The New Girl in Smallville by Christopher Leeson Part 6

 Posted October 6, 2025

 

THE NEW GIRL IN SMALLVILLE

by Christopher Leeson

 

Part Six: Homecoming

They passed through the double doors and made the walk to the gymnasium, a journey Claire had made countless times as Clark, but never like this. The big room had been transformed for the evening with crepe paper streamers, fairy lights, and cardboard stars suspended from the ceiling on fishing line. A backdrop for photos had been erected at the far end, already surrounded by giggling couples.

They paused by the big easel that held pictures of the dance attendees when they were much younger.

Pete extracted a snapshot from his pocket. "I brought a photo of myself from my first year at Smallville High. Should I pin yours up, too?"

Claire shook her head. "I didn't pack any photos from home. I never expected to be invited to parties and dances."

“Don’t you like parties and dances?” her escort asked.

“Not too often. My favorite hobby is reading.”

“You’re a lot like your cousin Clark that way,” said Pete as he pinned his photo to the board. From there, they drifted toward the refreshment table. Already, the dance floor was teeming with students doing the energetic Watusi, with arms swinging and hips swaying to the pulsing beat.

Pete offered his arm with exaggerated formality. "Shall we, Milady?"

Though he remained convinced that the girl beside him was Clark Kent, Pete thought it best to act as though she was a new acquaintance. Claire hesitated only briefly before accepting his arm. How ironic that her super-strong fingers felt so light against his sleeve.

As they approached the dance floor's edge, several heads turned their way. Claire felt a rush of self-consciousness, but Pete gave the surrounding onlookers a quick smile, trying not to seem triumphant about arriving with such a striking girl at his side.

The music soon died, and the dancers dispersed in a burst of chatter and laughter.

"Punch?" Pete suggested, leading his date toward the refreshment table.

As he poured two cups of the bright red liquid, Claire surveyed the room with an anthropologist's detachment. Girls clustered in tight groups, whispering and laughing, casting occasional glances toward the boys who stood in packs near the walls. When the Twist started up, couples hurried back to the dance floor, some close together, others maintaining a shy distance. It was like watching an elaborate mating ritual from a National Geographic newsreel.

"Have you ever done the Twist?" Pete asked.

"I haven't had the chance. But I saw this guy on TV who showed the audience the moves. Basically, you make your right foot look like you're putting out a cigarette on the floor, while moving your hands like you're drying your lower back with a towel."

"Yeah, that's the Twist!" He handed her a filled cup. "So what's your first impression of Smallville High's party scene?"

"Well, it’s hectic, but it doesn’t look dangerous," Claire replied with dry humor. "I haven't been to many school dances, but I see a that it's hard to make a gymnasium look like anything except a gymnasium."

 Pete smiled. "I can agree with that. From my experience, gym dances are pretty standard—awkward teens, wallflowers, punch with too much sugar, and music that's already six months out of date."

 "I’ll need your help to keep me from becoming a wallflower," Claire said. "I let my aunt go overboard fixing me up, so I wouldn't look like a social drab."

 "People won’t consider you a loser if they see you dancing."

 "Then we'll have to dance, I suppose." Pete extended his hand. “I accept your invitation.”

Claire hesitated. She had prepared for this by dancing with her mother and father. But now, being asked in public to dance with a boy, she felt daunted. Still, she'd come here to fit in, to appear to be a very ordinary schoolgirl. Not dancing might make her seem shy or stuck-up.

 "Sure," she said, taking his hand.

Pete led her to the dance floor. The Twist didn't require them to touch, a detail both secretly appreciated. With no required coordination between partners, Pete and Claire began grinding down imaginary cigarettes and vigorously drying themselves with invisible towels.

"You look to serious," Pete whispered. "Dancing is supposed to make a person happy!"

Claire forced herself to relax, letting the music guide her movements. The next dance was the Swim—a series of arm movements mimicking a swimmer's front stroke, side stroke, and backstroke, with a move called the "Cannonball" that meant pinching your nose shut and bending your knees as if going underwater.

By watching the other dancers, both Pete and Claire picked up the moves. Gradually, moving to the music’s rhythm became almost natural.

"You're getting the hang of it," Pete said, smiling.

 "Thanks," Claire quipped. "It's at least easier than rocket science!"

 “Does Mr. Harris teach rocket science now?”

“Not now. Next semester!”

Pete smiled, this time without forcing it.

Between dances, they returned for more punch and munched on treats—mostly pastries from the local bakery. Their snatches of conversation carefully avoided sensitive topics. Claire was still amazed to be on a date with a boy, while her escort found it equally hard to wrap his mind around the fact that his date was Clark Kent.

The next dance was the Mashed Potato, with simple moves involving clicking heels and making side kicks. Some couples got into trouble when they tried to dance too fast, but Claire, accustomed to super-speed, had no difficulty keeping pace.

 They left the dance floor when the song ended. On the way back to the tables, a commotion erupted near the gymnasium entry doors. The principal's voice crackled over the speaker system:

"Attention, students. I've just been informed that there's been an accident on Highway 7. A tanker truck has overturned, and there's a chemical spill. Emergency services are responding, but as a precaution, we're going to keep everyone inside the building until further notice."

 Murmurs rippled through the crowd as students scattered across the large enclosure, seeking anyone with more information. Claire tensed, her enhanced hearing already picking up distant sirens wailing through the night.

 "Highway 7 runs right along Miller's Creek," Pete said, his voice low with concern. "If chemicals spill into the water…"

He didn't need to finish the thought. Miller's Creek fed directly into Smallville's reservoir—the town's major water supply. If toxic chemicals contaminated it, the whole town would have to use an alternate source for weeks, maybe months.

Claire felt the familiar tug of responsibility. It reminded her of the reason Superboy had fallen into his routine of endlessly helping people. It had been his way of making himself feel useful in Smallville, of protesting his fate of being overlooked as the unassuming Clark Kent. Public notice made him feel less lonely while avoiding the need to get close to anyone.

It flashed through her mind that it had been a very imperfect way to live. She remained angry and had promised not to get involved in problems that were not her own. It had taken her present disaster to realize how ungrateful the people with whom she interacted really were.

She noticed a strange look come into her date’s eyes. “You wait here and be safe,” he said. “I want to find out if anyone has heard more about the accident on the radio!” He hurried off. Pete was always rushing away in tense moments. It was a quirk of his.

But his retreat had given her room to react to the emergency, if she wanted to. She realized that toxic water would plague Smallville for months if she didn't act immediately. She didn’t care so much about the ungrateful people of the town, but contamination would make life and business hard for her parents.

 "She hurried toward the girls' bathroom, mind racing. Through its large window, she could exit unseen, just as Clark had done from the similar boys' room countless times. She had brought her Super-Sister costume compressed to the size of a handkerchief in her clutch purse.

 She had to act. Letting Smallville get poisoned was more revenge than she wanted to take.

 Claire looked at the costume in her purse, then noticed her reflection in the lavatory mirror—the elegant dress, the styled hair, the corsage on her left shoulder. She looked like an absolutely different person, even though he still felt the same on the inside.

 With a sigh of resignation, Claire changed clothes in a blur of speed. She couldn't compress the man-made fabric of her dress, so she carried it out the window with her, hiding it at super-speed inside the utility shed that stood on the lawn outside the gymnasium.

 Cloaked in speed and darkness, Super-Sister arrived at the accident scene in seconds. The tanker truck had jackknifed across Highway 7, coming to rest on its side like a wounded beast. A viscous fluid leaked from the tank, forming an expanding pool that trickled steadily toward the nearby creek. Emergency vehicles were still creating a perimeter, their flashing lights illuminating the grim faces of firefighters in chemical suits moving in to contain the spill.

Claire hovered above, assessing the situation with super-vision. Hairline fractures spider-webbed across the tanker's main compartment. It was only minutes away from a catastrophic rupture that would dump thousands of gallons of industrial chemicals directly into the watershed.

She descended in front of the incident commander, who looked up in surprise.

 "Wellll! You're that new super-girl, aren't you?"

 "Yes," Claire replied, letting her confidence show. "Let me help. That tanker’s about to rupture."

 The commander—a veteran firefighter named Reilly, whom Clark had met before—eyed her skeptically. "We've got chemical hazard protocols to handle this. Are you as experienced as Superboy? Are you sure you won't get hurt?"

Claire bit back a sharper retort and said, "I can fly through stars! Caustic chemicals can’t hurt me. "Are the chemicals explosive or combustible?"

"No, but they're highly toxic!"

"I should be able to weld the fractures with my heat vision and move the tanker away from the creek."
Reilly hesitated, weighing his options. Claire could sense his reluctance to trust an unknown quantity—especially a female one. Oddly, he sounded like a parent concerned for the safety of a child.

"Sir," one of the hazard techs called urgently. "Pressure's building in the tank. The chemicals are jetting, and any second they’re going to bust the tank open. We need to evacuate now!"

Reilly's jaw tightened. "All right," he said to Claire. "Super-Sister, do what you can. But if I tell you to stand down, you’ll do as you're told—understood?"

Rather than remind him of her indestructibility, Claire simply nodded. She was determined to do what she had to do, no matter what the local fire chief thought.

Super-Sister took to the air again and positioned herself above the damaged tanker. Using her super-vision, she identified each point of structural failure and began applying pinpoint beams of heat vision to seal the fractures. The metal glowed red, then white-hot as it melted and fused.

As she worked, a new sound reached her ears—a low rumbling from beneath the ground. With her attention divided between delicate welding work and this fresh development, she almost missed the subtle shift in the earth beneath the tanker.

"Everyone back!" Claire shouted as realization struck. "The ground is unstable!"

Her warning came just as the saturated soil allowed the tanker to slide downhill, pulling asphalt and dirt with it in a growing avalanche. Emergency workers scrambled backward as Claire abandoned her welding and dove to grab the tank.

The eighteen-wheeler's weight was nothing to her Kryptonian strength, but its awkward shape and the slick chemicals coating its surface made it difficult to get a secure grip. As she struggled to stabilize it, one of the hazard technicians lost his footing on the muddy slope and tumbled toward a contaminated puddle.

Claire faced an instant decision: secure the tanker or save the technician. With a frustrated grunt, she propped the tank momentarily on a stable section of ground and streaked toward the falling tech, catching him inches before he rolled across the poisoned ground.

"I've got you," she assured him, easily lifting him and setting him down safely behind the emergency line.

But in those few crucial seconds, gravity reasserted its hold on the tanker. It was sliding again, its massive bulk picking up momentum as it headed for the creek.

Claire flashed back, grabbed the truck's front axle, and dug her heels into the ground. Her boots sank into the mud beneath her, but she held firm. Its weight was nothing compared to her strength, but the physics of shifting terrain made the operation touch-and-go.

With a last surge of determination, she lifted the tanker entirely, hovering a few feet above the treacherous ground. "I need somewhere to put this!" she called to Chief Reilly.

He pointed to a flat, paved area well away from the creek. "Take it to the park! Containment pools are being set up there!"

Claire carefully transported her awkward load to the designated area, setting it down with precision atop the plastic containment barriers the emergency team had rapidly deployed.

As soon as the tanker was no longer an immediate source of contamination, she returned to the creek bank and used her super-breath to freeze the chemical trail that had almost reached the water's edge. Then she dove into the muddy ground and, by shoving, created a dike of mud to block the flow-way of the deadly chemicals. That would give the rescue team time to deal with the contained toxins.

“Are you mean able to contain things now?” Super-Sister asked of the wide-eyed hazard team.

Commander Reilly approached at a fast trot, looking less skeptical than before. "Good work, young lady," he acknowledged. "You saved my technician and kept this disaster from getting out of hand."

"Just doing what needs to be done," Super-Sister replied, though she didn't particularly care for being called "young lady."

"Are you really Superboy's sister?" one of the younger firefighters asked.

Claire hesitated. "Something like that," she answered vaguely. "But I can’t stop to talk. A…woman’s work is never done. I have an emergency elsewhere that I have to tend to."

"Wait!" Reilly called as she prepared to take off. "What's your name? I need it for the report."

Claire paused. "It’s like in the newspapers. Call me Super-Sister." The name still felt repugnant to her tongue, but she had to keep things in proportion. A name was much less important than protecting her secret identity. She had to go back and make it look like she had never left the homecoming dance.

Super-Sister launched herself into the night sky, her cape snapping in the onrushing wind. As she flew back to the school, Claire felt dazed by a complicated tangle of emotions. The successful rescue might make people realize she was in the same league as Superboy—a thing which her pride demanded.

But she wondered if she should avoid competing with his memory. Maybe she shouldn’t keep rescuing every kitten from every tree. Maybe Super-Sister needed to keep a lower profile. Why not let her concentrate on major disasters, and not make a big deal out of lesser annoyances that every town has to deal with?

With no loss of time, Claire recovered her party clothes from the utility shed and slipped back indoors through the bathroom window. She changed back into her party dress in a blur, hopeful that the confusion in the gymnasium would prevent anyone from noticing her absence. Checking herself in the mirror, she noticed a smudge of soot on her cheek and winced to see the mess that the wind had made of her hair.

She used the facilities to make herself presentable. People would more easily notice a girl in dishabille than they would Clark Kent. It wasn’t fair, but it was the cards she’d been dealt.

Finally, with a deep breath, Claire pushed open the lavatory door, went down the short hall, and stepped back into the decorated gymnasium.

TO BE CONTINUED IN PART 7