It was just typical. Moments after his arrival in Metropolis, and an incident had already occurred. This was going to make Roy's job even more complicated.
He had just arrived in the city and spent his time at one of the storages he had set up a long time ago with Oliver. After they had gone their own separate ways, Oliver had become busier with League business. As a result, Roy had found he was the one who used them more often.
After taking inventory on all the equipment in the storage, Roy made his way over to the television screen which had been installed. Wasting no time, Roy flipped from channel to channel, trying to get a new lead on Cadmus. He knew the news would not know the whole story, but he could hear something that could give him a clue.
While trying to find the right news channel, Roy tried to remember what projects Cadmus had made public to the people. Mercy Graves had spoken about Cadmus performing genetic research to extend human life. But Roy didn't buy it; he was sure it was a cover up for something else.
And that was when he saw a news reporter talking about how ten men had been arrested for disturbing the peace, as well as attempted murder and kidnapping. But that wasn't what really caught Roy's attention. The odd thing was the fact that they had been in a fight with a teenaged boy.
"Hard to believe, but that's what witnesses are telling us, Jack. The men arrested today were last reported trying to kill a young teenaged boy. Even stranger, this boy beat them all with only his bare hands. I'm here live with some of the witnesses who saw the battle."
Roy watched as the camera turned to two college kids, both of whom looked pretty hyped. Whether it was because they were live television, or because they had just seen a unique phenomenon, Roy neither knew nor particularly cared.
"That's right," one of them said. "It was incredible. The dude looked about a few years younger than us, but they just shot him and the bullets didn't hurt him at all."
"Yeah," the other guy said, "Superboy really laid some smack down on those guys. And serve them right, trying to kill a man and his girl like that."
"Superboy?" the reporter asked. "Why do you call him that?"
"Well, for starters," the first guy said, "he was wearing Superman's shield on the front of his shirt."
"And he shot freaking lasers from his eyes!" the second guy blurted out. "There was no mistaking it! He's got to be from the same planet as Superman!"
Roy paused the television in disbelief. He suddenly understood what Cadmus had been doing all along. They had been trying to clone Superman. And it looked as if they had succeeded.
As much as he wanted to believe the clone was trying to do something good, but he had to consider the possibility this had been a shown set up by Lex Corp. What if this was all just a training exercise to see if the clone was ready for the field? If that was true, how many more people would get hurt as a result?
There was only one way to find out. That night, he was going to Lex Corp, and he would discover the truth about Superboy.
***
"That went as expected."
Mercy Graves had just seen the news report about Kr's sighting in Metropolis. Somehow, it had made sense that the clone would come here. This would prove to be a mistake on his part.
Ever since she had heard about Kr's escape from Cadmus, she had begun to take the steps necessary for a confrontation. These steps had been set up in advance by Lex Luthor himself. And although he was not at Lex Corp personally, Mercy knew what she needed to do.
When Superboy finallyarrived, he was going to be in for a few surprises. The clone didn't know it,but he was going to meet his match.