Superman: Dawnbreaker (DC Icons #4)(55)

Seconds later, he was kneeling in the grass in front of the loader. He tore off eight small strips of the steel from the side, each one about a foot long. He then pressed each strip in his bare hands to flatten it. Next, he concentrated on the middle of each piece until a thin laser shot out from his eyes and he was able to weld two perpendicular pieces together, and then he burned a small hole through the center of the bottom one. He did this three more times and let them cool for a few minutes before slipping them into his backpack.

He then pulled out the crumpled letter Gloria had tried to throw away.

He took out a Smallville High T-shirt from a recent pep rally and put it on while studying her address.

A few minutes later, Clark found himself moving through downtown Smallville.

It was almost nine, and the moon had overtaken the sun in the sky, but many of the businesses were still open. The restaurants and cafés. The two-screen movie house. And there were dozens of people out and about. Young couples on dates. Families. Old people with canes moving slowly down the wide sidewalk. He recognized almost all of them. This was his community. But it also wasn’t.

What would happen if he told them the truth?

What if he stood atop the library steps right now and announced that he was really an alien named Kal-El? That he’d landed here in a spaceship when he was only a baby.

Would they run away screaming?

Would they call Deputy Rogers?

And what would the police do once they had him in custody? Stare? Prod him with a stick? Draw a sample of his blood?

He walked south through the downtown and out the other end. Smallville was too tiny and rural to have an actual “bad” area. But the neighborhoods in the south end were more downtrodden. The streets grew narrower and were full of potholes. Some store signs were in both Spanish and English, and there were bars over many of the windows. A few dilapidated fences surrounding abandoned lots were covered in graffiti, and he remembered Mrs. Sovak’s lecture about Smallville’s hidden history of redlining. It hit him even harder in the context of what he’d just learned about himself.

When Clark arrived at Gloria’s building, he glanced at the letter again, this time looking for her apartment number. It was 3B. He glanced up at the faded facade of the structure, assuming the number three meant the third floor. There were only three windows on that level, and one was high and very small, which made Clark think it was a bathroom window. That left two possibilities. He picked up a tiny pebble and lobbed it at the closest one.

The pebble tapped the glass and fell away.

The window remained dark.

He waited a minute before tossing a second pebble, this time at the other window. A light turned on. The blinds were slowly swept aside, and a silhouette of what looked like Gloria appeared in the window.

Clark waved, heart racing.

In a few seconds, she disappeared from the window.

His shoulders slumped and he cursed himself. Why did he just show up at her apartment building uninvited, after dark, and think she’d be happy to see him?

But hadn’t she said they could talk anytime? That she’d drop everything?

Just as he was turning to leave, he heard the lobby door creak open behind him. He saw Gloria standing there, dressed in jeans and a Smallville High sweatshirt, her hair pulled up.

“You okay?” she asked.

The kindness in her voice made his chest ache.

He shook his head.

She motioned for him to follow her to a short stairwell on the side of the graffiti-tagged building. She sat down and patted the spot next to her. “What is it, Clark?”

He broke eye contact when he felt like he might get emotional. He knew he wasn’t actually going to cry, of course. He’d never shed a tear in his entire life. Not even as a kid. And now he understood why. That was the whole point.

“Clark?”

He shook his head again. “My dad told me some stuff tonight, and it…I don’t even know.”

Gloria hesitated, then slowly reached out her hand to him, palm up. He took it, and the second their skin touched, an electricity surged through his entire body. “It’s okay if we just sit here awhile,” she said. “We don’t have to say anything.”

She gazed up at the dark sky. If only he could explain to her what was up there. And where he’d come from. He gently squeezed her hand and said, “Can you go somewhere with me?”

“When?” she asked. “Now?”

He nodded. “I sort of planned a surprise for you. But I understand if it’s kind of late.”

“No, I wanna do your surprise.” She looked up at her building. “Wait here a sec. I have to get my mom’s permission. With everything happening around Smallville right now, I don’t want her to worry.”

Clark watched Gloria hurry back into her building.

She came out less than a minute later, saying, “I could really use some kind of distraction, Clark. Lana was here earlier, talking to people. Did she tell you it’s not just Smallville? People are missing from neighboring counties and cities, too. Like Metropolis. And some of them aren’t undocumented.”

Clark stood, crushed by this news. “What’s happening, Gloria? Who’s responsible?”

She shook her head. “I can’t even talk about it right now. Can we just do your surprise? Please?”

He nodded and looked out over her neighborhood. “Come on.”