Part 8
************
The tightly drawn blinds blocking out most of the late afternoon sun gave the normally cosy room a gloomy atmosphere. Seated on the tan covered couch were Perry, Jimmy and Jack, their eyes glued to the large T.V. The black screen flickered, and the image of a small concrete utility room came into view. The janitor, whose motion had activated the camera, collected a large broom and left. The time stamp on the screen showed 9:14am.
Despite the small surveillance camera being motion operated, they had to sit through nearly twenty minutes of tape, watching two janitors, a security guard and a wayward visitor enter and leave the tiny room over a seven hour time period. Each flicker of the tape showed a different person entering, along with a different time stamp.
Jack yawned and looked around the tastefully furnished living room. This detective work could make one awfully bored. Despite having spent last night in Perry’s apartment, he was still a bit awed by its size and expensive furnishings, not to mention the life-size portrait of Elvis Presley that hung on the main living room wall.
Focusing his attention back onto the screen, he watched as a well-dressed man entered the utility room. The unknown man turned around to lock the door, clearly showing his face as he did so.
“Lex Luthor!” The time stamp displayed 15:47.
“Yeah, but what is he doing?” Jimmy asked.
“Looks like he’s stripping.”
“What’s with the fake beard?”
“And those glasses.”
The three watched as the neatly presented Lex Luthor quickly transformed into a slightly hunched man, dressed all in brown and carrying a cane. Jack snorted, even in disguise, Lex had to wear expensive leather gloves. The stiff bowler hat looked like it came straight out of a H.G. Well’s story, while the tweed overcoat was a stark contrast to the designer suits Luthor always wore. The slightly shaggy beard that Luthor fixed on his face, followed by the tinted glasses completed the disguise.
“What the dickens?” Perry asked, amazed.
The now transformed Lex Luthor stowed his clothes in a large bag and hid it in a smudged box that used to hold an industrial vacuum cleaner. Once again, as he turned to the door, his face was clearly visible. If Jack hadn’t seen the transformation, he would never guess that this man in the bowler hat was the billionaire, Lex Luthor.
“O.K. so what does this mean?” Jimmy’s puzzled voice mirrored Jack’s own feelings. Why would the head of LexCorp dress like a street thug?”
“I don’t believe it.” Perry leaned closer to the T.V. as he spoke. “Alice told me about this guy. She and Lois have been trying to find out who he is.”
“What do you mean, ‘who he is’? It’s Luthor, Perry.” Jimmy replied.
Pointing to the frozen image on the screen, Perry said, “The guy who shot the lawyer in the warehouse, Mr Brown, he’s the main player behind the city’s crime. Alice and I thought he might be ‘The Boss’ that you and Jack found out about.”
“Are you saying that Lex Luthor is Mr Brown?” Jimmy asked, catching on.
“Lex is ‘The Boss’?” Jack reiterated.
Nodding, Perry stood up. “Boys, I think it’s time we saw Inspector Henderson.”
*************
Jack felt his body tingle with excitement as he stood with his back pressed against the back of the large elevator. Jimmy’s grin mirrored his own as they watched the numbers above the polished doors slowly climb.
It had taken Perry ten minutes of bellowing to get the officer at the front desk of the police station to get Inspector Henderson, but once Jack, Jimmy and Perry were seated in Henderson’s office, things had moved quickly.
Henderson had his own suspicions about Luthor and already had a large amount of evidence relating to ‘The Boss’. Once Perry played the car park tape showing that Luthor was ‘The Boss’ and also the man whom Alice and Lois had witnessed killing David O’Hara, Henderson had called a judge whom he knew wasn’t on Luthor’s payroll and a warrant had been quickly issued.
Convincing Henderson that the three of them should accompany the police when they arrested Luthor had been a lot more difficult to arrange, but once Perry had promised that Jack and Jimmy would wait for the officers to act before entering the penthouse, Henderson had reluctantly agreed.
A soft ‘ding’ announced their arrival at the penthouse of Lex Towers. Glancing at his watch, Jack realised it was now 6pm.
As the doors of the elevator opened, the men in blue fanned out. The sound of Luthor’s indignant “What do you think you’re doing?” rang out, and Jack and Jimmy exited the elevator and followed the sounds of Luthor angrily declaring “Don’t you know who I am? I’ll have your badges.”
A sudden crash halted the boys’ progress. Then a shot rang out. Pounding footsteps ran towards them, and before they could move, a devilish looking Luthor ran into Jimmy.
“Out of my way, imbecile!” Luthor screamed, as he pushed Jimmy away and ran down the hall, past the elevator and opened a solid oak door.
Without a second thought, Jack raced after Luthor, the sounds of he police giving chase behind him.
Jack pushed open the partially closed oak door, only to glimpse Luthor entering a green room.
The door to the green room was slammed shut, just as Jack reached it. The police had almost caught up, and without a second thought, Jack took two steps back, and with all his might, kicked the door.
It shuddered, but didn’t open.
A burly looking policeman, who had seen Jack try to kick down the door, glanced at Jack, “You okay kid?” Before turning to successfully break down the door.
By the time Jack had picked himself up from the floor several more policemen had entered the green room. Rubbing his posterior, Jack followed them.
The room was a cosy room with wood trim around the walls and a fireplace set in the far wall. Jack couldn’t see any other doors.
There was no sign of Luthor
*****************
A kaleidoscope of colours bombarded Lois’ eyes as she tried to open them. Closing them again, Lois focused her ears for any sounds. Silence. Cracking open one eye, Lois saw the concrete floor bathed in a green light.
Carefully, Lois pulled herself into a sitting position, and felt her pounding head. A large bump, caked with what she presumed was blood had risen on her left temple. Checking her foot that had twisted, she saw in the green light that it was now swollen.
“Superman!” Lois called out, as she dragged herself over to the first wine rack, the one that she had broken.
Using the rack as a support, Lois pulled herself up. She tested her damaged foot, but with a wince, realised she wouldn’t be able to walk on it without medical treatment.
Moving slowly along the wine rack to the stone wall that she had earlier used as a guide from Superman to the elevator, Lois gritted her teeth. Each time she hopped on her good leg, her brain felt like it was rattling inside her skull.
Eventually she reached the stone wall, and, turning to her left, began to follow it back to where she hoped Superman was. It was a long and slow process moving away from the cage, her headache getting worse, her stomach feeling woozy and the green light fading as darkness again enveloped her.
The cold she had felt when she had first woken up disappeared as the effort of moving warmed up her body. She only hoped that Superman was still alive.
Seeing him again had been painful. She hadn’t realised that Superman would be watching her when she saw Lex, but it made sense. Superman and Clark were as thick as thieves, and no doubt Clark had put Superman up to it.
Thinking of Clark made her feel guilty. Was it only that morning that they had shared that magical kiss? And yet, as soon as she saw Superman, all her feelings for the caped man returned. How could she love two men at the same time? What was wrong with her?
As a wave of dizziness swept over her, Lois steadied herself up against the cold wall. Taking a couple of deep breaths, she continued forward.
She had to let go of her feelings for Superman. Lois realised that. Clark was the one she wanted to be with. She had had plenty of time over the last month to finally admit that to herself, but it was disquieting to know that despite her decision to be with Clark, she still had such strong feelings for another man.
Lois halted, not certain why, and reached out. Stone wall. She was at a corner. That meant she was only a few yards away from Superman. Spurred on, she turned left, still using the wall as both a guide and a prop to help her continue moving.
Worried that she might step on Superman, Lois lowered herself to the floor, and dragged herself along. She reached her arms out in front of her, and then pulled her body along, using her good leg to help her.
Finally, her outreached arms felt something. It was a leg.
Lois pulled herself next to Superman, who was, by the feel of his position, lying on the floor. Resting her head against his chest, she let out a sigh of relief as she felt the feeble rising and falling of his chest. His body was cold, and her attempts to wake him failed. At her own physical limit, Lois curled herself around Superman, hoping her body warmth would help before again passing out.
**********
The sound of someone yelling awoke Lois. With a start she realised it was an infuriated Luthor. Something must have gone wrong. If he decided to look for the two of them, she had no way of escaping him. Nor was she in any shape to sneak back and attack him, or try to get away in the elevator.
“Where are they?” Luthor’s voice bellowed.
Lois heard the sound of glass smashing.
“Lex Luthor will not be kept in a cage!”
One last bang echoed around before the sound of the elevator as it descended met Lois’ ears.
**************************
Jimmy and Perry joined Jack in the green room, and the three began to move around as the police searched for where Luthor had escaped from.
Most of the officers had left the green room by now, and were searching the rest of the penthouse for any evidence, and the forensic team had been called in to see if they could find anything.
“I can’t believe we finally got the proof we need and that slime ball gets away.” Jack said to Perry and Jimmy.
“Yeah, well at least now everyone will know that he is a slime ball, and not that do-gooder he’s pretended to be,” Jimmy added, seating himself in one of the comfy armchairs arranged around the fireplace.
“It’s a pity we don’t have the Planet up and running yet to print this story,” Perry said as he lowered himself into another armchair.
“And what about Lois and Clark? Where are they?” Jack asked, as he began pacing in front of the fireplace.
“I don’t know, Son. I just hope Luthor’s not got hold of them,” Perry wearily replied.
Jack turned to begin pacing back when he noticed a fire poker, snapped in two. Bending to pick up the two pieces, he felt the lower part move as he seized it. Behind him he heard Perry and Jimmy gasp.
Jack looked up. Where the fireplace had been an elevator now stood, its beckoning doors open.
************
Clark could hear a voice far off in the distance, calling him.
“Wake up, Superman.”
Fighting against the fog in his brain, Clark focused on the voice.
“Superman, you’ve got to wake up. Metropolis needs you… I need you. Come on, you can beat this!”
Soft, petite hands moved over his face, drawing him out of the haze his mind was in.
“I can’t go on if anything were to happen to you, Superman. You’ve got to wake up. I know you think I just care about your superpowers, but it’s not true. It’s you. I don’t know why, but I feel this connection to you. I always have. I know we can’t have anything together, but I still need you. I still need to know you’re out there. The world needs you to inspire them to be better, to do more for each other.”
Clark tried to move his stiff body.
“Who’s going to rescue me if you’re not around?”
“Lois?” he croaked out.
“Oh, Superman!” Lois’ warm body enveloped him in a hug, and Clark finally managed to move his arms and embrace Lois.
“Lois.” Not wanting to do anything other than lie there and hold Lois, he listened as she quickly told him of her attempts to find a way out, and of Luthor’s return.
However long he had been unconscious, coupled with the warmth of Lois’ body had recharged him enough that he was able to sit up. After waiting for his head to stop spinning from moving his position, Clark realised he didn’t feel as queasy as he had before.
“Lois, I need to apologise, for the way I treated you, when I last saw you at your apartment.”
“There’s no need, Superman, if it weren’t for what you told me, I would never have found out about Luthor, and I would probably be marrying him on Saturday.”
Lois voice was sincere, and held no accusing tones. “I should be thanking you. Although it was hard to hear at the time. If anyone needs to apologise, it’s me, for not listening to Clark. I’ve been a stubborn mule when it comes to him.”
Clark could feel Lois turning her body so she was facing him, although in the dark he couldn’t see her.
“Superman, I need to tell you something. I know 30 feet underground, in the pitch black and with a deadly cage blocking our only exit, that is if we could get the elevator to return, isn’t the best place, but, well, I need to tell you.”
“Go on,” Clark said encouragingly. He had no idea what Lois would come up with next, but it was a revelation to hear her apologise, even if Lois didn’t realise she was telling Clark. That must have been what the muddled up babble at this apartment earlier had been about. A certain kiss had distracted him.
“I do care about you, nothing will change that, but I can’t have a future with you. I realise now, that you probably know that, and that’s why you’ve given me such mixed signals, one moment you seem to care, the next, you’re breaking my heart.”
“…Lois, I’m sorry about that…”
“No, let me finish.” Clark could hear Lois take a deep breath. “I also care about Clark. A lot. More than I realised. If only I hadn’t been so blind, that day in the park, I could have saved us both a lot of pain, but that’s in the past.”
A familiar voice interrupted what Clark was going to say.
“Great shades of Elvis!”
****************
Lois tried again to sit up in the ambulance, only to have a strong arm force her to lie down.
“Now Miss, none of that, we’ve got to get you off to hospital, that foot, if not broken is at least in need of a good bandaging, not to mention that crack in your head. How long did you say you were passed out for? Concussions not something to be taken lightly, you know.”
The determined ambulance officer motioned for his partner to close the ambulance doors so they could begin the journey to the hospital.
Before the doors closed, Lois watched as Perry helped Superman into Perry’s car. Superman had assured her that he would be all right, and indeed the colour had returned to his face one they had come outside and into the sunshine. Still, it was maddening to have been part of the biggest story of the year, only to be bundled up and shipped off to hospital because of a bump on her head.
As the wail of the siren started up, Lois began to feel the effects of the pain relief. Perry, Jack, Jimmy and Inspector Henderson had been the first to arrive in the wine cellar and discover her and Superman.
Superman had given a compressed version of what had happened, and the four men had agreed to keep the kryptonite cage’s affect on Superman quiet. As Inspector Henderson had said in his usual pokerfaced manner, “What effect?”
Henderson had use a group of policemen he trusted to dismantle the cage. Surprisingly, it had only taken 15 minutes to collapse the cage into five sections, with the help of an oxy-torch. Once the green metal was taken up in the elevator, it was guarded in a distant room, ready to be transported to S.T.A.R. Labs once Superman was out of the building.
Superman. His image floated before Lois, those deep brown eyes full of Love. The image shimmered and now Clark was before her. “My two true Loves”, Lois slurred.
“It’s O.K. to sleep, if you need to, Miss.” The ambulance officer said, as though from a distance. “It’s safe to sleep with a concussion, as long as you are woken at 2 hour intervals.”
With the ambulance officer’s reassurance, Lois stopped her struggle to stay awake. She was drifting into a dream where Superman’s and Clark Kent’s face’s kept morphing into each other, relieving her of the guilt she was carrying for loving two men at once.
If only dreams could come true.
****************
The smell of hotdogs wafted from the vendor across the road and mixed with the smells of petrol fumes, tar and the other comforting smells of the city. The sound of a businessman arguing with a cab driver over a fare could be heard over the general hub of noise which arose around her. The only ingredient left to make this her city was a fresh edition of the Daily Planet.
It had been two weeks since Luthor had escaped. Alice had fully recovered from her gun-shot wound and Perry had whisked her away for their second honeymoon – at Graceland.
Alice had confided in Lois, before she left how Perry had brought her a single red rose to her hospital room each day. Although they still had a lot to sort out about their marriage, Perry had not only apologised for the years of mistrust and bitterness, as had Alice, but had lifted Alice onto a pedestal, where she felt like the most beautiful, loved, needed woman in the world.
Lois sighed. She was truly glad for her friend, but deep inside herself, Lois wished she too could have someone care for her. ‘More to the point, Lane, that you could care back.’
Her nagging conscious was right. Lois could stare down the biggest terrorists, face death daily, win awards for her work, but open her heart up to love? That was scary.
As though following some silent cue, she saw Clark round the corner of the re-built Daily Planet building, and approach her at a casual pace. The sight of him in his business suit, with that glaring orange and red tie brought a smile to her face and unwittingly made her heart skip a beat. At least she knew who she wanted to open her heart up to.
Clark greeted her in his usual friendly manner. “Hi, Lois.”
Suddenly shy, Lois smiled in return. Since their toe-curling kiss in his apartment they had tip-toed around each other, neither really sure of what to do. Lois had been scared by her strong reaction, and coupled with her renewed feelings for Superman, she had been too confused to follow up. Clark, she was sure, was waiting for her. Ever the gentleman, he wouldn’t pressure her or make demands. That was one of the many things that had helped her come to her decision.
“I’ve never seen anything so beautiful in all my life.” Clark said as a crane began to position the new Daily Planet Globe.
“You never gave up. On the Planet, on your friends, on me.” Lois said.
“I couldn’t. You’ve just named almost everything in the world that’s precious to me.”
I don’t think I’ve ever, *will* ever meet anyone quite like you.”
“Clark,”
“Lois,” the two said simultaneously.
“Let me go first, please.” Lois asked.
Before Clark could reply, and before she could lose her nerve, Lois blurted out “Willyougooutwithme?”
The seconds ticked by as Clark’s mouth hung open. Maybe this wasn’t a good idea, maybe he didn’t really care, maybe if she wished hard enough, the ground would swallow her up.
“It’s okay, I understand, I mean, we’re friends, and now partners, again, and who want’s to jeopardise that, and you could have met someone, I mean it’s been 15 days since we kissed, and kisses don’t mean everything, it’s not like a commitment, it’s only a kiss, an a amazing kiss, and..”
“I’d love to, Lois.”
“…obviously you must be very experience so you’d…you what?”
Clark gently took Lois’s hand in his, and making sure he had her full attention repeated his statement. “I’d love to, Lois.”
“Oh.”
“And I’m glad you like that kiss, because it was amazing for me as well.”
Clark was smiling at her, his eyes dancing with happiness
Lois sighed, this time in contentment, and accepted Clark’s embrace. She wasn’t ready to admit to love just yet, but it was wonderful being able to take this first step in opening up her heart.
Standing under the newly placed Daily Planet globe, her old job back, her Boss and mentor re-united with his life-long love, her friend, partner and who know what more holding her, Lois smiled.
Life was as it should be.
The End.
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This was my first story, and I'm guessing from the feedback in was o.k. It didn't suck, but then it wasn't that good either. If anyone has any suggestions on how I could imporove my writing, it would be great.
Thanks,
Mouse
