Entrance Post
"ATTEMPT NINETY-EIGHT COMPLETE."
The room is a mix of grey and green, dark and eerie at the same time. It's oddly settling, comforting. Maybe I should find this worrisome, maybe not, I don't know. But this looks like the lab of a mad scientist, and it really should give me the creeps.
Maybe knowing what it really is helps.
"PROTEIN LINK FAILURE AT SEVENTY-TWO HOURS TWELVE MINUTES FIFTEEN SECONDS."
I feel my shoulders slump, my eyes close slowly, the weight of yet another failure on my shoulders. I don't need the computer to tell me what I already know.
"ATTEMPT NINETY-NINE UNSUCESSFUL."
I sigh out loud, pressing my fist and my forehead against the tank in front of me, the one full of a green liquid. Another tool in my plan to bring him back. Another tool in a plan that keeps failing, time and again.
"Computer," I ask aloud, glad the machine can't detect how tired and depressed I feel right now. "What went wrong?"
I uncurl my fist, instead pressing my open hand against the glass. I've been trying to clone Kon, Superboy, my best friend, pretty much since I got back from my trip with Dick and Bruce and managed to set up my secret lab here in the basement of Titan's Tower. This has been the ninety-ninth attempt to clone him. All have failed.
"KRYPTONIAN EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL D.N.A. REJECTING HUMAN D.N.A. AT LEVEL THREE."
I feel myself getting angry. I feel it bubbling up inside of me. I've had the patience for almost a hundred attempts. And enough is enough.
"STABILIZER NEEDED. SPECIFICS UNKNOWN."
I don't know what to do anymore. I could call for another attempt, but what's the point? None of the others worked. Why should the next one?
"SOLUTION UNKNOWN."
And that's when I lose it.
"AAAAHHH!" I push, I push hard, and the whole case tumbles over, glass shattering, green liquid spilling across the cold hard floor. But I don't stop there. I smash everything I can. Computers, tables, charts and equipment. All of it worthless, every last piece of it useless to me. All I want is my friend back. All I want is not to completely lose yet another person. First it was Mom, and then Stephanie, Dad, Kon, even Cass. I keep losing people, again and again, and I can never stop it, I can never do anything about it. Not even now. Not even when I think that finally, finally, I have a chance to change things.
I fall to my knees, having destroyed almost everything, and find a picture of Kon on the floor. With a cry of rage, I bring my fist down on it, and suddenly there are spider web cracks over my best friend's face. And I only feel ashamed.
I hear a voice, calling my name, but for some reason it sounds far away, as if at the end of a long tunnel.
"Tim?"
And all of a sudden, I'm not in the lab anymore. In fact, as I turn my head up and sweep my gaze over the long street stretching before me, I get the feeling that I'm not anywhere I've ever been before.
This is, I suspect, not good.
The room is a mix of grey and green, dark and eerie at the same time. It's oddly settling, comforting. Maybe I should find this worrisome, maybe not, I don't know. But this looks like the lab of a mad scientist, and it really should give me the creeps.
Maybe knowing what it really is helps.
"PROTEIN LINK FAILURE AT SEVENTY-TWO HOURS TWELVE MINUTES FIFTEEN SECONDS."
I feel my shoulders slump, my eyes close slowly, the weight of yet another failure on my shoulders. I don't need the computer to tell me what I already know.
"ATTEMPT NINETY-NINE UNSUCESSFUL."
I sigh out loud, pressing my fist and my forehead against the tank in front of me, the one full of a green liquid. Another tool in my plan to bring him back. Another tool in a plan that keeps failing, time and again.
"Computer," I ask aloud, glad the machine can't detect how tired and depressed I feel right now. "What went wrong?"
I uncurl my fist, instead pressing my open hand against the glass. I've been trying to clone Kon, Superboy, my best friend, pretty much since I got back from my trip with Dick and Bruce and managed to set up my secret lab here in the basement of Titan's Tower. This has been the ninety-ninth attempt to clone him. All have failed.
"KRYPTONIAN EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL D.N.A. REJECTING HUMAN D.N.A. AT LEVEL THREE."
I feel myself getting angry. I feel it bubbling up inside of me. I've had the patience for almost a hundred attempts. And enough is enough.
"STABILIZER NEEDED. SPECIFICS UNKNOWN."
I don't know what to do anymore. I could call for another attempt, but what's the point? None of the others worked. Why should the next one?
"SOLUTION UNKNOWN."
And that's when I lose it.
"AAAAHHH!" I push, I push hard, and the whole case tumbles over, glass shattering, green liquid spilling across the cold hard floor. But I don't stop there. I smash everything I can. Computers, tables, charts and equipment. All of it worthless, every last piece of it useless to me. All I want is my friend back. All I want is not to completely lose yet another person. First it was Mom, and then Stephanie, Dad, Kon, even Cass. I keep losing people, again and again, and I can never stop it, I can never do anything about it. Not even now. Not even when I think that finally, finally, I have a chance to change things.
I fall to my knees, having destroyed almost everything, and find a picture of Kon on the floor. With a cry of rage, I bring my fist down on it, and suddenly there are spider web cracks over my best friend's face. And I only feel ashamed.
I hear a voice, calling my name, but for some reason it sounds far away, as if at the end of a long tunnel.
"Tim?"
And all of a sudden, I'm not in the lab anymore. In fact, as I turn my head up and sweep my gaze over the long street stretching before me, I get the feeling that I'm not anywhere I've ever been before.
This is, I suspect, not good.