Part Seven
He took his time packing, placing each individual item carefully into the cardboard box, checking and re-checking drawers for trinkets of no importance that would not be missed. The desk seemed strangely bare, even for him, and every second he delayed, the black hand of the clock took him further into the future, further away...
That hand was his enemy, he reflected dully. It was cumbersome, ponderous - it moved so slowly. A strange contrast - for those few, fleeting, golden moments of his life, it fairly flew, but for those times when he desperately needed it to move, it refused. Stupid, idiotic, un-co-operative time. There had seemed like there was so much of it, and then it had run out.
He ran a hand through his already-rumpled black hair, sighing tiredly as he surveyed his desk. Polished mahogany gleamed everywhere - not a speck of dust touched it, no worthless knick-knack or candy wrapper defamed it. It was perfect.
It scared him, things being perfect. Perfect was always too much to ask for.
He began to seal the box, then, wincing as the ripping sound of the Scotch tape echoed through the large, empty newsroom. No Daniel-Hayes-Wannabe disturbed his peace tonight. Daniel was so much more arrogant to every other office gopher he'd met... one particular office gopher would *never* have dreamt...
He closed a desk drawer with a louder-than-required bang. He couldn't afford to wander down memory lane. The point was, nobody was interrupting him, and that was *good*, because...
He rolled his eyes to heaven as the elevator door pinged behind him. Was the world deliberately trying to kill him, or was it just a fun little pastime?
"Kenneth?"
Yep, definitely trying to kill him. He carried on, ignoring the twist of unpleasantness in the pit of his stomach, and watched as his parents' faces, enclosed by a silver frame, disappeared slowly into the dark depths of the box.
"What are you doing?" Her voice was definitely suspicious.
"Packing." He was brusque. If the woman had any small iota of sense, she would back off.
"Packing for what?"
"Packing - to go - home." The words sounded awkward even to his own ears.
"Home - as in apartment-home?" She was coming nearer now; he could feel her presence behind him. "Or as in America-home?"
"America," he said distractedly, ripping the end of the tape off at the edge of the box. He had the strangest sensation that he was somehow apart from his body - as if he were floating around the room somewhere, shocked at this stranger's brusqueness to an innocent woman.
"You're leaving?" Her voice was shocked, her gaze sweeping over the table.
He gathered the cardboard box in his arms. "Yup."
"So quickly?"
"I've been on standby at Heathrow for two days now. I just got a call. I have go."
"But... *why*?"
"Because."
"Because what?"
"I'm needed."
"But *where*?"
"At home."
"Dammit, Kenneth!" Her hand hit the desk with a definite thud.
It was the first time she had ever blown up at him. It was also the first time he had ever heard her swear. He felt a perverse sort of satisfaction in that fact.
He spun on his heel, looking at his watch with one hand. "I have to go home, to America, because somebody I care about is in danger," he snapped. "Happy?"
Her mouth dropped open.
"Oh, I'm so sorry!" Amazed, he watched her as she blushed.
"Don't be, you couldn't have known." He turned around again and started walking towards the elevator.
"But I should have. You're my friend."
Despite his hurry, he spun around again, looking at her in incredulity. "Friend?"
She moved towards him. "Friend," she reaffirmed.
The corner of his mouth quirked into a tiny, stunned smile. "Friend."
He looked at her for a long moment. Her copper hair shining over a green linen shoulder. Her bottomless eyes staring into his.
"I have to do this, Emma."
She was so small, so delicate, but she'd been a force in his life for a time - however short. She'd been a friend to him. He hated to admit it, but she had. And he was abandoning her, like some cheap, worthless piece of flotsam. Without even an explanation.
"I'm sorry I can't say more," he said quietly, "but I'm not altogether sure of the situation myself. I just know that I have to go."
"Will I ever see you again?" she asked quietly.
One hand reached out mistily and touched a single curl. Somehow, smooth skin was under his lips, and when he drew back, he could see a circle on her forehead where he had touched her with his mouth. He swallowed harshly.
"Goodbye," he said simply. And Emma Denton had her answer.
And then he was in the elevator, watching in a daze as a drop of moisture made its way down her cheek the same instant the doors closed.
A beat, and his own eyes produced an identical pearl.
And then he was out in a lobby. And then he was in a cab. And then he was at the airport, staring aimlessly around him in the departure lounge. Seconds, hours, decades later he was in the plane, a heavy monster, rattling through endless darkness. And then... andthenandthenandthen...
And then his cheek hit his arms, crossed on the convenient fold-up table, but he didn't feel it. He slept.
~&~
~*"Au secours, Superman!"
All the smoke. So, so much smoke, *everywhere*, in his eyes, in his mouth, in his *head*.
"Tabhair cabhair orm, Superman, in ainm De!"
Why had it always to be a fire? Sometimes he thought he could deal with the torturous strains his subconscious put on him at night-time, if it weren't for the repetition of endless burning buildings, night after night after night after night.
"Superman, hilfe uns, bitte!"
He knew why, though. Knew why his subconscious chose to torture him in that way. His least favourite emergency had always been a fire, and it had been the last thing he had ever helped at.
"Voithia!"
He glanced down at his chest. He was wearing a black turtleneck sweater. No Suit. In fact, he wasn't wearing the Suit at all.
"Kounisou!"
There was somebody yelling, a few different voices. Yelling out of the darkness. A group of people, obviously. Agitated. The worst kind.
"Il y a le feu a la maison! Au secours!"
He took a deep breath, filling his lungs with a gasp of fogged oxygen and dived forward into the haze, willing his eyes to pierce through the smog.
There they were. Both men and women this time, he noted with relief. Hopefully no accusing witch, then. Hopefully no guilt. Hopefully no pain.
He snorted. Yeah, right. It was a dream. More importantly, it was *his* dream. He could almost sit down and write a script for the little group to follow.
"Il y a le feu a la maison!"
"Ta an teach tri thine agus ta a lan daoine isteach! Foireann orthu!"
"Everything will be fine," he tried, desperately, "if you'll just tell me what's wrong in *English*, I can find Superman and maybe..."
"C'e un'emergenza. I vigili del fuoco hanno bisogno del tuo aiuto!"
He shook his head wildly, cursing his stupid brain. His stupid memories. His stupid life.
"Parakalo!"
"I don't understand you..." he tried desperately, at the group. "I speak English, not... not..."
"Vamos Superman! Salvalos!!"
"I...I..." He stared at them all desperately, willing *one* of them, *any* one of them, to speak a language he could understand.
"Wir brauchen deine Hilfe!!"
"Foireann orainn! Foireann orainn, in ainm De, go *tapaidh*!"
"Pourquoi vous restez plante la?!?"
"C'e gente in pericolo! Perche non aiuti?"
"Cen diabhal ata ort??"
"Waarom ben je nog niet onderweg?"
"No... stop it..." he held his hands out to the crowd, as if to shove the stubborn words aside. "I can't..."
"Cosa c'e che non va?"
"I don't know... I can't help you, I..." he tried desperately.
"Esta ahi quieto sin moverse..."
"Parece confundido. Crees que necesita ayuda?"
They were beginning to talk amongst themselves, and he wheeled around, wretchedly trying to stop the situation he could see happening in front of him.
"Een groot ongeluk in de Hoofdstraat! We hebben je hulp nodig! Snel!"
He shook his head. "I don't... can't..."
"Schiet op! Er zitten mensen vast in hun auto's en de benzinetank is waarschijnlijk lek... ze gaan dood als je niet komt, *nu*."
"I can't..."
At that moment, he heard a great creaking and buckling behind him, and swung around just in time to see a huge and majestic mansion, where there hadn't been one before, toppling to the ground slowly.
The crowd reacted as one. A great and terrible scream rose up over his head, ringing in his ears and driving him mad. He looked at the crowd, desperate.
The young wife turned to him, her face ravaged with fury.
"Ortsa an millean!! Diabhal agus daichead ort!!"
He cringed. He didn't understand her, but the venom and anguish injected behind those words spoke their own story.
"Eleos!"
He wheeled around madly, clapping his hand s over his ears in an attempt to block out her face, her eyes. The haunted look that was present in every *single* person he met, there waiting to be discovered if he just looked hard enough. The single scream reverberating through his head day after day, hour after hour, minute after minute, no matter which language it was spoken in...
//It's my fault... it's all my fault...//
He shuddered deep inside his soul and tried to fly, tried to get away...
"As me voithisi kapios!"
Tried, because suddenly he couldn't. Couldn't fly. And suddenly he felt so weak... so, so weak. He put a hand up to his face, and it came away bloody. Somewhere, a woman was crying, sobbing as if her heart was breaking. He wanted so badly to help that woman, but he couldn't for the life of him remember what her name was. He put a hand out, desperately searching for something, *anything*, that would let his brain...
"Edo pera ime!"
Suddenly he felt a piercing, penetrating pain, delving straight into the core of his being. Collapsing in a helpless heap on the ground, he moaned as the green rays of beautiful, deadly light shone through the darkness that had suddenly engulfed him.
//No more... I can't take any more...//
And then there was only blackness. Only blackness, and the sound of that woman's helpless tears, and somewhere, very dimly in the background, there was laughter...*~
~&~
Three months. She'd been safe from him for three months. "Friend" had lived up to its name - it had been absolutely perfect. Big enough so that she wouldn't stick out like a sore thumb, and yet small enough so that stories from Metropolis rarely made an impact. Who would think of looking there for Lois Luthor, bored trophy wife? Nobody would expect her to be waiting tables in a shoddy diner, wearing an itchy polyester uniform, six months pregnant with the body to show for it.
She stared despondently into her cup of coffee. Above her, the light flickered on and off, zapping a few flies in the process. Wincing, she placed a hand to her lower back and shoved inwards, grimacing at the crack. Her uniform didn't absorb sweat, so it pooled in a sticky puddle around her waistband.
She couldn't stay for much longer. Her boss had hinted as much, time and time again. She wouldn't get maternity leave, and she was starting to slow down. If she kept going at the pace she'd been going at, she'd burn out.
She sighed, rubbing a hand against her damp forehead. The prospect of packing up and riding out of town again was *not* tempting.
If only she could...
//No,// she told herself instantly. //You already thought about that, remember?//
How much of a problem was it, though? Logically, *how* dangerous would it be to go to the Kents? Surely if he hadn't found her by now, he never would.
Her heart in her mouth, she jumped up from her seat, suddenly invigorated.
That's what she'd do, then. She'd call them, maybe, or maybe she'd just *do* it, maybe she'd just pack her bags and head west again, she knew she'd be welcome, maybe... maybe...
She'd be welcome. Definitely. The Kents radiated feel-good heart-warming hospitality. They were both like some kind of brilliant force, so kind, in such direct contrast to her own parents... and her husband.
When you were a kid, you got lulled into thinking good overcame evil. All those wonderful fairy tales - the villain gets shoved in a cooker and the kids skip home to the parents who'd abandoned them in the woods.
But real life wasn't like that. In real life, the bad overshadowed the good. Every artist knew that black dominated every other colour on the palette - obliterated it, warped it, turned it into something ugly.
She swallowed. Sighed. Grabbed a wet mop and swished it around a little, trying to look as though she was working.
She had no idea what she was going to do. No idea whatsoever. She couldn't stay, she couldn't go, she couldn't ask anybody for help, she couldn't work everything out on her own...
//Jonathan is great with working out plans... all that farm routine stuff...//
She didn't know what to do about the baby... she didn't know if she needed to visit a doctor... she didn't know what she was going to do in labour...
//Martha has been through all this already...//
She ran her tongue over her dry lips, irritated.
Advice. That was what she needed. Advice, and a game plan.
In, out. Thirty minutes.
"Annie," she called, her stomach squirming, "you don't know of anybody heading west today, do you?"
Her co-worker - pah! Co-worker could only be used when the other one *worked* - looked up instantly. Lois could practically see her nostrils flare, sniffing gossip.
"Where'd you be thinking of goin', Louise?"
She ignored the alias, her heart thumping. "I have an aunt in Smallville. Bill gave me leave." Referring to her fat, balding, chauvinistic boss.
Annie was already looking away, obviously disappointed. "Tom Irig's out there, filling gas in his car, he mentioned he was goin' to visit his grandparents. Maybe he can give ya a lift."
Her breath hitched in her throat. She ripped off her apron and stuffed it in the nearest refuse bin. She was going home.
Smallville. Comfort... security... advice. No danger, no trouble. Just...
...family.
~&~
~Five Hours Later~
She was home. She was home. She was home, to all that was familiar and dear.
And that made no sense at all. No sense whatsoever. She'd never visited Smallville. Nothing was familiar about the Kent family house. Nothing at all.
But still it felt safe. And welcoming. She'd met the Kents before. Felt the aura of security around them.
The road did pirouettes around her as she jogged up the track, but she didn't slow her pace or take her gaze from the sturdy farmhouse in front of her. An assault of air hit her and she breathed in deeply, the scent of freshly mown grass and pure unadulterated country striking a chord within her.
Somebody inside was singing, her voice like leather, textured and contradictorily smooth. She thrilled at the sound of that voice, at the owner, at the knowledge that Lex didn't know this woman, this symbol of motherhood. He didn't know her, so he couldn't take her away.
"Oh Shenandoah, I long to hear you..."
She was getting closer. Her breath came in tiny excited puffs, her chest rising and falling agitatedly.
"Away you rolling river..."
Her jog became a full-on sprint.
"Oh Shenandoah, I long to hear you..."
She was nearly there... nearly...
"Away I'm bound to go..."
She reached the door, and the singer came into view, bending over her plants.
She knocked at the door.
"'Cross the wide..."
There was a long, long silence. Lois felt the blood racing in her temples. It seemed like an age before the door was opened.
She looked at her, the woman who had been so gracious, so kind, so motherly to her from the very first moment she'd met her.
"...Missouri," she sang softly, and then fell forward, into her arms, arms which opened readily to receive her.
"Martha," she managed, before giving in to the sweet silence of oblivion.
~&~
~Two weeks later~
The office was a bustling hive of activity, the centre of the city, a thousand phones ringing at once. Having been in the business for so many years, Detective Wolff was afforded the honour of a whole desk to himself, and it was here he sat, tapping a pencil off the polished wood as he stared at a photograph, deep in thought.
Wolff was a good cop. He prided himself on his skill, his tenacity, his unwillingness to let a case go. He'd been in so many situations where he needed his gut instinct - this was no exception. His eyes were trained on the photograph, but he wasn't really seeing it.
She had been beautiful, some remote part of his brain realised. He remembered seeing her photograph beside her by-line every day in the Daily Planet, remembered bumping into her dozens of times at crime scenes. She'd been extremely beautiful, and strong. A capable woman, radiating fire and passion. He'd been bowled over by her, he'd trusted her immediately, recognised himself in her a little. She was as good a journalist as he was a cop.
But this picture didn't match his impression of Lois Lane. This picture had been officially released by LNN, in an effort to find her. This picture... this picture spoke to him, somehow. It had obviously been taken at some function or other; she was dressed in diamonds, glittering like an exotic butterfly on her husband's arm, astonishing in white, a colour he'd never, ever seen her wear before; and he'd been in contact with her pretty regularly.
There were marked differences in this woman and the woman he remembered. The woman he remembered had been slender, yes, but not painfully thin like the picture depicted. The woman he remembered had radiated good health and vitality; the woman in the picture radiated insecurity and isolation. Even her smile was false, pearl teeth bared in an almost-grimace.
He shook his head, sighing. He was obviously losing his edge. Surely it didn't matter what differences there were between Lois Lane and Lois Luthor? Surely it wouldn't help him solve anything? He did *need* to solve it - needed it with surprising intensity. He'd always managed to stay detached from his cases, but this one was different. He'd known this one. He'd worked alongside this one, admired her. He owed her, somehow, owed it to her to find out what had happened. As a testament to her fierceness; he needed to find who had snuffed that passion out...
...and lock them up for the rest of their lives.
A small, polite cough startled him out of his musing, and he looked up sharply. Standing him front of him was a man, a man he vaguely recognised but couldn't place...
"Can I help you?" He frowned slightly - the guy's identity was bugging him. He knew the name, had it on the tip of his tongue...
"I... um... I was wondering if I could enquire about a case?"
A husband? A... boyfriend? A father? Surely not a father, but maybe... somebody going out of his mind with worry, obviously... poor guy... which case, which case could he be connected with...
He spread his hands. "Go ahead."
"Lois L... Luthor. I was wondering if there'd been any developments?"
Suddenly, it clicked. "Kent... Clark Kent. You were her partner?"
The man nodded slowly, a strange, almost frightened look in his eyes.
"Take a seat." Clark Kent, the man he barely knew, nodded again and pulled up a chair, still looking somewhat ill at ease. Wolff eyed him thoughtfully. It wasn't every day something dropped into his lap like this.
"Mr Kent. Usually the details of these cases are confidential..."
"I know that, but..."
He raised his voice, rode over him. "...but I know how good you two wrote together. I imagine you want her found." A fervent nod.
"Where did you last see Mrs Luthor?" Clark Kent started, as if the name didn't ring right. He ran an agitated hand through his hand.
"It must have been... sixteen months by now... I..."
Wolff quirked an eyebrow. "So long? I thought you guys were pretty good friends?"
Kent swallowed; Wolff could see his throat quivering. "Her marriage... we've been busy..."
He nodded; let it lie for a little. He knew, or thought he knew, he was on the cusp of one of those flashes of inspiration...
"Mr Kent... I'm afraid that there's been a slowdown in the case. Mr Luthor has called off the search... said he didn't want to waste valuable police time... I'm holding it open for as long as I can, but you can only do so much when the leads dry up."
Kent nodded, his eyes tangled behind his glasses.
"There is one thing you could do for me... do you recognise this?" Wolff reached under the desk, pulled out a sample of cloth, the least bloodstained one. "We think this was Mrs Luthor's..."
Again the involuntary start, and Wolff's gaze suddenly caught Clark Kent's fingers, laced tightly in his lap. So tightly that his knuckles were white. Startled, he glanced at his face, and noted the vein throbbing in his temple. He looked like a dangerous man, a man teetering on the edge of sanity.
"It's Lois's, all right." Kent's fingers were red and purple and almost pulsing with the strength of his own grip. "I know it is."
Wolff nodded carefully, watching him. "Do you know anyone who might have had a grudge against Lois Luthor?" He noted again, the little jump of alarm at her married name.
Kent stood up, and he was suddenly struck by how tall the man was.
"Try her husband," he bit out, then spun tightly and almost ran out of the office.
Wolff stared after him, his brain ticking madly. A tiny beginning.
He glanced back at the photograph. At that strange, haunted woman.
"Luthor, you *bastard*," he muttered under his breath.
~&~
To be continued...
