Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Lois & Clark Fanfic Wrong Clark (119/???)

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

Where we left off in Part 118 …

What must have been only a few minutes later, though Clark had been so absorbed in his thoughts of kissing Lois and the near misses in the sky that he couldn’t really say for certain, Jimmy stuck his head into the Chief’s office. “Hey, where’s Perry?” he asked Clark.

Clark shrugged. He hadn’t seen him since he returned.

“I think he left about fifteen minutes ago for lunch or a meeting upstairs,” Lois responded, not even glancing away from what she was typing.

“Oh, no,” Jimmy exclaimed. “He left? During a huge crisis like this?”

“What’s going on?” Clark asked, approaching his friend.

“I promised I wouldn’t say anything, but I found out that the Chief got bad news from his physical last week. I think he’s trying to do away with himself,” Jimmy said, quickly putting on his jacket.

“No,” Clark said.

“Jimmy, that’s absurd,” Lois countered, interrupting, as she opened her little bottle of correction fluid.

“No. I’m serious. There was an entry in his calendar for today that said that he was going to the Metropolis Bridge,” Jimmy said, heading towards the elevators. “I think he’s going to jump.”

“Of course he’s going to jump, Jimmy,” Lois said, returning to her typing, and much more calmly than Clark expected. “But not until tonight after the paper's been put to bed. People are known to do crazy things when they turn fifty, including going bungee jumping.”

Jimmy halted and backed up to her desk. “What?”

“What what?” Lois replied, looking Jimmy in the eye.

“Excuse me? What did you say? The Chief is going bungee jumping? Bungee jumping? Mr. White?” Jimmy said, staring at Lois.

“How do you know about Perry’s birthday?” Clark asked. The Chief had seemed quite certain nobody at the Planet knew about his big birthday.

Lois’s gaze shifted to Clark. “Huh? His birthday? I don’t know. I just…knew,” she mumbled as her whole body went rigid. Slowly, she stood up and her stare at Clark deepened. Her face turned white and she stammered, “P…P…Per… Perry’s birthday… is t…t…today?”

Clark nodded slowly, moving towards Lois. He was beginning to recognize the signs of her premonitions: knowing something she shouldn’t, the shock at knowing it, and the color draining from her face were all dead giveaways that something wasn’t right.

“Geeze, guys, you could’ve clued me in. I’ve been worried sick all week,” Jimmy griped. “Hey, Lois, are you okay?”

“P…Per… Perry’s... his birthday?” she repeated before her eyes rolled back into her head and she started to fall to the floor in a dead faint. Luckily, Clark was close enough to catch her.

***

Part 119

Two men faced each other on a dusty stretch of town, and not just any town, an old Western town. They were dressed identically in skintight blue body suits, red capes, red shorts with a yellow belt, and red boots. One’s slicked-back hair style varied slightly from the other one’s, and that was the only discernible physical difference between them. They were twins; although, vocally one of them sounded younger than the other.

As the two supermen stared at one another intently a ball of flame burst into existence between them. Suddenly, the flame flitted through the air and hit the hanging sign directly above Lois’s head. She gasped and darted behind some crates.

“Don’t you understand?” one of the supermen called to the other. “This is a fight neither one of us can win.”

The second Superman must have activated his heat vision again as another flame appeared out of nowhere between the two men, only this time it was closer to the second Superman. The flame exploded knocking the second Superman to the ground. The first Superman ran up to him to make sure he was okay.

“Go ahead,” the second Superman insisted. “Finish me off… Only the strong survive.”

“I don’t want to hurt you,” the first Superman told him. “You and I… we have so much in common, we’re linked. We’re… we’re brothers.”

The second Superman struggled to his feet, grunting in pain as he did so.

“Are you all right?” the first Superman asked.

The second Superman leaned against the first trying to keep his balance. “I’m dying,” he replied. “Maybe it’s for the best… there’s nothing left to live for anyway. I have something to do. Will you wait here for me?” Without waiting for an answer, he took to the sky and disappeared.

Lois approached the first and remaining Superman. “Where is he going?”

“I don’t know,” the first Superman replied, before scooping her up into his arms and flying her back to the Daily Planet.

She stumbled down the ramp to the bullpen. It looked slightly different than it normally did, but she couldn’t put her finger on what exactly had changed.

Jimbo rushed up to her with a gift-wrapped package. “Cutting it close,” he said.

Lois glanced at her watch… her watch, the one her grandmother had given her after graduation from Metropolis University. Had her watched stopped? It read only 7:52am and she knew it had to be sometime in the afternoon. She shook her wrist, but the second hand kept ticking. She decided to play along and see what happened, even though it was strange to have Jimbo in the newsroom again. “I’ve still got eight minutes. What did I get him?”

“Checked suspenders. Did you remember the card?” Jimbo asked.

“Oh, no,” she groaned. She always forgot the card.

Jimbo held up a light blue envelope. “Who’s your buddy? Who’s your pal?”

Lois grinned. Jimbo really was the greatest.

“I am, right?” Jimbo gloated some more.

She grabbed the card and hit him gently in the head with it, before heading towards her desk.

Clark set down a wrapped gift on his desk and approached her, as if nothing had happened, as if nothing were wrong, when clearly everything was.

Anyway, how could Clark already be here, when Superman had just dropped her off and was heading back to meet the other Superman? Had the second Superman been her Clark? She had been so sure it had been the first one, because the second one didn’t speak like her Clark, her Superman. He didn’t appear to be ‘dying’ though but, then again, he was good at faking a lot of things.

“Good morning, Lois,” he said in that bright voice of his which made her life worth enjoying.

‘Good morning?’ It must have been in the middle of the afternoon from where the sun had been during the Supermen’s re-inactment of ‘High Noon’. For that to be true, though, the old west town had to have been in Italy. Had it only been a movie set? Well, that made sense. Weren’t all those old Clint Eastwood westerns filmed in Italy? The trip hadn’t seemed to take that long but, then again, when she flew in Superman’s arms, time always seemed to fly by. Could it have been a ‘good first time I’ve seen you today’ type good morning? No, it couldn’t be, since he had just seen her, but he didn’t know that she knew he was Superman. Or, perhaps, this was how their day would have gone if he hadn’t met her in the supply closet. Yes, that must have been it.

“You’re late,” she snapped.

“‘Good morning, Clark,’” he replied for her, but the smile on his face told her that he was only teasing. “So, what did you get him?”

“Checked suspenders,” she announced, knowing that Perry was going to love her gift.

A perplexed expression crossed Clark’s face as he pointed at her upheld gift. “Didn’t you get him those last year?”

Had she? No, wait, she hadn’t known Perry’s birthdate last year, or had she? It felt like she had, but the past seemed blurry. Anyway, Clark hadn’t joined the Planet until May, so how would he know what she had given Perry for his birthday? Had Perry bragged about her gift? Had she?

“Yeah,” she admitted reluctantly before defending her choice, “He liked them, didn’t he?”

Clark laughed at her faux pas. Damn his smug self.

She heard a man clear his throat behind her, but when she turned around, she was no longer in the office, but in the woods. What the hell? How had that happened?

In front of her, a man stood in a bright blue jumpsuit and a silver vest, holding a gun and waving it around as if he was looking for something or someone. She stood behind him with a large stick in her hands; she was holding it over her shoulder as if it she were playing baseball. Was she fighting this man, or was he a good guy? He was somewhat dressed like Superman, except Superman would never have a gun.

Bad guy, then, she decided. She came out swinging her stick, knocking the man and his gun to the ground. She dropped her stick and went after his gun. The man caught her, and they rolled around fighting for the gun for a moment, before his larger size gave him the edge.

He got to his feet and aimed the gun at her. “How did you get here?” he demanded.

Now that he was looking directly at her, Lois recognized him as the ‘Duh’ man from that vision she had when she discovered Clark was Superman. He seemed to know about as much as she did about where they were and how they had gotten there. Not having time to contemplate what was going on, she swung her leg up and knocked his gun free from his hand again. Although he had a weapon, the man seemed ill versed at fighting. As he ran off after the gun, she spotted Clark standing behind a tree a couple of yards away… only Clark wasn’t really standing there. He was transparent and fading, a literal invisible man. Only his clothes seemed to remain.

“Clark!” she called, shifting directions towards him, but the man in the weird clothes tackled her again.

“Oh, no you don’t, missy. He’s going to die and there isn’t anything you’ll be able to do to stop it,” the man said.

Lois elbowed the stranger’s jaw and kneed him in the stomach, knocking him to the ground. At which point, she punched him a couple more times before he passed out. She ran to Clark… or more accurately, his clothes.

“Clark! Oh, Clark, what’s happening to you?” she asked. As she embraced him, his clothes emptied of his essence before they themselves disappeared. “Clark, no!” she hollered, dropping to her knees and feeling like her soul had been sucked from her body as well.

A breeze floated through the trees and with it, she heard Clark’s voice, ~I’ll always love you, Lois.~

“No!” Lois shouted. “No! Clark!”

“Okay, calm down, Lois,” Clark whispered from beside her, and the warm supportive arms, which had been holding her, retracted. “You fainted.”

Her eyes flew open. “I most certainly did not faint!” Lois insisted to Clark. “I don’t faint!” Then as she came to her senses, she realized that she was yelling at Clark.

Clark! He was alive. The other Superman hadn’t killed him. He was alive! He hadn’t faded away to nothingness. She launched herself back into his arms.

“I’m going to have to side with Clark on this one, Lois. You fainted,” Jimmy said, from where he was kneeling down on the other side of her. “Eyes rolling back in your head and everything. Only I expected you to be out longer, not just a second or two.”

“You’re alive,” she mumbled, looking back at Jimmy. “You’re both here. Alive! It was just a dream.” She wrapped an arm around Jimmy’s shoulders and pulled him to her as well. “Just a dream.” Only she knew it wasn’t a dream; it felt too real.

“Great shades of Elvis! What’s going on here?” Perry yelled, marching over to where a crowd had gathered at her desk.

“Lois fainted, Chief,” Jimmy informed him, extracting himself from Lois’s embrace.

Their boss two-finger pointed at him and announced, “That’s brilliant, Jimmy!” He shook his head.

“Brilliant? No, it’s not brilliant, Perry, any more than you letting me think you were dying when all that was happening was you cracking up over turning fifty,” Jimmy returned angrily. “I thought you were going to kill yourself! I’ve been worried sick.”

Perry! The supermen had been fighting… because of her… over her. The dream was real, and it was going to happen on Perry’s birthday, and today was Perry’s birthday.

It was all her fault that Clark would die.

“You thought I was dying? That I was going to kill myself?” Perry echoed in surprised, and then in mirth. “Well, that explains your weird behavior over the last few days, Olsen.”

“My weird behavior? You’ve got to be kidding me,” Jimmy retorted. “You’re the one who’s been acting whacked.”

“Kent, you promised not to tell anyone that it’s my birthday,” Perry rebuked Lois’s partner.

“I didn’t; Lois did,” Clark said, helping Lois to her feet. “We should get her into the conference room to lie down.”

Lois shoved her way out of his arms. “Don’t touch me!” she yelled. “In fact, Clark, stay away from me. Don’t come near me!” She backed away from him and his hurt expression. “It’s my fault, Clark. It’s all my fault,” she sobbed in justification.

“Lois?” Perry asked softly. “What’s your fault, honey?”

“Clark!” she explained, pointing at her stunned partner. “He’s going to die because of me. It’ll all be my fault!” Then she remembered the two supermen battling out at the old west town. “I’ve got to warn Superman.” She shoved through the crowd surrounding her, trying to get to the elevators, knowing she couldn’t explain to Clark about his twin here on the newsroom floor.

“Whoa, there, Lois.” Perry caught her arm. “Are you feeling all right? You’ve been running yourself to the bone… I think Clark’s right. Why don’t you come and lie down? I’ll call upstairs and see if we can’t find a doctor to check you out.”

Lois gazed at Clark with wide-open eyes. She could feel her heart pounding in fear, so she knew he must hear it as well. “No! No doctors! Clark, tell him I’m not crazy. I’m not crazy! You’re going to die, and I can’t let that happen.” She grabbed Clark’s arms, shaking him. “Please, Clark, tell him I can’t go back there. Please!” she begged him as the tears ran down her cheeks. “I can’t.” Then she realized that she was touching Clark, and it was because of her that he would die at that other Superman’s hands. “Clark, I’ve got to warn Superman!” She shoved herself away from him again, and ran for the elevators, jumping inside just as the doors were about to close.

*

Perry, Jimmy, and the other staff members turned away from where Lois had gone to stare at Clark in a mixture of curiosity and dismay.

Clark shrugged sheepishly. He was only a little less lost than they were. “She’s not crazy, Chief. Just a little too stressed. I’ll go catch her, before she does something… anything… I’ll go catch up with her,” he said, backing away from them and running for the stairwell.

He guessed if she were going to look for Superman, she would try contacting him from the roof. He arrived at the top floor just in time to see her disappear through the door to the roof stairwell. “Lois!” he called to her, but she didn’t heed him.

When he arrived at the roof, he had already heard her calling to Superman. “Lois,” he said again from behind her.

Lois spun around and faced him. “Clark! What are you doing here? I need to talk to Superman.”

“You need to talk to me, Lois. Tell me what you saw,” he said, taking a step towards her.

She stepped back. “No, Clark. Please, stay away. I’m going to tell Superman the same thing. He’s… He’s going to die too, because of me.”

Those words caused Clark to pause. “What do you mean?”

Lois turned away from him, flustered. “I don’t know. It doesn’t make any sense, but I can’t take that chance, can I? If staying away from me saves you and Superman, it’s a sacrifice I’ll gladly make.”

“Why do you think my death… and Superman’s death… will be your fault, Lois?” he asked.

“Because it is. I was there. If I’m not there, maybe you’ll survive,” she said, and then added as if an afterthought. “Superman, too.”

“Is this the private matter, which you needed to talk to Superman about?” Clark asked, taking another step closer towards her back, hovering just above the roofing gravel so as not to make a sound.

Lois shook her head. “That was something else. An investigation I’ve been working on and with which I need his help. In the grand scheme of things, it’s not important. We’ll talk about it later, if you can survive the next couple of days…” She waved off any other inquiries into the matter.

Clark stopped again. Was Lois conducting investigations without informing him? He always knew that they had separate stories, but he had thought that they didn’t have any secrets at work. Then again, he never told her about working with Cat on the Brenda Muldoon investigation or his probing into Luthor’s dealings. Could he really expect that Lois wouldn’t investigate stories without him? He guessed not. Still, the thought made him sad.

Despite her grumbling, working at the Daily Planet with Lois was one of the best parts of his new life in this dimension. He loved his job as a reporter much more than he had back in his old dimension, even before he had been outed as a man from another planet. Even back during those times when Lois wasn’t talking to him, he would get out of bed happy just to have the opportunity to see or talk to her. Perhaps they weren’t as close as he had thought previously… as he had hoped… as he had thought they were only ten minutes before in the supply closet. Nevertheless, he refused to heed her warning or give up.

“Lois,” he said softly, setting his hands on her shoulders, causing her to flinch. “Are Superman’s death and mine related?” Her shoulder muscles remained tense, so he began to massage them.

“I don’t know,” she murmured.

“Then maybe you should tell me what you do know,” he suggested. “And we can make sense of it together.”

Lois turned around and rested her head on his chest, surrounding him with her arms. “Will you tell Superman what I know? I can’t stand here calling for him. If I avoid Superman altogether, maybe they won’t fight and he’ll survive.”

“‘They’ who?” Clark asked, softly caressing the back of her head. “Who won’t fight?”

“Superman and his…” Lois pulled back to look Clark in the eye. “Did you know that Superman has a twin… a twin brother?”

Clark’s jaw fell open. “A what?” he sputtered. He didn’t have a brother, let alone a twin. He had expected Lois to say that he, Clark, and Luthor had fought it out, but Superman and… Superman?

“That’s what I saw. Superman was fighting with himself… well, his twin self. They were fighting over… me.”

“You?”

“Apparently, one of the supermen kidnapped me – I’m assuming it’s the Superman I haven’t met yet – which angered the real Superman, and they ended up dueling it out on the streets of an old west town,” Lois explained, setting her head back on Clark’s chest.

“Like gunslingers?”

“Except with heat vision,” she clarified.

“They both used heat vision?” Clark questioned, and he felt her nod against his chest. His arms tightened around her protectively as his heart contracted.

Had she seen a vision of the future? Of him battling her True Clark for her and losing? Of course, he deserved to lose. He had once told Herb that he would willingly step aside and let Lois go to the man with whom she was supposed to be, her true soul mate, if that was how the chips fell.

Clark kissed Lois’s forehead. Now, he wasn’t so sure that he could give her up so easily. Would he fight for her, for the right to be her one and only? If he had to defeat her soul mate to ‘win’ her, would she still want him? He guessed not.

“How… How do you know which one won?” he asked.

“I don’t know. My first thought was that he had won, our Superman, but… I…I’m not sure now. The defeated Superman said he was dying and that he had nothing left to live for, and flew off,” Lois murmured. “I’m so afraid, Clark. I don’t want to lose him… or you. Don’t you see why I need you to stay away from me?”

“Nope. You lost me there. Does my death tie into Superman’s death wish somehow?” Clark asked, not wanting to add to Lois’s current confusion and stress by telling her that he and Superman were one and the same. He could see why Lois felt as if he was the defeated Superman. Did a part of her sense that he wasn’t as good as her True Superman? That he was the weaker man? If True Superman were to return and Lois no longer wanted him, the wrong Clark, he would die of a broken heart, having nothing left to live for, as the man from her dream had said.

“Do you mean does one of the supermen kill you to get to me, which is why the other one battles him?” she asked, contemplating. “That would make sense and explain why the two supermen were fighting over me, but no…I… I don’t think so. That sounds evil, and I cannot imagine Superman acting in that way, willingly killing someone. No, he wouldn’t be ‘Superman’ if he did that. Superman values life too much. He even refused to get in the ring with Tommy what’s-his-name, the cyborg boxer, because he didn’t want to hurt him.” She swallowed. “Anyway, you just disappear.”

“Then how do you know that I’ll die?” he asked.

“I don’t quite understand it either, Clark. It’s as if you faded away, turned invisible, only without one of Morris’s invisibility suits. Then a breeze blows what’s left of you, your clothing, away like ashes or flashes of light in the wind, as if you no longer existed.”

A chill passed down Clark’s spine. No wonder this vision frightened Lois. It was as if she witnessed the end of his existence.

His eyes widened with realization. She had witnessed the end of his existence. Was that why she had memories of her other timeline? Had Lois been with her True Clark in the future when Tempus had killed off baby Kal-El in the past? Would there be a way to stop the past from happening when they crossed the spot in time when Tempus had wiped True Clark from this dimension’s future? Without knowing when and where the event occurred it would be nearly impossible to pinpoint the exact moment when True Clark disappeared.

“And it happens today, on Perry’s birthday, or tomorrow,” she went on. “That’s why I need to warn Superman that he has a twin out there somewhere who he’s going to end up fighting.”

“Lois, Superman’s busy dealing with the repercussions of this Ides of Metropolis computer virus,” he reminded her.

“Well, I know what I saw, Clark,” she said in her ‘you better believe me’ tone. “I saw them fighting over me. Then the loser flew off, and Superman brought me to work because he didn’t want me to be there when the other Superman returned to the old west town. Anyway, everyone was preparing for Perry’s birthday. Jimbo had even bought my gift because I forgot, again, and you were there…”

“I was there?” Clark asked. Superman dropped Lois off, and yet Clark was already here? But Superman was also heading back to meet the defeated Superman? Clark raised a hand to his head, trying to wrap his mind around Lois’s “facts” to find reason to them. “So, I wasn’t already dead?”

“No, it happened afterwards. We were discussing how I seem always to give the Chief checkered suspenders, when suddenly I found myself in the woods, battling some Superman groupie or something,” Lois said.

“Battling a Superman groupie?” he echoed. He was trying very hard to believe this crazy story that Lois was telling him, because Lois believed it and, more often than not, her visions had a grain of truth to them.

“I know how it sounds, Clark. I don’t quite understand it either. At first, I wondered if he was Kryptonian too, because he was wearing a blue bodysuit, like Superman’s, but it was baggier, and… well, glitterier…” she said, almost skeptical of her own memory of the event. “And he wore a silver vest of some sort. He looked weird.”

“What gave him away as human?” Clark asked.

“The gun.”

That would do it. He nodded. Another Kryptonian wouldn’t need a gun on Earth.

“Anyway, we were fighting. At some points, he was winning, and sometimes I was. Eventually, I knocked him out and that’s when I saw…” Lois’s voice cracked. “You. Only I couldn’t see you, because you weren’t there. It was as if only the barest of hint of you remained, and then…” She sniffled, tightening her grip around him. “You were gone. It felt as if my heart was torn from my body.”

Clark closed his eyes. He knew that feeling. He felt exactly the same way the two times he had to say goodbye to that Lois from that other dimension and return to living in a dimension without a Lois. He knew if he ever separated from this Lois, the pain would be worse than being stabbed by Kryptonite. “And that happens today?” he asked, his voice rough.

“Or tomorrow. Whenever we celebrate Perry’s birthday,” Lois said.

“Do you mind if I hope that you’re wrong?” he said, trying to interject some levity into this entirely too serious conversation.

She pulled back, looked into his eyes. “I…” She stopped and glanced around.

He followed her gaze with his own. Was she searching for someone or something? Perhaps she was looking for Superman. When he didn’t notice anything, he returned his gaze to Lois and saw that she was staring at him.

“I love you, Clark,” she said with finality to it as if she was scared that she might never be able to tell him again. Her hands gripped his arms. “Promise me… Promise me that you won’t disappear on me.”

Clark cupped her jaw in his palm. “I wish I could, Minha, but that doesn’t sound like the type of disappearance over which I would have any control.”

“Promise me,” Lois said more forcefully as her grip on his arms tightened.

If her vision was of her True Clark losing his future, because he died soon after arriving on Earth, then Clark knew he had nothing to fear. “I love you, Lois. I will always love you. I promise that I will never willingly leave you,” he said, giving her the best he could give. “Unless you send me away.”

She smiled weakly at him as her acceptance of his pledge, and then closed her eyes and tilted her chin up. Clark didn’t need more of an invitation to seal his pledge with a kiss.

Much too soon, Lois stepped back. “Tell Superman what I told you, and tell him that he isn’t to come near me for any reason whatsoever.”

“Lo-is,” Clark said in disbelief. “I can tell him, but if you end up in danger, I doubt if he’ll comply.”

“Octopus!” she said, pointing at Clark, and then gasped, placing a hand over her mouth. “I didn’t mean it!” she called out into the sky.

Clark crossed his arms and gazed wryly at her. She clearly wasn’t in trouble.

She held up her hands. “Let me explain. We have this code word that I’m supposed to use…”

“Octopus. I know. You used it when Menken kidnapped you, remember?” he reminded her.

“I did? Yeah, I guess I did,” she said. “I’ll be fine. I doubt I’ll need the kind of help that Superman offers, but if I do, let him know that I’ll call out for our eight-legged sea friend. Okay? You’re going to have to trust me on this, Clark. I’ve already spent too much time in your company.” She kissed his cheek. “Tell Perry that I went to meet a source about Harrison. I’ll call you later and let you know I made it home safely.” She ran her thumb over the spot she kissed. “If you can do the same, I’d appreciate it.”

He nodded. “Don’t worry. I’ll be fine.”

“That’s what you told me during Nightfall,” Lois reminded him. “We just need to survive the next couple of days and… and…” She set a hand on his arm. “Watch out for any suspicious looking supermen out there. Make him tell you the code word to verify his identity. I can’t be at the Planet any more today. I can’t chance it,” she said, backing towards the door.

Clark wanted to reassure Lois that nothing would happen. That no other Superman would appear out of the heavens to make him disappear. Only, her visions had been accurate in the past, even if only by a grain of truth. “Take care, Lois.”

***

“Tell me again why Lois isn’t crazy,” Perry said to Clark as they sat in the editor’s office some fifteen minutes later. “And don’t give me some malarkey about how she’s stressed out about her arrest, or how she hasn’t been eating properly.”

Lois hadn’t given Clark permission to air her secrets to the Chief, but Clark felt he needed to say something to put his boss’s fears at ease. “She received some upsetting news recently and…”

Perry started to look even more skeptical. “Upsetting news?”

“Maybe I should start at the beginning,” Clark suggested, clearing his throat.

“Is she pregnant?”

“What? No!” Clark gasped. “Whatever gave you that idea?”

“Are you sure, Kent?” Perry said with a knowing look. “The woman did faint, and women in a delicate condition have been known to do that every once in a while when they try to do too much at once.”

“Lois… wouldn’t… hasn’t… isn’t…” Clark sputtered, before throwing an arm towards the newsroom. “You remember what Cat concluded about Lois’s intimate life back when Trask accused her of sleeping with Superman. Lois doesn’t sleep around. She picks and chooses her romantic partners very carefully. How could you even suggest such a thing about her?”

“That was almost a year ago, Kent. A lot has changed in this past year, even in the past few months, I would say,” Perry probed, still driving this conversation in the complete wrong direction.

Clark blushed, feeling as if Perry was accusing him of something of which he certainly wasn’t guilty. “Lois isn’t seeing anyone,” he announced. Officially, he added silently. At least, Clark could be reassured that Lois wasn’t having a relationship with Luthor because of the conversation he had overheard earlier.

His boss pressed his lips together, and Clark could tell that Perry didn’t believe him.

“Intimately,” Clark clarified further. “She’s not… wouldn’t let...” He coughed. “Lois is not with child, Sir.”

Thankfully, Lois had cleared the air with him about what really happened while he was in the hospital or Clark might consider Perry’s theory viable, and he really didn’t need his mind going down that road at the moment. But he couldn’t stop his thoughts as they raced on ahead. If they had… then she could… and he’d be… Clark had to grip the arms of the chair to stop himself from floating. But they hadn’t… so she wasn’t… because they couldn’t... And gravity had firm hold of him once more.

Perry raised an eyebrow. “And you would know this, because…?”

Clark’s rosy cheeks must have matched his cape after this pronouncement. “She would have confided in me,” he squawked. “We’re best friends.”

“Uh-huh.” His boss’s eyes narrowed. “I’m thinking that’s not why she would’ve told you, but…”

“Sir! Lois and I are not… have never… we’re… what exactly are you implying?” Clark said, standing up.

“Of being in love with your partner,” Perry retorted, standing up and leaning his fists on his desk. “I love the woman like the daughter I never had, and if she’s cracking under the pressure or requires medical attention, which I know from experience she is liable to disregard, I want to get her the help that she needs.”

“As would I,” Clark insisted, neither confirming nor denying his boss’s accusation. “As I said before, I will always treat Lois with the upmost respect and honor, Sir.”

Perry nodded his acceptance of Clark’s vow and waved for him to sit back down, as he himself sat down. “I’ve also got to keep the Daily Planet afloat during this crisis. I’ve got an entire team of people out there relying on me to steer through this storm so that they still have jobs when we get out of these rough seas, so if one of my crew requires extra attention...”

“I understand, Sir,” Clark said, knowing he would have to dance around the truth to not reveal Lois’s entire secret, but it was better to be honest with Perry than let his boss continue down the path he had chosen. “The fact of the matter is that Lois has a source, who contacts her from time to time with vague information. This source told her that something bad would happen to me today… well, on your birthday, to be specific. I guess, Lois did a bit of research and, right before she fainted, must’ve put two-and-two together and realized that today everything would be coming to a head.”

Perry whistled. “I know that she loves you, son…”

Clark’s eyes widened. Perry knows?

“Don’t look at me like that, Kent. I didn’t become editor of the Daily Planet by not seeing the nose at the end of my face. With the amount of combustible energy between the two of you, I figured it was only a matter of time before you... uh... partner up… er… privately. After what she went through when you disappeared during Nightfall, add on to that getting arrested and facing a probable prison sentence, and the whole country going to pot because of this computer virus, I could see why she might react a tad wildly to such news. Yet, you don’t seem too worried about this possibility.”

“Lois explained what… what her source told her would happen, and I’m… well, hoping she’s wrong,” Clark said, glancing away.

“Uh-huh,” Perry said, eyeing him warily. “How accurate is this source?”

“Not very. Sometimes the source is spot-on accurate, and sometimes she’s way off base. Lois first told me about her when we were held captive in the Messenger hangar. The source had told Lois that Jimmy would die, as well as all the colonists of the Prometheus transport, and that Lois would barely escape with her life,” Clark explained.

Perry held up his hand to stop him. “Hold on a minute, son. Are you trying to get me to believe that Lois is flaking out because she’s been talking to a psychic? Lois would never believe some phony baloney psychic, especially one who is as wrong as that.”

Clark smiled sheepishly. He had hoped to avoid that aspect of Lois’s visions. “Sir, with all due respect, the source also told Lois that a ‘Superman’ would save her life last May, that she would lose out on the Bureau 39 warehouse story if she didn’t keep you apprised on it, that Max Menken would be shot, that the staff of the Daily Planet would go crazy in love, and that something terrible would happen to me if Superman went on that first Nightfall mission.”

“Harrumph,” Perry grumbled, and Clark could tell he didn’t like relying on psychics. “What you’re saying is that she can’t discount what this woman says, because it might be true?”

“Unfortunately.”

“So, what are you going to do to make sure that you don’t die today?” Perry asked.

“Stay out of the woods,” Clark replied with a shrug of his shoulders. And avoid meeting up with Lois’s True Clark.

Perry laughed. “Damn psychics!”

***End of Part 119***

Part 120

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