For the
Extra Lois Challenge.
It was one year ago today… one year ago, although she hadn’t known it at the time, that her life veered off into the Twilight Zone.
Lois’s memories of that day were still vague and she suspected she would never fully remember what really happened to her in the moments before she barged into the Daily Planet bullpen to face down her erstwhile partner, Clark Kent, for taking advantage of her drugged state.
She remembered, as if from a dream, getting sprayed with Miranda’s perfume and chasing after Clark. She remembered making love to Clark. She also remembered waking up horrified at what had happened – and the fact that Clark had been willing to make love to her even though she had obviously not been in her right mind at the time.
She had been furious and hadn’t given Clark time to say or do anything to mollify her. Lois remembered that part quite clearly. She remembered going to her apartment to change clothes and then… then there was a blank as though the time had simply disappeared and she found herself inside the bullpen ready to rip Clark’s heart out.
She found him in Perry White’s office that morning. Obviously he’d been telling Perry all about how she’d come on to him. In her fury she missed the signs that something was wrong – more wrong than just Clark talking about her behind her back – until it was too late.
“I will not work with him,” she announced, shaking her finger at Clark.
Clark gave her a blank look. “I’m sorry, but have we met?”
“That is one sick joke, mister. So, you have your fun and now you pretend you don’t remember my name?” she hissed.
“Mister White, I swear…” he began, turning to the editor.
“Don’t, Clark,” she ordered. “I don’t know what the devil you were thinking that you could get away with… with what you did last night…”
“Lady, I don’t know who you are, and we certainly didn’t spend any time together last night, no matter what you claim,” Clark stated.
“Right… like I never met you, or your parents in Smallville, and I don’t know that you’ve traveled around the world and was taught to dance by a Nigerian princess or that the first article you showed Perry was about the mating habits of the knob-tailed gecko?”
“Lois…” Perry started, “if you say this hound dog’s done you wrong… well, you know I won’t stand for any of that.” Lois watched in satisfaction as Perry turned to Clark. Then the satisfaction turned to confusion as Perry said, “Sorry, Kent, but I’ve no place here for someone who would do that to a lady, even if I had a job open.”
A job open? What the hell’s going on here?Clark looked resigned as Perry handed him a pile of clippings and what Lois now recognized as a résumé.
A résumé?“I’m sorry to have taken your time, Mister White,” Clark said as he walked out of the office. He didn’t look back.
“Perry, what’s going on here?” Lois demanded.
“You tell me,” Perry said. He looked like he couldn’t decide to be happy or upset. “Lois, where have you been for the past six months? We thought you were dead. And now you show up and accuse…”
“But I’ve been right…” she began. Then she noticed the calendar on his desk. The date was June 10th. But she would have sworn it was October…
“Lois?” Perry’s voice intruded. “Are you okay?”
“Is that the date?”
“Yes, hon.”
She felt faint. She barely noticed as Perry guided her to a chair and waved away the curious onlookers outside his office.
“You want to tell me what’s going on?” Perry said gently, as though he was afraid of spooking her.
“I have no idea,” she admitted. “The last thing I remember is being doused with some foul chemical during that stupid photo shoot and then going over to Clark’s place… only the date’s wrong and he didn’t know me and you said I was dead…”
“You don’t remember going to Pointe-Noire on that arms-smuggling story?” Perry asked.
Lois shook her head.
“You have no idea where you’ve been for the past six months?”
“I know where I’ve been,” she stated. “I’ve been right here, working with…”
“No, Lois, you haven’t,” Perry told her. “Last December you went to the Congo to chase down a story. Just after New Years we got word that you’d gone missing. They assumed you’d met with foul play.”
Lois shook her head. She remembered her trip to Pointe Noire. She had followed Marj and Marvin Turner to the Congo and found the warehouse they’d been using to house the arms being sold to the local warlords. Only the warehouse had been destroyed moments after she left it. She had taken the hint and come back to Metropolis with what evidence she had, including documentation on the complicity of the ‘local authorities’ in the Turners’ not-so-little enterprise.
“Lois, where are you staying?” Perry asked.
“At my…” she began. His quizzical expression made her stop. “My apartment’s gone, isn’t it?”
He nodded.
“Do I still have a job?”
He smiled at that. “Yes, hon, you do,” he told her. “I didn’t have the heart to tell personnel we didn’t think you were coming back.”
-o-o-o-
As far as the world was concerned, Lois Lane had been missing since New Years. Clark Kent did not have a job at the Daily Planet and had never been assigned as her partner, even though Lois knew they had worked together for five months.
And there were other things that were ‘off’. The death of Beatrice Shaw during the razing of the Sarah Bernhardt Theatre felt wrong. The destruction of the Messenger shuttle and the Prometheus space station felt doubly wrong.
Superman had saved the space station – only Superman hadn’t shown up this time. Superman hadn’t shown up anywhere. Lois knew she didn’t dare look for him – with six months supposedly missing from her life, remembering things that hadn’t happened wasn’t going to make Perry any happier about her refusal to seek professional help with her ‘memory loss’. Looking for a ‘super-man’ would be the last straw for her career as an investigative journalist.
Perry White didn’t run an alien-hunting tabloid.
The one oddly bright point in all the wrongness was that Lex Luthor had actually agreed to Lois’s request for an interview following her successful investigation of the Toaster gang’s predations.
“Mister Luthor, I know you're hesitant to give interviews...” she had said as he was leaving a fund-raiser she was covering as a favor to Perry – Cat Grant was out with the flu.
“I hope you can understand, a man in my position. I wouldn't want to be misinterpreted, and I have had one or two bad experiences with the media,” he said suavely.
“But not with me,” she assured him.
Luthor looked into her eyes and smiled. “Why don't we make it dinner?”
Luthor’s limo picked her up at her apartment on Clinton. To her surprise, Luthor wasn't in the vehicle. The chauffeur explained in heavily accented English that Mister Luthor rarely ate out in Metropolis. They would dine at the penthouse.
Luthor was waiting for her in his penthouse. It was a richly elegant set of rooms – the lair of someone wealthy who saw no need to hide the fact.
His study was a prime example – paneled in dark wood and furnished in dark leather. The walls were lined with lit cases filled with ceremonial weapons from all eras and nations. From her research she knew that his collection was priceless. Luthor stopped and pointed out an ancient sword.
“The prize of my collection…” he began.
“Macedonian?”
He seemed surprised that she recognized the age of the weapon. She wasn’t about to tell him that she ‘remembered’ Luthor’s conversation with Clark.
“It belonged to Alexander the Great,” Luthor continued. “A brilliant tactician. His strategy was simple: always control the high ground. It was with this sword that he...”
“...defeated Darius III, and was proclaimed King of Asia,” Lois stated.
“You surprise me, Ms. Lane. I'm not often surprised,” Luthor said.
“I try to do my homework, especially when interviewing someone as influential as you are,” Lois said, appealing to his vanity.
Luthor’s man servant appeared, interrupting whatever Luthor had planned to say. Luthor ushered her into the dining room. Like the rest of the penthouse, the dining room was richly appointed – just bordering on ostentatious. But like the rest of the Luthor’s quarters, it seemed a waste. No one outside of his few intimates ever saw these rooms.
Lois settled down to business. “Both your father and mother died when you were fourteen, correct?”
He seemed amused. “Why don't I have my office send you a biography?”
“Because I don't want the standard line; I want to know the real Lex Luthor,” she explained. “We all know the rags to riches story. But I want to know what makes you tick. What you want, what you strive for...”
He seemed to actually take a moment to consider his answer. “Pleasure. The pursuit of pleasure… Does that surprise you?”
“I would have guessed you'd say ‘power,’” she admitted.
“Power is a means, not an end.”
“But, achieving power must give you pleasure.”
His smile actually reached his eyes this time. “Very good.”
“You took over your first big company at age twenty-one, but there were rumors that the buy-out was coerced,” she said, getting back to business.
Luthor stiffened and Lois knew she had struck a nerve. “Is it true the Board of Directors were paid substantial, unreported fees?”
He reached over and took her hand. It was an obvious ploy to distract her. “Was the food not to your liking?”
She looked down at her plate and realized she hadn’t done more than taste her food. It looked delicious but she really had no appetite for it. “Sometimes when I'm working...”
“All work and no play... your credo, Lois Lane?” he asked, still holding onto her hand.
She tried to pull her hand away. “I don't think...”
“Can't we just enjoy the evening? Enjoy each other? Let down your hair, Lois. Loosen the tie…” he said. He turned her hand over and uncurled her fingers. “You're so tense. Let the defenses down.”
She finally got her hand away from him. “Lex, I think you have the wrong idea about this dinner.”
He smiled disarmingly – at least Lois assumed it was meant to be disarming but her stomach was churning. “I hope you don't think we're here merely because you are a beautiful young woman. That wouldn't speak well for either of us... You wanted an interview. A scoop. I understand that. But, quid pro quo, let me tell you what I want.” He leaned closer. “My talent in life is not making money or juggling companies. It's character assessment. I sense things about you. Possibilities. Potentials. You have the intelligence, spirit, and vision to transcend the mundane...”
He was smoothly seductive and Lois couldn’t remember the last time an attractive man had told her she was beautiful – aside from Clark during their one night of insanity. It would be so easy to fall for Luthor. So easy and so utterly insane.
She made a show of checking the time. “Lex, I have a story to write tonight. I think we'd better be going.”
“No dessert?” he asked. She knew he wasn't referring to pie or cake or anything else that came out of the kitchen.
“No thanks. I never have dessert,” she told him. She resisted the urge to rub her upset belly.
“Really? You don't know what you're missing.” Luthor’s expression was coyly sly, as though he fully expected her to change her mind and have the dessert he was thinking of.
Lois’s gut finally had enough. She looked around in alarm to find the door to the rest room as what little she had eaten threatened to reappear.
“Lois, do you need a physician?” Luthor asked as she made it to the powder room and emptied her stomach. He actually sounded alarmed.
“No,” she managed to say.
“Was there something wrong with the meal? I’ll...”
“No,” she repeated. “The meal was fine. My stomach’s been a little queasy the past few days. Nerves and too much coffee most likely,” she assured him with a lie. She had a suspicion about what was wrong with her and it wasn’t the food.
“I’ll have Asabi drive you home,” he offered. The seductive silkiness was still there but Lois knew she’d blown it. There would be no second interview. Luthor was already mentally preparing himself for his next conquest.
Maybe it was for the best, Lois told herself as Luthor’s man drove her home. She ‘remembered’ Lex flying her off to Italy, France, and England for dinner and shows. She remembered being flattered by his attention. She also remembered Clark’s unexplained distrust of the man.
What had Clark known that he’d been unwilling to share with her?
