Superman: Dawnbreaker (DC Icons #4)(39)

Three of the five men did not appear to be locals. They wore black leather jackets. Militant-looking eagles were embroidered all over their clothes. Several distinct tattoos on their arms confirmed their racist beliefs. Clark assumed they owned the massive choppers parked out front.

The other two attackers wore plaid shirts and cowboy hats. Worn boots covered in spit and blood. Wrangler jeans with pucks of chewing tobacco in the back pockets.

But they weren’t the men he’d caught trespassing on his farm.

Clark recognized both of the locals. One was a man named Justin Walker, a long-distance trucker who used to be married to one of the cafeteria workers at school. The other was Sheldon Ealing, the man who’d caused the scene at the All-American Diner only an hour or so before.

“Go back to Mexico!” the tallest of the attackers shouted.

“You and your kind are ruining this town,” another added, after smashing a bottle against the ground. “You’re ruining the whole country!”

Clearly, they were all drunk. Even the victim’s desperate pleas for the men to stop were slurred. The smell of booze hovered above the entire scene like a gas.

Booze mixed with testosterone.

And desperation.

Confusion.

Clark’s jacket and shirt were in pieces around his bare, heaving chest. He’d shown up so suddenly that it took the men a few seconds to notice his presence.

“Who are you?” the heaviest one finally asked.

“Get lost, kid!” another shouted. “This ain’t your business.”

“We said, get out of here!” Sheldon barked. “Unless you want some of this yourself.” He was squinting from a distance of twenty feet and didn’t seem to recognize Clark.

The man on the ground rolled over and groaned. A tooth tumbled from his mouth into a pool of blood.

“Go home,” Clark heard himself say in a calm, stern voice. “All of you.”

One of the bikers took note of Clark’s ripped shirt. The cuffs were still intact, and shreds of cotton hung from his wrists.

“What are you doing back here anyway, kid?” the man asked suspiciously. “And why are you dressed like that?”

“You’re just as bad as him in my book,” the tallest of them said, motioning toward the Mexican man on the ground. “Making a mockery of this whole proud nation.”

Clark’s eyes burned with anger. How could these men have so much hate for people they didn’t even know?

He moved toward them, pulling in measured breaths now, letting them out slowly. He closed his eyes briefly. He didn’t want his fury to shoot out of his pupils in the form of incinerating lasers. These men deserved some kind of punishment for what they were doing, but Clark knew it wasn’t his place to do the punishing. He was here for one reason only: to protect someone who could no longer protect himself.

Once he had his anger in check, he opened his eyes and stared the men down. “Go home,” he repeated, louder this time. “You’re done here.”

“What’d you just say to me?” Sheldon shouted.

Clark motioned toward the man on the ground. “You will not touch him again, understand?”

Sheldon grinned and stepped away from the man on the asphalt. “Are you telling me what to do, boy? ’Cause I’ll put you down right next to him.”

One of the bikers threw an empty beer bottle, which shattered against the wall, and shouted, “We’re the only ones out here protecting this town anymore!”

All five began moving away from the beaten man.

They circled Clark instead.

Clark took a few more breaths, trying to think. Trying to prepare himself for what was about to happen. He considered taking off his glasses but didn’t. He’d never been in a legitimate fight. The closest was what had happened at the party. He didn’t know what to expect next. Or how to carry himself. He had superhuman strength that he knew they weren’t prepared for. And superhuman speed. But there were five of them.

And his powers were out of control. He’d just tried to fly, and he’d crashed through the roof of a building.

Would he really be able to impose his will against five grown men?

One of the men lunged at Clark from the side.

Clark saw the whole thing as if in slow motion. The man leaning forward, eyes narrowing, fists clenching, then hurling a right hook toward Clark’s face.

Yet he wasn’t able to stop it.

He stood there paralyzed as the man’s fist slammed into his jaw with a sickening crunch, but then a curious thing happened. The spell of uncertainty was broken.

The man retreated, howling in pain and staring at his shattered hand.

Clark moved forward. Unfazed now. Committed.

Sheldon grabbed a broken pool cue out of a nearby dumpster and swung it at Clark’s face, but Clark calmly blocked it with his forearm, snapping the thing like a twig.

He continued forward.

Two more of the men charged him, one from behind, the other from his right side. They both threw wild haymakers, which Clark ducked easily. But it was impossible to keep track of them all at once. A third man slammed a brick into the back of Clark’s skull. The brick exploded in a cloud of red dust and pebbles, leaving a loud ringing sound in Clark’s ears.

He emerged from the haze of the exploded brick with more determination than ever. Even when they hurt him, he now realized, they couldn’t actually hurt him.