Missing Lois - TOC Author's Note: Just a reminder Lois has told Sam Lane that she is his other daughter, Lucy Lane, aka Lois Lane's sister. She calls her Clark, Kal. Everyone else in the alternate dimension thinks she is Lucy El (wife of Kal El), an old college friend of Clark's.
Where we left off with Chapter 2: Part 5...“Wait here,” he said and stepped behind a large air conditioning unit, then returned dressed as Clark Kent.
Mayson smiled holding a hand out to him. “Thank you for changing, Clark.”
Clark took her hand, and as she stepped away toward the edge near the
Daily Planet building, he tugged her back. “I still need to speak with you, Mayson.” He pulled her to him and kissed her.
“Clark! Everyone’s watching,” she murmured, embarrassed, trying to step out of the kiss.
“Everyone who, Mayson? We’re on top of a building.” He held his hand on her back and deepened the kiss. Her knees failed her and she wrapped her arms around his neck, kissing him back.
Chapter 2: The Twilight Zone - Part 6“Forgive me,” Clark whispered a minute later as he let her go. “I was worried about you.”
“Me?” Mayson coughed, stumbling over to a vent to sit down. “I’m fine.”
“I just wanted to let you know how important you are to me. That I care.”
“Clark, we’ve had two dates.”
“Three.”
“One whole and two half dates,” she corrected him.
“I don’t date much,” he said, crouching next to her. “You mean a lot to me and I worry.”
Her brow furrowed. “That’s the second time you’ve said you worry, Clark. What haven’t you told me?”
“Lucy overheard something. She thinks the gunman shot her because he mistakenly thought she and I were dating.”
Mayson looked confused. “You and Lucy aren’t dating?”
Clark shook his head. “But you and I are.”
“Oh.” Mayson touched his cheek as his words sunk in. She glanced down at the bullet proof vest. “Oh!” Standing up, she looked around at the nearby buildings and stepped closer to him. “Why would anyone want to harm your…” She could not speak the word she wanted and searched for another term. “Friends?”
He wrapped his arms around her, protectively. “To test me.”
“Test?”
“My speed. My hearing. My abilities. I don’t know.”
“Oh.” She looked down. “Superman.”
“It’s no secret, Mayson, that we’re the same person.”
“I know,” she whispered. “But you seem so different in the blue suit. There’s something intimidating about Superman.”
He smiled, tugging on the lapel of her navy suit. “I could say the same about you.”
She returned his smile. “Clark is personable. Funny. A good kisser.”
He laughed. “I’ve never been called that before.”
Mayson walked to the edge of the building and took off the tarp covering the rifle. “Why would someone just leave the gun?”
Clark pointed, not wanting to incur her wrath by touching evidence. “See, here, a laser guided telescopic video camera. And here, a remote control.”
“The shooter wasn’t on the building.”
“I should take this to S.T.A.R. Labs and see if they can back track the location of the signal.”
She gazed back at the
Daily Planet building. “How did Lucy overhear the shooter?”
Clark didn’t answer as he bent over the rifle. His head tilted to the side. Tick. Tick. Tick. He quickly scanned the rifle and found a bomb located next to the remote control switch. The digital clock read four seconds. He grabbed Mayson and zipped back to the
Daily Planet.
“What the...” she started to say as the shockwave and explosion hit.
“Sorry,” he whispered, setting her down next to his desk. “I should have noticed that sooner.”
“No. No. That’s quite all right, Superman,” she replied, quite breathless, stepping away from him. “That was soon enough.”
“Will you be okay?” he asked.
She nodded, placing her hand on the butt of her gun at her hip. Her eyes never left his.
“I’ve got some errands to run. Call me when you get off duty and I’ll escort you home.”
She stepped after him as he took off. “Where?”
“I should be home by then.”
“Home?” She looked confused. The blue suit or the explosion had knocked her senseless.
Superman landed next to her. “Clark’s.”
“Oh, right.” She shook her head. “Sorry.”
“Stay safe,” he said, disappearing out the window.
***
Returning to Clinton Street, Clark found that Lois was still sound asleep. He sighed. Most likely, still dreaming of her and Kal’s wedding. If he had been in Kal’s shoes, he wouldn’t have waited another day to make Lois his own.
Clark looked her shoulder over again, but still didn’t see any wound. There was hole in her shirt, so obviously a bullet had hit her. There was even a little blood around the hole, indicating she had been shot. But the only mark on her was something that looked like an old scar. Round, like a bullet hole, but well-healed. He shifted her shoulder and saw a duplicate mark on the back of her shoulder. A through and through shot.
“Oh, Lois, what is going on with you?” he whispered, kissing her hand. How in the world was he going to explain her lack of a wound to her father? Much less to Mayson.
What was going on with her? Then he remembered something she had told him earlier when she thought he was Kal. The super hearing! He placed a hand to her stomach and listened. He could hear the super fast heartbeat of the little Kent. Had she developed some Kryptonian abilities when she got pregnant? The super hearing was a good defensive skill for a new mother. The fast healing – not impenetrable like him, but definitely faster than human – to ward off broken ribs and internal bleeding when this super baby started to kick.
He needed to talk to Sam Lane. He should have called him first thing upon bringing Lois here, but he couldn’t. Lois had been fading, literally. How would he explain to the doctor that his daughter was transparent? And then when she was back to her normal color, he couldn’t wake her. She had been right. Being shot and electrocuted on the same day took a lot out of her mentally. And if she was developing super healing, was it was raising her metabolism? She would need to eat more. Much more.
The phone rang.
“Hello.”
“Where is my… Lucy?” Sam Lane asked.
“I heard about the shooting on the news. I need to speak with her… And to you.”Clark winced. “She’s here. Resting. She’s had quite a day.”
“You should have brought her straight to me or to a hospital.”“You are right, I should have.” But he didn’t. He had his reasons and he didn’t feel like arguing. “She’s fine.”
“She wasn’t shot?” Sam was amazed.
“But on the TV…”“News reports have been known to be wrong.” Clark hated to state that fact about his profession. “The bullet passed through her shirt, that’s all.” He swallowed his pride and continued. “I’m sorry I didn’t call.”
“It’s okay, Clark. I wasn’t here. I took the bus to my brother’s to pick up some more supplies. I just heard the news report.” Sam sounded tired and distant, but friendlier than he had been the whole week.
“Is everything all right, Dr. Lane?” he asked.
“Can you bring her home? I need to speak with you.”“She’s asleep,” Clark stated. He glanced over at her through the doorway. “Yes, I believe I can fly her home. Can you open the window for me?”
“Of course. See you soon.” He hung up.
As he set down the phone he noticed that there were lots of messages on his machine. The first call was an old message from Mayson he had missed earlier that afternoon asking him to call her, immediately. She needed the status and whereabouts of her victim and witness, Miss Lucy El. Ooops. No wonder she had been so angry with him.
The second call was from Mr. Olsen asking after Lucy and asking him to call him at his earliest convenience. He also asked if Lucy had had a chance to discuss with him the information he had passed on to her the night before. No, thought Clark, she hadn’t even mentioned the meeting with Mr. Olsen. He pursed his lips.
Thirdly, editor Ralph had called. He wanted to know where his ‘star reporter’ was; whether his story would be on his desk in time for the late edition and to make sure he went to Metropolis University Hospital to interview Jaxon for his article. Already on his to-do list. Not word one about Lucy.
Next, Mayor White called, also worried about Lucy, and asked him to call him back. My, had Lois become popular within two short weeks! Everyone was worried about her.
Surprisingly, the last call was from Jaxon, himself. He had woken up after surgery. He had seen Clark pick up Lucy earlier and asked how she was. Strangely, he didn’t wonder why Superman had completely ignored him.
Clark wanted to go first to Jaxon’s hospital room, but he knew that Sam Lane was waiting on him for that special delivery. Not needing to change, as he was still in his blue suit, he carefully covered Lois with a blanket and scooped her up into his arms. She seems slightly heavier, despite her rail thinness. He wondered if her molecular density had also changed with the baby. It had been a long day already and he felt completely drained. He took off from his living room window and shortly arrived at Lois’s apartment.
Sam was waiting for him in the living room. He nodded curtly to Clark as he and Lois passed through. Surprisingly, he didn’t follow Clark into Lois’s room. Clark set Lois on her bed and covered her with her blankets.
“Clark,” she moaned and hugged the pillow covered by Kal’s t-shirt. She was having a good dream; he sighed. He would leave her alone.
He returned to the living room. Sam stood near the window, looking at a piece of paper.
“I’ll check in later with you, Dr. Lane. I’ve got to interview a colleague of Lucy’s and mine who was also shot. He’s out of surgery.”
“… Um… Clark, before you go,” Sam said, sitting down. “I need to know something.”
“Sure,” Clark said. “Hold on a minute, I’ll go change.”
“It’s okay, Clark. You don’t have to change this time.”
“All right.” Clark was surprised. Sam Lane hated to talk to Superman.
Sam looked as if his heart had been broken. Dejected. “Who is she?”
“Who is who, Dr. Lane?” Clark was confused. Had Sam found out about Mayson?
“The woman impersonating my daughter.”
“Oh.”
“You don’t seem too surprised by this news, Clark. I was hoping you might be. That I wasn’t the only person she had lied to.” He looked down at the paper again.
“What’s that?” Clark asked.
“The results of the initial tests of Lucy’s, or whatever her name is, blood. She’s definitely pregnant, like she said, and she doesn’t have any diseases detrimental to the fetus.”
“That’s good.”
“Yes. Yes, it is. But her blood type is O-, same as my Lois. My Lucy is AB+.”
“Are you sure?” Clark asked, surprised that he would remember that.
“It’s not something a doctor forgets about his children, Clark.”
“Oh.”
“So, can you tell me who she is? Is she my Lois?” Sam asked, hope filling his face.
Clark did not want to tell him the truth. He had hoped that he and Lois could keep this secret between themselves for her entire visit. But she needed her father, now more than ever. With her body changing in new and different ways, she would not be able to go to a regular medical doctor. He did not know what to say to the man.
Sam stood up and moved the dining room table. “The reason I ask, Clark, is because I went through her room after I found out she couldn’t possibly be my daughter Lucy, and I found this.” He held up the photo of Lois and Kal from the Kerth awards. “And this.” He held up another photo Lois had brought of her with her friends from
The Planet at a football game. “And these.” A pile of photos of her and Kal, which he threw across the table to Clark. “I know you have said that you have never met my daughter Lois. But I was at a loss as to what all this evidence against you meant, until I found this photo.” He held up the photo of Lois with her parents – both Ellen and Sam – from the previous Christmas. He fell into a chair and stared at the picture. “How is this even possible? And who in the world is she, Clark?”
Clark sat down opposite Sam. “I’m sorry, Dr. Lane. We never meant to hurt you.” He gathered up the pile of loose photographs. “The man in these photos is her Kal-El, essentially my twin brother.”
Sam’s jaw hung open. “That’s not you?”
Clark shook his head and pointed to the photo of Lois with her parents that Sam still held. “And the woman in these photos is not your daughter, Lois, but this Sam Lane’s daughter Lois.”
“How is this possible?” Sam was dumbfounded.
“What I’m going to tell you may seem strange and crazy, Dr. Lane, but it’s true. Lois, the woman you know as Lucy El – comes from another world, a parallel dimension, where she is married to that dimension’s Clark Kent. Her Clark, whom I call Kal to lessen the confusion around here, was adopted on Earth by the Kents, same as me. He met and fell in love with a colleague of his at the
Daily Planet, a spunky reporter by the name of Lois Lane. That’s the woman now asleep in your Lois’s bed.”
Sam raised a brow at him, crossed his arms, and looked like Clark had just fed him a lemon. Okay. He didn’t believe him. Understandable. It was pretty difficult concept to accept. He hadn’t believed her the first time she told him, either.
As Sam didn’t say anything, Clark continued with his explaination, “Shortly after they got married, a couple of people from the planet of New Krypton, a colony of the old planet where Kal and I originated, found Kal and asked him to return to New Krypton to help them stop a war.”
“The civil war you mentioned.”
Clark nodded. “Do you remember Tempus’s threat that we were going to be invaded by aliens?”
Sam nodded, wide eyed.
“Well, in her dimension it actually happened. Some bad Kryptonians found out that on Kal’s planet they could live like gods, so they came to colonize Earth. They started by enslaving the people of Kal’s hometown of Smallville and using them for target practice. Lois had just found out that she was pregnant with Kal’s child and fled here to hide from those evil men.”
“That doesn’t sound like Lois. She’s not the hiding type; she’s the stand-up-and-fight type.”
“Yes… well, she is, normally.” He had to agree with Sam there. “But she had more to think about than herself this time, Dr. Lane. Kal was still on New Krypton, she had no one to protect her from the invaders and if they were to find out she was Kal’s wife and carrying his child…”
“Oh, I see.” Sam nodded. His eyes had glazed over a bit, though.
Clark exhaled. Good, Sam seemed to buy that version of events. He didn’t want to explain the real reason Lois was here. At least that could remain secret.
“How did she get here?” Sam asked.
“We know a man, an inventor, who built a machine that floats through time and space. Tempus stole this machine and adapted it to travel through dimensions. He then kidnapped Lois and stranded her here last February during the election.”
“Why?” Sam seemed mesmerized by the story.
“Tempus hates Superman. And this dimension had no Superman. Tempus brought Lois here to turn me into her hero, so he could destroy me and win himself an election.”
“Wait a minute. That Lois is married to Superman?”
Clark was beginning to understand how Kal was able to keep his secret identity secret for so long. A little subterfuge went a long way. People kept forgetting he and Superman were the same person. Take off the glasses and put on a blue suit and a red cape, suddenly he was treated differently, because people thought of him differently. Even people who knew full well that he was both Superman and Clark Kent kept forgetting.
“She said so, didn’t she? Everything she told you last Saturday was true.” More or less.
“Really?” Sam stammered.
“She loves you. You remind her of her own father. So, again, Dr. Lane, I apologize that Lucy and I lied to you, but I hope you can understand why we can’t go around telling everyone the whole truth.”
“But she’s not Lucy, she’s Lois.”
“Yes, sorry. You’re right. But Lucy El is her secret identity while she’s visiting us,” Clark explained.
“But why does she need a secret identity. If she is a Lois, why didn’t she just pretend again that she’s my Lois?”
“Well, when she was here before, it was a quick visit; she hoped to get home right away. She thought our Lois was dead and borrowed her identity to gain access to me. This time we knew it would be a much longer visit. We have no idea when Kal will return and kick the bad Kryptonians off Earth. If she had returned again as Lois, then all those questions about her missing three years would be asked over and over and it would have put a spotlight on someone we wanted to blend in. She needed to be a nobody, so when she did leave, possibly on the spur of the moment, not many questions would be asked. Lois Lane attracts attention with her in-the-face, no-holds-barred, and, as you said, stand-up-and-fight reporting style. Lucy El is just a research assistant.”
“A nobody.”
Clark nodded. “Also, she’s pregnant. If we cannot hide her pregnancy for her entire visit, then people would start asking more questions. Who is the father of Lois Lane’s baby? It would be a whole media mess. And I could not do that to Lois. This dimension’s or that one’s.”
A half smile appeared on Sam’s face. “No, Lois wouldn’t like that. Not one bit.”
“Exactly. She’s not this dimension’s Lois Lane. I asked her not to be Lois Lane, again, for you and Perry and all of us who haven’t given up on the real Lois and want her to come home. I couldn’t pull the rug out from under you a second time, Dr. Lane.”
“Thank you, Clark; I appreciate that,” Sam said with a wipe to his eyes. “Your honesty and trust in me is refreshing. I haven’t had that since I became a bum. I hope I can live up to that trust.”
“Stay sober and keep your doctor- patient confidentiality and you will. Nobody outside this apartment knows what I just told you; we need to keep it that way. Okay, Dr. Lane?”
Sam nodded. “Then I think it’s about time you called me Sam, Clark.” He held out his hand.
Clark stood up and shook it. “Thank you, Sam. I hate to fly, but Ralph wants an article about the shooting for the evening edition. And I still have another interview to conduct first.”
“I’d best be checking on Lucy.”
***
Sam watched as Superman flew out the window. He went to check on this other Lois. The bed looked rumpled but it was empty. He checked the bathroom. It was also empty. Where did she go? He had had responsibility for his patient for a whole half a minute and he already lost her.
His mind rushed over the information that Clark had just shared with him. Lois, but not his Lois. And he just realized something else, she was carrying Superman’s child. What effect would such a fetus have on a human woman? How in the world was he supposed to see this pregnancy through to the end? He really needed a drink.
***
Ten minutes earlier, Lois had rolled over and hugged her pillow. “Clark?” That wasn’t Clark. She blinked her eyes and realized she was back in her apartment, only not her apartment. The other dimension. So, it hadn’t been a nightmare, after all. She sighed.
At least, she was Mrs. Clark Kent. Finally. A real beautiful wedding. Clark had promised her she would have one and thanks to Mike, she did. Who was that Mike man anyway? Her guardian angel? Hopefully, Mr. Wells would arrive any minute and tell Clark and her stand-in how to get rid of the curse. Then he could fly over here and pick her up for her journey home. Home.
Her super hearing picked up voices in the other room. Clark and her father. They were discussing her.
“Yes. Yes, it is. But her blood type is O-, same as my Lois. My Lucy is AB+.”
“Are you sure?” Clark asked.
“It’s not something a doctor forgets about his children, Clark.”
“Oh.”
“So, can you tell me who she is? Is she my Lois?” Sam asked.
Lois couldn’t listen to them any more. As the men moved into her dining room, she snuck down the hall and out the front door. She needed some fresh air. She didn’t need to deal with her substitute father learning the truth about her. She couldn’t be the one to break his heart. Clark could clean up her mess himself; they don’t deserve any better, talking behind her back like that.
Lois tiptoed down the stairs towards the lobby. As she reached the bottom step a voice from behind, stopped her in her tracks.
“Lois? Lois Lane? As I live and breathe, what are you doing here?”
Lois reached up and felt her face. Somewhere along her journeys, she had misplaced her John Lennon glasses. She cleared her throat. “Sorry, you must have me confused with someone else.” She took another step.
“Oh, that’s right. In this dimension, you prefer Lucy El, don’t you?”
Lois turned around and standing up at the top of the stairs was Star, only not any version of Star she had ever met. Her hair was pulled back in a neat knot at the back of her head and she wore a tasteful and not inexpensive fuchsia business suit. “Star?”
The woman walked down the stairs and hooked her elbow with Lois’s. “Dear, you are in no condition to be walking the streets of Metropolis.”
“I’m not?”
“Of course not.” She led her back up the stairs. “So, you can either go back into your apartment or you can come hang out with me.”
“You,” Lois croaked. She wasn’t ready to face Clark and her father.
“Okay, then.” Star walked them back to her door. “Let me just do something first.” She opened the door to her apartment and held her hand up to Lois to wait. “Mrs. Lake, you don’t want to divorce Mr. Lake, now do you?”
“No,” sobbed the blonde woman in Star’s living room. “But he’s cheating on me. I just know it.”
Lois peeked through the crack in the door. A tastefully dressed woman in her mid-forties sat crying on the sofa.
Star placed a hand on the woman’s arm. “Your husband is not cheating on you. But he has started placing bets at an off-track betting arena.”
“What? Why?” Mrs. Lake appeared truly shocked.
“You have a decision to make. Do you truly love you husband or do you love all the gifts he gives you? If it is the former, tell him so. Tell him you don’t need gifts to be happy with him and he’ll stop gambling away your fortune. If on the other hand, you decide you cannot live without the gifts Mr. Lake lavishes on you, you can come back to me. We can bicker with his divorce lawyer for the next three years over every little item in your collection. Either way, you’ll end up with nothing. What you must decide is whether or not you want to be poor with Mr. Lake or without him.”
Mrs. Lake sobs stopped and she grabbed her purse. “Well, I never!” She stomped out of the apartment. Lois hid behind a nearby potted plant. She recognized the woman. It was the same person who, with her husband, had kidnapped her and Superman this past year for their one-of-a-kind collection. Small world.
“Come on in, Lucy,” Star called.
“You seem different, Star. A different kind of psychic than back home.”
“Oh, that’s because I’m not a professional psychic,” Star called from the kitchen. She re-entered the room with a fairly large banana split.
Lois laughed. Some things never changed.
“Eat. Eat. For the first time in your life, you don’t have to worry about counting calories. Enjoy it.”
Lois looked down at the ice-cream and wondered if it was a good idea. Her stomach gurgled that it was and she dug in.
“I’m a divorce attorney.” Star handed her a card. “For later.”
Lois gulped down her bite of ice-cream. “I am not getting divorced. I just got married.”
Star sat down next to her. “Yes, you did. Congratulations to you and Clark. If he’s anything like this Clark, you are one lucky lady.”
“You know Clark?” This somehow surprised Lois.
“I will.”
Lois pushed her card back across the table. “I won’t be needing that.”
Star pushed the card back. “Of course not, Sweetie. But I do also take referrals.”
Lois picked up the card. Moonbeam Mayhem, Attorney at Law. Divorce.
“Moonbeam?”
“Oh, yes. I meant to correct you earlier. In this dimension, I’m Moonbeam, not Star.”
Lois shook her head. “How is it that you aren’t the same? Everyone else here is essentially the same person, same basic career objectives, more or less, but you’re so different.”
Moonbeam smiled. “In essentials I’m the same as the Star, you know. But the same life choices, no. What would be the fun in that? What can I say? I like variety.”
Lois laughed. It was good to have a woman she could talk with, here.
“You’ve had a busy day, Lucy, so far. Let’s see, you almost faded away from electrocution, married, and shot.”
“Shot?” Lois looked down at herself. “I was shot?”
“The sharpshooter at the
Daily Planet. I heard about it on the radio. Plus, you have blood on your shirt.”
Lois jumped up and ran into the bathroom. She saw the hole on the right shoulder of her shirt. She pushed back her shirt and looked at her shoulder. It looked fine to her. Maybe Star… Moonbeam was wrong, this time. She pulled her arm completely out of her sleeve and looked closer. She felt a bump, she didn’t remember. That was strange. It looked like she had been burned by a cigarette on her shoulder. She would have remembered that, wouldn’t she? The scar looked old and well healed. She put back on the big flouncy shirt that was Lucy El’s style. Sticking her finger through the hole, she felt for that round scar. It matched the hole in her shirt perfectly.
She felt light headed and sat down on the closed toilet. What in the world was going on? Had Clark sealed the wound with his heat vision? Yes, that made sense. She sighed in relief. She wasn’t going crazy after all.
Lois returned to Moonbeam and the banana split, but the ice cream no longer looked appetizing. All those colors and textures swirling together into one gooey mess. She felt sick to her stomach.
“Lucy, you look green.”
“Can I lie down?” Lois didn’t wait for an answer and lay down on Moonbeam’s sofa.
Moonbeam brought her a damp cloth for her forehead. “The nausea will ease about mid-September.”
“Good to know.” Lois groaned. Only two months left of this torture. If she survived that long.
“Your hard day isn’t over. Clark and Lois still want their honeymoon.”
“I know.” Lois groaned, again. She felt dizzy, nauseous, and lightheaded. She looked at her hand. It seemed to be getting fainter. “Get Clark.”
Moonbeam was standing at her window. “I can’t. He just left. And he won’t be able to help anyway. You’ll just worry him.”
“Clark.” Lois moaned. “Clark.” Her voice grew softer. Her hand became more and more clear.
Moonbeam sat down next to her. “Lucy, I want to tell you a story. Close your eyes and focus on my voice.”
Lois nodded, she could do that. The world around her faded…
***
There was a knock at the door. Moonbeam opened the door to the older balding man on the other side.
“Excuse me,” he said. “Have you seen this woman?” He held up a photo of Lois; he had folded Clark out of the photo.
“Yes,” Moonbeam replied. “She has just disappeared.” She pointed to the empty sofa. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “She’ll be back in awhile. A half-hour, maybe less. Would you like to wait? Or should I send her home then?”
The man looked at her like she was nuts. “Yeah. Thanks. That would be great.” He turned to go.
“Dr. Lane, hold on.”
Sam stopped. “How did you know....?”
“Lois isn’t dead.”
“That’s good.”
“Your Lois, I mean. She’s alive. She’s fine, but darkness surrounds her. I don’t understand that. Hmmm.”
Sam’s step faltered. “Pardon?”
“Maybe you should come in.”
“I need a drink,” he muttered.
“Lucy needs you. Why don’t you wait here for her?” She closed the door as he stumbled to the sofa. “Don’t sit there!” Moonbeam warned.
“What? Huh?”
“Lucy is sitting there.”
He looked at the empty sofa and staggered back to the door. “You’re crazy.”
“You don’t really believe that, Dr. Lane. Now, sit over there.” She pointed to an armchair across from the sofa. “And let me make you some tea.”
“Lady, I need something stronger than tea. The day I’ve had.”
“You can call me Moonbeam. I keep forgetting to introduce myself. Your daughter will need you when she returns, Dr. Lane,” Moonbeam called from the kitchen.
“She’s not my daughter,” he mumbled, running his hand over his damp forehead. He heard the kettle whistle.
“I put the water on when Lucy came in,” Moonbeam explained. “And she wasn’t the daughter to whom I referred. Honey or sugar?” She smiled.
“You know my Lois?” he gasped.
“I will.”
“Huh?”
Moonbeam closed her eyes and held out her arms from her sides. “Clark will save her. But he’ll need Lucy’s help. And she’ll need your help, Dr. Lane. You daughter will return to you greatly changed, but in essentials the same. You have raised a good and strong daughter. She will need you to see the light.” She put down her arms and opened her eyes.
Sam’s jaw hung opened; he snapped it shut. “Thank you.”
She held out a cup. “Tea?”
He took the cup without another word. A few minutes later the cup started rattling in his hands. For there on the sofa where Moonbeam had told him not to sit, Lucy slowly rematerialized.
“Oh, good. Mr. Wells was in time. Lucy returns to us.”
“Clark,” Lois murmured. “Clark, it happened again.”
Sam set down his teacup and knelt beside the sofa. “Lucy?”
“Daddy?” She reached out to him with her transparent hand.
“Where did you go, Sweetie?” he asked.
“I don’t know. I just disappeared into a fairy tale.”
“Something almost happened in Lucy’s dimension which would have made it impossible for her to return there; thereby erasing her existence,” Moonbeam explained. “All better now.”
Sam turned to her. “Who is Mr. Wells?”
Lois sat up. She was almost back to full color again. “Was he here? Did I miss him?”
“No. Not here, Lucy. Your dimension. He arrived in your dimension in time. I made you some ginger tea. It’s a little strong, but it should settle your stomach.”
“Thank you, Moonbeam.”
“It’s not over yet. I sense you might disappear on us once more before too long. So, drink up.”
Lois’s eyes bulged from their sockets.
“Disappear, again?” Sam gasped.
“It isn’t a science, Dr. Lane, changing one’s past lives. Canceling a curse. Sometimes it takes a few tries. But it’s well worth it, don’t you think, Lucy?”
Lois nodded, not wanting to say more on the subject in front of her father.
“Curse? Did you say curse?”
“Lois and Clark’s love was cursed centuries ago. But they’re fixing it now. Everything will be just fine. Wait and see.” Moonbeam smiled and, turning to Lois, set a hand on her arm. “The next two weeks will be hard for you. You’ll want to sleep the whole time. But you can’t live in your dreams. You need to eat to keep your strength up. Clark will need you.”
“Clark needs me? This Clark or my Clark?”
“Both, of course. But I was referring to this Clark. Oh!” Moonbeam clapped her hands. “Let’s not tell him. Oh, yes! Let’s let it be a surprise.” She ran into the kitchen.
The more time Lois spent with her, the more she reminded her of Star. She turned to Sam. “What is she talking about?”
“I’m not quite sure. But I think she’s referring to something she said earlier. She said that Clark will find my Lois, but he’ll need your help to do so.”
Lois nodded. “Yes, I definitely don’t think we should tell Clark. He has enough on his plate for the moment.” She lowered her voice. “He probably wouldn’t believe us anyway. Star… Moonbeam takes some getting used to.”
Sam nodded.
Moonbeam returned. “Ginger snaps. I bought them a couple of weeks ago, but I forgot. They go great with tea.” She held out the plate.
“Thank you,” they said, each taking a cookie.
Moonbeam sat down. “He’s been so sad all his life. She’ll make him happier than he’s ever known he could be. You’ll forgive him, of course,” she said, turning to Sam.
“Of course,” replied Sam. It was easier just to agree with her.
“Oh, I do love happily-ever-after stories, don’t you?” She sighed.
Lois grinned. “I do.”
Moonbeam handed Lois her card, again. “Now, don’t forget to refer me. I live for referrals.”
Lois took the card and her heart sank. Who did she know that was going to need a divorce attorney?
*** End of Part 6 *** Comments Chapter 2: Part 7/8
