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[color=RoyalBlue]"This is wrong,"[/color] I say to myself, pacing back and forth across the dusty concrete floor of the storm cellar underneath the farmhouse.  [color=RoyalBlue]"This is all wrong."[/color]

It's not the first time I've said something along those lines since I woke up in the bed upstairs, in a house I'd apparently just purchased, in a world somewhat familiar but definitely not my own.  I'd say to myself watching the news, seeing people I'd known for nearly a century only just starting out, or the successor to a heroic legacy being the originator instead.  I'd say it looking at the state of the people who populate this world, the crippled and dying culture that could have made them great now spun into the pursuit of cheap distractions and easy outrage.

Now I'm saying it as I look down on the old metal work bench and the form laid across it....at the bleached, dried bones of another version of myself, left unceremoniously in front of my house while I was out on my morning patrol.

[color=RoyalBlue]"How could anyone know about me, here?"[/color] I ask, staring at the grinning skull, a pair of darkened sockets which used to hold eyes that could see to the farthest ends of the universe, observe quantum-level events, or spew heat that could slice through a planet like a knife through hot butter.  [color=RoyalBlue]"Superman never existed on this world.  Kara came to Earth instead of Kal-El.  Diana was the first public super-hero, showing up years before even I did in the rea--...in [i]my[/i] timeline.  Jonathan Kent was killed by a tornado in the late 90s, Martha Clark remarried and moved away to Missouri.  The name Clark Kent shouldn't mean anything to anyone on this world, let alone Superman.  So for someone to have found me out, to kill one of me and leave it at my door, it's imp--"[/color]

[color=Yellow][i]Impossible?  HAH!  Imagine [u]you[/u], of all people, calling something 'impossible.'  Ridiculous.[/i][/color]

[color=RoyalBlue]"Be quiet; you're not real,"[/color] I dismiss that annoying brassy voice.  [color=RoyalBlue]"I'm imagining things, hearing voices to keep myself company, that's all."[/color]

[color=Yellow][i]Oh, you [u]wound[/u] me!  And why exactly is the thought that you're cracking up your first guess?[/i][/color]

[color=RoyalBlue]"Because I watched you die, Mxyzptlk!"[/color] I shout, my hands curling into fists that could punch through the fabric of reality in my younger days.  [color=RoyalBlue]"Because....because I killed you."[/color]

[color=Yellow][i]Awww, and so I'm some manifestation of your guilty conscious then, is that it?  The ghosts of your pasts, your biggest failures come back to haunt you?  Maybe you're right.  Maybe after all this time, you've finally gotten a screw loose.  Or maybe, [/i]juuuuuust[i] maybe, it has something to do with what's under that tarp behind--[/i][/color]

[color=RoyalBlue]"Enough,"[/color] I cut him off, gripping the edge of the workbench, steel squishing like clay between my fingers.  [color=RoyalBlue]"That's something to deal with later.  Right now I've got a murder to solve."[/color]

[color=Yellow][i]Oh?  And since when were you the detective type?[/i][/color]

[color=RoyalBlue]"I was an investigative journalist,"[/color] I answer.  [color=RoyalBlue]"Now then.  I picked the site clean before moving the corpse.  No tracks, no fingerprints, no residue from a Boom Tube or trace elements of magic in the air.  The bones don't show any signs of damage, no cellular decay or leftover radiation, which rules out Kryptonite."[/color]

[color=Yellow][i]And what about the [u]big[/u] question, eh?[/i][/color]

[color=RoyalBlue]"What question would that be?"[/color]

[color=Yellow][i]The one you're afraid to ask yourself.  The one that's literally staring you right in the face right now!  Who is the victim?[/i][/color]

[color=RoyalBlue]"That's obvious.  It's a Su--"[/color]

[color=Yellow][i]Of course it's a Superman, you ninny!  But [/i]which[i]Superman is it?"[/i][/color]

That stops me in my tracks.

[color=Yellow][i]This world doesn't have a Superman, does it?  And why would that be?  Did Super-gal just swap places with lil' baby Kal at the last second?  Or did something else happen to him?[/i][/color]

[color=RoyalBlue]"If that's the case, then--"[/color]

[color=Yellow][i]Or [u]maybe[/u], it's some rando from another universe, the first in a trail of breadcrumbs to lead you on a merry chase against a multiversal Super-Serial-Killer.  After all, it's not like you're a stranger to this kind of thing.  Maybe Darkseid or Mandrakk ain't quite as defeated as you thought, an' they're targeting anyone an' everyone with an S on their chest.[/i][/color]

[color=RoyalBlue]"I'm not afraid of Darkseid, or--"[/color]

[color=Yellow][i]Or [/i][u]maybe[/u][i], that stiff on the slab isn't just from another set of space, but a different stretch of time.  Maybe someone's drawing you out by sending you, well.....[u]you[/u].[/i][/color]

I hadn't really considered the possibility, but the thought of it......the thought that someone could be sending me my own bones as some kind of sick message, well......I can't imagine that would sit well with anyone.  You stare down death as many times as I have, and the thought of your own mortality starts to lose its meaning.  I've survived catastrophes that sundered entire galaxies, been exposed to enough Kryptonite and magical attacks to wipe out my home planet all over again a hundred times over.  I lived through my entire universe collapsing.  The idea that I could die at all, just doesn't seem possible.

Then again, like he said, the idea of Superman calling something impossible is ridiculous in and of itself.

[color=RoyalBlue]"All right, then,"[/color] I say, squaring my shoulders and putting on a brave face.  [color=RoyalBlue]"I may not have access to the Fortress in this universe.  I don't have the technology from the Watchtower at my disposal.  I don't even have the password to use the Bat-Computer here.  But I can think of one way to get an idea of who this Superman is."[/color]

I snap my fingers.  Then again.  And a third time.  Each time, I listen to the sound, the sharp click of my fingertip slapping against the meat of my thumb.  I focus my hearing, closer and closer, beyond the immediate sound....and I start to hear the deep vibrations.

All matter in the universe is composed of atoms.  These atoms are in turn composed of smaller subatomic particles, which are then composed of quarks, gluons, gravitons, et cetera.  These break down further and further, until finally reaching one-dimensional 'strings' that vibrate on certain frequencies.  At the core level, everything in every potential universe is composed of vibrations, entire timelines and universes separated only by the frequencies at which they vibrate.  Barry used to take advantage of that fact to hop between universes.  As did Ultraman and the Crime Syndicate.  And the Anti-Monitor, who killed Kara....

I tune out the noise of reality around me, and I focus on that sub-quantum, nigh-imperceptible frequency, the starting tone of my old universe.  Literally nothing in this world should make that same sound.

I rap my knuckles against the edge of the work bench, and sure enough, the deep vibration of this universe's matter is ever-so-slightly different, just a hair's breadth higher in pitch.

[color=Yellow][i]Now for the moment of truth, pal.....[/i][/color]

I hold my hand over the skull of the Superman laid out before me......

[b][i]*KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK*[/i][/b]

I flinch, so focused on my test that I'm genuinely caught off-guard by the knocking from upstairs.  Krypto is barking again.  Someone's at my front door.

[color=RoyalBlue]"Erm, one second!"[/color] I call out, frantically searching for something to cover the dead Superman's bones before using the tarp draped over an object in the corner.  I'm nearly blinded by the opalescent light the object lets out, but I figure [i]that[/i] will be easier to explain than the skeleton on the table.

Draping the tarp over the bones, I head up the stairs, closing the door to the cellar behind me.  I undo the dead bolt to the front door and open it, to find.....

[color=PaleVioletRed]"Hi, I'm sorry to bother you,"[/color] she says, a warm smile brightened by glittering green eyes.  [color=PaleVioletRed]"I wasn't sure if there was anyone here, but I'd heard in town that someone had bought the old Kent farm, and since I live in the next one over, I thought, well, I ought to say hello to my new neighbor."[/color]

She's older than the one I knew, probably in her early to mid fifties.  Her striking red hair has faded to a strawberry blonde, her eyes lined with crow's feet, skin starting to wrinkle and sag.  Her smile, though, is every bit as infectious as the one I'd spent all those days and nights with so long ago.

[color=RoyalBlue]"I, erm.....well, hello,"[/color] I stammer for a moment.  [color=RoyalBlue]"Sorry, I was in the middle of--"[/color]

[color=PaleVioletRed]"Oh!  Well, I can just come back later if you--"[/color]

[color=RoyalBlue]"No no, it's not a problem,"[/color] I say, [color=RoyalBlue]"I just...haven't had a visitor since I came here."[/color]

What are you doing, Clark?  This isn't your world.  This isn't your timeline.  She isn't--

[color=PaleVioletRed]"Well, I'm glad I could be the first to welcome you to Smallville, Mister...."[/color]

For a moment, I juggle all of the different aliases I've used through the years-- Smith, White, Clayton, Ellis--

[color=RoyalBlue]"Kent,"[/color] I blurt out the truth.  [color=RoyalBlue]"Clark Kent."[/color]

She smiles and extends her hand.

[color=PaleVioletRed]"Lana Lang,"[/color] she introduces herself.  [color=PaleVioletRed]"Nice to meet you, Clark Kent."[/color]