Silent for a moment, Lois thought about what Clark said. "No, Clark. You're right. You're not normal."
He looked crestfallen. Lois pulled her chair close up to his and looked deeply into his eyes. "Not normal at all. Never will be. Thank God. You know, a 'normal' guy would have been outta here, long ago." He tried to turn away from her, and found her soft hand touching his in appeal. The contact sent a jolt through his system. He looked back to her. "Let's set aside the fact that you've trashed your entire personal life to save the lives of anonymous strangers. Let's just talk about you - Clark Kent - and how not normal you are. I've put you through the mill over the last few stories. I've prodded at you, poked at you, stuck my nose where it obviously didn't belong. Yet you stuck by me. You put up with me. You meet me halfway and more. No normal guy that I've ever been with has done that."
He sighed and shook his head. "You know that's not what I'm talking about, Lois." Pulling his hand away, he sat back in his chair, physically separating himself from her.
"No, actually, I don't know what you're talking about, Clark." Anger began to edge into her voice. "I don't know what you think you are, Clark. You don't share. But I'm willing to listen if you want to talk."
It had been so long since he had someone to talk to. Really talk to. Clark nodded.
"I might just take you up on that. I hope you don't regret the invitation, Lois."
"I'm sure I won't." Surprised that he had given in so easily, Lois pressed her advantage. In her best reporter's voice, she began to interview him. "So, give. Who are you? Who do you think you are? Tell me, help me understand."
Sighing, Clark decided to tell her everything. But the most important fact came out first. "I *am* Clark Kent. My parents found me in a field in Kansas. They saw what they thought was a shooting star. It was a ship. It was my spaceship. They pulled me - and a few other items they found - out of that ship and took us home. My dad went back that night and took everything else he could find and buried it all on the farm, trying to hide the evidence of my strange arrival. A whisper on the wind that my mother's cousin had an unwanted child, a few dollars to the right person here and there in records offices, and I became Clark Kent."
Clark stood and walked to the window of the conference room, opening the blinds and looking out onto the mostly-dark bullpen floor.
"My childhood was blessedly normal, except that I didn't get sick much, and I hardly ever got hurt. When I was ten, I started getting headaches. My parents thought my eyes were bad. When my dad asked me to read some writing on a calendar on the kitchen wall, I concentrated on it. I guess I concentrated too hard, and I saw through the wall. Heat vision came next. My parents told me to wear the glasses to remind me to be careful. You see, my father was always terrified that someone would find out. They would find out, and they would take me away. So we were quiet and we were careful."
Lost in memories and telling his story, Clark didn't see Lois's expression. A childhood alone, so different from her own, yet alike in the most basic of ways. She could hear the loneliness and sorrow that echoed in her teenager's soul. But she said nothing - she didn't even move - as she wanted him to continue his story.
"When I was fifteen, my parents gave me my heritage. They told me how they had found me - how they had always thought of me as a gift from God since they couldn't have children themselves. They gave me a blanket I had been wrapped in when they found me. They gave me a globe - I think you saw it on my shelf? Hiding in plain sight? - that globe, when I touched it, lit up and told me my history."
Clark had turned to Lois, to see if she was really listening to what he was saying. Then he made the clearest and most damning statement he could.
"I'm an alien, Lois. The only survivor of a dead planet. My birth parents sent me to Earth, to a place where they though I might be able to thrive. The yellow sun gives me the powers that let me play the part of the Guardian. It makes me almost invulnerable. Almost, but not quite."
Sitting back in his chair, he distanced himself from the pity he saw in her eyes. Pity because he was so 'different', he was sure. Time to finish it. Time to move on. He looked back out the conference room windows from his chair, unable to watch as she distanced herself from him.
"You look surprised. No one knows what hurts me. But there is one thing. The last thing my parents gave me was a rock they had found near my space ship. It glows a sickly green. My theory is that it's part of Krypton, my home planet - so I call it Kryptonite. When I first held that rock, it almost killed me. It ends up that rock is the one thing on this Earth I've found that can hurt me, physically. And as lead shields my x-ray vision, it also shields the presence and effects of Kryptonite."
"And that's it. That's me. I've given you every tool, every piece of information about me that is important. I've given you every secret I have, and do you know why?" Unable to look in her eyes, Clark waited for her rejection. Waited for the moment when he could say he was leaving, putting this behind him. She wouldn't want him around now, anyway.
Lois knew Clark was expecting her to shy away from him, to put a distance between them after he had opened himself to her. She figured it was yet another way he hoped to protect himself. But she was a lot more stubborn than he was, and she knew what she wanted. Him.
"Because you trust me? Because there's something here, between us?"
Clark was dumbfounded. He expected her to pull away, as the Lois Lane he had heard about would do. Looking back to her, he was surprised to see how close her face was to his. He couldn't help pulling back as she leaned even closer, her eyes narrow.
"Get this through your thick Kryptonian skull. I'm here. I'm not going anywhere. Now," having issued her ultimatum, Lois leaned back in her chair and forced her body to relax. "Shall we get to work on this story? Or are you going to fly away, like you've always done before?"
Watching as Lois gathered some piles of information in front of her, Clark was silent. It was his choice: move on, or stay. He didn't notice that Lois was actually undoing hours of work, mixing different piles.
Lois needed to do something, to let him make his decision for himself. If he stayed, he could re-organize in seconds. If he left, she didn't think she'd be able to work on this story anymore anyway. Realizing that he could do just that - leave - made her blood go cold. It was the first time she acknowledged just how much she cared about him.
When had attraction, caring, friendship turned to such a love? She wanted to take back her last question. She wanted to beg him to stay. But it had to be his decision.
As he watched her methodically (or so it seemed) turn her mind back to work, it struck him. He was a coward. He had been running for years, depending on his strength and speed, and risking nothing.
Maybe it was time for that to change. Hadn't he taken a step in that direction by moving to Metropolis? Maybe it was time to grow up a little, stop wallowing in self-pity. Stop being… what had Lois called him?... Eeyore. Nodding, he stood. He walked to the computer where Lois had been working, sat, and began paging through the files - this time at a speed natural for him. He was quickly engrossed, and didn't notice Lois as she looked up at him and smiled.
*****
They worked through the next day, but were unable to get anything else from the computer that they could use in the story. Lois and Clark worked on putting the story of the terrorist conglomeration together, and Jimmy got the best stills he could from Clark's digital copy of the meeting.
Though Clark held up his half of the work, he still had his other job to do. Lois watched the monitors each time he left, and noted the Guardian showed up somewhere each and every time. It amazed her that she hadn't put it together before - that no one had. Then again, maybe the walls he built around himself had protected his identity, too.
So it was that the story was finished and headed for the front page of the midnight edition, and Lois was ready to go home at a decent hour that afternoon. Her jaw caught in a huge yawn - she was more than ready to get some badly needed sleep. Looking around for Clark, she remembered that he had gone out again, but she hadn't seen anything on the monitors this time. Shaking her head to clear some of the fatigue, she looked over the monitors again.
There he was, battling a huge fire, a cold look of calm on his face. She turned up the volume on that particular monitor to hear the reporter lamenting that the Guardian had been unable to find all of the residents that had been reported missing. He was still working with fire crews to terminate the blaze, but hope for the missing was completely gone.
Lois shook her head. How could he live with this burden, day in and day out, and have no one to share it with? She went back to the conference room where they had been working. She shut down the laptop and gathered his notes, adding them to her already heavy bag.
He wasn't going home to an empty apartment tonight.
*****
Lois was waiting for him on his couch when he got back from the failed rescue attempt. His complete discouragement showed clearly on his face.
"I'm so sorry, Clark. I can't imagine what it does to you. But you have to know that you did everything you could. Everything. This is not your fault." She had walked to him, taken his face in her hands, and forced him to look in her eyes.
"But I was too late. God, Lois. There was a little boy. When I got to him, he was struggling to breathe. As I flew him to the medics, he stopped struggling. He shouldn't have died." Shaking his head, he closed his eyes as the anger rose in him.
"Why do things like this have to happen? I just can't understand! Innocent. He was innocent! And now, he's dead!" Clark turned from Lois, afraid that in his anger he might hurt her. He went again to the window and looked to the sky from which he had fallen. The sky he could fly to, but never escape in.
He felt her hands on his back. Rubbing, soothing. It had been so long since someone comforted him. So long. No one had ever been there to share the burden of being the Guardian. Who in his right mind would volunteer to take up this load?
Lois would.
He turned to her, taking her in his arms. He held on to her as though he wouldn't let go, listening to the sounds of the night and feeling her hands, running up and down his back.
After a bit, he pulled away and went to sit on the couch. She sat next to him, and he held her hand as he began to tell her of the failed rescue attempt. And of another that had happened months ago. And of another.
"Clark, don't you see? You can count the number of times you fail, or the number of times you succeed. How many stories have you gotten to the second after they could have made a difference? You have to focus on what's important." She hooked her finger under his chin, gently forcing him to look at her. "Why do you think people call you a hero? It's not simply because you have these abilities. It's not even that you save millions of people every year. It's that you have the compassion to go out there every minute of every day and do your best - which, I might add, is better than most of the natural citizens of this planet, combined! Oh, Clark. You've given so many people second chances. Don't you think it's time you gave yourself one?"
He pulled away from her then, standing.
"I know your parents were killed, and you think you should have saved them. I know it forced you into isolation for years." She stood then, trying to figure out how to approach him. "That comment you made the other night - about Jimmy and I being the closest friends you've had in so long you can't remember. Clark, if anyone in the world is built for friendship, it's you! But you've been holding yourself from everyone. Depriving all of us and punishing yourself. It's time to let it go. Your parents wouldn't want this for you, not if they loved you as you say they did." He looked at her then, noticing how she stood next to him, her eyes pleading with his to listen to what she was saying.
"It's not as easy as that, you know," he denied, shaking his head.
"No," Lois slowly replied. "I don't suppose it is. But nothing worthwhile is quick, nothing worthwhile is easy." She paused, then smiled. "Except chocolate. I brought you some, you know. Double fudge crunch bars, my particular favorite, though there are those who say Hearsey's are better. Anyway, I figured you could use it tonight."
Clark smiled and laughed sadly. She knew just when to turn the course - just how to pull him from the edge. He pulled her into a hug, whispering into her hair, "Thank you. Thank you for being here. Thank you for listening."
"That's what friends are for, Clark," she whispered back, glad he was finally opening up to her.
He held on to her for a while, just absorbing the peace that she radiated. He had missed the basic camaraderie his parents had offered him. Besides being his parents, they had been his sounding board and the only people with whom he could share all of himself. He had made other friends in the past, but none of them had filled so many of the roles - until Lois. And, with every new feeling that he shared with her he offered one more prayer of thanks that he had found her. That they had found each other.
The moments of silence passed between them, Clark began to pull away, a tentative smile on his face, when he heard a brisk knock on his door.
Distracted, Clark spun quickly out of his Guardian outfit and walked toward the door to his apartment. He wasn't expecting anyone, especially given the hour, but he was suprpised to see a well-dressed (if somewhat antiquated) gentleman. Cautiously, he opened the door.
"Mr. Kent?"
"Yes?"
"I have some pressing information to share with you. May I come in?"
<I've had stranger sources…> Clark thought as he eyed the gentleman. He didn't look crazy, and a brief scan didn't reveal any lead, so Clark figured there wouldn't be any harm in letting the man in. Whatever he wanted, it must have been important to approach a reporter's door so late in the evening.
Closing the door, Clark noticed that Lois had made herself scarce. Probably she didn't want to scare off a source. Clark gestured to the couch.
"I'm sorry if my hospitality seems kind of shabby, but it is pretty late, Mr…?" Clark paused, waiting for the stranger to supply a name.
<I hate this part…> Herbert George Wells thought to himself. <It always takes forever for them to believe me.>
"My name is Wells, Herbert George Wells."
"H. G. Wells. Like the author." Clark's voice dripped with disbelief.
"Look. I know you don't believe me. How about this. You are the Guardian. At least, in this world, that's what you call yourself. Sometimes you go by the name Superman."
"Sometimes?"
"Yes. I am a time traveler. Time runs in many directions, and dimensions. In other dimensions, you go by different names. In most dimensions, you're a hero of the people. Both as Superman, and as Clark Kent: half of the reporting team of Lane and Kent - the voices for truth and justice." As he said this, he looked toward the bedroom. Clark raised his eyebrows, then realized that this strange little man knew, somehow, that Lois was in the other room.
"Lois, you might as well come out."
"Yes, of course she should. We need her sharp wit to combat the enemy."
"Which enemy is this, Mr… what did you say your name was? Oh, yeah, that's right. Wells. H. G. Wells." Lois came back to the living room and eyed the time-traveler with obvious mistrust. He did, however, know things he shouldn't… so perhaps it was best to humor him.
"Once again, I need help tracking down a common foe of ours, Tempus."
"Tempus?" Clark looked to Lois, and she shook her head. "We don't know a Tempus. But… What does he look like?" Tempus, Chronos… it could be. Clark stopped himself. There was a small, crazy man in his living room. A small crazy man who believed he was a long-dead author, but somehow knew that Clark was the Guardian.
Clark noticed a small apparatus in the stranger's hand. It produced a… hologram, for lack of better words… of the man from the videotape. Lois's eyes widened in shock at the device itself and the picture it showed.
"Ahh, I see your looks of recognition. This is Tempus. A criminal from the future. He's here to change the past, wreaking as much destruction as he can in the mean time."
"What do you have to do with it?" Lois asked, suspicious. "Why is it up to you to catch this guy?"
"Ah, well, you see…" Mr. Wells stammered sheepishly "he's using my time machine to get around."
Sighing, Clark folded his arms on his chest. In for a penny, in for a pound. There was no way - with current Earth technology - someone could make a hologram like the one Wells had just shown him. Clark decided to trust his instincts and listen to the little man. "What would you like from us?"
Wells sighed. They believed him.
"Tempus is doing something to alter the fabric of time. I told you that there are some naturally occurring dimensions - they aren't carbon copies of each other, but they are, in essence, extremely similar. My instruments show me that something is causing an extraordinary number of dimensions to occur, and I've reason to believe that something is Tempus. I've tracked Tempus to this particular dimension, but I can't pinpoint his whereabouts. I'm hoping he will challenge the two of you, as he always seems to do…" Noticing the look of utter confusion on Clark's face, and the look of impatience on Lois's, Wells paused. "Oh, dear… how to explain…" Wells turned and walked to a window. Sighing, he turned back and began to speak.
"Let's start at the beginning. Once upon a time, there was planet named Krypton. Krypton was a regular little planet populated with hominids, but it had the misfortune of having a very short lifespan - as planets go. It suffered an untimely, cataclysmic destruction.
"Two people on the doomed planet Krypton foretold this destruction and sent their son, Kal El, away to survive the destruction on a planet called Earth. A childless couple, Martha and Jonathan Kent, adopted Kal El and raised him as their son, Clark. They raised him to believe in truth, justice, and tolerance. Clark had special abilities that no other human had. And, though he could see through objects, hear the tiniest of sounds, fly - he could do any manner of marvelous things - his biggest strength was his compassion. His humanity. He - and his wife Lois Lane and their descendants - set a new standard for human behavior. Their very existence changed people - bringing about Utopia." Lois smiled when he heard the phrase 'wife Lois Lane', and was surprised to feel Clark's hand, which had unconsciously grabbed hers at the beginning of Wells's speech, squeeze her hand lightly at the same phrase.
"Utopia is the ultimate future." Wells sat across from Lois and Clark, trying to emphasize his point. "There is minimal oppression, war, famine... People - whether native to earth or not - are all treated equally. It's truly a magnificent place. To most people.
"But there are exceptions. People who are born discontented. Tempus is one of those. Tempus hated Utopia. I, quite foolishly, took Tempus on a tour of the past, showing him how barbaric it was. I thought it would convince him that Utopia was the best place to be. Unfortunately, he didn't agree. He looked upon it as time travel lessons, took my time machine, and went back to random points in history, trying to change the past, thereby changing the future.
"Since then, I've been chasing him, correcting his changes, foiling his nefarious schemes. When the existence of alternate dimensions was proved, he found a way to them, corrupting as many time lines as he could find. I've always been one step behind him, but, generally, with the serious help of many of your counterparts, I've been able to stop him.
"According to my instrument readings, something he has been doing is causing an immense number of splits in the timeline. I've consulted with some leading scientists, and no one's sure whether it's to do with Schrödinger's hypothesis or a strange manifestation of Krauthemmer's law. At any rate, Tempus has caused an inordinate number of parallel universes - such as this one - to come about. Due to his meddling, many of these universes do not have enough… matter, for a lack of a better term, to continue existence. Even the valid dimensions are feeling the effects of this disaster. His tampering is killing the future – everyone’s future. I need your help to stop him."
"You want us to work with you to stop a crazy man - ignoring a plot that could potentially harm the entire world as we know it - and that very action may destroy the universe we currently live in?" Clark asked with disbelief.
"Well, when you put it that way… it does sound rather illogical. But I assure you, there’s nothing more you can do here. This dimension is one of those that is dying even as we speak."
"Dying?" Clark turned his head to Lois, both of them wondering what this time traveler could mean.
"Yes, dying. If you follow this universe in the continuum, it abruptly vanishes in a few thousand years."
"And what is it you want us to do?" Clark asked with a sigh. He didn't know if he believed this guy, but if what he was asking was in line with what they were already investigating, it wouldn't hurt to agree.
"Help me find Tempus. You are the best investigative reporters around, and I know from previous experience that I can trust you. From the sound of things, you've dealt slightly with Tempus already. I need to find him and hand him over to the temporal authorities."
Clark nodded. "Well, we don't know him as Tempus. We know of him - and it's under the name of Chronos. It turns out that our current investigation is the one that Chronos is involved in. So, looks like we'll be helping you, Mr. Wells." Sighing, Clark looked warily at Lois, "whether we think it's a good idea or not."
*****
The headline of the Planet once again put the reporting world on its ear. The networks scrambled to get copies of the now infamous tape while the board of the Planet grinned victoriously behind their shocked and concerned veneers. It was a national security concern, of course, and though some insinuated the publication of the pictures would hasten action on the part of the terrorists, most news outlets were simply jealous that the Planet had gotten there first.
And, though that headline was accompanied by a Lane/Kent story, the pair of reporters were not resting on their laurels.
"This makes no sense!" Clark mumbled, frustrated. "Files full of numbers. Are they code? I can't find a key, or even make any sort of sense out of them. Maybe Jimmy…"
"Jimmy's a hacker, Clark, not a math whiz. Besides, we have him helping me to look for every possible connection to Tempus, Chronos, and John Doe so we can get the guy Wells is looking for." Lois shook her head and sat back. "Doesn't it strike you as wrong that Wells shows up asking for our help, dumps an impossible task in our laps, places a dire cloud of doom over our lives, then disappears, vaguely mentioning 'instrument readings' or some other trash?"
Relaxing in his chair, Clark looked over to Lois.
"Yeah, seems kind of unfair to me. Maybe even fishy. It's not that I think he's lying, but I kind of think Wells left some things out."
Lois nodded, then sighed. "But he did give us a lead on this Chronos guy. Seems like a nutcase if I ever saw one. You know, though," Lois turned, thinking aloud, "Wells says Chronos is doing something to cause the universes - all of them - to end. And when we find him, we have to try to figure out what he's doing and stop him. But everything Wells told us about Chronos leads me to think the guy is a creature of comfort - his own. If he destroys all the timelines, he destroys his own life. And he doesn't seem like the suicidal type."
"Wells said this guy has been going between dimensions, wreaking havoc." Clark paused, trying to figure out how to say what he was thinking. Lois eyed him curiously, allowing him to finish his idea. "You know, when I've read about time travel stuff, it's always had these warnings. Say you travel back in time and make it so your grandparents never meet. That means you can never be born. But then, you'll never travel back in time, so your grandparents will meet. Seems to me, if Chronos destroys everything, then he can never exist…"
"So everything will go back to 'normal'." Lois finished, nodding. "But time travel theory is all just that: theory. Not like anyone we know… or many people we know… have actually done it."
"And meanwhile, we know a criminal from the future - who has access to Lord knows what kind of technology - is working with a group of known terrorists. And I can't make heads or tails of the files from the only connection we have to the group…" Raking a hand through his hair, Clark vented his frustration.
"Let me take a look at the files, Clark. I'm getting nowhere with my work here." Clark sent a copy of one of the files to Lois, and she looked at it briefly before squinting her eyes in thought. "I wonder…" she murmured.
The look of possibility on Lois's face got Clark's attention. Rising slowly from his chair, he walked around the table to watch what Lois was doing.
"I always wondered if kissing up to my father would pay off. Back when I was a teenager, still trying to please the old man, I used to spend my summers working in his lab. I mean, it was either that, or listen to my mother criticize how I didn't date the right kind of boys or how I would never get a husband because I was too ambitious or whatever. So, I went in to the lab with him every day. He used to have me take the results of his experiments - files of numbers - and type them into graphing programs." She typed as she spoke, then shook her head. "Drat. I didn't keep any of those old graphics programs after all. I could call my father…"
Clark interrupted. "I have a contact at Star Labs - a friend who helps me out once in a while when it comes to Guardian stuff. I could put a call in to him… I'm sure that he'd help us figure out these files - maybe even have some input on time travel, as well."
Lois nodded. "Ok, give him a call, and let's go!"
