted his teeth and used more of his strength to kneel in the mud and instinctively push back against the immense force he was feeling causing the massive machine to jolt and twist in his grasp. However, he miscalculated, he stopped it too suddenly and the whiplash of the sudden stop caused a ripple of force to run across the chopper. It spun out of his control and landed on its side with a tremendous crash, blades digging into the soft earth with a wet thwacking sound, shrapnel flying everywhere.
The chopper settled only inches from the side of the old barn. Apollo stared in shock at the helicopter's battered underbelly, smoke and steam spewing out of the wreckage. He could hear the heartbeats of all of the occupants, they were alive. Apollo smiled a little to himself but made a mental note that if he ever needed to catch any flying things he needed to catch them higher and slow their momentum to a halt before they reached the ground.
"Hey!" Apollo shouted, scooping his glasses off the ground and putting them back on. "Anyone need help?"
Apollo used his x-ray vision and saw someone hanging halfway out the cracked back window, their heart was still beating but their breathing was a little shallow meaning they were unconscious. They were others but they were moving and checking on one another meaning they were conscious. He needed to help the one that wasn't, especially since Apollo could hear the glass of the window grow less structurally sound meaning it would fall and cut into the person's unconscious body. Apollo hurried over and pulled the limp body down from the vessel. Just in time, as the remainder of the window fell from the frame in a single sheet, shattering against the side of the chopper. Apollo held the guy in his arms, looking him over. It was a kid he recognized from school. Bryan Something. He must've been thrown from the cockpit when the blades smacked against the ground. His head had punctured the window.
Bryan's eyes were closed, and his pale arms hung lifelessly.
"Son!" Jonathan shouted calling for him in the distance as he ran towards them. "You all right?"
The boy groaned weakly as Jonathan's shouting seemingly woke him and he blindly reached a hand up toward the raw scrape on his forehead.
Breathing a sigh of relief, Apollo set him on the ground.
Bryan tested his arms and legs as if trying to confirm that he was still alive.
Apollo studied his dark, scraggly hair. His deep-set eyes and stooped shoulders. He was thin, like one of the fence posts Apollo and his dad had just been repairing. Yet there was a fire in his eyes. Then Apollo remembered how he knew Bryan. He was new at school, having started just before the end of the year.
"What…happened?" Bryan managed to say.
"There's been an accident." Apollo motioned toward the ground near the helicopter. "You're lucky you landed here. In the mud."
Bryan scrambled to his feet. "Corey!" he shouted, hurrying around to the battered cockpit.
Two other people were now cautiously climbing out of the wreckage. They each had several cuts and bruises, but miraculously none of their injuries appeared to be serious. One was a middle-aged, balding man. He wore thin glasses that were slightly bent, and he was holding a cell phone in his right hand. He stood in the mud, looking back and forth between the helicopter and Apollo, something unsettling in his gaze.
The other passenger wasn't much older than Bryan. He was taller, though. And broader. They looked like brothers.
"Thank God you're okay, Corey," Bryan said.
His brother marched right up to Bryan and jabbed an angry finger into his chest.
"What were you thinking up there! You could've killed us!" Corey said angrily.
"I just looped back around like you—" Bryan started to say before he was cut off by his brother.
"This is the one thing you're supposed to be good at, Bryan! But you suck as a pilot, too, don't you? God, no wonder Mom and Dad think you're such a loser!" Corey said clearly emotional cause of the crash.
Apollo watched Bryan turn away silently.
Jonathan showed up, breathing heavily after sprinting across the field. Mercifully, he stepped between the brothers.
"Easy, guys. I've already called for help. What matters is that everyone's okay." Jonathan told them deescalating the situation.
Apollo marveled at how quickly Bryan's older brother's demeanor shifted. Two seconds ago, he'd been berating his brother. Now he was smiling at Apollo's dad like some kind of over caffeinated tractor salesman. He held out his hand for Jonathan to shake which his father did very tentatively.
"I was just explaining that to my brother, sir. The main thing is we're all okay." Corey said a charming smile on his face.
"I'm Corey Mankins," he said through an artificial grin. "This your farm?"
Jonathan nodded.
Apollo realized these weren't just any brothers. They were the sole heirs to the powerful Mankins Corporation. But what were they doing in a helicopter above his farm? He glanced at a middle aged man with glasses, who appeared to be discreetly collecting something from the wreckage slipping it back into his pocket. Apollo saw that it was a flash drive and he watched the man suspiciously.
"Where are my manners?" Corey said to Jonathan noticing Apollo and Jonathan eyeing the mysterious man in the back.
"This is Dr. Paul Wesley, a renowned scientist from Nevada. And you've already met my brother, Bryan. The three of us were out here taking atmospheric measurements to help inform our harvest schedule" Corey said still keeping his artificial charm going.
Jonathan gave his name and shook hands with them. Apollo did the same. The scientist's handshake was especially aggressive, like he was trying to establish some kind of unspoken dominance. Apollo fought the urge to show the guy what a tight grip could really feel like.
"Listen, I'm sorry about your field," Corey went on. "My father would be happy to pay any damages—"
"No, no, that won't be necessary," Jonathan said, cutting him off.
"Just a bunch of mud and dirt out here. And a barn on its last legs. I'm more concerned about you fellas." Jonathan assured him before and Corey nodded seemingly a bit shocked at the refusal of any kind of payment.
Apollo turned to the scientist. As someone who was always interested in science and especially the unknown he was curious about speaking with an actual expert.
"So…atmospheric measurements?" Apollo questioned trying to get more insight into what exactly they were doing.
"That's right," Paul said pushing up his glasses. "My company specializes in agricultural gene editing and environmental strategies."
"Future of farming," Corey added. "By tracking weather patterns, we can better predict when to plant, what to plant, and where to plant. It's like crop disease and pest scouting on a whole new level. The more science we bring to farming, the more efficient we'll be. And efficiency, as I'm sure you know…It was Mr. Kent, wasn't it?"
"That's right." Jonathan answered.
"Efficiency, Mr. Kent, brings prices down and production up. Everyone wins." Corey said to Jonathan hoping his faux charm would work on the senior Kent.
Jonathan however simply nodded politely and Apollo could tell his dad was just as skeptical as he was. Corey was a smooth talker. Apollo and his dad had never liked people who pretended to have all the answers. No matter how rich they were.
Soon a couple of fire trucks arrived at the scene.
Then an ambulance. And the county deputy sheriff.
Deputy McNally had a long yellow raincoat on, and he peered out from underneath the oversized hood after each question. Corey did most of the talking, while Apollo tried to stay out of it, standing beside his father and occasionally glancing at a dejected-looking Bryan.
EMTs took the three crash victims to the back of the ambulance to check their injuries, and Deputy McNally followed with a notepad and pen, occasionally barking directions into his crackling radio.
By the time a special flatbed tow truck had arrived, the rain was a full-on downpour. Apollo and his dad huddled under the eaves of the barn and watched the scene unfold. Not entirely strangers to interacting with the local police department. McNally was giving his men orders but strangely seemed to be looking to the scientist and Corey for approval. His crew worked to load the wrecked helicopter awkwardly onto the truck, Corey insisting they do it according to his special instructions and Deputy McNally making his men listen to them.
Before the truck pulled away, Dr. Wesley and Deputy McNally walked towards one another away from everyone else and had a discreet conversation. Wesley was seemingly telling him something that had him Deputy McNally agitated and after fighting the urge to not eavesdrop Apollo finally gave in a caught the tail end of the conversation.
"So still no sign?" Deputy McNally said.
"Not yet but this is Smallville nothing stays hidden for long" Dr. Wesley replied
"Right you are. I'll keep an eye out" McNally told him and Wesley simply nodded in response before the Deputy turned and went back to talk to his men.
Apollo stopped listening and walked over to Bryan, the kid's arm was now in a sling and a fresh butterfly bandage covered the cut on his forehead.
"You okay?" Apollo asked, motioning toward his arm.
"It's nothing," Bryan said, forcing a smile. "Just a precaution until they can do X-rays."
Apollo glanced at Bryan's arm seeing right through the sling. Through the skin and muscle and cartilage. Apollo looked at Bryan's bones—as clear as if they were outside his body. Seeing all the stuff inside a human arm didn't bother him anymore, by now he had grown use to it and was mostly curious. Fortunately, all the bones he saw were intact. There were no cracks or breaks or dislocations of any kind.
"You pulled me out the window before it came down on me," Bryan said, rubbing the back of his neck. "You're like…you're a hero, man. I could've been seriously hurt."
Apollo scoffed, adjusting his glasses. He still wasn't entirely comfortable receiving compliments after saving people's lives no matter how many times he'd done it.
"I was just in the right place at the right time, I guess" Apollo said to him warmly.
"And you're humble too, most guys who are star athletes have ego's a mile long. You're seriously one of a kind" Bryan said and Apollo sheepishly smiled.
"Everyone's one of a kind, including you. Never forget that" Apollo told him as he reassuringly put his hand on his shoulder remembering how his brother berated him after the crash. Bryan was visibly very touched by this and after an awkward moment coughed and looked away.
"Well…" Bryan turned to look at the battered helicopter lying on its side on the truck. "Can't believe I lost control like that. I'm not even sure what went wrong exactly."
"Had to be the storm," Apollo told him. "It got bad really fast."
Bryan nodded and lightning flashed, illuminating the concerned look on his face. A powerful roar of thunder followed.
"Bryan!" Corey called out from beside the ambulance. "Come on. Let's go."
Bryan shook Apollo's hand thanking him once more before running off to his brother. Apollo watched them, the Doctor and the Deputy and his men leave. Apollo briefly thought about the Deputy and the Doctor's conversation before he saw his Mum drive back to the farm having finished her shift at the hospital. Sprite was in the car with her, she usually volunteered to read stories to the sick and blind kids in her spare time so the two would usually carpool. Jonathan and he walked over to Ajak and Sprite. Ajak looked a bit confused having driven past EMTs and police cars on her way entering the farm whereas Sprite had an expectant and interested grin on her face like she was awaiting a really cool story.
"Jonathan, Apollo. What happened?" Ajak questioned as Jonathan pecked her on the lips like he usually did when she came home.
"It's a long story" Apollo said as he dapped up Sprite before kissing his Mum's forehead to greet her.
"Do tell" Sprite said way more excited than she should be after seeing a parade of cop cars and ambulance drive from their house.
"Let me shower first and I'll tell you everything" Apollo said to them both and the two nodded noticing how completely covered in mud he was.
Apollo walked into the house with his family briefly looking back at the crater caused by the crash before looking forward to his parents and his aunt and deciding to put the lingering thoughts he had about the Doctor and the Helicopter to rest.
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Also read Superman(Marvel+DC) and Marvel: Hyperion.
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