Disclaimer: All recognisable characters etc. are property of DC Comics, Warner Bros and December 3rd Productions.
Author's note: This is set in Neverending Battle, and is another loose sequel to At First Sight. Thanks goes to Ken J and Trina for beta-reading.
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People only see what they want to see.
I use this fact to my advantage every day- after all, who looks for a super powered alien under the guise of a reporter?
In my case, it's a necessary deception, so that I can continue to help people and still have a normal life.
But it can also be a mask for evil. And right now, here in Metropolis, evil is hiding.
...
The strange thing is, I seem to be the only one that sees it. Lois and Perry, two of the most insightful and intuitive people I have ever met, don't see it, and neither does the rest of the city. All they see is the self made billionaire philanthropist, the facade that he likes to show the world.
Maybe I can see other people's secrets because I'm hiding such a massive one of my own. Maybe he let the mask slip because I challenged him.
Whatever the reason, I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that Lex Luthor is evil.
I've known since my first week in Metropolis that he is manipulative and at the very least condones murder, even if he doesn't commit it with his own two hands. But it wasn't until this week that I found out that he is truly evil.
It's something that I hadn't yet come across in all of my travels. I thought I'd seen the worst of human nature until I met Luthor. Even Trask isn't really evil. Paranoid, rabidly xenophobic and utterly ruthless, yes, but not really evil.
Luthor is something quite different. I'm no psychiatrist, but I think he may well be a sociopath. He seems to view human lives as expendable in his quest to reach his own ends. It's an idea that's completely foreign to me, and one that I can't quite comprehend.
In this case, his goal seems to have been to get me to leave Metropolis. And he almost succeeded.
He had me doubting myself. Doubting my ability to do enough, to be enough.
Lois Lane saved me.
With a few simple words, she made me realise that I don't have to save everyone.
The ones I can't save are always going to haunt me, but I have to accept that even I have limitations- and move on.
She has no idea what she did. No idea that if it wasn't for her, I would've hung up the red and blue Suit- permanently.
I've saved her more than a few times now; turnabout is fair play, right?
Maybe one day I'll be able to tell her.
As for Luthor...
I cannot prove anything, something that frustrates me beyond measure. He always stays just behind the line of plausible deniability.
One day, he'll slip up.
And when that happens, I'll be there waiting.
One day.
