Greg Cox - Man of Steel

It felt as if a giant was stepping on him, grinding him beneath its heel, even as the World Engine continued to spew its toxic gases into the air. Gravity waves penetrated the Earth, increasing the planet’s mass. Soon the entire world would be fit only for people who didn’t belong there.

No, Superman thought, I can’t let this machine win.

He remembered all the people who were depending on him, all the souls he’d touched and been touched by in his travels—his mom, Lois, Pete, Lana, Captain Heraldson and the crew of the Debbie Sue , the roughnecks on that oil rig, Chrissy the waitress, Colonel Hardy, Father Leone…

And he remembered those who had sacrificed everything to give him the chance to make a difference: Jor-El, Lara Lor-Van, and Jonathan Kent. He couldn’t let them down, not with seven billion human lives depending on him.

Billions of years of terrestrial evolution, millennia of human civilization and progress, generations of men and women fighting to make a better life for themselves and their prosperity, stood to be wiped way unless he came through now—and became the hero his fathers and mothers had dreamed he could be.

“You just have to decide what kind of man you want to grow up to be, Clark. Because whoever that man is… he’s going to change the world.”

Or save it.

He raised his face from the gravel. Incredibly, impossibly, he staggered to his feet. The crushing force of the column made just standing upright a Herculean feat, but that wasn’t good enough. He lifted off from the flattened island, rising slowly against the pressure, then gaining speed.

The gravity deformed his face, making his skin ripple, as he stared up into the infernal heart of the World Engine. His pupils glowed red.

Crimson energy shot from his eyes, meeting the gravity beam head on. For a moment the two forces appeared evenly matched. Then, screaming from the strain, Superman broke the stalemate and drove himself upward into the belly of the World Engine. Turning his own indestructible body into a weapon, the Man of Steel burst through the crown of machine and shot into the churning alien clouds.

Suddenly brain-dead, the World Engine tottered upon its monstrous legs. Its magnetic tendrils went limp. Flames erupted from its perforated head. Unsteady legs gave out as the entire structure collapsed in on itself, crashing down onto what was left of the volcanic island, which suddenly resembled Krakotoa.

The blast from the Engine’s demise knocked Superman from the sky.

After a few minutes Lombard opened his eyes, and the expression on his face showed that he hadn’t expected to be alive.

Perry knew how he felt. Cradling Jenny’s head, he watched in surprise as the encroaching column ground to a halt. Gravity waves rebounded back toward the hovering starship. The gigantic column, which was looming like Niagara Falls over their heads, evaporated into the ether. The debris ring orbiting Zod’s spaceship fell apart. Perry ducked his head, shielding Jenny with his body, as powdered stone and glass fell like rain.

He shared a baffled look with Lombard. What on earth had just happened?

Not that he was complaining.

Sirens keened aboard the Black Zero. Faora stumbled as the bridge shook beneath her feet. Her fierce eyes demanded an explanation from Jax-Ur, who was viewing a holographic display with open alarm.

“The World Engine’s stopped transmitting!” he cried out.

Faora knew what that meant. With its link to the Engine broken, the gravity column came apart, creating an energy discharge that rocked the ship. The bridge crew scrambled to stabilize them, even as she tried to make sense of the failure.

“How?” she asked urgently.

Jax-Ur knew better than to keep her waiting.

“It was Kal-El!” he reported. “He’s destroyed it!”

The son of Jor-El? she raged. That womanborn turncoat?

A murderous fury ignited inside her, hotter than Earth’s gaudy yellow sun. The World Engine was essential to their plans to reshape this wretched planet. Kal-El had destroyed more than just a machine—he had murdered the dream of a new world that had sustained Krypton’s only true survivors through all their years of bitter exile.

She shook as her fists clenched at her sides.

The Phantom Zone was too good for such a traitor. Kal-El must pay for his perfidy, along with the miserable human beings he chose above his own kind.

“He did it!” Dr. Hamilton shouted via the comms. “The gravity fields are out!”

Lois grinned, trading excited looks with Hardy. The view from the cargo plane’s windshield confirmed the scientist’s pronouncement. The punishing gravity column had been sucked back into the Black Zero, while the ship’s halo of levitating debris was being dispersed by the wind. At long last, they had a clear shot at their Kryptonian target.

Thank you, Superman, she said silently. I knew you could do it!

The C-17 banked around for its final run. Two remaining F-35s provided escort.

“NORTHCOM, this is Guardian,” Hardy reported. “We are passing through phase line red. We are good to go.”

“Godspeed, Guardian,” Swanwick replied. “You are cleared hot.”

Hardy glanced at Lois.

“We’re lining up our final run.” he said. “It’s up to you and Hamilton now.”

Finally, she thought. Unbuckling her seatbelt, she scrambled toward the cockpit stairs, clutching the Kryptonian command key. Hardy barked into his headset as she headed for the cargo hold.

“Loadmaster, power panel switch and open doors!”

The rear cargo ramp was just opening up as Lois rushed into the hold, joining Dr. Hamilton, Gomez, and the two armed guards. Strong winds invaded the hold, blowing against her. The Kryptonian space capsule rested securely on the rails, waiting to be deployed.

A quick glance at Hamilton’s gravity map confirmed that the dangerous fields had evaporated entirely.

“Doors are open!” the loadmaster reported.

The World Engine’s cataclysmic demise knocked Superman for a loop. Crashing back down onto the island, he landed in the shadow of a rocky spire outside the flattened disaster area. Displaced seawater, which had been caught up in the gravitational vortex of the machine, flowed back into the ocean, leaving behind a series of tide pools. The toxic clouds emitted by the Engine began to disperse, letting the dawn through. The morning sun shone down on the island.

Thank heaven, Superman thought.

He stirred upon the barren shore, barely able to move. His hard-fought battle against the World Engine had left him drained of energy. A shaft of sunlight, slicing toward him, might have restored his strength, but the spire’s long shadow cut him off from the tantalizing yellow radiance so that it might as well have been miles away. Straining, he groped for the light, but his desperate fingers fell short by mere inches.

Salvation was just out of reach.

“Please—” he croaked, his voice barely a whisper. “Please.”

He stretched his arm as far he could.

Hardy’s voice rang out over the plane’s PA system:

“We are LZ inbound and two minutes out! Lining up the drop!”

Lois joined Dr. Hamilton next to the space capsule. She shouted over the rushing wind.

“Time to activate the drive!”

He nodded enthusiastically, looking as excited as a kid on Christmas morning. Never mind saving humanity from extinction, the scientist clearly saw this as the experiment of a lifetime.