The night was thick over the Metropolis docks, broken only by the blue and red strobes of police lights. Inside a stolen van, Rude Jones and Marty were sweating bullets.
"Damn, we're gonna get busted!" Rude yelled, his knuckles white on the steering wheel.
"No way!" Marty shot back, his eyes wild. "Not happening!"
He slammed the accelerator, the old engine roaring in protest. As they sped onto the bridge, a flash of blue and red streaked across the sky above them.
"No! It's Superman!" Marty cried, his heart pounding.
"He ain't gettin' me!" Rude growled through clenched teeth.
In a desperate, panicked move, Marty wrenched open his door during a sharp turn and threw himself from the moving vehicle, tumbling across the asphalt before disappearing into the darkness beneath the bridge.
Alone, Rude lost control. The van swerved, smashed into the guardrail, and flipped several times before skidding to a stop on its roof.
Inside, Rude, dazed and bleeding, was trapped. Worse, the stolen LexCorp chemical drums had ruptured. A toxic, violently reactive cocktail of liquids and gases spilled out, enveloping him in a crimson, electrically charged cloud.
Sparks flew from the van's crushed electrical systems.
The reaction was immediate and horrific.
Rude screamed, a sound of pure agony as the foreign energy fused with his flesh. His body contorted, his skin taking on a sickly purple hue. He felt a hunger... an insatiable, primal hunger, not for food, but for life force itself.
When Superman landed softly beside the wreck, ready to rescue the driver, he no longer saw Rude Jones.
He saw the Parasite.
The creature rose, shattering the remains of the van like paper. Its eyes glowed with a hungry green light. It stared at Superman, and a twisted, greedy smile distorted its features.
"So much... energy..." it rasped, its voice now a raw scrape.
It reached out a hand, and an immediate, crushing wave of weakness washed over Superman. The Kryptonian staggered, his very life force being ripped away, drained by the monster's touch.
Meanwhile, under the bridge, Marty, unharmed, watched the scene in horror. He saw his partner transform into a living nightmare, then he saw the Man of Steel himself falter. Fear overwhelmed him. He scrambled backward, then got to his feet and fled at a full sprint into the night, leaving his accomplice—and now, this monster—behind.
The Parasite, invigorated by the energy stolen from Superman, began to laugh, a grotesque, hungry sound. Superman's first encounter with this new threat had ended in defeat. The parasite had fed on the most powerful of heroes. And it was still hungry.