This is a rewrite of Green, Green Glow of Home that's not entirely done yet because it's kind of stuck in the middle. (Although, the end has already been written! wink ) Also, several lines of dialogue have been lifted directly from the original script in an attempt to preserve authenticity.

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Oh, my God.

"Lois, honey, do you want any cookies before you head up to bed?"

No, she didn't.

"Clark has always loved his milk and cookies before bedtime," Martha said fondly. "I bake up a fresh batch for him whenever he comes home. They're double chocolate chip. Clark tells me you love chocolate, Lois."

Yes, she did. But how could anyone think about chocolate right now?

"Um, thank you, Martha, but... I've already brushed my teeth, and anyway, I'm really tired, so I should probably just go to sleep and the sugar from the chocolate might keep me awake all night, and then I wouldn't be any good tomorrow trying to get past the railroad job the so-called EPA is trying to put on us, and then Perry would be upset, especially after we came all the way out here on a hunch, and I hate it when Perry gets upset because he'll make me cover the Metropolis Dog Show, and dogs are so smelly and they drool all over you, and-" Lois stopped abruptly at the bewildered expression on Martha's face. She blushed. Why was she never able to stop talking when she was nervous?

"So I take it that would be a no, honey?"

"Yeah, I suppose it would." She dipped her head so her hair fell forward, partially obscuring her face. "I guess I'll go to bed now."

"Good night, Lois!" Martha called after her as she headed up the stairs. She could hear the back door creak open, followed by the sounds of two people walking across the kitchen. Jonathan and Clark must have come in from the barn. Clark...

She shut the door to her room - Clark's room - and leaned against it for a second. Clark Kent was Superman. Superman! The Man of Steel had a secret identity, and she knew what it was!

This was the story that would win her the Pulitzer Prize.

She settled Indian-style onto Clark's bed and rested her laptop on her knees. The blank screen stared invitingly at her, coaxing her to put the biggest scoop in the history of the *world* into words. She would win every journalism award in existence for this story. She thought briefly about Superman, aka Clark Kent. How was she going to go about this? She typed out a few sentences, hoping that seeing her thoughts on the screen would help her formulate them. It did. Within a few minutes, she was lost in another world with the story, and only the story.

It was past midnight when she finally finished - the first draft, anyway. She saved the file under a fairly innocuous name and buried it under layers of folders. Not that she was really afraid anyone would go snooping into her laptop, of course, but it never hurt to be careful. She could look over it again in the morning before sending it to Perry.

***************

Lois woke up much earlier than she had intended, thanks to the smell of frying pancakes that came drifting up from the kitchen. She lay in bed lazily for a moment. Mmm, those pancakes smelled so good! And hadn't Martha said something about fresh-baked cookies last night? Martha! Lois sat upright in bed as though she were a toy soldier that had been wound up too tightly. The events of the previous evening came flooding back... how she had gone downstairs to send a fax... how she had gotten distracted by the night sky and gone outside to look at the stars for a moment... how she had seen Clark, no, *Superman* float down from the roof of the barn, calling to his father that he'd replaced the broken shingles... how she had realized that Superman was actually her partner, Clark Kent.

She reached automatically for her laptop and pulled up the story she'd saved last night. She skimmed over it, pleased with the style and the grammar, but mostly with the story. It was an awesome story. Perry would have kittens when he read it. She could already see the bold headline he would put on it - "Superman exposed!" by Lois Lane. She wished she had some pictures of Superman doing super-stuff while dressed like Clark as physical proof.

"Lois?" Clark's knock was quiet, almost as if he were afraid of waking her. "Are you up? Breakfast is almost ready."

He couldn't come in here and see her working! "I'll be down in a second, S-Clark!" she called cheerily. Hopefully, he wouldn't pick up on her little slip.

"You'd better hurry," he teased. "You don't know how many pancakes I can eat in a second!"

Oh, I bet I do, thought Lois. She saved her changes to the story, connected quickly to a free ISP with which she had an account, and e-mailed the file to Perry along with a short note. She wanted to explain in greater detail, but she was already short on time, and she figured he would call her when he saw what she'd sent him anyway. Shutting off her computer, she ran for the bathroom.

***************

"So what do you two have on tap for this morning?" Martha asked. Lois, busy drizzling syrup over her pancakes, didn't hear her, and Clark, busy chewing, was unable to answer.

"I think we're going to go back over to the Irig farm and poke around some more, Mom," he said finally. "Unless Lois has another suggestion..." he trailed off, looking over at his partner. She didn't respond. "Lois?"

Her head snapped up. "Huh? Oh, no, Clark, that sounds like a good idea. I mean, after all, we're in Smallville and you know Smallville better than I do, and it might be better to do things the Smallville way instead of the way I'm used to doing them in Metropolis because everything's just so different here, I mean, you wouldn't see a farmer in Metropolis, not on his own farm, anyway..." she trailed off. The Kent family was staring at her. "These are really good pancakes, Martha."

"I'm glad you like them, honey," the older woman replied. She turned, ostensibly to move the butter dish into a more accessible location.

Clark shook his head slightly in response to his mother's unspoken question. No, Mom, he thought, she's not always like this. He sat back and watched Lois devour her pancakes. What was she up to? Sure, she babbled occasionally, but only when she was nervous or excited, and she never, never admitted that anything Smallville might be better than Metropolis. He sighed inwardly. The last thing he needed to worry about right now as Lois getting into trouble, especially since he didn't have his superpowers anymore. Just what was that green rock Wayne had found, and why could it hurt him so much?

A phone rang, breaking into his thoughts. Lois was out of her seat as though it had suddenly caught on fire. She raced towards her handbag and pulled her cell phone out of the front pocket. "Hello?" she said breathlessly. "Oh, Lucy, hi! I'm so glad you called!" She turned to make some sort of hand motion at Clark and his parents, then disappeared up the stairs.

"I wonder what that was all about," said Martha. Clark could only shrug his shoulders in reply.

***************

Once she was safely inside her room, Lois relaxed a little. Sure, with his superpowers, Superman would be able to overhear her conversation if he wanted, but he was too ethical to do something like that. She was almost guaranteed her privacy. "Sorry about that, Perry. Superman was in the room, and I had to get away. Did you get my story?"

"Did I get your story? Judas Priest, Lois, I can't run a story like that without evidence! I need hard facts before the Daily Planet can claim Superman and Clark Kent are the same person."

"And I can get you them for you, Chief. I just need some time in Superman's apartment. I bet anything I'll be able to find his suits, or maybe something even more convincing! I just can't do anything from Smallville, especially not while he's here."

"Now Lois..."

"Come on, Perry, do you think we'll ever get another chance to dig through his apartment?"

"Lois, I don't even know if I think we should be running this story, much less digging through his apartment. If Superman has a secret identity, do you really want to tell the whole world what it is?"

"What?" She had never expected Perry to take this angle on the story. "Chief, this is the biggest scoop anyone has ever come across! It'll only be a matter of time before somebody figures out his secret. Don't you want the story to be in the Planet first? I mean, just think about what it would do to us if anyone found out we had the story and sat on it!"

Her editor sighed. "All right, Lois. You fly back to Metropolis this afternoon, and get me some corroborating evidence, then we'll see about running the story. You can tell Kent I pulled you off the Smallville story."

"I think you better tell him, Chief. In fact, I think maybe you'd better hang up now and call back in five minutes. I don't want to give him any reasons to be suspicious."

She heard Perry sigh again, but at least he agreed to do what she'd requested. She closed her cell phone and did a little dance around the bed. Yes, yes, yes! She was so close to the Pulitzer she could taste it!

Okay, Lois, she told herself, calm down. You can't let Superman see you like this. He'd know for sure you were up to something. She took a few deep breaths. *I'm calm. I'm very calm.* She took her cell phone with her when she went downstairs. No point in leaving it upstairs if Perry was going to call.

"Hey, Lois. Everything okay?"

"Clark! Yes, yes, everything's fine. You ready to go?"

He took a step backwards as if to re-examine her. "What's going on, Lois? Did something happen? You're practically glowing!"

Glowing? Superman thought she was glowing? Was he checking her heartbeat, too? What could she say to him? Her mind blanked for one horrifying moment. "Lucy's engaged," she heard herself saying.

"What? And you're happy about it? Lois, you hated her boyfriend! You called him a lecherous, vegetative, worthless slimeball."

"Um, this is a different guy. He's really great. He treats her wonderfully."

"But she was dating the slimeball last week. You had a fight on Wednesday because she didn't want to hear your opinion about it," Clark said, confusion written all over his face. "She broke up with the first guy, and now she's already engaged to the second guy? Don't you think that's a little fast, Lois? I thought she really liked the first guy. Why did she break up with him anyway?"

"Um, well, you see, Clark..."

The sound of her cell phone ringing saved her - at least for the moment.

"Hello? Hi, Perry. What's up?" She paused, rapidly trying to think of a good story to feed Superman to explain this unexpected phone call. "What? On those murders near Hobbs Bay? That's great, Chief!"

"What are you talking about Lois?" Perry asked, but she didn't really have the time or the opportunity to answer.

"Clark, guess what!" she squealed. "Perry says someone called the Planet wanting to talk to me about those murders we were investigating a while ago."

His face blanked a little, and she figured he was trying to remember exactly what she was talking about. Not wanting to give him a chance to realize the story she was referring to was several months old, she continued, "I'm taking the next flight back to Metropolis to meet with him."

"The next flight? Lois, what about this story?"

"Perry wants to talk to you," she said, ignoring his question. "Here you go." She shoved the cell phone into his hand and went upstairs to pack. Time was of the essence here. If she could make it to Wichita by noon, she could probably be home by eight or nine, Metropolis time.

***************

Clark listened mechanically as Perry explained that Lois needed to return to Metropolis, but Clark should stay in Smallville and continue working on the Irig story. "Okay, Chief. I'll send you an update later." He turned off Lois's phone, suddenly very depressed. He had enjoyed having Lois here, and he probably could have used her help in finding out more about the green rock that had incapacitated him so badly last night. Still, he supposed there were advantages to her leaving. He grinned to himself, imagining the conversation he might have had with her to convince her the rock was important to Superman without actually telling her he was Superman. All in all, it was probably a good thing Lois had gone to bed before he staggered back into the house last night, and also a good thing she was leaving and he'd be able to investigate things further without opening himself up to any uncomfortable questions.

He went up to his bedroom to find Lois almost finished packing already. "Wow, Lois, that was fast! What'd you do - steal Superman's super speed?"

"What? Clark, don't be silly!" Lois zipped the suitcase closed and hauled it into an upright position. She carefully placed her laptop next to it. Calm, Lois. You have to be calm. You only need to stick it out for a few more minutes. "There, I'm all packed. Do you think you could take me to a car rental place so I could pick something up to take me to Wichita?" Not that you couldn't fly me there yourself, she thought, but this isn't really the time to make that request.

Clark picked up her suitcase with one hand and her laptop with the other. "No need for that. I'll be happy to drive you there."

"What? Oh, no, don't be silly!" she answered a little breathlessly, following him down the stairs. Things were happening so quickly! She would have to make sure she was careful about what she said. "You have work to do here, and I know you don't get to see your parents as often as you'd like. I can easily drive up myself. I don't want to bother you."

"It's no bother, Lois. Really, it's not."

"But what about your story? You can't leave Smallville now, not while the trail is still hot!" That argument seemed to sway him a little, so she moved in for the kill. "Who knows what they'll have time to hide if you spend the day on the road?"

Clark carefully deposited her suitcase and laptop into the trunk of the old convertible he had rented in Wichita on their way in, torn between wanting to spend as much time with her as possible and wanting to chase down the green rock and find Wayne Irig. He looked up at her as he shut the trunk. She was so determined to go by herself, not to be a bother to him. If he insisted, she just might get angry that he had pushed her decision to the side. Besides, he *did* want to get to the bottom of the rock mystery as soon as possible. "All right, Lois. Hop in, and I'll drive you to the car rental place."

***************

Martha was heading out to the corn festival when Clark came back. "It's too bad that she had to go away so soon, Clark. I liked her!"

"Me too, Mom." He took some of the packages out of her arms and put them into the backseat of her car. "Me too."

"Oh, by the way, honey, there was something on the fax this morning. I'm not expecting anything, so I figure it's whatever you wanted from Metropolis."

"Thanks, Mom," he replied. He waved goodbye as her car pulled away, then ran into the house to get the fax. It was several pages long. He tried to go over it using superspeed and found that he couldn't. At "normal" speed, it took him a few minutes to go through the whole thing, but when he was done, he had found some very useful information: Smallville was not on the list. "Now, Ms. Sherman," he said to himself, "we need to have a talk."

When he arrived at the Irig farm, he noticed there were just as many strangers swarming over it this morning as there had been last night.

"Excuse me, sir, but you can't be here." The man was armed and dressed in military fatigues. Since when did the EPA need military backup?

"I'm here to see Carol Sherman," Clark explained. "I'm with the Daily Planet."

"Ms. Sherman is busy."

"I'm sure she is. This will only take a few minutes."

The guard looked at him suspiciously, but he radioed to someone, asking for Carol Sherman to be sent out. "She'll be right out, sir."

Clark nodded his acknowledgement, then took a step backward to get a better view of the "EPA" headquarters. He surreptitiously pulled down his glasses to really get a better view of the goings-on inside the tent, but much to his frustration, he found his super-vision was working no better than his super-speed. That rock had definitely done a number on him.

"Mr. Kent? What can I do for you today?" Carol Sherman's voice interrupted his thoughts.

"Hello, Ms. Sherman," he said politely. "I got a fax from the EPA this morning, and they didn't list Smallville as one of their clean-up sites." He held the fax out for her inspection.

If he thought it would faze her, he was wrong. She smiled calmly. "That's an older list, Mr. Kent. I've got the updated one right here." She handed him a different list, and sure enough, Smallville was right at the top of this one. "It usually takes Washington about six weeks to figure out what the people in the field are up to. I can make a call if you like. I have additional paperwork as well, if you need more proof, Mr. Kent."

"I don't need to see any extra paperwork," he replied, "but I would appreciate being able to speak to Mr. Irig for a few minutes."

Sherman shook her head. "I told you, Mr. Kent," she said, her voice holding just the right note of frustration, "that Mr. Irig went on vacation as soon as we got here. Said he couldn't stand to watch us rip his farm apart."

"He didn't leave contact information in case you needed to get in touch with him?"

"No, he just packed up and left."

"Surely you would want to talk to him after you were through with your investigation."

"He'll come back eventually. After all, he does live here."

"So the EPA is willing to wait until Mr. Irig comes back 'eventually' after having been caught using illegal pesticides for several years?" Clark let a hint of mockery creep into his tone. That was Lois's influence... he was trying to make her angry...

"We really can't control what Mr. Irig chooses to do with his time." She didn't look at him as she spoke.

"You're not answering my question, Ms. Sherman."

"If you don't have anything else, Mr. Kent, these men will escort you back to your car now."

He decided to try another tactic. "Wayne Irig would never risk damaging his land by overusing pesticides."

Now she lifted her head to look at him coldly. "Good afternoon, Mr. Kent." Without waiting for his reply, she disappeared back inside the large canvas tent.

Clark sighed as he went back to his car, wishing he could get at the people really behind this business. Carol Sherman was just the front-woman, the undersecretary they trotted out to deal with outsiders. From the looks of it, she wasn't even very experienced at playing the role. A truly accomplished public relations representative would never have let herself open up even more questions that she didn't want to answer. Where was Wayne? What were these people really doing here? Were they really the EPA? Because they certainly didn't seem to act like it.

If he'd had use of his powers, he'd probably be x-raying the contents of the tent right now. As it was, he would have to turn to good old-fashioned detective work...which meant, his stomach reminded him angrily, refilling his energy reserves with some good old-fashioned lunch. He could swing by the corn festival for a bit and chat with people he had not seen in a while. He might even be able to pick up a tidbit or two for his investigation; small town people knew everything about every one of their neighbors, and if Wayne Irig really had left town - not that Clark believed for a second that he had - surely somebody in Smallville would know where he'd gone.

***************

Carol Sherman walked into the large canvas tent frustrated with herself and her job. She'd joined the EPA because she thought she could make a difference in the world. Some difference, she thought contemptuously. All she was doing was preventing the press from doing *their* job of uncovering the truth. For the twentieth time that week, she thought about requesting a transfer, Trask's threats be damned. After all, she had to go home at night and tell her daughter what Mommy did all day, and she couldn't quite bring herself to say Mommy lied for a living. Because that's what she was doing. Lying, supporting torture and illegal search and seizure - because God knew she had yet to see a warrant, or anything even resembling a warrant - not to mention uprooting farmland. Plus, she was working for a total fruit loop... or she would be if she allowed herself to use terms like "fruit loop."

"Another visit from Mr. Kent? I wonder where the lovely Ms. Lane is?" The fruit loop in question went over to the tent to peek through the small opening. "She's the more dangerous of the two. Like a pit bull, and in love with the alien to boot."

"Ms. Lane didn't come with Mr. Kent. It's possible she's busy with something else today."

"In Smallville? What's she doing, covering the ritual crop worship?"

Carol didn't feel the need to answer. She placed Kent's copy of the EPA fax into the folder with her own less-than-authentic version and filed them both away. She started to leave the tent, but at the doorway stopped and turned around. "Exactly what are we looking for here?" When Trask didn't immediately respond, she continued, "Look. If I'm involved in this, I have to know what's at stake. In order to do my job."

"Fair enough," he replied. "I have reason to believe there's a very important meteorite in Smallville."

"Meteorite? Why do you need to keep it such a secret?"

"Because if I don't, I will lose the element of surprise over Superman." His tone sent shivers up her spine.

"What's this got to do with Superman?"

Trask gestured towards a large crate sitting at the opposite edge of the tent. "This, Ms. Sherman, was retrieved from Smallville, Kansas in 1966, not far from here." At his motion, two agents unloaded the crate, revealing a small silver spacecraft bearing the same S-shaped crest that graced the superhero's costume. Carol gasped as she recognized the famous symbol.

"The meteorite probably landed here at the same time but wasn't discovered until the latest storm. It seems reasonable to assume that it comes from the same source as Superman. The planet Krypton. It's all here."

He nonchalantly opened a nearby filing cabinet and pulled out a thin file folder. "Not of Earthly origin. Periodic element 126. Emits an extremely high band radiation that doesn't seem to affect humans," he read. "However, my theory is that if a Kryptonian were exposed to a significant piece for any length of time, the result could be lethal."

The glee in his eyes when he talked about killing Superman scared her. He was just the kind of man who would take his grievances against her out on her daughter. Carol bit back a sigh as she realized that, for the time being at least, she was stuck. Maybe if Clark Kent dug a little harder, he'd find something that would set her free.