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Wrong Place, Wrong Time, Wrong Clark TOC can be found Here

Part 97

Part 98

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Truth…
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A half hour earlier…

“If Cat Grant is over at Clark’s apartment, I swear I’m going to tear her limb from limb,” Lois grumbled as she marched down Clinton Ave. to Clark’s apartment building. “If something actually happened between them…” she paused, both her step and her rant. She winced with a moan of despair at this thought, “Oh, Clark.”

If Clark and Cat had done something, she knew she wouldn’t be able to lay it all at Cat’s doorstep. Clark would be equally to blame. He might not have his old memories, but he had his new ones, including the one that told him that he and Lois were an item.

A loud series of bangs startled her in the alley next to Clark’s building. It sounded as if something crashed into the trashcans. Who in the world would be going through the trash today of all days?

“Good job there, Clark,” she heard Clark grumbling to himself.

Ask a stupid question…

“Clark?” Lois called hesitantly, not really wanting to believe it was him. “What are you doing here?”

“Uh…” he mumbled, walking out from behind the big pile of knocked over trash. “I live here.” It sounded to her as if Clark didn’t know what he was doing in his alley either.

“No, you don’t,” she chuckled, approaching him. “Not in the alley.” She reached up and pulled a lock of his hair down to his forehead. Clark clearly didn’t have his memories back, being that he couldn’t remember how he styled his hair. “Did you hear something?” She craned her neck to look around the pile of trash. “Did someone come after you?”

Clark grabbed her arm and pulled her to his chest. “Uh…No. That was me,” he admitted sheepishly. “I was looking… uh… searching, for clues, and accidentally knocked over the cans.”

“Clues? Here?” Lois asked skeptically, to which he only nodded weakly. “Are you feeling okay?” Because, frankly, he was acting strange… stranger than he normally acted without his memories.

He nodded again. “The same. No memories, except…” He glanced at her with longing. His hand ran over her hair, before tucking a lock of it behind her ear and cupping her jaw. It was an odd move for him to do. The first was how Superman always touched her, and the second… well, it felt more like something remembered from a dream. He leaned over to place a kiss to her lips, but she covered his hand with hers instead, stopping him with her stare into his eyes.

“Have you always done that?” she asked.

Clark blinked, gazing at her. “Always done what?”

He didn’t even realize what he had done, so it must not be so outside his range of thinking.

“No, nothing. I just thought…” Lois shook her head. “And then you…” She stared at him. He had touched her the same way last night, when she and Cat had left his apartment. “Never mind. I guess I was wrong.”

He continued forward with the kiss, pulling her closer. “I can’t imagine you ever being wrong,” he murmured between kisses.

She smiled. “See, you’re getting your memories back already,” she teased, deepening the kiss.

It felt good to be in Clark’s arms again. She had been worried about him all night. Once more, his embrace made her feel safe. Lois knew Superman would stop Nightfall. She knew it, but with each passing hour without hearing from him, each minute the clock ticked closer towards doomsday, her fear for Superman’s well-being increased.

“Oh, Clark,” she murmured, resting her head against his. “I’m concerned.”

She felt him curve around her. “I know.”

Lois raised her gaze to his. “Do you?”

“I’m worried too,” he admitted. “If only I could remember.”

“Don’t blame yourself, Clark. It’s not your fault that you lost your memories. I just wish I could understand why Superman hasn’t gotten in touch with me… us,” she said. Superman knew she had been worried about Clark’s safety before the mission. “It’s not like him. Although, he did go away before,” she murmured, remembering how Superman had blamed himself when Lex had shot her.

“He did?” Clark asked with some surprise.

“Yeah. I was hurt, and he felt responsible,” she said sheepishly.

“Was it his fault?” he asked softly, but she could hear an edge to it.

“What? No! Absolutely not. How can you even…? Oh, right.” Lois said before her mind caught up with her mouth. She ran a hand down his cheek. “The details aren’t important, but I was wondering if that’s why he disappeared again.”

“Why? Has someone close to Superman been hurt?” he asked, taking hold of her hand. “You’re okay, aren’t you?”

“I’m fine, Clark, but you…”

“Oh, right,” he said with a slight flush to his cheeks. “Me.”

Even without his memories, Clark was still his thoughtful self, worried more about others than himself. She was glad that this was who he was down to a cellular level.

“I’m concerned that he blames himself for you getting hurt. For his entire tough guy act, he’s really quite caring,” she said with slight smile. “In fact, I’d say he was a marshmallow.”

“Marshmallow?” Clark repeated. She didn’t know if he sounded skeptical or appalled.

Her smile turned into a grin. “In the most positive sense of the word, Clark. Don’t tell anyone, but he’s a big softy,” she explained with a wink. “He believes, with his whole being, in truth and justice. With the criminals and bad guys, he’s an intense man whom you could imagine bending steel with a glance. Imagine it, because that’s not one of his abilities. Well, maybe if he used his heat vision… Anyway, they know he could grind them into powder if he chose to, and a lesser man might be tempted to, but not Superman. He values life above everything else, whether human or non-human. He’s especially partial to kittens stuck in trees, but don’t tell him that I know that.” She let a giggle escape as she leaned on his shoulder, remembering the number of letters she received from little girls, wanting her to thank Superman for them for saving Fluffy, Snowball, or Zebra-Bunny.

She glanced at Clark and saw that he was staring at her, his mouth ajar.

“I believe that even without powers, he would risk all to save a stranger’s life. If there’s ever something he can do to help, he helps. He puts everyone and everything above himself, his wants, and his desires. He really personifies the word ‘hero’.” Lois knew her voice was turning wistful, as it often did when she thought or spoke about Superman. She cleared her throat and set her hand on Clark’s chest. “You remind me a lot of him.”

“Me?” he gulped. Oh, dear. She meant it as a compliment, now he was getting a complex about her words.

“No matter what you or he does, I tend to forgive you both,” she said with a teasing nudge.

Clark’s eyes widened in alarm.

He appeared so worried that she reassured him with a kiss. “As Perry just reminded me, it’s not who you used to be and what you used to do that’s important, it’s who you are now. I forgive you, because there’s just something so pure of heart about both of you.”

“Is that what reminds you of Superman?” he asked.

“Yes, your goodness. The way you gave the last bite of your hotdog to that man’s black lab yesterday afternoon, for example. Your kindness. Such as how you listened to that little boy ramble on for five minutes about the glories of Superman, so I could talk to his mother,” she said, wrapping her arm around Clark’s waist and leading him out of the alley. “How can I not love a man whom both dogs and small children like?”

“I was interested in his tale of how Superman wrestled that giant lizard of the sea,” Clark replied.

Lois chuckled, kissing him. “It’s not true, Chuck. Superman has never, to my knowledge, ever wrestled Godzilla, and I know everything there is to know about Superman.”

Clark opened his mouth again, and before he could ask, she reassured him that Godzilla didn’t exist either.

“No, I was going to ask how you know so much about him,” he said, stopping by the door leading into his building.

Lois looked off, thinking about that first moment that she had ever seen Superman, when he busted into the Prometheus shuttle to save her from the bomb. She shook her head. “I don’t know. When I saw him, and I just knew that he would change my life,” she said, a dreamy smile creeping onto her face. She shook her head again, trying to shake that feeling of love from her mind that had overtaken her the instant she had first seen Superman. She shifted her gaze back to Clark. She loved Clark so much, but there was still a part of her, which was enamored with Superman, which still loved Superman, and which would always love him. It was so unfair. Clark deserved better from her.

A cat ran through their legs at that moment and into the alley.

Lois stepped back, caught the heel of her shoe on something, and twisted her ankle. “Ow!” she gasped, leaning onto Clark again.

“Here. Let me…” He scooped her up and cradled her in his arms, as Superman was apt to do. Clark stared at her, really focused on her, and his eyes widened. Suddenly, his lips crashed down on hers in fiery passion.

Far be it for Lois to complain, she wrapped her arms around his neck and reciprocated his attentions.

“Lois, you’re amazing!” he gushed.

“And you say you can’t remember anything,” she said, laughing.

“No, that’s it! I had a flash of memory, just now,” Clark announced, his eyes alight with happiness. “Thanks to you.” He kissed her again.

“Oh, Clark! How wonderful!” Lois exclaimed, wondering if he recalled carrying her over the threshold at the Lexor. “What do you remember?”

“Superman!” he replied. “I know how to access him.”

“Well, what are we waiting for? Let’s go!” she said, slipping her legs out of his arms and back to the ground. “I can walk,” she said, before testing if that hypothesis was actually valid.

He nodded. His head jerked off to the right and slightly up in a familiar way; this movement always seemed to precede his announcement of some forgotten errand he needed to accomplish. Did this mean that his memories had returned? Did this crane of his neck have to do with his communication with Superman?

Faintly, as if carried on a breeze, she heard someone, a female voice, calling to Clark. Was that what he had heard?

Lois glanced up and sure enough, there high on the roof of Clark’s building… no, not the roof, was that Clark’s patio?... was a familiar silhouette leaning over the edge and calling down to the alley, searching.

“Clark?” the voice called again.

“I’ve got to run,” he announced, kissing Lois’s cheek and turning towards the blue front door of his building. “I’ll meet up with you at the Planet.”

Lois nodded dumbly, unable to speak. She flicked her hand in a salutation as he disappeared inside.

Cat Grant had beat Lois to Clark’s apartment. Cat Grant was up in Clark’s apartment at this very moment, calling to him. As soon as he had heard her, Clark had run off.

Lois took a tentative step forward and found that her ankle was still tender from her twisting it. Damn cat! It didn’t hurt as much as her heart was hurting from the twisting occurring inside her chest. She took another step, trying to catch her breath from the pain of the knowledge that Clark had Cat Grant in his apartment, and that he hadn’t told her. Her eyes squeezed shut. He had run off as soon as he had heard her. He had been with Lois, but he had run off to be with Cat.

Clark’s seven-hundred pound gorilla returned and he was hugging Lois to his chest so tightly she felt as if her ribs were cracking. She had believed Clark when he said that he and Cat were just friends. She had bought it, despite knowing what kind of person Cat was. She was a fool! Clark had certainly slept with that strumpet. Why wouldn’t he? She was willing and he was male. Maybe Cat had been asleep when Clark came down to the alley, looking for... who knew what? Clothes flung off in passion perhaps? That would explain his lack of shoes. But when Cat had awoken and called to him, he instantly dropped Lois and ran off to be with her.

Lois couldn’t breathe. She loved Clark. She had been so certain that he loved her in return. How could he have done this to her? She had been so sure that he was the one. And she had even called him ‘pure of heart’ like Superman. Ha! Well, if that didn’t just jinx everything.

She stopped and set her hand on the building on the corner, trying to find air to fill her lungs, but with the tears streaming down her face, she doubted it really possible. She took a ragged breath, between sobs and tears, and forced herself to take another step towards the Daily Planet. She would get there for the asteroid’s impact, if it killed her. She had promised Perry, her one and only true friend, that she would be there for him. At least, they could be together at the end.

She didn’t know how long it took her to make it to the next corner, but it certainly was at least three times as long as her normal clipped pace. She heard a whoosh of wind and instinctually glanced up. A familiar man in blue and red floated down as if from a dream or part of a mirage.

“Lois? Are you okay?” Superman asked, landing in front of her.

Lois stumbled into his embrace, tears rushing out, and her voice rough. “Oh, Superman… Clark…” She didn’t know how to put into words her feeling of betrayal. She knew that the real Clark loved her, but since his amnesiac self had slept with Cat, would she ever be able to forgive him?

“I’m sorry, Lois,” Superman murmured, wrapping his arms around her waist and pulling her to his chest in an embrace.

Somehow, Superman had known of Clark’s betrayal and how she had needed him. It was just like Superman, always arriving when she needed him most and in the nick of time, too. Maybe it wasn’t with Clark who Superman was connected but her.

“How about a lift?” Superman suggested. Chest to chest, he floated the two of them into the air straight up and into the clouds.

Lois distinctly remembered the first time Superman had taken her into the clouds. It had been so romantic. As she gazed deep into Superman’s eyes, it wasn’t hard to recall how it had once been between the two of them. The feelings, which had overpowered her when she had first met him. She relived all those stormy unguarded gazes of longing, which would turn her knees to jelly and held promise of passions to come, that Superman had given her all last summer. His anguish when Lex had shot her and how Superman had blamed himself, even to the point of breaking up with her. Yet, despite that, Superman had continued to guard her, and only her, for weeks afterwards, giving up being a hero to make sure that she remained safe.

How could she have ever doubted that Superman loved her? True, he had told her that he wanted her to move on to a man, who didn’t fly off into battle leaving her unprotected, the man who Clark was with his memories. Without those memories though, Clark had scarred her worse than all the men before him had. She didn’t see how she could ever love another again.

She remembered the fear and uncertainty that she had lived with day-in and day-out over the last three days, not knowing whether Superman was alive or dead. Now, he stood before her, holding her in his arms once more. He had erased all her grievances with one simple apology. It felt so good to be in his arms, to be held by him again, and to know that everything would be okay. Superman was still the sweet, kind, and gentle man he had always been, and deep where she had buried them when he had broken her heart in the woods all those months ago, the missing seven pieces of her heart murmured with hope.

That little encouragement was all that Lois needed to press her lips onto his. She melted into him as he opened his mouth, not to protest, but to deepen the kiss. He still wanted her as much as she wanted him.

Her heart soared, before it fell.

The problem was that Lois didn’t love Superman anymore as she once had. Despite the betrayal of Clark being with Cat, Lois still only really wanted to be with him.

“Oh, Clark,” she murmured through her tears. How could Clark have done this to her? She remembered how, during her first kiss with Clark, she had pretended he was Superman, and now with Superman all she wanted was to be kissing Clark.

What was wrong with her?

What was she doing?

Here, Lois was no better than her father, cheating on Clark! She had no proof that Clark had succumbed to Cat’s wiles, only that he had withheld the information that Cat had been at his apartment. The first chance Lois had, she was kissing another man, and not just any other man, but Superman!

Superman?

Superman didn’t kiss her.

Superman flat out, stubbornly, refused to kiss her.

Superman’s kisses wouldn’t be so warm, and soft, and addicting as Clark’s, would they?

“Lois,” Superman murmured against her lips, even sounding like Clark.

The more she kissed Superman, the more recognizable this familiar sensation became, this sensation that she wasn’t kissing Superman, but she was actually kissing a man whose lips she knew quite well. Other than the part where they were floating on air, she could have sworn she was kissing Clark, not another man. Was that just her broken heart, searching for meaning, or…?

An image of a man with a beard, wearing a blue suit and a silver vest, appeared in her mind. “Duh!” he said, as if she were the most galactically stupid woman in the history of Earth.

Lois pulled slightly back, breathless and panting from the heat of the kiss, and looked at Superman, really looked at him for what couldn’t be the first time.

“I noticed that Clark has a mole right above his lip,” Cat’s voice echoed in her head. “You never noticed that.”

Sure, Lois had. There it was, right above… Superman’s lip.

Lois raised her eyes to Superman’s and recognized the same deep pools that she had fallen into numerous times when gazing into Clark’s eyes. The only difference was a pair of glasses.

She continued to stare at him. How could she not? Superman was none other than her partner Clark Kent, the man she loved, the man without a past. It all made sense now.

Superman, Clark, whoever he was, smiled sheepishly at her. “I’m sorry, Lois, but I’ve got to go.”

Of course he did. Some things never changed.

“Right,” Lois replied automatically with no conscious thought behind the words. “Nightfall.”

“Will you be all right?” he asked.

She nodded slowly. How could she not be all right? Her boyfriend was the same man who had smashed her heart into smithereens, the same man who claimed they could never have a relationship, and the same man who had disappeared at the same time as her boyfriend.

Well, of course, he had!

He reached over and tucked her hair behind her ear, just as he always had. “I’ll be back as soon as I can, and we’ll talk.”

Lois set her hand over the hand caressing her face, and then touched his face with her other hand, running her thumb over his mole. “You’re right, Superman, one kiss changes everything.”

She had just cheated on her boyfriend with… her boyfriend.

She backed away from him, unable to take her eyes off him. She hadn’t even realized that her feet were on solid ground and that they were standing on the roof of the Daily Planet building until that very moment.

Lois wished this development changed things. She wished that his one lie made everything all right, but the truth of the matter was that Lois had cheated on Clark. Sure, it was with Clark’s alter ego, a flying superhero, but at the time that she had initiated the kiss, she hadn’t known that. All that she had known was that she was in pain from Clark’s supposed betrayal, and that she had wanted, needed to feel loved. Then out of the heavens, Superman had landed in front of her as if in answer to her prayers.

“I will come back, Lois. I promise,” said the man in the blue uniform with the big ‘S’ crest, floating into the air. With a twist of his body, he super sped off out of her sight.

Lois was left with that dread knowledge that not only was she in love with Superman, Clark, whatever his name was, but that somehow Lex Luthor had acquired the power to hurt him, the ability to kill Superman, and Lex was doing this because of her. Therefore, Lois would be the only person who would be able to stop Lex.

***

Lois walked slowly down the stairs to the top floor elevator. Her mind buzzed with what had just happened, what it meant, why she hadn’t seen the clues before, and what she should do now. That last thought she pushed aside until she had time to focus on the other thoughts.

The elevator doors opened to the newsroom much sooner than she expected and she walked out, her ankle not hurting amongst her numbness. The déjà vu was overpowering. She felt like she was repeating that day she had jumped out of Trask’s airplane and Superman had caught her. Only how had he caught her? Clark had been up in Trask’s plane too. Oh, that was right; he had told her that he had jumped out after her. Trask must have thought they were nuts, and he wouldn’t have been that far off.

She headed towards her desk before she realized that she wouldn’t be able to concentrate out in the center of the room with everyone watching her. She needed to be alone. Looking around, she decided on the conference room.

Ralph was inside the room with some mousey researcher, who was about to make the worst mistake of her life. He had pushed her skirt up to her upper thighs and was about to do unspeakable things to that poor woman.

“Out!” Lois demanded, pointing towards the door.

“Do you mind?” Ralph snapped. “We were here first.”

The mousey woman grabbed her shirt and pulled it together, and tugged down her skirt, looking both bewildered and embarrassed.

Lois rolled her eyes. “Superman’s back. He just dropped me off,” she informed them. She shifted her gaze to the woman whose jaw fell open. “Trust me, even if the world was going to end, which it isn’t, Ralph’s not on your to-do list.”

The woman glanced at Ralph, who was now glaring spitefully at Lois, before nodding and running from the room.

“Hey!” Ralph said, stepping closer to Lois with attitude. “My sex life isn’t any of your business.”

“No, but telling the people the truth so they can make informed decisions about their lives is. If she had had sex with you, she would have regretted it for the rest of her life. Sex with the wrong man is something a woman can never take back,” Lois retorted, crossing her arms. She knew that from personal experience. “And until you get a lobotomy, Ralph, you’ll always be every woman’s wrong man.”

Ralph stuck a finger in Lois’s face. “This is about Kent, isn’t it? He told you about me reminding him of our little bet on the Nets game, didn’t he?”

Lois grabbed his hand and twisted it behind his back until he squealed in pain. Then she pushed him towards the door. “Clark doesn’t gamble, and if he did, it certainly wouldn’t be with you,” she said, throwing him, literally, out of the conference room.

Ralph stumbled to the floor by Lois’s desk. “Hey, it was just some harmless prank on the brainless guy. No harm, no foul. Anyway, he deserved it after tying me to a chair and leaving me in the storage room. Do you know that I had to wait for the night janitor to get out of that mess?”

“He was saving your life. After what you said about me, count your lucky pennies that you weren’t left dangling upside down and naked in the sewers as rat bait with your privates cut off,” Lois growled. She was surprised that such a graphic image of Ralph’s dead body flashed across her mind. What he had said when he was drunk on Revenge was horrible, but had he really deserved that sort of ire? What was wrong with her?

Ralph blanched. “Geez, Lane, don’t get your panties in a twist. It was only fifty bucks.”

“If I see you anywhere near Clark in the next week, I’ll inform Perry that you were not only trying to use the conference room as the EZ Sleaze Motel, but that you tried to con Clark.”

“Consider me informed,” Perry said, stepping out of his office.

Ralph pointed at Lois. “Assault! Assault!”

Perry ignored him and glanced at Lois. “What are you doing back so soon? Where’s Kent?”

Lois’s eyes widened. How could she answer that question? “Uh… he had something to do,” she sputtered and returned inside the conference room, shutting the door.

“Did you threaten to kill him too?” Ralph yelled through the closed door. “Is that how he ended up brainless?”

She sat down on the couch and buried her face in her hands. It was her fault that Lex's goons had abducted Clark and thrown him in the bay. Lex had tried to kill him because of her, she was sure of it. Now, she only had to prove it.

Lois felt battered and bruised from all the ups and downs in her two relationships with the same man, whose true identity she still did not know. Clearly he wasn’t “Clark Kent”. Clark Kent was the baby in the almost unmarked grave in Smallville. “Superman” wasn’t a name, but a title, a nickname of sorts for what he could do. “Chuck” was the closest to a real name that she had for him, but she had given him that pet name. What was his real name anyway?

Perry opened the door of the conference room. “You okay?” he asked.

Lois nodded, but didn’t look at him. She knew if she did that, he would be able to tell that she was lying.

He must have stepped inside, because she heard the door shut. “Darling, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong. I’m fine. I don’t want to talk about it!” she insisted.

“Uh-huh.”

“I’m a horrible person and an even worse reporter,” she said as the tears poured down her cheeks. “I’m weak, and gullible, and blind.”

“Wow, you discovered all that in less than an hour?” he asked.

She shot him a glare.

He pulled a chair from the conference table over next to where she was on the sofa and sat down. “What happened?”

“I found out who Clark Kent really is,” she admitted. “And I’m freaked out about it. So, just leave me alone while I try to process the information. Okay?” Her eyes widened as she realized what she had said, and she buried her head once more.

“All right, you’ve hooked me. Who is he?” Perry asked.

She could hear the incredulity in his voice. He thought she was carrying on over nothing. Nothing. Ha! She wished. “I can’t tell you.”

Perry crossed his arms, leaned back in his chair, and waited.

Lois jumped to her feet and started to pace. “You already know, don’t you? I bet you do. I’m sure everyone here knows. If Cat had figured it out, clearly it couldn’t be that difficult, right? I’m such an idiot!”

“You’re not an idiot, honey. What’s bothering you? Did something happen with Clark?”

“Yes, I cheated on him!” she announced, quickening her pace. “I kissed another man, kind of, sort of, not really. Well, I thought it was another man.”

Perry’s eyebrow went up. “You cheated on Kent? So, you and him…” he started before she interrupted.

“Yes! No! I don’t know. Maybe, sort of. Don’t say you didn’t know about it, because according to Cat the whole office knows,” Lois snapped.

“Lois, what the whole office knows and what the whole office suspects are two different things entirely,” Perry clarified.

“Okay, so perhaps I’m not an idiot,” she said, dropping back onto the sofa, but that didn’t stop her from feeling like one, a galactic one. “Maybe everyone else doesn’t know.”

“Slow down, Lois. First things first, you found out Clark’s true identity?” Perry said.

“Mostly,” she admitted, biting her bottom lip.

“Mostly?” he echoed.

“Well, I know with ninety-five percent certainty,” Lois said. “Until he tells me outright, I won’t know for sure, but I’m pretty sure I’m sure.” She nodded.

“He’s not Clark Kent from Kansas then?” Perry probed.

She scoffed with a roll of her eyes. “Hardly.”

“Excuse me?”

“I told you back in October when we returned from Smallville that I had found the real Clark Kent’s grave,” she reminded him. Perry hadn’t believed her then either. “No, our Clark, the guy we know as Clark stole that Clark’s identity. Well, it’s true he needed another identity, so why not take one from some deceased person out in the middle of rural America? That makes sense. What’s the likelihood that we over here in the big city would ever discover he wasn’t that person? Like nil, right?”

“Who is he, then?” Perry asked.

“I’m not sure, and I won’t be sure until he tells me,” Lois said, realizing that Perry wasn’t going to let this drop until she told him what she knew and she couldn’t let that happen. She held up her hands. “But he’s not a risk. I can promise you that.”

“Uh-huh,” he replied, not sounding convinced. “Is he a mole from the Metropolis Star?”

“No,” Lois said, unable to stop the giggle that escaped. “If he was, I’d want you to shoot me now. That is, after I killed him.”

Perry ignored her aside, and continued guessing, “But he’s on the run from the law, right?”

“No,” Lois said, still smiling. The law loves Superman. “Definitely not. I’m telling you he’s not a risk, Perry.”

His eyebrow shot back up. “I thought you said he was on the run.”

“No. I said that there were bad men after him, and there are,” she conceded. All of them. No wonder Clark wanted her to have a relationship with him instead of Superman. He was too overprotective of her.

“Didn’t you say that he was some Italian émigré?”

Lois flushed. “I was wrong about that.”

“But he’s hiding out as ‘Clark Kent’?” Perry guessed.

She nodded.

“Is Clark an undercover police officer or an FBI agent?”

“Kind of. Not really, but yeah, that works,” she said, nodding. “I really can’t tell you, Perry. I’ve said too much already.”

“Are we under investigation by a government agency?” Perry probed.

Lois groaned. “No. He’s a reporter, just like us. He’s just trying to get justice for little guys.” Okay, that was a bit of a stretch. Clark wasn’t a reporter ‘just like them’. He brought an extra skill-set to the job. Her brow furrowed as she considered how, when, and where he might have used his abilities for a story.

Perry thought about this for a minute, and then asked, “Is he an ultra-billionaire just trying to lead a normal life?”

“Like Lex Luthor?” Lois laughed. “No, I guarantee you that he’s nothing like that.” Clark resided on the opposite side of the scale actually.

Perry pressed his lips together and then grinned. “A circus clown?”

“Perry!”

He nudged her. “A woman?”

She roared with laughter. “Uh… No.”

“Batman?”

“I hope not!” she said, shaking her head.

“Rumpelstiltskin?”

“Too tall,” Lois retorted. Now, Perry was just being silly.

“A flying alien from the planet Krypton?” her boss said, throwing back his head with a roar of laughter.

Lois’s eyes went wide as she gulped. Holy crap! She tried to laugh away this guess but she found that she couldn’t move. The best she could manage was a weak smile. Was this why Clark hadn’t told her? Not fifteen minutes had passed since she had found out, and she had already given away his secret to the editor of their newspaper.

Perry realized that Lois wasn’t laughing. He stared at her. “Great shades of Elvis!” he hissed, his voice barely above a whisper. “Lois, tell me I’m wrong.”

“You’re wrong,” she said feebly.

They both knew she was lying.

He held up his hands. “I don’t know this.”

“I could be wrong,” she whispered.

Perry looked at her, and they both knew she was never wrong. “You don’t know for certain?”

“He hasn’t admitted it, per se, but…” Lois started, and then shrugged. She was certain.

“How’d you find out?”

“I kissed him.”

Perry looked both confused and skeptical at the same time, before asking, “Who?”

“Superman.”

“But you’ve kissed him before, haven’t you?” he asked.

“No! It was the first time. Well, I mean, I’ve kissed Clark plenty of times, but this was the first time I’d kissed him while he was dressed in the Super Suit,” Lois admitted. Oh, why had she told him that? She cleared her throat. “I was so excited to see him, Superman him, and know that he would save us from Nightfall, that I went a little overboard with my greeting.” Okay, that wasn’t the full truth, but it was close enough.

“So, you’re not sure. Good. Let’s keep it that way. If I don’t have the cold hard facts, I can’t print it. This conversation never happened,” Perry said, heading for the door.

“Fine by me,” Lois agreed. If Clark ever found out that she had spilled the beans on him to their editor, he would be less than thrilled.

Perry turned around to face her again. “Did you say that Superman’s back? That he’s heading to stop Nightfall?”

“No, because we didn’t have that conversation,” she retorted. “But Superman is back. He just gave me a lift to the Planet.”

“For future reference, Lois, that’s the story you should lead with!” Perry growled, and marched out of the conference room. “Olsen!”

***End of Part 98***

Part 99

It took us 10 months to get here, but we finally made it. Comments ?