Symphony of Ash and Steel

In Metropolis, a woman with grayish skin emerged from the water; she had left Gotham in search of peace, but, for no apparent reason, she was suddenly overcome by a wave of irritation—compelling her to head toward Metropolis, driven by an inexplicable urge to destroy everything in her path.

Michael walked through the LexCorp hangar with an almost provocative serenity—the two Kryptonian women were unconscious, exhausted from the intense sexual encounter they had just shared with him. Lena Luthor, however, remained tense; she held a rigid posture and a clinical gaze, struggling to maintain her composure. She was accustomed to dealing with colossal egos—after all, she carried the weight and the surname of the Luthor family—but Michael’s presence was on an entirely different level. She couldn’t quite pinpoint the source of her discomfort—was it because he was her sister’s fiancé, or perhaps because of the women in suits who surrounded him? Pushing the thought aside, she refocused.

"The efficiency of the delivery was remarkable, sir," Lena said, while trying to ignore the almost fanatical closeness with which the women—Diana among them—gravitated around him, acting like devoted satellites in orbit around a central star.

Before he could respond, an explosion rocked the Metropolis skyline; the sound of shattering concrete reverberated through the financial district. Through the hangar’s massive glass walls, the pale, grayish-skinned silhouette of Victoria Solomon appeared amidst the dust.

Despite her feminine and fragile appearance, the creature possessed superhuman brute strength. With a guttural roar that defied the heavens, she turned the city streets into a field of ruins. Victoria attacked everything in her path, sowing chaos with a blind violence that made the skyscrapers tremble to their very foundations. Michael remained impassive. Diana—disguised as a security guard—even whispered an offer to confront the threat, but a single glance toward his secretary made her understand the situation perfectly.

"Leave it to me, sir," Clarice murmured, her voice firm yet imbued with the absolute submission that Michael had meticulously instilled in each of them.

With a sonic boom that shattered the remaining glass panels in the hangar, Clarice soared toward the chaos, leaving a vacuum of silence in her wake—having changed her attire with such speed that ordinary eyes would have been unable to follow the movement.

Michael turned to Lena. The scientist was pale, though her eyes remained fixed on the spot where Clarice had vanished from her sight.

"You seem tense, Lena," he observed, approaching with deliberate steps.

He did not resort to any physical display of power; instead, he steered the moment with subtle precision, calming the scientist and—with a mere thought—causing her to forget that he had arrived accompanied by Clarice. After all, he wasn't even worried that she had discovered Superwoman’s identity; she would have found out eventually, especially after her sister shifted her stance regarding Superwoman—not to mention that he intended to add Lena to his harem.

"What happened?" she whispered, her voice trembling, as her gaze drifted downward involuntarily.

Michael smiled—a predatory, absolute smile.

"Don't dwell too much on what you saw; get used to it—this is going to happen quite often, Lena." Now, tell me... do you still intend to present the first phase of the implementation to me, or would you rather show me the way to LexCorp’s private office?

— No... my sister would kill me if I didn’t show you the research prototype. Upon arriving at the facility where the parasite was being kept, you saw him approach, but he was interrupted.

— Don’t touch it. — The Martian appeared.

(images created by lawless)