***

Pain. Searing pain like nothing he’d ever felt before ripped through his side, and he immediately fell to the ground, his knees hitting the pavement, as dark spots blurred his vision.

Not good.

Stand up.

Don’t give in.

Blinking hard, Superman pushed himself to his feet again, listing sideways. He lifted his eyes to the monstrosity standing in front of him. All eight feet of it. Dark gray mottled skin covered its otherwise skeletal frame, and spikes of dense bone-like material protruded from its arms, legs, and shoulders. Blood dripped from one of the protrusions on the beast’s hand; Superman’s blood. Dark crimson and viscous.

The monster didn’t give him a second to recover. It launched at him at full speed, malice filling its otherwise blank stare. Superman could almost read the creature’s thoughts.

Kill.

Its only objective. One word encompassing all of its being.

Unable to move fast enough, Superman again felt the monster land a piercing blow, this time to his left shoulder. He suppressed a groan and stumbled backwards several steps, but the monster kept coming, landing blow after blow to Superman’s abdomen, chest, and head. Colors danced across his vision, and pain sprouted from new wounds opening in his skin. Skin that was supposed to be impenetrable, invulnerable. Skin that was now betraying him. And the superhero finally fell — first to his knees and then facedown onto the cold, black pavement.

A horrible sound escaped the monster’s lips, vaguely reminding Superman of his dad’s tractor trying to turnover when the battery had gone bad. A dry, coughing sound. Only it wasn’t a cough. No, it was laughter. The creature was laughing at him.

The creature lifted the fallen hero by one arm, sniffed him warily, and then slammed Superman back down onto the hard ground. Superman landed on his back, looking up at the cloudy sky, and found himself wishing for sunlight. Soothing sunlight that might help heal his broken body so he could continue fighting. However, the sky instead opened up with a heavy, sudden downpour, the chill sucking away the last of the Sun-given life energy that had always filled him. The raindrops turned red as they sluiced off the deep, ragged wounds in his head, shoulder, and side.

And the monster cackled again, lifted the hero up, and pounded him down onto the pavement one final time.

***

Gasping for breath, Clark Kent sat bolt upright in bed, a thin sheen of sweat covering his forehead. Residual pain lingered from the all-too-familiar recurring nightmare, and he closed his eyes as he forced himself to remain calm.

The same nightmare had plagued him for three weeks now. Each time, the nightmare grew more and more realistic, the pain more and more intense, and the end — his death — more and more inevitable.

He flopped back down on the bed and then glanced at the clock on the nightstand. 5:14 a.m. Groaning, he turned onto his stomach, buried his head into his pillow, and closed his eyes.

A definitive knock at his front door, however, startled him awake several minutes later. He sat up, rubbed the sleep from his eyes, and blinked at the clock again. Who could possibly be knocking at 5:33 a.m.?

He forced himself up and put his glasses on as he shuffled through the living room toward the front door. The knock came again, more insistent this time, and his keen hearing picked up four heartbeats outside — one regular and steady, and the other three much more rapid. He frowned again as he lowered his glasses while taking the steps to the door two at a time.

He froze partway up the stairs, his mouth open in surprise.

H.G. Wells stood outside the door, and behind him towered three…Supermen. Three almost-but-not-quite-identical Supermen. All with grim expressions, arms crossed over their chests, and mouths set in tight frowns, but slightly different hairstyles and minor variations to their suits — a bit longer cape here, a bit darker red there.

He floated up the final steps and pushed the glasses back up his nose as his heart started pounding again. Then he swallowed hard and opened the door. His eyes hadn’t tricked him. The three Supermen straightened and nodded in unison as their eyes met his.

He shook his head. He must still be dreaming, right?

“You…” His gaze drifted down the line of Supermen. “There’s three of you. I mean… There’s three of me. I mean…”

The Supermen smiled tightly, but remained grim and silent.

Wells cleared his throat. “Well, Clark, my boy —”

The Superman closest to him stepped forward and cut in, his voice low but serious. “You’ve been having dreams about a terrible monster, haven’t you, Clark?”

Clark’s jaw tightened as he nodded.

“Yes, actually, I just…”

His voice trailed off as the Superman who had spoken earlier frowned.

“This monster is real. And we’re here to help you defeat it. May we come in, and then I’ll explain everything?”

Fifteen minutes and several unbelievable explanations later, four Supermen rocketed out of the apartment and headed toward the Midwest, where a massive monster was about to break free from its formidable prison buried deep within the earth. They’d get there just in time to stop it, reinforce its prison, and launch it off into space on a trajectory that would ensure it could never do any harm.

This was their fifteenth stop, they’d told him… The fifteenth time they’d universe-hopped and banded together to save the life of another Superman. The monster, which they called Doomsday, wouldn’t even get to see the morning sunlight.

And he, Clark Kent, would be able to continue fighting for truth and justice and acting as a protector for his world.

Lois will never believe me when I tell her, Clark thought wryly, shaking his head as he sped alongside his companions.

Together, the four Supermen dove down to unearth the creature and prevent the tragedy of Clark’s nightmare from coming true, saving the day…yet again.

THE END