Elsewhere
LexCorp Tower
Rain pattered against the immense glass windows of the penthouse, each drop sliding down the surface like a tear. The city below was restless, a living thing in agony. Helicopters circled above the damaged headquarters of the Daily Planet, their searchlights cutting through the smoke like knives. Police lights flickered in the distance, pulsing like distant, dying stars.
Every television in the room carried the same live feed.
No reporters spoke.
No analysts debated.
No commentators speculated.
The footage spoke for itself.
On the largest screen, Superman stood amidst the smoke and debris, his cape limp in the still air. In his hands was a black body bag. The camera zoomed in, the lens unflinching.
The world recognized immediately whose body was inside.
Lois Lane.
The room seemed to grow colder, the air thicker, as if Metropolis itself was holding its breath.
Lex Luthor stood before the screens, his hands clasped behind his back, his posture rigid. His reflection in the glass was pale, almost ghostly, his eyes sharp as he watched the unfolding tragedy.
For several seconds, he didn't blink.
On another screen, Superman carefully laid the body bag onto a stretcher, his movements precise, controlled. Then he turned, and the camera caught the second black bag.
Jimmy Olsen.
The camera lingered on Superman's face.
No anger or tears.
Just emptiness.
A void where the world's greatest hero should have been.
Lex exhaled slowly, his breath fogging the glass of his tumbler. He lowered the drink to the table, the crystal clinking against the polished surface.
"I… actually did not think he would go through with it, that... That clown..! ."
His voice was low, almost a whisper, but it carried in the silence of the penthouse.
Behind him, Mercy Graves, his longtime bodyguard and confidante, stood motionless, her arms crossed, her expression unreadable.
She had seen Lex in every mood, triumphant, furious, calculating but this was different. This was something akin to awe.
"Sir?" she ventured, her voice cautious.
Lex did not turn. His eyes remained fixed on the screen.
"The Joker. I always assumed he was… contained. A nuisance. A variable we could account for."
He shook his head slightly, his lips curling in a cold, humorless smile.
"I spent half my life preparing for gods."
He turned away from the window, his gaze sweeping over the screens, each one showing the same devastation.
"I never expected a lunatic with makeup to succeed where armies failed."
Mercy stepped closer, her boots silent on the marble floor
.
"You're not… concerned, sir?"
Lex let out a short, sharp laugh, the sound devoid of humor.
"Concerned? Mercy, I'm fascinated."
He approached the television again, his fingers hovering just above the screen, as if he could reach through and touch the tragedy unfolding before him.
The image changed.
Now it showed old photographs of Lois and Jimmy.
Memorial pictures.
Already.
The media moved quickly.
Lex stared at Lois' photograph, his expression unreadable. Then at Superman. Then back again.
His face gradually changed.
The shock remained, but concern joined it, then something darker. Something like fear.
Because he knew Superman .
Perhaps better than anyone else on Earth.
Not because they were friends.
Not because they trusted one another.
But because they had spent decades opposing each other.
Observing.
Understanding.
Testing.
Lex spoke quietly, his voice barely above a murmur.
"I know who you are, Kal-El."
He sat down slowly, his body sinking into the leather chair as if weighed down by the implications of what he was witnessing.
"I know what keeps you moving."
His eyes returned to the screen.
Superman still hadn't left the Daily Planet.
He still stood there.
Motionless.
"I know how much she mattered to you."
Silence filled the penthouse, so thick it was almost suffocating.
Then Lex's voice lowered further, his words tinged with a rare, unsettling uncertainty.
"And I know what you could become… without her."
That thought lingered, heavy and unwelcome.
He hated it.
Because for perhaps the first time in years,
He wasn't thinking like a rival.
He was thinking like a man watching another man lose everything.
He remembered the countless arguments.
The countless battles.
The countless ideological debates.
Superman had always believed people could be better.
Always.
Stubbornly.
Infuriatingly.
Lois had reinforced that belief.
She grounded him.
Reminded him why humanity was worth protecting.
Now she was gone.
Lex slowly removed his glasses, rubbing the bridge of his nose as if trying to erase the image from his mind.
His reflection looked back at him in the darkened window, older, more tired, more human than he cared to admit.
He looked again at Superman.
Still standing.
Still silent.
Then Lex spoke, his voice low, measured, as if each word was a piece in a deadly game of chess.
"I do not know what you will do next, Clark."
A pause. The weight of the unknown pressing down on him.
"I do not know if you will grieve."
Another pause. His fingers tapping against the armrest of his chair.
"I do not know if you will rage."
The room seemed smaller, the walls closing in as the reality of the situation settled over him.
He folded his hands, his knuckles white.
"I only know that every government on Earth… should be terrified right now."
Because if Superman snapped,
There was no contingency.
No army.
No weapon.
No strategy.
Not truly.
Lex understood something most of humanity never fully appreciated,
Superman restrained himself every second of every day.
If that restraint disappeared,
The world would enter entirely new mathematics.
His eyes slowly narrowed, his mind racing through the implications.
"The Kryptonian's moral compass… was his greatest weakness."
Mercy shifted, her expression darkening.
"And now, sir?"
Lex did not look at her. His gaze remained fixed on the screen, where Superman still had not moved.
"Now, Mercy, we prepare for the storm."
He leaned forward, his elbows resting on his knees, his voice dropping to a whisper.
"Because if he does break…"
A beat. The air in the room grew colder.
"…then the only question left… is whether anything can stop him."
Mercy did not respond. She didn't need to.
She knew the weight of his words.
Lex stood abruptly, his chair rolling back with a sharp scrape.
"Contact the board. Discreetly."
Mercy nodded, already pulling out her comm device.
"And sir?"
Lex paused, his hand on the window, his gaze fixed on the city below.
"Double the security on all LexCorp facilities. If he does lose control…"
He turned, his eyes cold, his voice a blade.
"I want to be the last thing he sees before he realizes… he's made a mistake."
Mercy hesitated, then nodded, her expression grim.
"And if he doesn't, sir?"
Lex smiled, but there was no warmth in it.
"Then we watch. And we wait."
He turned back to the screens, his hands clasped behind his back.
"Because this…"
He gestured to the image of Superman, still motionless, still silent.
"This is the most dangerous man on Earth, the most powerful man to fly our skies."
The news continued playing.
The city mourned.
And high above Metropolis, in the silence of his penthouse, Lex Luthor simply watched and waited.
Because the game had changed.
And for the first time in a long time,
Lex Luthor wasn't sure he was ready to play.