Chapter Text
Bank robberies in Metropolis had dropped off dramatically since Superman moved in five years ago. The most recent one had been perpetrated by an unarmed homeless man with diabetes who clearly just wanted a roof over his head and some semblance of healthcare, even if it was in prison. (Clark Kent’s profile on him in the Daily Planet had led to an outpouring of sympathy and gifts for the robber, as well as a good job offer as soon as he made parole.)
This robbery, though, seemed serious. They had masks, hostages, and what looked like custom-made electricity guns in addition to more prosaic handguns. These guys were expecting him. On the bright side, they probably wouldn’t have bothered with electricity guns if they had access to Kryptonite, so there shouldn’t be any of that around.
He was peering through the roof of the bank, trying to figure out how to take out the robbers without putting any of the hostages at risk, when a sound stood out against the background noises of Metropolis: the unmistakable rhythm of helicopter blades, approaching fast. He swooped over to check it out, but realized that it was clearly marked as a news copter and turned his attention back to the bank.
That was when he felt the peculiar sensation of all his muscles involuntarily clenching as hard as they could, accompanied by bright light obscuring his vision. He knew he had been hit by a blast of electricity, but not where it came from or how it hit him in midair. By the time his vision cleared, he found himself barely a yard above the roof of the bank, and just managed to avoid going through it.
So, not a news helicopter, then. They’d managed to angle their shot so that Superman was between them and the bank’s lightning rod, making sure that the path of least resistance went straight through him.
Before they could line up another shot, he circled behind the helicopter until he was standing on the tail, then reached one arm up and let the blades break against it. He let the helicopter fall for a few seconds before he grabbed it, just to shake them up a little, then placed it on the ground behind the police line in the bank parking lot. It was immediately surrounded by officers.
“Thanks, Superman,” one of the police officers said. “We’ve got them trapped now. Only way out is through us.”
That was when every officer’s walkie-talkie simultaneously let out a crackle of static, followed by a frantic announcement.
“Clear a path! I repeat, clear a path! They’re in the armored car!”
Clark jumped into the air to assess the situation. Apparently there’d been an armored car parked outside the bank when the robbery started, and the robbers had used a mass of hostages as human shields to move from the building to the car. That might mean they had some kind of inside help--he was pretty sure armored cars were supposed to be harder to steal than that--but that would be for the police to figure out later.
He would have just ripped the roof off the car, but there was a hostage inside with a handgun pressed to her temple. Even he couldn’t get through armor plating fast enough to keep the trigger from being pulled. He’d have to stop them some other way.
“Superman, I know you can hear me,” one of the robbers said from inside the car. “You pick this thing up or start messing around with heat rays and she’s dead, got it?”
Was he supposed to respond somehow? He hoped not, since he couldn’t see any non-threatening way to do so.
The armored car continued to barrel down the street, apparently heading for the tunnel to New Jersey. They did realize that he didn’t have to let them go if they got out of Metropolis, didn’t they? They must.
At the entrance to the tunnel, the car put on an extra burst of speed, and someone inside yelled “Catch!” The hostage was being pushed out the car door.
There wasn’t any time to plan, only to fly down as fast as he could, match speed with the car, grab the screaming hostage, and swerve off to the side in a curve that he hoped was tight enough to keep them from slamming into the wall of the tunnel but loose enough that the acceleration wouldn’t hit her with too much force. She blacked out from the jerk, but he’d held her neck steady and a quick scan didn’t reveal any internal bleeding or organ damage, so he’d done about as well as circumstances permitted.
Since he wasn’t going to just leave her unconscious by the side of the road, he took her to one of the pursuing police cars and deposited her with them. He was about to go back into the tunnel after the thieves when he heard an explosion.
The overpass at the entrance to the tunnel had been blown up, blocking it off and leaving--Clark grimaced at the poor timing--a school bus dangling with two wheels over the edge. He could hear the children inside screaming.
He lifted the bus without too much trouble and deposited it back on the road, then hesitated, torn between trying to calm the hysterical children and going after the thieves.
“I’ve got the kids, Superman,” the bus driver yelled. “You go get the bastards who did this!”
When he got back into the tunnel through the side that hadn’t been blocked off, the robbers had almost finished transferring the money from the armored car to an unremarkable hatchback sedan. Superman dashed in and got their electricity guns away from them before they realized he was back, taking the time to bend each one into uselessness.
Two of the five men immediately put their hands up and dropped the guns and money, but the other three started shooting at him with handguns.
“Hey, watch out!” Superman said. “This is an enclosed space, you could get hurt by a--”
Before anyone else could react, a bullet bounced off his chest, then off the side of the armored car. It was headed towards the face of one of the gunmen when he darted over and caught it.
“--ricochet,” he finished. “Now put those down.”
Once the police had taken custody of the robbers, Superman headed towards STAR Labs with one of the bent electricity guns, grinning to himself once he was high enough to be out of sight. This had been a tricky one, but no one had died or even been seriously hurt. If Dr. Hamilton could figure out where the custom-made guns had come from, this could be a complete victory.
“You’re too late,” Dr. Hamilton said as soon as he got there. “They’re long gone.”
“What? Who?”
“Didn’t you hear me calling you? A bunch of masked men broke in here and stole an experimental para-radio transceiver!”
“Oh jeez, Dr. Hamilton, I’m sorry. There was a bank robbery, and then a schoolbus--”
“It’s alright, I understand. Even you can’t be everywhere at once. I suppose that explains where the police were, too.” He sighed. “I can’t figure out why anyone would want to steal that transceiver anyway. I made it to test some theories about how you draw strength from the sun, and it did seem to confirm the existence of another spectrum parallel to the EM spectrum, but I couldn’t even begin to theorize how to transmit anything by it. It’s a receiver with no transmitters.”
“Maybe they got the wrong thing?”
“Maybe.” Dr. Hamilton did not look reassured. “Anyway, what is that you have for me?”
“Oh, right. It’s an electricity gun. I thought it was probably custom-made, so maybe you could figure out who made it.”
“Hmph. I’d bet a month’s pay it was LexCorp, and six months’ pay that we’ll never tie it to him--not in court, anyway.”
“No bet,” Superman said, his good mood entirely gone. “Even if I gambled, no bet.”