Superman arrives at the Fortress cradling Jordan, and the Jor-El hologram confirms that the issue is Jordan’s super-hearing kicking in. There’s no magic fix, though; it will take a lot of practice and he might hvae pain and discomfort until it’s done.
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Back at the Kent farm, Jordan is sitting in font of the fire, listening to noise-cancelling headphones. Clark says that he will help Jordan tomorrow, but that the boys need to get to bed, and then consoles a frustrated Lois.
At the Cushing house, Lana calls Lois to ask what she should be watching out for with Edge, and asks whether there’s a way to know that someone has powers. Lois says no, but cautions her to be careful since others likely do.
At the Kent breakfast table, Clark joins Lois, who has a file on the real Marcus Bridgewater. Clark tells Lois that they should tell the boys what’s going on with the Edge situation. Lois doesn’t want to yet, saying that they need more information, and leaves to go confront Bridgewater.
At Edge’s company, he’s berating Leslie Larr for failing to get anything on the man who was with Lois at the mines. She leaves, and he meets up with Lana Lang, asking her to start creating a leadership program for employees.
At home, Clark coaches Jordan on how to focus on one sound, and tune everything else out. He quickly gets overwhelmed, though, and wants to quit, putting the noise-cancelling headphones back on.
In his RV, Captain Luthor is working with his AI, trying to repair it, when Lois knocks. He takes a gun to the door with him, and she tells him that she wants to meet with him in a public place in an hour, and that if he doesnt’ tell her the truth then, they can’t work together anymore.
Luthor thinks about his Earth, where he wakes up next to Lois. The two start kissing, only to be caught by their daughter, who complains. Their little family debate is interrupted by an attack on the city from an army of Kryptonians led by Superman.
With Clark gone, Jordan again tries to focus his hearing, this time on Sarah Cushing. He tunes in on the second half of a conversation between Sarah and Jonathan. While the actual conversation is innocent enough, the small snippet Jordan hears makes it sound like Jonathan is flirting with Sarah.
Jonathan, meanwhile, isn’t happy about having to make excuses for Jordan, or about the fact that Sarah immediately jumps on the Jordan conspiracy theories rather than asking about his cast.
Lois goes into the diner with Captain Luthor, where he is reluctant to give her any information, while Clark heads to the RV to look for evidence. He is greeted at the door by the AI, who calls him “Captain Luthor,” which obviously sets off alarm bells.
Lois gets a phone call from Chrissy, tipping her off that Edge is about to send out a small shipment of Kryptonite. Luthor tells her that he needs to talk to Superman urgently, but she tells him not until she knows who he really is.
At the RV, the AI shows Captain Luthor a photo of Clark trespassing, but Luthor isn’t interested in that. He’s more interested in a satellite surveillance showing activity at the mines.
At the Edge office, one of Lana’s friends from Smallville comes in to apply for the young executive program. She is reluctant, since she knows Edge is dangerous, but tells her friend she will try to help, and Edge catches a glimpse of the exchange.
In the car, Clark and Lois speculate about whether The Stranger could be related to Lex. They’re following the trucks carryign some of Edge’s X-Kryptonite, and a security detail, using Clark’s telescopic vision to keep their distance, but he has to go rescue the security detail and drop them in the middle of the desert when he sees that they’re about to come into conflict with a gun-toting Captain Luthor. They immediately call out to Leslie Larr, whose idea it was to try sending out some X-Kryptonite to see who it would draw out. Lois and Clark confront Captain Luthor, who steals a lead-lined case of X-Kryptonite.
At school, Jonathan meets a pretty girl and awkwardly flirts with her a bit.
Back on the road, Captain Luthor tells Lois that he needs her to introduce him to Superman, because “it’s the only way to stop this.” Lois says she’ll set up the meeting, if he surrenders the X-Kryptonite. In a flashback to his Earth, Lois goes on TV to tell the world about the existence of Kryptonite, and is murdered onscreen by Superman for her trouble.
Outside the Smallville Gazette, Lois asks Clark to bring the box from the X-Kryptonite to the Department of Defense to get fingerprinted, and leaves to connect with Chrissy. Clark leaves, and Captain Luthor heads back to his lair to assemble something to attack Superman. This is intercut with a series of shots of the Stranger and his niece assembling the suit of armor he used when he first confronted Superman.
When Jon gets home, Jordan confronts him about chatting with Sarah, but when the argument starts getting loud, he collapses to the floor as his hearing starts to give him pain again.
At Edge’s company, Lana has four of her five candidates selected. He wants to know whether there’s something she isn’t telling him, and suggests that he could put Kyle into the program if she wanted. He tells her that he looks forward to hearing her decision.
At the Gazette, Chrissy reports that there’s no chance the Stranger is related to Luthor.
Superman goes to meet him, and the Stranger tells him that they need to stop something that’s coming. When Superman asks whether he thinks Edge is the biggest threat, he says no, then tells him in Kryptonese that Kal-El is.
Meanwhile, Lois gets a phone call from the DoD. The prints have come back, and the Stranger is actually someone who has been dead for six years. Not Luthor, but John Henry Irons. Lois borrows Chrissy’s car to run for help, just as Irons blasts Superman with a wall of red sunlight. He tells Superman that he’s the Man of Steel, summoning a giant hammer to him and hitting Superman with it. He explains that the hammer feeds on kinetic energy, so that the farther it travels, the harder it hits. Leslie Larr, hearing what’s going on with her super-hearing, calls Edge and tells him to move a larger shipment of X-Kryptonite while Superman is distracted.
As Lois drives toward Clark, calling him to try and tell him that she thinks her source is the Stranger. Meanwhile, Jordan’s super-hearing picks up the attack on Superman and the boys get in the truck and start driving toward him. Just as Irons is about to deliver a devastating hammer blow to Superman with the kinetic hammer, the boys drive the truck into the lair and run Irons over. Jon then take the hammer and smashes out the red lights, giving Superman a second wind and a chance to take Irons into custody.
At the DoD, Superman tells the soldiers on hand that he and General Lane will interrogate Irons in the morning, and no one is to try it before then.
At the Cushing house, Lana’s friend comes in to report she got the job, and that Edge had called her himself. She brings Lana a basket, telling her that Edge told her she got the job after he saw her with Lana.
Back at Edge’s company, he has a whiteboard together that suggests Lana has unwittingly chosen guinea pigs for his X-Kryptonite experiments.
Back at the Kent farm, Lois tells Clark that she still has a bad feeling about Irons, and Clark says that he plans on getting more information tomorrow. The pair agree to tell the boys everything.
In one last flashback to John Henry’s Earth, John and Lois’s daughter — Natasha — is worried that the suit isn’t ready yet, but John says that they know where Superman is, and this is his one chance to end it. He tells her he’s going to go out there and kill Superman, and then he’ll be right back. The two share a tearful hug, and Nat puts one of her hair ties around his wrist. He promises her one more time that he’ll be right back, and leaves their basement for what seems likely to be the last time he ever saw his daughter. On our Earth, he sits in his cell, stroking the hair tie.
