Reiterating what I said in my FDK folder:
I know I said I'd stick to the N-fic folder from now on, but I got a private email request from a very sweet lurker asking me to try and PG this story and continue here.
What I decided in posting this section was to edit my installment and actually slice out the section I thought was too racy for this folder. It'll be like the episode of SUPERMANN where Lois's apartment nearly gets blown up by a Nazi, and suddenly Jimmy's at the door. I hope that'll work for my readers who don't feel like delving into my nficy imagination.
If it doesn't fly, I'll go back to my resolve of staying in the nfic folder. Okay? Enjoy!
Last time
She drew in a sharp breath as the heat of his touch melted away any trepidation she may have been feeling, her eyes drooping closed from the strength of the warm pulse that shuddered through her.
And then she saw what he meant, everything about their engagement exactly as he’d told her, except of course he wasn’t wearing glasses at all. The only difference was the fact that he was clean-shaven in her recollection, but obviously he’d allowed his whiskers to grow in since then and she couldn’t help trying to remember if they tickled when he kissed her
Now...
With her new “recollection” of their engagement, Kal was just ready to breathe a sigh of relief when her speculation about his whiskers filtered into his head. In fact, he received a full-blown depiction of her musing, the two of them in a close embrace, his whiskers whispering against her chin when his mouth made contact with hers. The vision was enticing in its detail; the plump warmth of her lips, the gentle feathering of her breath against his face, the silky softness of her skin where his fingers touched her cheek.
That part, the touching, was real. His fingers were cupped against the side of her face and his thumb was stroking the arch of her cheekbone. All he had to do was lean in…
And totally destroy any chance of getting out of this debacle with his sanity intact. This unusual connection he had with her had already caused instability in parts of his mind he thought he’d kept well restrained. He didn’t need the added burden of her affection to disable his psyche any further.
Summoning his depleted reserves of willpower, he pulled his hand away from her and backed off.
Only, as he moved back, she moved up, her hands reaching to grapple his shirt collar. Her action caught him off guard and she was easily able to yank him down to her level as she plastered her lips across his.
At that moment, he detected the teeniest sensation of euphoria, the tingle of a thrill rippling down his spine, the heavy, unfamiliar warmth of happiness.
And then a split second later she squealed against his lips and pushed away. At least as far as she was able, for in the short moment she had been asserting herself, his arm had wound itself around her waist. He could only gaze down at her in wide-eyed astonishment while she leaned back in his grip, her hand covering her mouth as she directed a scowl up at him.
“Mruphid!” Her curse was muffled behind her fingertips, but he understood her well enough. And as she moved her hand to feel around the delicate skin of her lips and chin, he saw exactly what she was cursing about. Miniscule scrapes were welling up every place the coarse hair of his beard had rasped against her face.
Not very tickley at all.
She was trying to maneuver toward the mirror, so he hammered down his reluctance to release her and removed his arm, stepping away as he’d planned to do in the first place. As far as his logic was concerned, she had learned her lesson and this wouldn’t be a problem any more.
The heat of her glare bouncing off the mirror at him as she examined the damage confirmed his belief. Unfortunately, her next outlandish statement rescinded that notion.
“Kal,” she began firmly as she dabbed around her lips with a small piece of tissue, “the beard’s gotta go.”
Her impertinent demand left him completely stunned and gaping at her reflection. “What?”
“If you expect any more of the smooching,” she warned him, “you’d better get rid of that thing real quick.”
He couldn’t believe it. This little wisp of a woman telling him what to do with his face!
His hand came up to cover his chin possessively as he stroked the coarse hairs of his goatee. Ridiculous! He wasn’t shaving his beard! He hadn’t been in the habit of kissing since he was an adolescent and he wasn’t about to start now. He needed to make that clear, or better yet, tinker around with her “memories” to remind her of that “fact”...
…which would involve touching her again, dumba**! he berated himself.
But what did that matter? Touching her when he thought he needed to make an adjustment to her conditioning wasn’t causing him any problems.
<…Ha!…every time you’ve had to touch her, your libido goes into overdrive…you’re getting hooked on it…>
He jerked his head in angry confusion, wondering where that accusation came from and denying the statement at the same time.
“You don’t like kissing me?” Wanda ventured uncertainly, turning away from the mirror, her eyes wide and questioning as they lifted to confront him. He realized that she must have interpreted the gesture as a rejection of her request though, for her bossy arrogance melted into insecurity.
Oh god, she was doing that ‘hurt’ thing to him again! He could feel the level of her self-confidence plummeting and the tightening of her chest as she held herself on the verge of some strong, emotional outburst.
He wanted to assure her she was wrong; he *needed* to make her stop looking at him like that, stop her from FEELING that way, but right here, right now, he couldn’t trust himself to touch her without doing exactly what she was practically begging him to do. Mentally squaring his shoulders, he realized that he would just have to find some other way to redirect her thoughts to something less intimate; something that would take her mind off his beard, something that would make her mad at him…
“It’s--it’s not that,” he stammered, “it’s just that...you know...you haven’t brushed your teeth yet, have you?” he blurted out accusingly.
Her explosion of indignation chased him from the bathroom followed up by a loud door slam and a muffled “Kal Eldritch, you are such a jerk!”
<…Brilliance!…why don’t you just tell her she’s ugly too?…>
<…Who is that!?…> he charged.
Silence.
Great, I’m losing it over one measly kiss, he mentally grumbled.
Shoving his hands in his pockets he made his way back to the lower floor continuing out the door to sink limply onto the porch swing, wondering what the hell he was going to do now.
***
Wanda had to search him out again, which only increased her already growing ire. She spotted him from inside the door, sitting on the porch swing outside. He was leaning forward in a familiar pose; his elbows propped on his knees, his head in his hands. His fingers were back to rubbing his temples and his shoulders were stiffly set.
Observing his pensive demeanor tamped down her vexation a bit. She had no idea what had caused him to be so churlish just a few moments ago. Granted, she had been a little abrupt herself this morning, but she had just awakened from a terrifying nightmare…though she couldn’t quite remember what it had been about. And then he hadn’t moved to comfort her, though she was pretty clear from his expression that he’d known she was distressed.
That’s what had made *her* angry, now that she thought about it. She was still angry…and frustrated…that she was so clueless about him.
<…and the best way to investigate is to ask questions…>
Exactly! Like…how cold-hearted did a guy have to be to ignore his fiancée when she was obviously upset? And why had he gotten so hostile when she’d tried to be affectionate? She wanted to know how strong their relationship was, and she had hoped getting a bit forward with him this morning might clue her in. But now she was only left with wondering what about her he didn’t like.
<…honey, it’s not you…>
So? Then what about *her* had compelled him to propose? And what about *him* had compelled her to agree? She hadn’t yet had any recollection of how they’d met, so other than his physical attractiveness, she had no idea what it was she actually *liked* about him. What did they have in common?
<…it’ll come to you…>
She knew they had traveled together because he’d told her this and there was that memory of Paris to back his tale up. They were obviously dedicated to each other enough to remodel a home together and he was steadfast in his support even with her illness, which involved things like seizures, blackouts, short-term comas and memory loss. That seemed to her fairly miraculous resolve considering how he reacted to her kiss just a few moments ago.
Insulting her breath! Her ire burned hotter at the idea.
The big jerk had just sandpapered the first layer of skin off her face and had the nerve to complain about her breath…not to mention he hadn’t made a move to get rid of the beard. Hadn’t even considered it…
<…refused…>
YEAH! Refused even. No wait; he hadn’t said anything about refusing. He hadn’t said anything. Which, of course, meant he hadn’t agreed. So he obviously wasn’t going to. He just he sat there in the porch swing, as if this was just a regular morning on the pager while the little woman was supposed to sit inside at her computer typing away-
Her head began pounding instantly, and she leaned hard into the doorframe as the weight of so much recollection filled her mind. Her head dropped to her uplifted fingers and her eyes clenched shut to keep the flow of thought from escaping.
The flood of memory coursed through empty channels of her brain, illuminating scenes of her occupation, sitting at a desk, an office, surrounded by bustling people, unperturbed by distraction as her fingers flew over the keys and files piled onto her desk, the screen before her filling with print, paging upward as each line of thought revealed itself. She saw herself pouring over files, note books, photos, sorting documents, piecing evidence together into viable outcomes, impatiently waiting by a printer as her latest exposé was produced with her by-line -
“Wanda?”
<…damn, he’s doing it again…>
She felt the screen door open beside her, but she was so involved in her rush to elucidate her memories that she wasn’t prepared to avoid the contact as he reached to take her hand. The moment his skin met with hers everything she’d been visualizing slammed into a blank halt, swirling into a vortex of black emptiness. She gasped in angry disappointment as she yanked her hand from his and opened her eyes to look up at him.
“Damn you!” she sputtered, “I was almost there!” She backed against a counter, swiping her arm across her eyes when they abruptly hazed over with moisture.
“But I felt…you looked like you--you were in pain,” he stammered.
“I was remembering!” she shouted, her voice thick with emotion. “I could see what I was doing before us! I was getting a part of me back.”
He stood despondent before her, seemly uncertain of what to do next, and her teeth clenched as the frustration she’d felt only a moment ago returned with a vengeance. What was wrong with him?!? Didn’t he know how scared she was? Didn’t he care that she was collapsing inside?
Then he stepped up and held his arms outspread, his eyes, soft and warm, beckoning her…
You gonna fall for that now, Wanda? she catechized herself, especially after he left you last time?
“Are you going to stay here?” she challenged him, her voice gritty and strained. “Are you going to stay and tell me everything you know, this time?”
He dropped one hand to solemnly cross his heart before offering the embrace to her once more. She dived into the solidity of his chest, using his cottony shirt to wipe her eyes. As his arms closed around her, one against the small of her back while the other curled around her shoulders so he could cup the back of her head in his large hand, she felt encompassed by the security he offered her.
The uncertainty was fading. The suspicion was still there, but not as prevalent. Her desire for assurance outweighed her qualms enough to give him this opportunity to impart his insight on their relationship…and as right as she felt being in his arms, she couldn’t think how she’d ever begun doubting her feelings for him over something so silly as a frivolous kiss.
***
<…besides, kissing’s not that important anyway…> he telepathically added, just to make his point.
Kal sensed her slight resistance as he pressed that concept into her thought patterns, shoving the idea into place, creating precedence against any future incidents that might occur. But her resistance wavered easily, for in her apparent need to be safe, he realized she was choosing to adapt to her situation.
That was good, that was wonderful in fact. If it was her security he had to target to get her to capitulate, then he meant to tap this source for prospective implants that he might need to do later. He felt relieved to have discovered an emotional trigger that would motivate a correct response to his procedures. Especially as she was such a difficult subject thus far. Nobody else had ever, EVER needed touch ups like this.
But nobody else had ever had a continual psychic link with him either. None of his other subjects had ever affected how he felt by projecting their emotions into his head. No one else had ever required the reassurance of a hug to accept his suggestion. Of course, this method of reassuring meant touching her, and he was beginning to acknowledge the affect touching her had on him; he liked it. He liked it a lot. More than was safe. But if that was what he needed to do to continue her conditioning, than he should keep doing it, right?
That’s right, buddy…you just keep telling yourself that, he chided himself.
On that note he gently disconnected, both mentally and physically, from her, giving her room to compose herself before asking, “Shall we sit or walk?”
She elected the walk after a quick breakfast of coffee and toast. Of course, she barely nibbled the slice, and he didn’t eat anything so they were soon sharing the sunlight of a late morning stroll. And she wasn’t about to let him follow through with the lack of contact as easily as he imagined either. She took hold of his hand as they traversed length of the driveway, racking her fingers through his so he couldn’t slip away. They made their way to the main road where she paused at the mailbox, noting the sticky stencil letters still attached to the rusted side.
“Kent,” she muttered, tracing the letters with her free hand. “The box isn’t new though?”
“We’ll get you a new one later,” Kal conceded, knowing that wasn’t the point of her question. “This one belonged to the previous residents.” He had to stop a clear a tickle in his throat before continuing to “remind” her about her connections here in Smallville. “Your aunt and uncle? The ones killed in the accident.”
As he continued his illustrative account on her familial link to Smallville, his words triggered the clues he’d planted while creating a past for her. She was soon nodding in comprehension, still asking questions from time to time, but he was pleased to note that she seemed easily able to evoke the visuals and substance of everything he’d conveyed to her during the three weeks of intensive conditioning he’d spent with her in the Congo.
He needed to only begin speaking on a topic of their relationship and she would start filling in the openings he left for her. Eventually she got around to asking him how they met and he related the events of the land purchase. How, initially, he had purchased the land when the corporation he worked for built a small airport nearby. According to him, she had contacted his real estate agent a year later saying that she was a relative of the previous owners and wanted to buy the land back from him.
“So I’d have a place to begin writing?” she presumed hesitantly.
“Exactly,” he agreed. “You told my agent that you remember visiting here when you were a kid...”
“And that I thought the atmosphere would help inspire me.” she proposed with more certainty.
“Right,” he affirmed, “But I didn’t want to sell...”
“So I bugged your real estate agent into giving me your number...”
“Which I should have sued her for,” he grumbled good-naturedly.
“But then we wouldn’t have met,” she concluded with a smile that made him wish he had never decided on facial hair.
He settled for returning her smile and squeezing her hand affectionately, while still tugging her along on their walk. He guided her into talking about what she thought of the place now and what her plans might be for the future. This enabled her to access more of the general data he’d stored in her head, graduating into the area of knowledge about the town of Smallville. She was beginning to consider making a trip into town and getting to know her neighbors. His only concern came up when she began elaborating on the information she related to him. As he would bring up subjects she was supposed to have knowledge of, she would “remember” more than he’d given her, details about things he hadn’t had any recollection of.
Worried about how anxious her little *additions* were making him feel, he led her back toward the house, dropping hints that he had to check in for work soon.
“You’re a pilot,” she confidently claimed.
“See,” he praised, enforcing the implant, “everything’s coming back.”
She looked up at him uncertainly once more. “Does this mean you’re gone a lot?”
“Um, yeah,” he replied as gently as he was able. They had reached the porch again and he was holding the door to guide her inside, but he saw that veil of stubbornness slide down her face as she worked her fingers loose from his hand to plop down onto the swing. “I’ve got to make up some time in fact.”
“Because of me,” she concluded in a hostile tone.
A big shot at the rift was staring him right in the face. He just needed to capitalize on this one a little better than the last time.
“Wanda, we’ve had this talk.” At her rolling eyes, he backed off slightly. “I mean, when we talked about this last…last time you were…” He gestured vaguely in a way that was supposed to mean *last time you could remember anything* but she narrowed her eyes for him to get on with it. “Anyway, we clarified that we were aware that my schedule might not always be fixed, it could interrupt important things, that I would have to fill in for people who filled in for me while I was gone-”
“While I did what?” she interjected. “Twiddle my thumbs and wander around on an empty farm-”
“You write!” he insisted, his claim emphasized by bigger and grander gestures, “you sit at the computer and you write, last time I checked you had, like, ten stories in progress.”
That perked her interest, much to Kal’s relief. He was ready for her next request.
“Can we go look?”
Only a few moments later they were at the ornate “L” shaped desk in her office, Wanda in the chair before the monitor, coffee stationed dangerously next to the keyboard. He was propped against the portion of her desk that bent beside her office chair, watching as she booted up the CPU. The computer asked for a password to logon to her settings of course. She sighed dejectedly for a moment, then sat up straight as she began tapping the keys almost on instinct.
*LthlWpn2*
She glanced over her shoulder with a guilty grin as Kal rolled his eyes indulgently, silently checking off that little tidbit off his list of implanted data. He paid closer attention as she navigated the system satisfactorily, without incident, conceding an internally grateful acknowledgement that the money he’s invested in this system hadn’t gone to waste. He had spent a good deal of that money and time with a young lady in the programming department of LexCorp to ensure the hard drive from the CPU he located in Ms. Lane’s storage had been wiped for all personal information without losing any of the fiction she had been producing.
Of course he’d checked all these stories himself for any content that might allude to her old life, deleting the ones that were just too close to reality. The subject of most of her stories bore a striking resemblance to the personality he’d become acquainted with during the short time he’d spent rearranging her life. Often the female champion of Lois Lane’s stories found herself caught up in circumstances beyond her control. The irony had made him chuckle derisively at the time, and he took particular relish in deleting the files that contained too many details of a certain lady reporter’s actual life experiences.
The stories he elected to leave were what he considered vapid, romantic female imaginings, more of that Johanna Lindsey junk. After having sampled her decent work, he’d felt slightly mortified for her, knowing she’d written this other drivel. He’d sieved through those files as quickly as he could, mentally embracing as little content as was necessary to ensure they were “clean” of any Lois Lane context. Secured in his manly knowledge that the written content of her stories was nothing but mushy nonsense, he considered the challenge of keeping her mind on her work easily solved.
Until she was reading one of those files right in front of him.
“Well,” he began, planning to disengage from the situation. However, her salacious *hmmm* over one section of the story she was perusing stopped him in his tracks. She became completely engrossed in the play of words on the screen as she methodically scrolled down, and subsequently her mood shifted to match the content. She had her back to him and her eyes were glued entirely to the computer screen, but he detected the beginning stirrings of something more than intellectual arousal.
He tried to put a voice to his exit again, a bit more successfully this time. “I’m gonna go call in and see if there’s anything new on the agenda…”
He trailed off as he straightened away from the side of her desk, meaning to schedule a page to himself at the phone as a means of escape, but just before he slipped away she turned her chair toward his departure. At that instant he detected the palm of a very purposeful hand making contact with his rear. Spinning around with an astonished look on his face to confront her, he narrowly escaped the squeeze that followed.
She tilted her head coyly at his flabbergasted expression. “You don’t want to spellcheck for me?” she offered.
“Why the heck would I be spellchecking for you?” This query offered within a nervous chuckle.
Her brow furrowed in perplexity as she replied, “You always edit my copy.”
Her copy, Kal realized, her reporter stuff, popping up like daisies, like that office stuff she was recalling earlier, dammit why does it keep coming back?
He had to fix this; this was a big one. This was the type of thing that needed to be eradicated utterly; should have already been gone. They hadn’t met face to face until the Congo; how was she seeing him “editing her copy”? Where was she coming up with this stuff?
Regardless, that memory had to go.
Seeming to acquiesce, he motioned for her to turn back to her screen, himself stepping up to bend over shoulders like a vulture, pretending to read her screen while he unobtrusively settled his fingertips on her temples.
Sinking into the soft haze of her thoughts, he searched for the memory she had mentioned, hoping to find the vision grouped with anything else she had illuminated about being a reporter, but nothing was obviously apparent, not even the initial idea she had come up with. The most recent thing he could detect at all was the content of the file she was reading, combined with her physical response to the slight groping she’d gotten away with just a moment ago.
<…yummy…> Her voice drifted past him with a husky growl that sent a physical shiver down his spine. <…wonder if it looks as good as it feels?…>
<…Wanda…> he warned, trying to enforce a bit of decorum, <…behave yourself and help me out here…>
<…help you, what?…> She sounded like she was pouting.
<…show me where I edited your copy…> he specified a bit more impatiently.
Silence reigned a bit more while he was flashed to the kiss she’d attempted in the bathroom earlier this morning.
<…right there…> she finally answered <…you edited me right there…reminded me that you never wore glasses…>
He was very involved in contemplating her kiss before he comprehended her answer. While he knew she was correct, he realized he’d have to get more specific to get the answer he was looking for. Even more he needed to get a handle on his own wayward thoughts.
<…when you’re writing, Wanda, show me that one…>
The sensual atmosphere began to seep away, leaving a chill void behind. For a moment he was almost certain that their link had been broken.
From out of nowhere a flood of visions, things that made no sense, swirled through his mind, bombarding his mental incursion to a halt. For a moment he was startled enough that he had no reaction, he merely absorbed, observing “wide-eyed” as the myriad of scenes flashed past, scenes in which he and Wanda were the primary characters.
The content of these visions ranged from cooperative busy work in an office environment to free time in front of a TV screen, complete with a bowl of popcorn and a remote. And he was clean-shaven in all these visions and wearing the glasses she mentioned earlier. But none of these incidents had ever taken place; none of them were real.
Chalking them up to some weird anomaly in her mind that he hadn’t yet made a connection with, he began slogging through the phantasmal mess and scrubbing it out, ignoring the growing presence of her irritation as he worked.
He was well on his way to creating another blank slate in her mind when his mental facilities were suddenly broadsided by the ostentatious spectacle of his pretended fiancée in the altogether. The psychic purging he’d been involved in up to this point ground to a stop as his mind was enthralled by the image of the woman in his hands completely and wonderfully unclothed.
Kal had been all over the world. He had been exposed the raw sexuality of women on many levels since he had first shown interest in them, either of his own accord or at the urging of his peers and mentor. Observing women of risqué backgrounds and utilizing their talents was as much a part of a business trip as sleeping in a hotel room or ordering take out. But lately, he’d begun to grow jaded and disinterested, only taking to such behavior if Luthor arranged the event during one of his many corporate outings, keeping up appearances out of some masculine pride that was goaded into reaction. Otherwise, the embers of his latent urges stayed dormant and unresponsive.
Coming into contact with Lois Lane had tapped a spark, from the moment he’d realized she was a threat to him. That challenge had aroused his intellect and he’d attempted to take steps to redirect her, early in her investigation, trying to trick her into a different resolution, but she’d displayed a tenacity that bewildered and impressed him. When he came to the conclusion that she wouldn’t be swayed from her path, somewhere a section of his mind, some primitive, possessive section, had rejoiced and demanded his compliance that he take her into custody.
It was this chest-pounding portion of his brain that also tempted him toward more despicable reactions to her proximity, behaviors he’d held off thus far. He considered himself to be fairly contumacious as well, more so than she. He’d been proud of himself for pulling away from her kiss this morning, and instead settling for holding her hand during their walk without giving in to the animal attraction she was radiating. He was a man of the world; he could endure the bared presence of a woman and still keep his composure.
<…like what you see, Kal…>
****
Insert NFICY imagination here
****
As her own cognizant abilities kicked back into gear, she became aware of two things at once. First, that the pressure of her body against the keys was causing the computer to emit a high pitched tone at the entry of too much information, too quickly for the processor to compute. Second, that her fiancé was on his knees behind the broken remains of her chair, panting just as hard as she was, the back brace of the seat gripped in his hands, broken in two.
“Kal?” The most she was able to vocally express between breaths at the moment. But her thoughts were whirling with incomprehension. What had just happened? How had her chair been broken? Why did she feel like she had just come in second place at the Boston Marathon? Regardless of her questions, her frustration level hadn’t dropped any, and the annoying sound the computer was generating was deserving of some outburst.
With a growl and a shove she pushed the monitor right off the desktop, causing it to land on the floor with a less than satisfying clunk. The continual beep stopped though, not because of the broken monitor really, but because she had lifted off the keyboard during her rampant moment of destruction.
She looked back over at her companion, wondering what he would make of her violent display, only to note that he had collapsed to his back, his chest still heaving in recovery. He had relinquished the pieces of her chair to scrub his hands methodically over his face as he lay on the floor. As far as she could tell, he wasn’t even aware that she was in the room with him. The notion irritated her even more, and, using the desk to support her wobbly self, she made her way over to where he lay, dropping down onto his gut with a wrestler’s precision.
She had no idea of the damage this move might cause her, but she was lucky he’d caught on to her notion just as she made contact. He was able to disable his innate defensive density enough to keep her from being injured, but the move shocked him anyway. Women didn’t just suddenly go into Ventura mode on him without a damn good excuse.
“What the hell!?” he barked, reaching to stall her next strike.
“You tell me.” Wanda retorted, stilling in the tight grip of his hands.
They lay panting, scowling at each other for a long while, the minutes stretching painfully between them like rubber band at the edge of its maximum tolerance. Kal broke the tension by sitting up quickly and arranging them both on their feet a moment later, without too many objections from his glaring companion. He returned her glare as he started to walk away in resigned silence, confusing her enough that just as he reached the door she demanded to know where the hell he was going.
Without turning to look at her he replied, “To go shave.”
He missed the jaw dropping astonishment on her face that followed his announcement as well as the shimmer of hope that replaced her astonishment, but he didn’t need to see it.
He felt it.
Their mutual elation suffused throughout his entire being, pulsing hotter with each stair step he ascended. Surrendering his sanity to destruction, he was determined, that if he *was* going to lose his mind, he meant to revel in the wonder of this connection beforehand and to hell with the consequences.
***
TBC...
Flinging monster and covering my eyes...
TEEEEEJ
