Chapter 35: Best Laid Plans
“How are they doing, Pete?”
Pete Lamb scratched his head. “Well enough, considering. Assuming we can shoot this latest attempt down, they should get a breather unless the SMPA passes. Since they’ll have to override our veto, it’ll take a while for support to reach that level. If we’re lucky, it won’t ever.”
The President rubbed his eyes. “We need to step up our messaging game. We’re not getting through to the public on this.”
Pete sighed. “The other side can be blunt, but we don’t have that luxury. We can’t be explicit on why ours is the best approach for aligning her with American interests, without inflaming the Chinese and the Russians. Not to mention our allies.
“For all their blustering about the SMPA the Chinese and the Russians are pretty happy about it. It gives them ammunition at the U.N., and if it passes and makes things too hot for her, they know she’ll run. They’d like nothing better.”
“Well, keep working on it. I want to give an address on this soon, in prime time, and I want a kick-ass speech. The public has to understand why we’re doing it this way.”
“Yes, Sir. I’ll meet with the speechwriters tomorrow. Was there anything else?”
“No, Pete. Why don’t you go home? Say Hi to Dennis for me.” The President smiled. “And it’s been too long since you’ve brought him here for dinner.”
Pete offered a crooked grin. “I’ll let him know, Mr. President. Have a good evening.”
The President rose from his desk as his Chief of Staff left, then turned to look out the window, his jaw clenched with frustration. Munroe and the others were jeopardizing something of great strategic importance to the United States.
People like him saw what they wanted and grabbed for it directly; they had the patience of a toddler. That wouldn’t work. You couldn’t boss a goddess around and expect anything good to come of it. Especially if the goddess’s father should come calling.
Your friend, on the other hand, would gladly help you out. Your friend would take your side, watch out for your interests. Having a goddess for a friend could be a very good thing.
But friendships took time and care. They were an investment.
• • •
Kara was bored.
She didn’t think she’d miss school, but she did. At Thanksgiving, they’d all needed a break, a chance to come to terms with their public exposure. But Kara had gotten used to the new rhythm of her life, and this was a big disruption. Again.
They didn’t even know when they’d be able to leave. Camp David was nice and all, but she’d rather have been back with her friends, or even better, her family. Caitlin and Emily weren’t happy either.
Supergirl wasn’t needed on Monday so there wasn’t that to keep her busy. They were sending some schoolwork along but it hadn’t arrived yet, so she had the whole day free. She did some reading, careful to do it at normal speed to make it last longer. Sometimes if she was really excited about a book she’d drop into super-speed without noticing.
She puttered around on the Internet for a while, but she wasn’t supposed to chat with her friends and you could only watch silly videos on Youtube for so long.
She spent an hour just running around Camp David at normal speed like a normal kid, trying to see where all the trails went. Unlike a normal kid, she wasn’t any more tired afterward than when she started. She was surprised that she missed that tired feeling — it was a kind of medal of accomplishment that let you know you’d done something. The Secret Service agent who’d been trailing her was tired enough for both of them, though.
She went flying, but was cautioned not to let anyone off the base see her coming or going, or to go anywhere near Delaware. The base was large enough, surrounded by an even larger state park, that she could head straight up before starting to travel. That was enough to keep anyone from seeing where she was coming from.
She was very, very tempted to visit the Moon, but was too worried about running out of air to try it before talking to her father. She thought she could make it there, walk around a bit, and make it back before having to take another breath, but she wasn’t sure. Besides, she kind of wanted to visit her own Moon, back home. Even though this one looked exactly the same, as far as she could tell.
She was kind of impatient to go back into space again, period. The view was amazing and the sun felt
so nice. Too bad even she needed to breathe, even if only every twenty minutes or so.
Huh. Maybe she could visit the space station, the one she’d saved? They’d have air. That might be fun! She could even take them some things from the ground they might miss. Like flowers; she bet they didn’t have fresh flowers there. Or burritos, or pizza.
It was getting too late today, though, and she thought she’d better ask permission first anyway. She didn’t think she should just show up and knock on the door. Did it have a door?
She checked her smartphone, this time making sure it had the right time zone, since she was currently two thousand feet above Hollywood. She’d wanted to see the sign.
She’d been tempted by Disneyland too, but didn’t have much money with her. Also, they had a sign saying children had to be accompanied by an adult. Maybe Emily could take them sometime?
She decided it was getting close to dinner time and started back to Maryland. She hadn’t been on her way more than a few moments when her attention was caught by the sound of gunfire.
She looked down, and her vision zoomed in on two groups of young men facing off with each other in a residential neighborhood; many on both sides had guns. No one appeared to have been hurt yet. In the small houses around them, Kara could see the residents cowering as far away from the windows as they could.
Without stopping to think she went into a steep power dive; moments later she landed abruptly between the two gangs, causing them all to jump in surprise.
“Stop shooting!” she shouted.
One of the men scowled and fired his gun at her. Kara was caught by surprise and the bullet ricocheted off her head.
He blinked, and fired off several rounds in rapid succession; Kara was prepared this time and easily caught them all.
She let the bullets slide off her open palm onto the ground like so many pebbles. The men all gaped and lowered their weapons.
“Stop shooting!” she repeated, stamping her foot for good measure. She was angry.
The men all looked at each other. “Whatcha gonna do,
chica? Arrest us?” A laugh ran through both gangs.
Kara frowned. “No,” she admitted. “The government people told me I shouldn’t try to arrest anyone.” She folded her arms and glared at them. “But they said I could stop people from getting hurt. Shooting each other is wrong, and you could hit the people in these houses! It’s stupid!”
The men seemed at a loss: with force and threats off the table their problem-solving skills were limited. One of them finally said, “Go home. This ain’t your business.”
“You’ll just start shooting again!”
Another of the men sighed, exasperated. “Just go home!”
Kara looked around at them. She knew if she left they’d just pick up from where she’d stopped them.
An idea came to her, and she started spinning and firing blasts of heat vision. Moments later all the men dropped their guns and cursed, shaking their hands. Kara blurred, then reappeared holding a ball of crushed, partially melted guns. She let it drop on the pavement, where it landed with a dull
thud.
“Hey!” shouted one of the men. “You can’t do that!”
Another man rolled his eyes. “She just did,
tonto. Whatcha gonna do, call the cops and file a complaint?” He walked over to Kara and knelt down in front of her, eye to eye. “You know this ain’t gonna stop nothin’,
chiquita. There’s plenty more guns where those came from.”
Kara frowned and looked down. “I guess.” She looked back up at the man. “But I
had to. I can’t watch people die and do nothing.”
The man nodded once in acquiescence.
“Why do you guys
do this?”
The man opened his mouth to reply, then stopped. He knew exactly why they did this, but couldn’t begin to explain it to the innocent child looking back at him. He was used to thinking of the good and innocent as weak and powerless, and she was anything but. She made him uncomfortable.
It didn’t help that she looked like an angel.
“It’s complicated. Maybe you’ll understand when you’re older.”
Kara looked around at all of them, and shook her head. “I don’t think I’ll ever understand.” A quick check with her vision assured her that no usable weapons remained. “I guess I can go now. But you guys are being really dumb.”
She shot upwards without further preamble. Both gangs watched silently as she dwindled into the late afternoon sky. Some of the men crossed themselves.
• • •
At twenty-six minutes past ten o’clock Tuesday evening, a light snow was falling in Milford Neck Wildlife Area, though it wasn’t sticking. In a clearing in a small stand of trees, a small, brightly glowing dot appeared in midair, illuminating the surroundings.
Within moments it expanded to a twelve-foot sphere, then deformed into an odd shape. Suddenly, from an impossible-seeming direction, something slid into that shape, and the glow faded, revealing a man and a woman on what looked like an old-fashioned horse-drawn sleigh.
Lois swallowed heavily. “Clark, after that trip I’d better not ever hear another crack about my driving. Wow…” She shook her head. She felt a little dizzy.
Hearing no response, she turned to find Clark slumped against the controls, his skin eerily glowing green in the darkness.
“Clark?” She reached out, hesitated, then shook him. “Clark?”
The glow faded slowly, and Lois shook him more urgently. “Clark, are you all right? Clark, what’s wrong? Clark!”
• • •
