Description: Lois has been waiting since she was nineteen to meet a certain, super-special someone. Sequel to
Vision of Destiny and part 2 in the Destiny series.
TOC__________
From Chapter 1What if everything she remembered, everything she knew about Clark was wrong? What if he wasn't the man she'd fallen in love with over the years?
The future she'd been working towards, looking forward to, aiming for, was a lie.
She'd awakened this morning full of despair and grieving for that lost life.
But now, hope had returned. Clark was here. Only one day later and he'd secured his place at the Daily Planet, his place in her life. And all her dreams came back to life.
Still, the nightmares of last night were a warning. If she didn't play this right … then she'd lose him. The only guarantee she had, was to act as she always did. Live the life that would have been 'Mad Dog Lane' if she didn't have this knowledge. She was going to have to do a lot of thinking in the days to come. She'd have to work out how she should behave around Clark. How she would feel about him, if he really were a stranger to her.
And that wasn't going to come easy. She'd known him, in her mind, in her memories, since she was nineteen. And she loved him.
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Chapter 2It was less than five minutes after Lois had listened to Clark's story, in Perry's office, and she found herself back in there again.
"I'll need a task force. I can't cover this story alone. Give me Clark."
"Kent's too new. You can have Jimmy." Perry didn't even look up from his desk.
"Chief, we're talking about the space program…"
"Okay. Take Myerson."
"He's busy," Lois crossed her arms.
"Burns."
"Budapest." She injected a disbelieving tone into her voice. How did Perry not remember what his reporters were doing when he'd given the assignments.
"Forget Kent, Lois."
"No, he's good man," Lois moved up to Perry's desk. "If you really feel this way … think he's a 'hack from Smallville' ... then why did you hire him."
Perry smiled and finally looked up. "Are you sure this "Smallville" even exists?" He curled his finger in the air to punctuate the speech marks.
"Of course it does. You couldn't make that name up."
Perry's smile turned into a knowing smirk. "So it's Kent or nobody?"
Lois opened her mouth in shock. Perry had wanted her to take Clark all along, but he'd been testing her. Possibly this was because she'd burst in on him yesterday and argued Clark's case. He was intrigued by how she knew Clark, why she was defending him. She needed to be more careful. Perry couldn't suspect anything about Clark, or 'her and Clark'.
When Perry raised an eyebrow, still waiting for an answer, she tossed her head and turned. At the door she looked back over her shoulder. "And you used to say that I'd never be a team player." She smiled and then left to find Clark.
He was standing near the copy desk, holding some papers. It was impossible not to notice how his brown jacket settled over his wide shoulders. She approached him with caution, her heart pounding rapidly. It was the first time she would really speak with him. She hadn't managed a single word when they'd been introduced yesterday, and she hadn't actually spoken to him earlier, when his work was being read out.
"Hi, Clark," she smiled.
"Hi," he returned and placed down the papers.
"So, Perry's assigned you to help me." She made it seem like she was begrudgingly taking him as partner, terrified he'd figure out how she felt, otherwise - how she was desperate for some time with him.
"Really?" his eyes lit up.
Her heart skipped a beat and she panicked, automatically going into defensive mode and practicing misdirection. "So, let's hit it." She turned and walked away.
"Mind if I ask where we're going?" he chased after her.
"To interview Samuel Platt. He's convinced the Messenger was sabotaged. Came rushing into the news room last week shouting that it was going to explode. Somehow, he knew this was going to happen."
"Sounds suspicious."
Lois spun round when she heard the intrigued tone in Clark's voice.
"Clearly! That's why we're visiting him." She was suddenly overwhelmed by his presence, directly behind her. He was so large, so strong, so handsome. She whirled away, gulping and hyperventilating. She needed some way to get in control. He was going to hear her rapidly beating heart soon. Perhaps he already had!
"And let's get something straight. I didn't work my buns off to become an investigative reporter for the Daily Planet just to baby-sit some hack from Nowheresville." The lie tripping off her tongue tasted rank. She'd worked her buns off
specifically so that she'd be here, at the Daily Planet, just to meet him. Continuing to the steps she stopped then whirled around on him again. "And one other thing. You're not working
with me, you're working
for me. I call the shots. I ask the questions. You're low man. I am top banana. And that's the way I like it. Comprende?" Striding off to the elevator he replied just as she past the door.
"You like to be on top. Got it."
Her mouth dropped open, in shock. Had she really just given him that horrible attitude. He'd never fall in love with her if she behaved in that manner. And he'd turned her attitude into a joke with his reply. This was a disaster.
He entered the elevator and stood off to the side.
"I … I'm sorry Clark. I'm not used to working with a partner," she stuttered. She didn't elaborate because it would have meant explaining that she'd rejected every previous partner because … because they weren't him. She turned and looked up at him, smiling shyly.
His stunned look reminded her of the unusual situation she was in, and she whipped her head back to look at the closing elevator doors. A tear squeezed out of the corner of her eyes and she held herself stiffly to keep from shaking.
"Lois …" he spoke tentatively. "I've never worked with a partner before, either." His voice was soft. "We'll work it out together. Okay?" He sounded hopeful.
"Together," she whispered. A memory of how 'together' they would be struck her and she recalled his sarcastic retort to her rant.
'You like to be on top.' Her heart rate accelerated when she began imagining being 'on top' at the same time as being 'together'.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Lois wandered around the cluttered, rundown … rooms. She couldn't in all conscience call it an apartment, although clearly Dr. Platt was living here. He'd prattled on, in his softly spoken voice, about reports, and particles, and other scientific things that she didn't understand. But, thankfully, Clark seemed to. Dr. Platt was currently travelling backwards and forwards, collecting, what seemed to be, random bits of mismatched paper.
"Dr. Platt, perhaps you could gather your report together some other time. I'll have somebody come by and pick it up." She encouraged him to stop, and calm down. The whole situation had her head buzzing. She took a deep breath and glanced down at the table where the papers were slowly gathering into an uneven pile.
Sitting at the edge of the desk was a photograph in a plain wooden frame. Lois recognised the man in the photo as Dr. Platt. He was smiling, along with the woman and girl by his side. There was another photograph, slid into the corner, of the same three people, although clearly the young girl was a few years older now. Again, all three were smiling. Lois reached out and picked up the photograph.
Family.
She immediately had the overwhelming feeling of family, love, commitment, reliability, responsibility.
Ten years ago these things, these feelings, would have meant something completely different to her. Her parent's marriage had been full of arguments, resentment, selfishness and blame. But she lived with the memories of a different marriage now. A marriage that was good, pure, giving, supportive.
Lois could suddenly feel Clark's presence behind her, even though he was still at the other side of the room. She was overwhelmed by a longing to experience her own family. Now that Clark was here that longing had changed into an impatient desire, rather than a wistful waiting.
"My wife. We planned to live together on the Prometheus," Dr. Platt explained.
"Where's your family now?" Lois knew that they didn't live here. No woman would live in this mess, and the girl … well it was clear from the photograph that she was disabled. She sat in a wheelchair. But there was no possible way that a wheelchair could navigate this place.
"Gone. They left when … well, it's all for the best."
Lois looked back at the picture once more. All three of the looked so happy. She knew that happiness. In her memories of her marriage to Clark. She would never consider, ever, leaving him. It seemed so strange to think that this woman could consider leaving her husband when she was so clearly perfectly happy with him, and their family. Even though they had a disabled daughter Lois could see the unconditional love in both parents' eyes. Dr. Platt was telling the truth … that his wife and daughter were not here, with him, but Lois could not believe that they had simply 'left'.
She looked back up at the short, plump man but saw the pain in his eyes. He wouldn't talk about his family if she pushed too much, so she changed the subject back to the reason for this investigation.
"Dr. Platt, who would want to sabotage space station Prometheus?"
"I don't know. See the micro gravity laboratory on Prometheus could be the key to curing hundreds of diseases here on earth. In a zero-gravity environment we can actually separate the proteins that form viruses and so many children with crippling diseases, my daughter, we could cure them." When Dr. Platt mentioned his daughter Lois looked back to the picture in her hand one last time.
She placed it back down, realising that this was so much more than just a factual story. People had died, but also, people would continue to die … if this really did turn out to be deliberate. The Messenger exploding by accident would be classed as a tragedy, and only one life was be lost. Yet if it was deliberate, as Platt claimed, then someone was interfering in the development of medicine in a large way, and millions of lives could be lost.
She turned to Clark. "I think you and I should pay Dr. Baines a visit."
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Time to visit
this thread.
