Issue #1.01
The Cage: Part 1
Three Months Ago
Apollo 26 research site, The Moon
The plains were cold and quiet as they always were, the sun was about to rise over the plains of the once proud sea of Mare Crisium, now it was nothing but empty desert. 40 miles away from the site of the last shuttle to make landfall on the surface - Apollo 26, emblazed proudly with the Lexcorp logo. Inside, the astronauts were working tirelessly trying to chart out the activity they had been seeing on their scanners for the past 5 months. The shuttle had been launched from the earth seven days ago and was now finally set up. Aboard was the proud crew serving under captain Prinshaw, a decorated spacefarer from Minnesota, famous for being the first nation-sponsored human to set foot on Mars three years ago. He didn't much care for diplomacy and politics anymore, though. That's why he took up a private contract with Luthor. Besides, Lionel made him a deal too good to pass up.
With him were several scientists and astronauts, the twelve of them combined had as many Ph.D.'s as a university and several of them had a military background. They were sent here to examine what's been happening on the moon's surface, as they had received readings that made just about no sense, meteor falls fourteen-hundred times higher than nominal readings from previous years as well as increased seismic activity far beyond the projected rates, Moonquakes with far higher intensity than normal. Something was happening on the moon, and while the rest of the world had been occupied with figuring out what was going on further out in the solar system with the knowledge of aliens revealed to humanity, Prinshaw and his crew were dedicated to making sure earth' closest neighbor stayed intact.
Prinshaw was working on some papers inside of his quarters when the biochemist McGaff walked in, tablet in hand.
"Yo, boss." He began and Prinshaw barely looked up from his papers.
"There's something on the scanner. Something weird. I was looking for reactions to the lunar flowers NASA planted last time they were here - y'know, ones that don't need water to grow? And they've seen massive development. Or at least they had till about four hours ago." This made Jake Prinshaw look up from his papers.
"Four hours ago?"
"Yeah. The 14 kilometers of flowerbeds are just gone. Torn out of the soil."
A notification sound dinged on his tablet and McGaff's eyes widened. "Uhhhh... You seeing that?" He asked and Prinshaw glanced at his computer before getting a shocked expression on his face.
"Shit."
He and McGaff made their way to the bridge of the docked station.
"Crew, this is Prinshaw speaking. We have to get the hell out of here. A Level 9 moonquake is coming out way. This station is only simulated to hold against a level 8. Everyone, move to bracing zones as we make preparations to evacuate." He announced over the P.A System. Everyone on the station scurried, orderly yet quickly. Everyone knew exactly what was important and what wasn't, packing and placing objects in safe containers that could hold even if the station was destroyed - if the station was destroyed the research would be retrieved by Lexcorp robots to ensure that their work wasn't lost.
Prinshaw made his way to the bracing zone, which was essentially a set of bunkers built to handle this sort of thing, which was when the third shocking revelation about the moonquakes occurred. The readings were abnormal even for a level 9 moonquake. There had only been four others recorded in the 60 years humans had kept a record of these things - but this one was completely different than any of them. They had all come from death within the moon, this one was only 10 or so meters within the crust of the soil, and it was getting more and more shallow.
"What the fuck" Prinshaw suggested, as the scanners now would pick up exactly where the quake was coming from, their eastern side, from the Harbinger Mountains. He opened up the camera feed and he could see a shape moving. This wasn't a moonquake exactly. It was an attack.
"Grims! Get me a visual at the western side, towards the mountains. X4 Cameras, gogo!" He shouted, Grims sprung into action, manning the tech station inside of the reinforced bunker, she rerouted the access from the main tech station above to this one, allowing them full access to the superior cameras on the particular side of the station.
"Holy mother of god" she exclaimed, hand in front of her face. Her colleagues all gathered around, Prinshaw already knew, and feared, what was on it, he only needed confirmation from everyone else's reaction. A Moonworm.
"How did we wake it up?" McGaff asked, and Prinshaw wasn't sure.
"Our scanners shouldn't have been able to piss it off right?" McGaff continued
Epkins, geologist chipped in. He spoke sternly, as he always did.
"The meteors may have angered it, meteors cause smaller moonquakes, 3's and 4's when they impact the lunar surface. With this kind of frequency, it's as if someone was poking at you with a needle while you're asleep."
"We've never even seen a moonworm of this size. Perhaps it's older or of higher status than the others..." McGaff spoke up.
"You think the worms have a
queen?" Grims questioned, a little bit of surprise in her voice.
"Everyone, we execute protocol eleven-forty-five. God bless us all." Prinshaw commanded interrupting their talk, pressing the button to his side with his fingertip, revealing each of their spacesuits for them.
Being rational men and women of science, they all looked at each other and continued putting on their spacesuits. The station was doomed, and the bunker might sustain a single attack of the moonworm of this size, but they would each have to navigate with their tech suits to get to any of the other stations on the moon to survive. The chance of survival for any of them was low.
Grims continued watching the camera as the moonworm got closer, now coming into view. Its grotesque visage made her stomach churn, it was as twice the size of the space station, and three times as high, effectively two football fields coming at them. But, as she put on her helmet she noticed something else. The sun was creeping ever closer to them, rising behind them and shining light towards the path of the worm, and in that light, she saw a figure. Her eyes lit up with confusion
"Captain... You should see this." She spoke and Prinshaw glanced over, securing his fellow astronauts' gear.
"Is that-"
"Yeah... It's a person. On the moon... In a hoodie" Zooming in, the picture was hard to decipher much, except that it was a man with a hood pulled up over his face. And something was in his hand. The worm was rising from the lunar dust ready to attack the station, ten meters ahead of the station stood the man, staring it down, putting the object in his hand to his face.
"He- He's drinking coffee I think" Prinshaw was utterly shocked.
The worm jumped out of the dust and leaped at them and in an instant, the man formed a fist and leaped into the air, meeting the worm. An explosion of kinetic force rocked the station as dust blew up all around them and they all felt the quake, shaking the entire station. Nobody could tell what happened after it, except that the worm got a hole through half of its head, killing it instantly and the man had vanished, saving the station.
I'm trying to run away from my own feet
If I don't touch the ground
There's not a soul on earth that could track me down
Searching for respite from the coward that I've become
Why does running away
Feel so much like a cage?Shortly thereafter
Smallville, Kansas.
"178 days I've been gone. Almost six months. I'm sorry for not visiting sooner." Clark spoke, wearing the same hoodie, the blackness had turned to gray, almost white from the dust and solar radiation. He stood at graves. It was a couple's grave he was standing in front of. One of them read.
HERE LIES CLARK JOSEPH KENT
BELOVED SON & FRIEND TO ALLSomething about reading your own headstone never sits right. Perhaps it's a human instinct. Even though Clark could see every atom making up the stone, each imperfection in the carving, he still couldn't believe it. He focused back at the headstone not his own.
He couldn't read her name, his eyes welled up as his head hung low.
"I am so sorry. I thought I would feel better if I got to get out all of this anger. I've fought anything I could get my hands on. I thought if I got stronger, I would feel better knowing that I'd be strong enough to save you." He gritted his teeth and his fist was clenched, the ground cracking under his feet. Six months ago when he left earth he had to exert himself massively to fight one of the moonworms. Now, after all of the solar energy he absorbed while spending months in space, he could defeat their queen in a single hit. But this knowledge didn't make him feel better. It only made him feel worse.
"The world thinks I am dead. Perhaps it's better that way. I need time. To allow myself to feel anything but anger. It's not what you wanted, and I am truly sorry for letting you down again, my love. But I can't be the hero people need me to be. I can't shoulder that burden." He hunched down and opened up a small metal box he took out of his pocket, in it he put his engagement ring and then jammed his hand deep into the earth leaving the case there. Covering up the hole he had made before he stood up. Looking once more at the gravestone in front of him, tears rolled down his face as the ground vanished below him as he ascended to the skies.
& HIS WIFE TO BE
BELOVED SISTER, DAUGHTER & FRIEND
LANA ELIZABETH LANG 
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