Superman: Dawnbreaker (DC Icons #4)(47)

“What else has your brother shown you?” Lex asked. Clark had never seen him so eager. He kept looking all around, like he was searching for something specific.

Bryan pointed toward another hallway, and the three of them headed in that direction. Halfway down the hall, just before they reached an antiquated freight elevator that looked out of place, Bryan stopped at another room. “Here’s the part I really wanted to show you guys. It’s one of their agricultural genetics labs.”

There was no one inside, and the room was mostly dark, but once Clark’s eyes adjusted, he saw something that blew him away. There, on top of several tables near the window, were four ears of corn the size of small logs. Each one was at least four feet long and twice as thick as the barrel of a major-league baseball bat. There were other enlarged crops on nearby tables as well. Tomatoes as big as pumpkins. Stalks of wheat three times the normal size. A single watermelon so large that it sagged under its own weight and dwarfed the table it rested on.

“Are these real?” Clark asked.

Bryan nodded. “According to Corey, they are.”

“But they seem so…unnatural.”

“Dude, almost all farm corporations are experimenting on crops now. My dad does the same thing. You pretty much have to in order to compete in futures markets.”

“It can’t be healthy, though. Or ethical.” Clark thought of his own farm. Everything was organic and natural. And the appropriate size.

“Why not?” Lex butted in. “Genetic defects are freak occurrences, right? They’re not supposed to happen. Genetic alteration is nothing more than science correcting nature’s mistakes.”

“Yeah, but—”

“We do the same thing with vaccines,” Lex added. “Treatments for cancer and other diseases. Are you saying we shouldn’t apply the same methodology to the production of food?”

“Look how big that watermelon is. I get fixing genetic mistakes. But this is something else.” The freakish crops Clark was seeing didn’t sit well with him, but he was having a difficult time expressing why. “So…what if this keeps going on and on? Like, how would you feel if they did this to animals? Or humans?”

“Ever heard of factory farms?” Lex grinned. “And you’re telling me you wouldn’t want to be bigger, faster, and stronger?”

Clark shook his head. “Not if it took chemicals to make me that way. Or genetic alterations. I’d feel…artificial.”

“Not everyone’s born like you, though, Clark,” Bryan said. “And you didn’t do anything to deserve it, right? I mean, I didn’t do anything to deserve to be born thin and scrawny. Why shouldn’t people look for ways to level the playing field?”

Clark turned back to the watermelon, considering his special powers. What if he was the product of something like this? What if his powers were artificial?

“Think about this,” Lex added. “If we can grow bigger and better crops that still taste good, maybe we can help end world hunger. Or at least drive food prices down. That’s a good thing, right?”

Clark shrugged, ready to put this whole conversation on hold. This definitely wasn’t the best setting for some deep philosophical discussion about the future of agriculture.

“Okay, Lex,” Bryan said. “We’ve seen the inside of the lab. It’s probably best if we get out of here now.”

“Hang on,” Lex said. “Isn’t there anything else interesting we can see? I feel like we just got here.”

Bryan shrugged. “I’ve only been in here once. And this is as far as we got. Corey said he wasn’t able to take me into the restricted wing.”

“The restricted wing?” Lex looked down the hall before turning back to Bryan. “We definitely gotta keep going. Just a couple more minutes. You can’t tell me you aren’t curious.”

Bryan looked around nervously. “Two minutes. Then we go, okay?”

But Lex was already continuing on.

Clark tapped Bryan on the arm. “If you think we should go, let’s go. I don’t want you getting into trouble.”

Bryan shrugged. “I guess a couple more minutes isn’t gonna make much difference. Come on.”

Clark thought about letting the two of them go on without him. But he knew he couldn’t do that. Instead, he switched his mind-set from investigating the lab to looking out for his friends.

They turned down a hallway to the left. Most of the rooms they passed now were dark and empty.

Clark froze when he saw the shadows of two stooped figures pass slowly from one hall to another. But when he and Bryan and Lex reached that spot, Clark didn’t see anyone. It was as if the figures had disappeared.

As they came upon a large conference room, a voice from behind stopped them in their tracks. “Who are you? And what are you doing here?”

The three of them spun around and found a large man in a suit standing just down the hallway with his arms crossed. He had blond hair and some kind of phone device in his ear.

“We’re f-fine,” Bryan stammered. “I was sent here to track down—”

“You have no reason to be here. This area is strictly off-limits.” The man raised a walkie-talkie toward his mouth, barking, “Security, we have a code red in section C, zone four. Request immediate intervention.”