Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Lois & Clark Fanfic Wrong Clark (140/???)

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

You can find Part 139 here.

Part 140

Lois had insisted over the phone that Clark meet her at Centennial Park. At first, she had suggested the cluster of trees where she had met Superman the day after Lex had shot her, but then almost immediately changed her mind with the unfinished thought of, “No, that’s where…”

Superman had dumped her.

She hadn’t needed to say the words, because both she and Clark knew what they were. Well, technically, Superman had officially broken up with her in the mountains near the Canadian border, but it was close enough.

Clark, himself, was more than happy to meet elsewhere. Breaking up with Lois as Superman had not only been the stupidest thing he had ever done, and something for which he would be lucky if she ever forgave him, but it had also been one of the most painful experiences of his life in this new dimension. He had once thought it necessary for love to blossom between Lois and Clark, but now he wasn’t as convinced of that.

They had scheduled to meet at the Centennial Carousel at ten. Clark arrived less than one minute after their phone call and ended up waiting an hour for Lois. It felt as if it had been a week since he’d seen her. It had been a week, the longest week of his life and he had experienced many long weeks in his life.

Seeing Lois felt like a breath of fresh air for Clark. She didn’t seem at all like her usual confident self, though. She had been ten minutes late and she apologized right away for being so, blaming the fact that she had left her watch at home and a Metropolis cabbie, whom she claimed hadn’t followed her directions. She didn’t want to sit and talk at one of the benches, but had a nervous energy to her as she had when she thought she had a bomb strapped to her chest. This time, it manifested itself with her constantly glancing around at the crowds, staring at everything and yet not focusing on anything, as well as wringing her hands in an unconscious manner.

She had said in her message that something had gone wrong in one of her investigations and that she had wanted to talk to him about it. It couldn’t have been that bad, could it? She would have mentioned something over the phone when they talked during the last few days, wouldn’t she have? If it had been that important, she wouldn’t have left it up to a couple of cryptic messages, would she have?

He should have come home to check on her.

Lois then froze and stared at the carousel, almost as if she fell into a long distant psychic memory or perhaps it was merely that she could see through it to the LNN building across the street from Centennial Park. She immediately turned away from the carousel and headed deeper into the park, mumbling, “This was a bad idea, a very bad idea.”

However, the clearest sign that something was bothering Lois was that she refused Clark’s offer to buy her an ice cream cone, a chocolate ice cream cone. It was only ten o’clock in the morning, but still Lois refusing chocolate, let alone chocolate ice cream, was as unheard of as Perry admitting that Elvis was a so-so singer and bad showman.

They had walked at a brisk pace for a good ten minutes before Lois finally slowed and looked around once more. They were deeper in the park now, and the only street they could see was Broad Ave. in the distance, which bisected the park. She hadn’t spoken a word as she tramped off the path across fields of grass, down another tree-lined path, and past the fishing canal used by kids in the summer months.

Clark wondered if she was mad at him. No, not ‘mad’; ‘irate’ fit her current mood. True, he had been gone ‘on assignment’ all week, but combining all the odd behaviors he had witnessed since she arrived, Clark discerned Lois was acting as if she had just discovered he could fly.

His breath caught in his throat for a moment as he wondered how he had given himself away. A second later, he recalled that Lois was the brightest, most perceptive person he knew, and he wondered how he hadn’t given himself away sooner. One thing he was sure of though, he was thankful, not to mention optimistic, that she didn’t want to explode her fury in too public a place.

They stood to the side of a great lawn, or one that would be later in the month after spring was in full swing. It was still damp and a bit muddy from the previous night’s rainstorm. He had figured it must have rained because the roads were wet when he flew home the night before.

Since Lois knew of his dual life, it was well past time for him to tell her. If he were able to get the words out before she did, then she would realize, at the very least, that he wanted her to know and had decided to tell her on his own, and not because she had discovered his secret.

“Lois…” Clark began his admission of not being from Kansas originally, but Lois spoke his name at the same time. “Clark…”

They looked at one another and then spoke in unison again. “Do you mind if I go first?” he said as she said, “I need to go first.”

“Lois, there’s something I’ve been meaning to say to you for a long time and I really think…” Clark said, before she started walking again. Naturally, he followed, calling out to her in exasperation, “Lois!”

“Lex proposed,” she whispered when he caught up.

“Proposed what?” he whispered back.

Lois stopped and stared him straight in the eye. “Marriage.”

Clark’s heart stopped and it felt as if the entire population of the world collectively held its breath to hear her answer to his next question. “To whom?”

“Whom do you think?” she hissed back. “Me!”

Clark took hold of her arm and forced her to stop. “What did you say?”

Lois waved her hands around her face as if swatting at flies, and he let go. “What do you think I said?” she snapped. “I told him I needed time to think about it. What else could I say to such a man?”

He placed his hand against a tree as he felt his entire body physically wince in pain. It was as if her words had pierced his skin with a piece of sharp Kryptonite, making his head spin and it difficult for him to breathe.

She had walked on and then, upon realizing that he wasn’t keeping pace, returned. “Clark, you need to keep up. I…” She glanced around again. “Let’s get through that section of the park. It will open up into a large field. On the other side of the field are the backgammon and chess boards. We can talk more privately there.”

Clark nodded absently in agreement. He tried to buck himself up by thinking, ‘At least, she didn’t say ‘yes’. Then again,’ his brain had instantly responded. ‘She didn’t say ‘no’ either.’

As they walked, Lois’s anxiety turned to nervous chatter. “Do you think I expected this? I didn’t. This was the last thing I expected from him. Well, maybe not the last thing. I didn’t expect he would jump onstage during a symphony orchestra performance of John Williams’s film scores and start to perform the ballet from Tchaikovsky’s ‘Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies’ in a pink tutu to the theme music to ‘Jaws’. So, other than that type of oddball behavior, this was the last thing I anticipated when he said he was grateful that I encouraged you to save his life last weekend.”

“Don’t make me regret that decision more than I already do, Lois,” Clark mumbled.

“It’s never wrong to save someone’s life, Clark,” she reassured him with a pat of his arm. “It’ll turn out all right in the end.”

Clark was having difficulty believing her.

“So, this is why I called you,” Lois said as they neared the game tables. “I need your help, your unbiased advice, Clark. Partner to partner. I’m not sure what I should do. I mean, I know what I should do. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity that I will never get again. I know how I feel about him and what I want to do. On the other hand, I know what he thinks of you, and what you think of him. I don’t know how to meld these two contradictory parts warring inside of me.” She laced her fingers together and shook them in the air. “Oh, Clark, I’m totally flummoxed, and that’s not a feeling I like. I need you to look at this clearly for me. Nobody is better judging the facts on their merit than you, even facts that you don’t like. What do you see as my best way forward?” She looked at Clark and must have seen something in his expression that he hadn’t known he was projecting, because she then continued, “Let me start over. I’m explaining this badly.”

Clark didn’t know how much more explanation he could take. Did he want to hear how Lois had fallen in love with Lex? No. Did he want to hear how marrying Lex would also be good for her career, because of his connections? Nope. Did he want to hear how she loved Clark, but how Lex would be a much better match for her because of his social status and wealth? Certainly not.

Taking Lois’s elbow, Clark led her to a nearby bench and invited her to sit down. He couldn’t sit down and tried not to pace in front of her, but he was finding it difficult to stand still. He felt he must do something, but he wasn’t quite sure what. He knew he had to say something or she would make the biggest mistake of her life, and marry a murderer. Finally, he came to a decision. He would tell her the truth and let her make an informed decision. Unfortunately, clarity and word choice failed him. “This isn’t how or when I wanted to do this,” he told her. “But there is something I need to say.”

Lois looked up at him with a torn expression. He could see anticipation, as if she knew what he was about to do, as well as a hint of panic in her eyes. Additionally, her heartbeat increased. “Clark, can we stay focused on my problem first before we get to that?” she asked.

“No,” he said firmly. “I mean… this isn’t entirely off the subject.” He took a deep breath. One would think he had never done this before. Then he realized he hadn’t… well, not quite like this, not with Lois.

Lois nodded. “Okay. Fine. Spill it. Let’s get this over with.” She waved him on.

Clark paused as he gazed at Lois. He knew that this would be difficult, being that she was already in shellshock due to Luthor’s proposal, but he had to try. If he didn’t speak up and tell her now, he would regret it for the rest of his life. He discovered he was staring at her once again. He turned his face up to the light blue sky and hoped a small dose of sunshine would give him the courage to speak the words he had wanted to say since he first met Lois.

His eyes gravitated open and he found himself admiring her again. He couldn’t help it. Lois was still – even more so now that he hadn’t seen her in a week – the most exquisite woman he had ever met, from any dimension, his, this one, and even the one with that other Lois and Clark. He was willing to give up his life for this woman. He only wished Luthor hadn’t forced his hand, as this wasn't the way he wanted to do this.

Clark took another steadying breath, more nervous than he had been the day he had “proposed” to Lana. Actually, that was because he hadn’t proposed to Lana. She had given him an ultimatum and then they visited the jewelry store together where she showed him the ring she wanted. He bought it and gave it to her with his love and his promise to marry her. It was due to that promise that he had never broken up with Lana even after he started having second thoughts, and third and fourth thoughts.

‘Promises should never be given lightly,’ he could remember his mother saying to him.

Now that Clark thought about it, Lana never gave the ring back after she broke up with him due to his becoming Superman, either.

When he still hadn’t said anything after a minute, Lois smiled at him with encouragement, sending a new course of butterflies through his stomach. He could do this.

Clark took Lois’s hands in his. “I have loved you since the first moment I saw you. You are intelligent and brave and beautiful and selfless and funny, a true friend and partner.”

As he said this, her anticipation turned to surprise. He was sure he was doing the best unintentional impersonation of a Lois ramble in his life. He wished her announcement hadn't knocked him sideways and that he had the time to fly out to Smallville to discuss or practice this spur-of-the-moment speech with Martha. There just hadn’t been time. He had to speak up now, or potentially lose her forever as he had with the Lois from his dimension.

“This isn’t the right time, or the right place, or the manner in which I would want to do this, Lois. Yet, I cannot – in good conscience – let you make the biggest mistake of your life without putting my two cents in,” Clark continued, before kneeling down before her. “Lois Lane, will you make me the happiest man in the universe and agree to be my wife?”

Her jaw fell open.

He had always wondered what she’d be like stunned speechless and he guessed he now knew.

Finally, her mouth closed and when it reopened, she asked, “You’re asking me to marry you?”

Clark’s heart crumbled. He knew a ‘no’ when he heard one. “I will be a much better husband than Lex Luthor. I know that you love me, or that you once did before we started in on this whole ‘pretending that we aren’t involved’ ruse. If you want to get married so badly, why not choose me?” He caressed her cheek, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear. “I still love you.”

As Lois closed her eyes for a count of ten, that muscle in her jaw tensed. She opened her eyes, pulled him off his knee, and drew him onto the bench beside her. “No, Clark, you don’t,” she said, her voice sounding rough. He could see the sparkle of unshed tears in her eyes. “A man doesn’t tell the woman he loves that the only reason he’s proposing is so that she doesn’t make the ‘biggest mistake of her life’ by marrying someone else.” She stood up, and Clark recognized the anger coursing through her as she began to pace. “A man cannot claim to love a woman when all he has ever done is lie to her.”

“That’s not true,” he sputtered, getting to his feet in the need to defend his integrity. “I don’t lie to you.”

She raised an eyebrow and her expression of skepticism would be difficult for a layman to miss. “How haven’t you lied to me, Clark?” she retorted. “Or whoever you really are? First off, Clark Kent isn’t your real name. I have no idea what your real name is, but you and I sure as hell know you weren’t born Clark Jerome Kent from Smallville, Kansas. He died as a baby. I saw his grave and met his parents. And they didn’t know you from Jimmy two years ago, did they?”

How could he explain to her that Clark Kent was his name? He just wasn’t the Clark Kent from this dimension, but he had no proof of that. He had to convince her somehow that he wasn’t lying to her about his feelings. He just wasn’t sure how.

“Okay, so maybe I’m not the son of the Martha and Jonathan Kent you met when we went to Smallville, but I might as well be. I care for them as much as I did my own folks. Perhaps my history doesn’t take place with me growing up there, and going to college at Mid-West University,” Clark admitted. “But, please, don’t judge me on my past. Consider the man you’ve gotten to know since last summer. My feelings for you have always been honest and genuine, and, in everything essential, I have always been sincere with you. That person who you work with, talk to, and joke with, that is truly who I am. That is the real me.”

“Is it?” Lois snapped, and Clark’s stomach sunk even lower. She leaned so her face was a mere inch from his face and hissed, “Superman.”

Okay, so she did know. The fury at him made sense; he had even anticipated it. He swallowed, trying to choose his next words carefully.

“I have no idea who you are!” Lois announced, throwing her hands into the air. “You have lied to me about your name, your history, your home planet, your very being…” Her voice got softer in volume, but not intensity, with each phrase. “— not to mention all those silly errands you insist on doing at a moment’s notice, since we first met. Now, you ask me to marry you without giving me the common courtesy of first telling me who you really are. Why should I believe you love me now?”

Because it’s the truth, he wanted to say, but knew she wouldn’t accept it. Clark had no other answer for her. “I have always had your best interests at heart, Lois,” he whispered.

“Really? Did you enjoy the way I threw myself at you when you were dressed in your Suit, begging you to love me, and yet, all the while you pretended to be someone else, my friend, my partner to my face, and the person I turned to for comfort when I cried about how you…” She poked his chest with her index finger. “— in that costume, hurt me.”

“Uniform,” he corrected automatically and then flinched, knowing what it would do to her anger. It wasn’t her anger, which scared him most, but the hurt and raw emotional pain he had inflicted upon her that he could see shining in her eyes. “And I never pretended to be your friend, Lois. I’ve always been your friend. There was no pretense.”

“So, you aren’t denying it, then?” Lois practically spat the accusation at him.

“No.” He sighed, removing his glasses to wipe his eyes. He gazed at her for a few seconds without his glasses on, so she would see that she had guessed correctly, if she had even guessed at all, before returning the frames to his face.

“Good!” she announced. “That’s a first.”

Clark could say that he had wanted to tell her, many times, but what good would it do? She thought of him, of Superman, as a liar and she had made a good case. He didn’t want to grovel. Either she wanted him or she didn’t. “For the record, I never enjoyed that you threw yourself at Superman, while ignoring… sometimes, despising the real me.”

“Don’t try to turn your guilty conscience around on me, buster!” she roared, causing a pigeon to take flight nearby.

“You’re going to believe what you want to believe, no matter what I have to say in my defense,” he said, squaring his shoulders. He had tried to be honest about his feelings and that hadn’t worked. “I ask you whole-heartedly, from the bottom of my very soul, Lois, please do not marry Lex Luthor.”

“Jealous much?”

“This isn’t about jealousy, Lois,” Clark admitted, sitting back down on the bench. Her irate tirade seemed to be knocked askew by his calm admittance of the truth, so he continued while he still could. “Luthor truly is a bad man, Lois. He has committed crimes from murder, sabotage, and arson, to destruction of the environment. He funds medical experiments on children and he was the money behind Menken’s cyborg boxers. He routinely flouts laws and throws his successes in my face, in everybody’s face.”

The journalist in her emerged. “Why didn’t you tell me, Partner?”

“I have no actual proof, Lois. No ‘hard facts’ as Perry always says we need. Luthor has multiple walls between him and everything he touches. Nothing leads back to him. I could come forward to tell Inspector Henderson what I have witnessed, but it would be just Superman versus humanitarian Lex Luthor,” he explained. “Nobody would believe me.” He only hoped that Lois would.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Lois repeated, her gaze sharp as if she knew the words he was about to say.

“I did try to bring up the subject, Lois, and every time I did, you defended...”

She held up hand to stop him. “That’s not the real reason. What’s the real reason?”

Clark cleared his throat, before admitting, “I didn’t tell you because we thought you might be too close to him, Lois.”

“And you didn’t know if you could trust me,” she finished his answer, her voice cold.

“You’re dating him.”

Her lips pursed. “No, Chuck. I was dating you. I trusted you.” She looked down at her feet and closed her eyes. “I love you, but you’ve betrayed me in every sense of the word.” She threw up her hands. “Hell, I even thought I could trust you with Cat and Linda… now… now, I don’t know.”

“Lois,” Clark started. “I never…”

“It doesn’t matter anymore,” Lois interrupted him. “There was once a time when I thought myself in love with Superman; that he and I were soul mates flung out among the stars – finally to have been brought together again.” Her words brought him hope, but like fools gold, it was not the real thing. “But Clark – and I am calling you this, because I really don’t have a proper name to call you – let me be honest with you, I fell in love with the other you, the man who I thought was my partner. I thought you were this kind, sweet guy who, despite having some background and psychological problems, seemed genuine and honest and real. He loved me, as I never knew I could be loved. Then I discovered that too was a lie.”

“No, Lois,” he insisted, rising to his feet and setting his hands on her shoulders. “Clark really is who I am and I do love you.”

Her expression was incredulous, and he looked away. She was right. Why should she believe anything he said in his defense?

“Then when I asked you for your advice today, you didn’t even listen to what I had to say,” her voice was soft and wavering.

Clark shifted his gaze back to her eyes and saw that those unshed tears now dripped down her face.

“You… you just jumped in and asked me to marry you, not because you loved me with all of your heart, but because you felt 'forced' to. Not because you wanted to be with me forever, but because you wanted me not to make 'the worst mistake of my life'. As if I were some prize in a competition between you and Lex.” She shook off his hands from her shoulders. “How can you say that you love me, when you don’t even know me?”

He closed his eyes, knowing he deserved her wrath.

“You lied to me. You made me believe that you were two separate people. You pretended to be my best friend, while you wooed me as another man. You made me feel guilty for loving and desiring another part of you. You admitted to me that you don’t trust me. You kept key facts of an investigation away from me. You allowed me to continue to associate with someone while withholding information of his so-called true character. Finally, you offered to marry me under the guise of stopping me from accepting another man’s proposal. Have I got all the facts correct there…” Lois seemed at a loss on what to call him. “Partner?”

“Lois, please…” Clark tried again as he could feel the tourniquet that used to be his intestines twist in his gut. The problem was that her facts were all correct.

“There is not a way you could have possibly phrased a proposal today, where I would have accepted it,” Lois went on. “Though you said you were offering me love, the truth is you were once more trying to ‘save me’, this time by deciding who I should and should not marry. You have offended our friendship, our professional relationship, and me personally, not only with your words, but also in the slipshod manner in which you made your offer. I truly cannot accept any more insults today.” With that, Lois turned on her heel and marched away. He could still hear her sniffling when she disappeared from normal view.

Clark stumbled back down to the bench and let her words flow over him like the soundtrack to a horror movie of his own making.

There is not a way you could have possibly phrased a proposal today, where I would have accepted it.

He grabbed the back of his head and rested his elbows on his knees.

What had he just done?

***

Lois stormed into the newsroom, hoping to hell that Perry was in. If there had been a way for Lois to slam the elevator doors, she would have. As she marched through the room and over to the Editor-in-Chief’s office, her co-workers parted as if they were the Red Sea. She opened Perry’s door, slamming it behind her for good measure, causing the glass in the door and the office windows to rattle.

“The jerk proposed!” she announced.

Her boss looked up from the paperwork on his desk. “Excuse me?”

“Did you know that Clark was investigating Lex Luthor?” she demanded.

Perry set down his pencil and leaned back in his chair in thought, which told her everything she needed to know.

“How could you?” she growled. “Clark said you gave him the story because I’m dating Lex. Why didn’t you trust me?”

Her boss shrugged. “If it walks like a duck…”

Lois set her hands on his desk and leaned towards him. “Is there anyone employed by this paper who is a better reporter than I am?”

“Well…” Perry shifted his position.

“So, if I walk like an investigator, and I talk like an investigator, why would you believe that I’m not dating like an undercover investigative reporter?” she snapped.

He sat up. “Who are we talking about here?”

“Lex Luthor is my story!” Lois announced, hitting her chest. “He’s been my story long before Clark’s flea-bitten behind started working here. I spent a year calling LexCorp to try to get an interview with Lex Luthor, before I finally got him to notice me at his White Orchid Ball last May. Now, after spending almost another year of remaining on friendly terms with that egocentric megalomaniac, who not only shot me but also paid a madam money to try to sleep with me, like that will ever happen, I have him in the palm of my hand. Then what do I learn? That, months ago, you turned my story over to my untrustworthy hack of a partner, because you think ‘I’m too close to it’.”

“Honey, I didn’t know of any investigation because you didn’t inform me. In fact, I thought you had dropped it, because I never received that interview you promised me after the White Orchid Ball,” Perry replied, giving her a pointed look. “As far as I could tell, you were number one cheerleader on the Luthor’s pep squad.”

“It shows you how good I am, if I fooled you, Lex, and Clark,” she muttered. “I shouldn’t have to keep proving myself.”

“And you shouldn’t expect those closest to you to read your mind,” he said. “If you keep us out of your loop, how are we to know what you’re doing?”

Lois looked up to the ceiling. “Both of you know I’m dating Clark! As if I would ever choose Lex over him.”

“Does he know that?” Perry asked.

“I told him to trust me!” she shouted, crossing her arms in a huff. “Fat lot of good that did me. That man wouldn’t trust me to hold his chocolate bar, and he doesn’t even eat sweets.”

Perry held up his hand. “Okay. I’m not going to touch that one. So, other than the fact that Kent’s behind is probably not ‘flea-bitten’ and he’s far from an ‘untrustworthy hack’, what do you have for me?”

“No facts as of yet, but I have a strong belief Lex was the one behind Clark’s abduction,” she said, sitting down in one of Perry’s guest chairs.

He looked her in the eye. “Does Lex know?”

They both knew what he was thinking: Superman.

“Doubtful,” Lois replied. If Lex knew Clark wasn’t from Earth, he would have used Kryptonite to try to kill Clark again in the past month.

“Did he discover Clark’s investigation?”

“I don’t think so. No one is sneakier than Clark,” she said. No one other than me, apparently.

“Why do you suspect him, then?” Perry asked.

“He asked me to marry him last night,” Lois explained.

Perry blinked his eyes and then shook off the surprise. “He did what?”

“Lex proposed marriage to me last night.”

“A-ha,” Perry nodded, pointing to her with understanding. “So, he’s the jerk.”

“No, Clark is,” Lois scoffed. Duh! Lex was a bucket of radioactive blood-sucking slime disguised as lime Jell-O, big difference.

She wondered if in the dictionary under ‘Lunkhead’ there was a secondary definition of ‘anyone originating from the planet Krypton’. Okay, she knew that wasn’t fair to all other Kryptonians to prejudge them on the behavior of one of their members, but from how Clark described his former fiancée’s treatment of him, she would stick by this belief until it was proved otherwise.

Perry threw up his hands to stop her and let him speak. “So, you’re telling me that both Lex Luthor and…” He mouthed Superman instead of speaking it, she guessed, in case Clark was in the building. “Proposed to you within a twenty-four hour period?” He whistled. “Impressive.”

She shrugged demurely. “Clark wasn’t serious.”

“You sure about that, darling?” Perry asked. He seemed to think otherwise. Then again, Perry hadn’t been in the park a half-hour before.

“Clark only proposed to give me a way out. He didn’t even listen to me when I tried to explain why I’ve been meeting with Lex. He only heard that Lex wanted to marry me, and he put his blinders on and pulled out his protective cape without even asking if I needed it,” she said. Clark’s words ran through her mind again.

I know that you love me, or that you once did before we started in on this whole ‘pretending that we aren’t involved’ ruse. If you want to get married so badly, why not choose me?

Lois bit her bottom lip to stop herself from letting herself break down again. She didn’t want to get married, she reminded herself. She was only twenty-six. She was too young to tie herself down to any man, even Superman, but still Clark’s words had hurt.

How many times did Lois have to tell Clark that she loved him before it sunk in? How often had she kissed him at work over the last month, breaking her cover and risking Lex’s spy, whoever that might be, catching them? She had thought that Clark understood that she was putting her life, her wants, and her desires on hold for him, to find out who attacked him. She had told him she was going undercover as someone who wasn’t dating him, but that she still loved him and that he needed to trust her. How much more clear did she have to get? Apparently, even telling a man to his face, what one was doing and what one wanted was too much for the Y-chromosome to handle. Did Kryptonians even have chromosomes?

Lois had trusted Clark… and he hadn’t told her about his Metropolis Star undercover operation, that he stole her Lex Luthor investigation, or that he was Superman before he proposed. How in the hell was she supposed to make an informed decision without knowing all the facts? She knew more about presidential candidates than the two men who proposed marriage to her. She had wanted so badly to believe that Clark was different, because he was different. She closed her eyes and willed herself not to cry. Maybe her mother had been right all along, and men were never to be trusted.

“Honey, Lex’s proposal is a good demonstration that you’ve earned his trust, but why do you suspect him of attacking Clark?” Perry asked.

Lois opened her eyes and cleared her throat. “Because Lex Luthor is the Voyeur.”

The Chief’s jaw dropped open, reminding her of the photo of the big-mouthed bass he had shown her from his last fishing trip.

“And if Lex was willing to break the law to spy on me, why wouldn’t he be willing to murder my best friend, so that I would turn to him, to Lex for comfort?” she said, before leaning closer to Perry and lowering her voice. “He’s been researching the Daily Planet, as well. I don’t think Carpenter’s the only reason we’ve been having financial troubles. You know Lex has his thumb over every bank in town. If he hinted that the Planet was a financial risk, why would they renew our lines of credit? He’s one of the largest employers in the city. Is LexCorp still spending advertising dollars with us? If Lex Luthor has ‘abandoned’ us, why should any other corporation think we’re a good investment?”

“Why? Why would he want to undermine the Daily Planet like that?” Perry sputtered.

“To buy us out and try to control me by knocking out my support system. I don’t know,” Lois admitted, shaking her head.

Perry crossed his arms and gazed at her skeptically. “Lois, Lex might not be the egotistical one in your relationship.”

She pinched her lips together. “Perry, I’m the best reporter this city has, and he knows that if I wanted to knock out his kneecaps, I could, but it would take hard work, determination, and the support of my paper, editor, and partner,” she answered. “And if Lex wanted to control the news in this town, why not own the newspaper with the one editor who can’t be bribed to look away or drop a story?”

“You don’t think I let the guys in the boardroom push me around either, do you?” Perry retorted.

“Of course not, Perry, but I wouldn’t put it past Lex to undermine you in the name of progress. I could easily see him making your life a living hell until you quit, therefore allowing him to appoint any yahoo to do his bidding in your position,” she explained, standing up. “I’ll stall him as best I can until you can find another buyer for the Planet, someone whom Lex can’t control and who will never sell to him.”

Perry also stood. “Stall him how?”

“By accepting his proposal,” Lois replied, heading towards the door of his office.

“Lois, no. I’m with Clark on this. Don’t do it!” Perry said, following her. “There is such a thing as going in too deep.”

Lois pulled open the door and announced loud enough for everyone else in the newsroom to hear, “I don’t care what you have to say, Perry. This was the last straw. I have my career to think about. Consider this my two-minute notice. You can send my things over to LNN.” She stomped over to her desk, picked up her nameplate and marched towards the elevators.

“Lois! Lois, get back here! You don’t have my permission to leave, Miss Smarty Pants. You’re going to regret this, I swear to you!” Perry yelled. “Lois!”

As the elevator doors shut, Lois caught sight of her red-faced editor still shaking his fist at her and she hugged her nameplate tighter to her chest.

***End of Part 140***

Part 141

You wanted them to talk, right? So, I made them talk. Comments?