(THE “S” STANDS FOR HOPE) CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE: CLARK II

Clark had never liked stalemates.

They implied a certain level of equality between two forces straining against each other, waiting for the other to give. But this wasn’t a stalemate. This was just the consequences of a lot of events, some of which he had even caused, but that didn’t make the pill any easier to swallow. 

Max Anders could not become mayor of Brockton Bay.

Clark had gone over the numbers again and again. Anders had spoken plainly about what people were afraid of and offered something deceptively simple in return: stability. A return to something people swore they’d once had and fiercely missed.

And the city, extremely tired, was listening.

There wasn’t a real opponent left standing. The major parties were entangled with the very interests that had helped create the city’s rot, and even the ones willing to recampaign were too cautious or afraid to take a real swing at things. Independent candidates lacked the necessary reach, funding, or connections, and a few had even joined with Anders’ coalition. And to cap it all off, the average Brocktonite didn’t capes, didn’t trust the PRT, and certainly didn’t trust distant federal oversight. 

But surprisingly, and quite disturbingly too, a growing number of them wouldn't mind someone like him. Someone like Superman. 

It had started as a punchline in editorials. If Superman cares so much, why doesn’t he run? Then they became op-eds, then call-in segments, and then genuine speculation on sites like PHO.

Superman for Mayor.

Clark had stared at the phrase longer than he should have.

It wasn't out of temptation—he told himself—but because it revealed something ugly about the moment. Power, to many of them, looked interchangeable with leadership. If he could lift collapsed bridges and stop Endbringers, surely he could balance a budget.

But he wasn’t vain enough to believe he was the answer to every problem, and he didn't think he was suited for governance. Strength didn’t teach zoning law, didn’t teach labor disputes, or infrastructure planning, or the slow, thankless art of coalition-building. And even if he could learn, if he could master it all, what would it mean for a cape to step into elected office because the civilian government had “failed”?

No.

That way lay a future far uglier than Max Anders.

Still, there had to be some way to stop this without directly involving himself.

That was what had driven him to Rebecca.

They met on a rooftop overlooking her city, wind snapping at his cape and flattening her coat against her frame.

“Anders doesn’t have to win,” Rebecca had said, voice even, hands clasped behind her back. “I can arrange for his death, and ensure it appears unrelated.”

Clark had stared at her, and despite the outrage that threatened to bubble up from within him, he… should not have been surprised. This was the woman who had kept the world from falling apart by making choices no one else would. She wasn’t being dramatic. She wasn’t being cruel.

She was being pragmatic.

From her perspective, Anders was a destabilizing variable with high projected civilian harm. Removing him preemptively would be efficient.

Still, as objectively right as she was, that wasn't an outcome Clark accepted. 

“No,” he’d said at last. “That’s not an option.”

Rebecca had simply stared at him, equally as unsurprised by his response as he had been by hers. “It is,” she replied. “You simply disapprove of it.”

“Yes.”

Humming in acknowledgement, she narrowed her eyes—a minute shift, but on her it was the equivalent of a frown—and for a moment became quiet. 

“Then you will need something else,” she said instead, staring at the ‘s’ emblem on his chest. “Your articles have failed. He has embedded himself too deeply.”

Clark knew she was right. The exposes had been airtight, with financial irregularities and testimonies from former associates. 

And the city had shrugged.

Some called it slander, others had dismissed it politically motivated, and a distressing number had simply not cared. Max Anders spoke about jobs, about security, and about restoring faith to Brockton Bay’s future. He shook hands in markets, held babies to pose for photos, donated to shelters, and paid hospital bills for families who couldn’t manage them alone.

People saw what they wanted to see.

Even if he stood on a throne of steel and blood.

“You must accept,” she continued, “the possibility that your preferred constraints will limit your effectiveness.”

He left her with that sentence following him like a shadow.

. . . . .

Carol had been different from Rebecca.

Clark floated a few inches above the carpet in her office while she sat behind her desk, heels kicked somewhere underneath it, and sleeves rolled to the elbow. A stack of polling data lay fanned out between them, fluorescent ink marking the numbers that hurt the most. And the late afternoon sunlight cut her face into bands of light and shadow.

“It should have mattered more,” Carol said, tapping one highlighted section with restrained frustration. “There’s evidence linking Max Anders to activities that, if not outright criminal, are certainly damning. In any other city—”

“—this would have sunk him,” Clark finished. “But this isn’t any other city.”

She let out a sharp breath that almost qualified as a laugh, then shook her head.

“I can’t even blame them,” she admitted with a sigh. “Every few months something new crawls out of the woodwork or drops out of the sky. Anders promises stability.” Her fingers flattened against the papers. “That’s what they want. That’s what this city has been starving for.”

They both knew it. Brockton Bay had endured Endbringer attacks, gang wars, and economic collapse. Its people were deeply exhausted. 

Still… 

“He’s Kaiser,” he said.

“Yes.”

She leaned back in her chair, the frustration draining from her posture, leaving only fatigue. “I hate it,” she said more softly. “But sometimes the truth isn’t enough.”

Clark turned toward the window. The skyline was a study in recovery, with cranes still pivoting above half-finished buildings, and streets hastily cleared of debris and patched up. Medhall’s logo was stamped visibly on more than one project sign.

They sat in silence.

There wasn’t a clean option left. elegant article that would change public opinion overnight, and no legal maneuver that wouldn’t take months the city didn’t have.

“So what’s left?” Carol asked at last.

Clark kept his eyes on the skyline.

He didn’t answer.

Because he already knew.

He just wasn't sure he liked it. 

. . . . .

The second time Clark met Max Anders, it wasn’t with a pen and notebook in hand.

It was with a cape at his back.

The rally was winding down in the amber wash of dusk. Applause still reverberated through the air, campaign banners snapping in the evening breeze, and ardent supporters lingered in clusters, faces flushed with hope and optimism.

Superman did not descend from the sky in a blaze of spectacle.

He stepped out from behind the stage scaffolding as the last volunteers began folding chairs into trucks.

Max Anders noticed him immediately.

There was a flicker of something there, just a flicker, in the man’s eyes. Then, he smiled. 

“Superman,” Anders said smoothly, adjusting his cufflinks as if greeting a colleague or a donor. “To what do I owe the honor?”

They stood alone beneath the fading light—with no cameras, microphones, or witnesses close enough to hear—and despite the lack of any overt display of force, the very air around them seemed to tighten with an unseen pressure. 

Yet, Max Anders’ pulse ticked evenly. There was no fear spike, only an obvious interest in the direction the conversation would go in. 

“You’re not becoming mayor,” Superman said.

A slight incline of the head. “That isn’t your decision to make.”

“It becomes my concern when the leading candidate for public office is also Kaiser.”

Even with his secret identity revealed in such a fashion, his smile didn't dim. Not even for a moment. If anything, his interest piqued, visible in the slight narrowing of his eyes. 

“You should be careful with allegations like that.”

“They’re not allegations.”

Finally, for a fraction of a second—too small for an ordinary human to catch—Anders’ heartbeat skipped.

Then it steadied again.

“You have no admissible proof,” Anders replied calmly. “And even if you did… what would you do with it?” His mouth curved faintly. “Intimidate me? Blackmail me? You don’t operate that way.”

Clark did not respond.

“That’s right,” Anders continued. “You are a paragon of virtue. You won’t become the thing you oppose.”

He took a slow step back, but he was not retreating.

“And the people love you for it. As they should.”

There it was.

The calculation.

Max Anders, on some level, was afraid of exposure. But he had watched Carol’s effort fail in real time. The polling numbers had dipped for forty-eight hours after the first article, then they stabilized. A week later, they climbed higher than before. He hadn't been affected in any meaningful way. 

He was smart enough, or at least had people who were, to come to the same conclusion Carol and Clark had come to. 

“You’ve built yourself a cage,” Anders said, his words coming out almost gentle. “A moral one. Very noble and admirable. But it has left you unable to really act.”

Clark felt heat rise within him, as he was reminded again of the time Lex Luthor became the president of America. He hadn't been able to stop the villain then because he had told himself then that democracy, flawed as it was, had to be allowed to function. 

Would he fail again? 

Was Anders right? 

Had his self-imposed rules left him unable to act in this situation? 

Did Earth Bet need him as Earth did, or as someone with less restraint? More ruthlessness?

Rebecca’s solution echoed in his mind.

Remove the problem from the board entirely.

Clark stepped closer to the man, though not close enough to threaten yet.

“You’re going to step down,” he said, adding more force to his words.

Anders’ eyes gleamed.

“And if I don’t?”

There was a line in the sand.

And Anders, smiling, invited him to cross it.

And for the first time since he had arrived on this planet, Clark felt the pull of that invitation.