Chapter 4- All of Infinity in the Palm of my Hands (MCU; Clark KentSI)

I searched the skies of New York with my eyes as I watched the movements by the various actors in what was to come in a short while. Loki flew with the aid of his spectre as he travelled to the top of Stark Tower. The Ancient one and a few of her disciples floated above their sanctum as they cast spells over the place in preparation for the inevitable invasion. It honestly shocked me how they still needed additional protection. Was the sanctum not supposed to be one of the most well protected places in the world?

I guess most of that protection had been metaphysical in nature, and the Chituari were everything but. Why was I just allowing Loki set off his plans? Because I could see the forest for the trees. The avengers were necessary. They would never form if this invasion never took place. The planet would never get ready for the various extraterrestrial threats that were sure to be on their way. No, the Chituari would invade and they’d do what damage they needed to to the city before the avengers would arrive and begin their plan. When I felt it was time, I would step in and crush the invasion in its tracks.

When I clenched my fists, I looked down at the nanotech weave that formed the suit I’d be using for the invasion. The large S of the House of El stood boldly on my chest, and my face was uncovered.

It was something I’d debated with myself and Kelex over on a continuous basis. What would happen when I outed myself as an alien? Would my companies suffer for it? Maybe. Very likely. Humans could be surprisingly racist creatures when given the right motivation. It wouldn’t surprise me if my investor capital dried up at the same time my customers all fled. On the other hand, something about hiding beneath a mask did not sit well with me. Secret identities were strange things, and what I knew about the Marvel Universe was that they never lasted. I’d get found out sooner or later, and it would hurt more then because I’d made the attempt to hide myself in the first place.

It had been Kelex who pointed out that I was creating a false dichotomy for myself. I didn’t have just two options. It wasn’t either (a) out myself as an extraterrestrial, or (b) wear a mask. I could choose the silent and invisible option 3. Wear no max. Be open about my identity, and let people come to their own assumptions about where my powers came from. Mutants didn’t exist in this universe, yes, but that didn’t mean that people would automatically sus out where my powers came from, in the end. People like the Hulk and Spiderman seemed to get away scot free without answering many questions from the public about their powers and abilities. Simply leaving it up to ambiguity was counter to my nature, but it was still the option I chose in the end. It was the wisest one after all.

The skies were torn asunder as a blue wave shot straight out from Stark tower and pooled into a portal right above central manhattan. Of course, the New Yorkers took out their phones to begin recording to share on social media instead of running away at the first chance they got. I waited until the first Chituari spacecraft had come out of the portal and fired on a building before I sent a simultaneous notification to everyone’s phone, asking them to evacuate the New York area, and the surrounding cities to be safe. Sure, I knew the invasion would be stopped here, but there was no justification for that beyond metaknowledge. As much as I could, I did my best to make sure that all my actions would be purely reasonable and justifiable from the perspective of a person who was as surprised about everything as the rest of the general public.

Once the first shots were fired and the notification and warning was sent, drones were sent flying across the city a few minutes later from the tower I’d chosen for my company. There weren’t a lot of them. A few hundred at the most. The highest number Kelex said I could justify. They weren’t armed, of course. They guided people to safety with flashes and asked people farther away to evacuate the city and they performed the secondary function of recording the emergency and livestreaming it on instaTV. My market share in the video space wasn’t as large as I’d expected it to be by this point, but Kelex projected that livestreaming an alien invasion was sure to get me anything from a billion to three billion downloads as people from all across the world tuned in to get the live footage directly from the source in this time of fear and anxiety.

Was I milking it to make money? Yes. But who cared? No one. As the invasion ramped up in intensity, I saw the Quinjet begin to land with Iron man and Thor serving as the advanced party of the Avengers. I listened in as Steve gave out his orders and right before he said the famous phrase, I flew into their midst.

“Ohhh. Any orders for me?” They all looked shocked to see me in my red and blue suit floating off the ground.

“What’s the name, kid?” Steve asked, not missing a beat

“Superman” “Clark Kent” Both Tony and I said at the same time.

“Superman” I said immediately after with emphasis in my voice.

“And what can you do?” Steve asked, giving Tony a look.

“Everything” I answered vaguely, a smug smile on my face.

When two Chituari on a speeder raced right at us, I just stared at them really intently, and bisected them with  a blast of heat vision.

“Ok, join Thor on air control”

“Avengers Assemble!” so cool.

A/N; I decided a time skip was appropriate.