“I’ve got a good trace on them,” S’Vram told Foster. “I’ve got a good reading on the tracker.”
“Now, with any luck, they’ll lead us to where they’re holding Superman and Kent,” Foster said. The man knocked on the partition that separated the technicians from the driver. “Follow them, but stay well back. We don’t want to be noticed,” he ordered the driver.
The van pulled into traffic, following a dark sedan as it turned the corner and headed south.
0 0 0
Lois felt the sedan drive up several ramps. The car finally stopped and the man who was supposed to have been meeting Clark pulled off the blanket and forced Lois out of the car. He ordered her to leave her shoes, and purse, in the car. Once she and the ‘contact’ were standing in the parking garage, the sedan pulled away.
The man took Lois by the elbow, holding a pistol in his free hand, and led her to a locked storeroom, near the elevators. He unlocked the door, handed her a paper bag with something soft in it. “Inside, strip down and put these on,” he ordered.
She stepped inside the closet and attempted to shut the door. He blocked it with his foot. “You have two minutes, or else you’ll never see your boy friend alive again.”
“My boy friend?” she asked as she pulled a set of green surgical scrubs from the sack and started to put them on.
“Your panties and bra, too,” he ordered. She stripped down to the skin, kicking her discarded clothes out to him. Somebody was going to pay for this, she swore to herself. That was a silk shirt and a brand new skirt, one she’d bought because Clark had mentioned he liked the color on her.
“I don’t have a boy friend,” she told him, coming through the door dressed in the scrubs.
“Our intelligence says otherwise. Or didn’t he tell you his real name is Kal-El?”
“Well, I certainly would remember if I had a boy friend named Kal-El,” she told him.
“In that case, you have nothing to worry about. But it won’t go as well for him, I’m afraid,” the man said. He grabbed her arm again, leading her to another car, a black SUV with blacked-out windows. The passenger side door was already unlocked and another man was seated on the driver’s side.
“People know I was meeting you,” Lois told them. “They’ll come looking.”
“We already know that Commander Straker has been in contact with you. Do you really think that SHADO cares about you? They want the same thing my people do. The information Kal-El has in his head. Information about the threat Superman and his people pose to the U.S. and the rest of this planet.”
“Superman? You have Superman? Where?”
“In the car, Miss Lane, and I’m sure you’ll get more answers than you want.” He stuck the muzzle of the gun in her ribs. She climbed into the passenger seat and buckled herself in. He pulled a small spray bottle from his pocket and sprayed her in the face. “Sleep well, alien lover,” he said as she fell back, unconscious.
0 0 0
“Colonel,” Ford said quietly. “We have a problem. The tracer in her shoe and the one in her skirt pocket are in different places. I have to assume we’ve lost her.”
“Give Inspector Henderson the details,” Foster ordered. “I’ll let General Straker know.”
0 0 0
A nondescript white six-wheeled trailer was parked beside the Daily Planet building. The trailer was lead-lined and the interior walls were covered with computer monitors and electronic equipment. There were no windows except in the back doors and those were covered by opaque curtains.
Straker, Freeman and two young operatives were seated inside the trailer, the MCC. The Mobile Command and Control was a portable control center that any military on Earth would give its eyeteeth to inspect, much less own. DOD experts wouldn’t recognize most of the equipment that lines the trailer’s walls. It was SHADO’s home away from home, allowing them to detect and deal with hostile alien threats as well as more domestic ones.
“It’s okay, Paul,” Straker assured his subordinate. “We’ll just have to do this the old fashioned way. We’re working on getting a list of Bureau 39’s current operatives and any property in the city associated with them.”
“What about abandoned warehouses, or sympathetic civilians?” Foster asked.
“By sympathetic civilians, I assume you mean Lex Luthor?” Straker asked.
“It is pretty well known he doesn’t like Superman,” Foster reminded him.
“I doubt Luthor would be so foolish as to associate himself with Myerson. But I’ll get someone on that angle as well. Thank you, Paul. I’ll see you back at the mobile.” Straker said, taking off the headset. He turned to his second in command. “Well, is Luthor involved?”
“It’s hard to say,” Freeman admitted. “But I doubt it. Nigel St. John would be the one in charge of the operation, and there’s nothing to indicate he has anything like that going on. But they are both under surveillance.”
Freeman saw the worry in Straker’s eyes. “Ed, we’ll find him and the girl.”
“I hope you’re right, Alec. I hope to God you’re right.”
0 0 0
Lois woke up in a cold, stone cell. The single fixture in the ceiling gave just enough light to see the cell was devoid of furnishings and there were dark stains on the floor in the corner. Who’s blood?
That answer came too soon.
Lois heard a key turn in the door lock and got to her feet, prepared to rush the door. Nobody was going lock Lois Lane in an empty cell and get away with it. The door opened and a man wearing soiled scrubs was pushed into the room. He fell to the floor with a gasp of pain, facing away from her.
“We brought you company, Kal-El,” a deep voice said. “Enjoy it while you can.” The door shut and the key turned, locking the door.
Lois ran over to the man. He seemed familiar. Dark haired, broad-shouldered. Kal-El? She touched his shoulder and he shuddered as she moved to look at his face – it was Clark. He’d lost his glasses, there was a strange necklace around his neck, his face was bruised and swollen, and there was blood on his face, but he was definitely her missing partner, Clark Kent.
“Oh, my God, what have they done to you?” she gasped. “They said they had someone named Kal-El.”
“Shh,” Clark croaked out. “They’re listening.” She bent closer to listen. “They think I’m him.”
“Why are they doing this? Who are they?”
Clark shook his head and tried to sit up. He had fallen on his good arm and now it hurt as well. “I don’t know. They keep asking about aliens, about an invasion. They don’t believe I don’t know anything.”
“Do they expect him to come?” she asked, keeping her voice low. “He may already be dead.”
Clark gave her a blank look, eyes hazed with pain.
“You’ve been missing about forty-eight hours,” she explained quietly. “And the FBI believes Superman was kidnapped or captured. They’re afraid he may be dead. We figure you went looking for him and got into trouble.”
“Yeah,” he murmured. “I was looking for evidence behind Fale’s and they grabbed me. I woke up here, and they . . .” A horrified look came into his face. “They grabbed you. They’re going to use you to make me talk, only I don’t know anything.”
“Look Cl . . .”
“Kal-El,” he interrupted, keeping his voice low. “That’s who they think I am.”
“Kal-El,” she continued. “Perry and the police know you’re missing and they know I am too. They’ll find us. I promise.”
Clark shook his head. “You don’t know what sort of monsters they are, Lois. You don’t know what they’re capable of.”
“Hey, we’ve been in tough jams before. We’ll get out of this one,” she assured him.
He didn’t say anything, laying back on the cold floor, eyes closed. Lois looked more closely at him. His left hand was bruised and badly swollen and he was favoring his left arm, which was discolored with bruises. She put her arm under his shoulders to help him sit up and he gasped in pain.
“What have they done to you?” she asked again. He started shaking again and she realized he was crying.
