PART THIRTEEN
Her heart nearly leapt into her mouth when she saw him fall sideways.
“Cla-“
In the nick of time, she managed to swallow the rest of his name and focused on reaching his side before he crashed onto the floor. Dr Klein was just behind her, and together they caught him and eased him upright on the stool. Still, he sagged forward and she had to support him while Dr Klein’s fingers moved swiftly to the pulse at his neck.
“Racing a little...but getting better,” he muttered. He began clicking his fingers near Clark’s face. “Superman, can you hear me? Superman?”
“Mmmm.” Clark’s head lolled on his chest.
“Superman?” said Lois. “Can you hear me? It’s Lois.”
And was he her Clark? He’d collapsed as if a swap had taken place, hadn’t he? It had to be him.
“Lois?” His head came up and his eyes cracked open a little. “Lois?”
“Yes, it’s me.” She studied his face, anxious for any clue – any little mannerism that she might recognise. “Clark Kent’s wife.” There, that should give him a clue, even if she wasn’t getting any in return.
A broad grin spread over his face. “Lois. My beautiful Lois.”
Yay! He was back, and all she wanted to do was fling her arms around his neck and hug him until the world stopped turning.
But... “Dr Klein’s here, Superman,” she warned. “He wants to check you over.”
Clark’s eyes opened fully. “Oh.”
Ten minutes later, Dr Klein stepped back. “Superman, I’m...well, I’m speechless. The device did exactly as we hypothesised – it homed in on your telepathic psi waves and transmitted your brain patterns across the universes. The potential is incredible. Of course, humans would have to develop telepathic powers first, but assuming we could, the possibilities-“
“Dr Klein, can we focus, for now, on making this machine safe?” asked Clark. “While swapping bodies and universes was an interesting experience, I don’t ever intend to repeat it.”
“Oh.” Dr Klein looked crestfallen. “I was going to suggest a few more tests-“
“No!” chorused Lois and Clark, causing Dr Klein to flinch under the force of their combined protest. “Sorry,” continued Lois, “but it’s a dangerous machine in the wrong hands and it needs to be neutralised. If the only way to do that is to shut it down completely, then that’s what you have to do.”
Klein frowned. “I’ll see what I can do.”
“Thank you,” she replied. “Superman, perhaps we should let Dr Klein work in peace? I’m sure there must be someone who needs you more than he does.” She felt her face split into a wide smile and had to resist a mischievous urge to wink at him.
Clark grinned. “I’m sure there is. Shall I drop you at the Planet first?”
“Home,” she corrected. “It’s way past finishing time at work. If that’s not too much trouble for you?”
“My pleasure, Ms Lane,” he replied. “My pleasure.”
**************
Home, sweet home. Clark’s mouth twisted as he lay in the dark awaiting sleep. How poorly that description fitted this house – a house he’d so eagerly chosen with Lana in another lifetime. Cameras and listening devices. A wife who’d spied on him. A life that had been a complete façade, from the day he’d first met Lana to the day he’d learned the sordid truth about her.
He’d sell up. If Lana wanted to keep her share and buy him out, she was welcome to it. In fact, he didn’t much care whether she even paid him for it. He just wanted rid of the place.
At least he didn’t have to share a bed with her tonight. Lois had told him, after he’d recovered from this latest body swap, that she’d run off to her parents – well, good riddance. He supposed he’d have to talk to her at some point, to sort out their affairs, but not tonight.
Tonight he was alone. He’d have preferred to have been with Lois, of course, but...well, he understood. Really, he did. He’d sort of felt the same as she did, in fact.
They’d been at her apartment, talking things over and revelling in the fact that they were together again – this time, hopefully, for good. There’d been a new sense of freedom; a lessening of the guilt which usually hovered at the back of his conscience whenever he was with Lois. Things, in fact, had become pretty celebratory.
“Sorry,” she’d said, suddenly breaking off one of many long, deeply sensual kisses. “I know...I know you want to, and so do I, but...”
She’d slid off his lap back down to the sofa, compelling him to let his hand slip out from underneath her sweater. The abrupt loss of warm contact with her body was almost as much a shock as a splash of cold water in his face.
His momentary frustration had nearly made him respond rather tetchily, but instead, he’d nodded. He’d known exactly what was bothering her. “You keep thinking about those cameras. I know – so do I.” He’d reached up to cup the side of her face. “But there aren’t any cameras here, sweetheart.” He’d said it as gently and as softly as he could, but her eyes still doubted; still looked fearful and uncertain.
“I know. There never were,” she agreed. “I know I’m being irrational. We don’t even have to worry any longer about you being swapped. But...I close my eyes and all I can think about is that room, and that bed, and what we did, and...and people watching us.” Her eyes turned glassy with unshed tears. “I’m sorry. I’ll be fine in a day or so, I’m sure.”
“Oh, Lois.” He’d gathered her into his arms and held her slight, fragile frame against his. “How about I check the place for you? Would that help?”
A little bit of him, in fact, had really wanted to do it, just to show that he could be just as useful as the other Clark. But that was petty, and anyway, she’d shaken her head. “I know there’s nothing here. I just...I’m just stupid, that’s all.”
He’d heard her frustration. “No, you’re not,” he’d murmured firmly. “It was a horrible thing to discover. I just wish I’d been here for you.”
Instead, he’d been enjoying himself tremendously. While she’d been discovering the cameras, he’d been learning how to fly. While she’d been going through hell, he’d been dressing up as Superman.
He’d tightened his hold around her and pressed a gentle kiss on her soft brown cap of hair.
“It must be horrible for you, too, though,” she’d replied. “Isn’t it?”
“Yeah.” He’d sighed. “But maybe I’ve been through so many shocks lately that they’re starting to bounce off me. Look, I don’t want you to do anything you’re not one hundred percent happy with. We’ll take our time, okay? No hurry.”
She’d nodded against his chest. “And maybe...maybe you should go home tonight.”
“What?” He’d been confused. “I can’t leave you when you’re like this!” he’d exclaimed.
“I’m fine.” She’d pulled away from him, sat upright and scrubbed the tears from her eyes. “Really. I just think it’ll be easier for us...for me, if you’re not here tonight.”
“Of course, if that’s what you want. But why, Lois?” He’d reached over to stroke her arm. “I don’t understand.”
“I don’t want us to start something and then have to stop because I’m obsessing about cameras...I don’t want that to happen, do you see? I don’t want to be thinking about people watching us when we’re making love, Clark.”
Those...those bastards. They’d even managed to sour the one thing he’d imagined was completely untouchable. The one thing, ironically, that had sustained him throughout this nightmare – his relationship with Lois. With difficulty, he’d kept his expression neutral and had attempted compromise. “But we don’t have to make love tonight. We... we don’t even have to share the same bed - I could sleep out here on the sofa, if you prefer.”
“Please, Clark.” Her still-moist eyes had pleaded with him. “I know it’s stupid, but just humour me, okay? I need to be alone for a while. Tomorrow...I promise you can stay over tomorrow night. If you want to.”
I need to be alone. Hearing her say that, he’d remembered something else she’d said earlier. The cameras had made her feel like she was in the middle of a porn movie, she’d confessed - like she was doing something illicit and tawdry. Perhaps she’d also been reminded that theirs was a make-believe relationship; that he was still a married man and she was ‘the other woman.’ He already knew she hated that aspect of their relationship – “I won’t be the other woman,” she’d said, just after they’d made love one night at the Planet.
Yet that was exactly what she’d become. What he’d made her into.
So he’d left, hoping that a night alone would help her regain her perspective. Knowing that Trask was definitely aware of her, he’d been tempted to sit outside on her fire escape all night, but in the end, he’d contended himself with stern instructions to call him immediately if she needed him.
“Help, Superman, I believe, is the phrase,” he’d said, a smile hovering around his lips.
She’d raised an eyebrow. “Oh, really? I think...” Her face had split into a broad grin. “I think I like it.”
“Good, because you could be hearing a lot more of it.”
“Really? You’re actually going to...?”
He’d nodded. “Yep. My mind’s made up. Um...that is, if you’re okay with it?”
She’d grabbed his shoulders and kissed him so energetically he’d nearly fallen over backwards. “Clark Kent,” she’d declared. “I love you.”
He’d grinned. “And I love you, Lois Lane.”
She’d pointed at the door. “Now go, before I change my mind.”
And so here he was, sleeping alone in a big, empty bed in a hollow, unloved house. Across the city slept Lois, his love – his real, true love. They could have been celebrating his decision; enjoying being together again. Right now, he could have been holding her in his arms, kissing her, touching her, drinking in her essence...
He groaned and turned onto his stomach. Forget it, Kent. Plenty of time for that later.
**************
Pain slammed him awake. Every muscle in his body spasmed. His stomach clenched and the acid bite of bile clawed at the back of his throat. He moaned and curled inwards, wizened and cowed by the fierce pain. Worse – a lot, lot worse - than anything he’d experienced before.
Lana. She must have come back. Dear God, had she come back to kill him?
Rough hands grabbed at him, rolled him forcibly onto his stomach and yanked his hands behind his back. His wrists were bound together before he’d even begun to realise what was happening.
Frantically, he began to struggle, fighting the kryptonite pain and the strong, rough hands. Kidnap. This was it – they’d come for him. Skywatch. He kicked out and writhed against the hands grabbing at him. Anything for survival. Anything not to be a specimen on someone’s operating table.
“Get its legs.”
He kicked harder, felt something connect followed by a sharp curse. A heavy fist slammed into the small of his back, knocking the wind out of him.
While he struggled for breath, someone grabbed his legs and bound them together. “No!” he yelled, noise his only defence now. “No! Help me! Someone help me!”
A hand grabbed painfully at his hair and yanked his head up. “Shut it!” snarled a harsh voice, then rammed his face back down into the pillow, making him cough and gasp for breath again.
His strength was fading now, the pain overwhelming all else. The hands began to manhandle him off the bed and he couldn’t even struggle against them. “No!” he cried, but his voice was weak. He was being carried, and then he was on a hard surface. Straps came around him, pinning him down.
“No!” he cried again, but only a whisper emerged.
Sounds were fading. Sensation was dissipating. Blackness dragged him down into its evil depths.
**********
“No!”
The protest was wrenched from deep within Clark’s gut, an instinctive, primordial reaction to an unseen threat. Fear pursued him as he awoke. The familiar became unfamiliar, distorted by the echoes of the nightmare he’d just escaped.
“Honey? What’s wrong?”
He blinked against the sudden harsh light of Lois’s bedside lamp. “Sorry,” he replied thickly. “Did I wake you?”
“You were thrashing around and then you shouted No!” she said, leaning over him and placing her hand on his chest. “Bad dream?”
The fear dissipated, leaving behind clearer memories of the cause. “Yeah. Someone was kidnapping me.” He grimaced at the dull throb of pain at the back of his head. A headache?
Lois frowned. “Sounds like that nightmare you said you used to get as a kid.”
“Yes, it does.” He pushed himself up to sit with his head resting against the headboard. “But that never used to give me a headache.”
Lois’s frown deepened. “A headache? You don’t get headaches. Do you think this might be connected to your exposure to that machine? Dr Klein said it wouldn’t hurt you, but maybe he was wrong. Perhaps we should call him-“
He shook his head. “No, I’m sure it’s-“ He flinched against a sudden shock of icy-coldness on his face.
“Clark? What just happened?”
“I...I’m not quite sure.” He replayed the sensation he’d just experienced. “It felt...like someone just threw a bucket of ice-cold water in my face.” He met her gaze, seeing his own concern reflected in her eyes. “What’s going on?”
“I don’t know, but I really think-“
He flinched again, the ice-cold water drenching his face once more. Hesitantly, he lifted his fingers up to wipe the moisture away, but as he already knew, his skin was dry.
Perhaps that machine had affected him somehow. He’d been closer to it than all the other times, of course. Maybe that had made a difference?
He frowned. These sensations seemed very real, and he couldn’t see why a teleportation machine should cause them.
Unless...
He felt Lois’s fingers touch his own where he was still absently prodding his face. “Sweetheart? What’s happening now?”
He looked at her. “This is going to sound crazy, but I think...I think I’m picking up some kind of echo of what the other Clark is experiencing.”
********************
Ice-cold water drenched his face, shocking him into consciousness. With difficulty, he opened his eyes, but found only a blurry grey world of indistinct shapes and sounds. He tried to focus, but his head was thick and sluggish.
Another deluge of ice-cold water made him gasp in pain. Someone spoke, but he couldn’t make out the words. His heavy head lolled on his chest; he pulled it up slowly, rediscovering as he did the constant ache of kryptonite biting deep into his muscles.
“When’s the invasion?” demanded an angry voice.
“No...no invasion.” He could barely remember any longer why he needed to say that, but he knew he’d been repeating it for a long time and that it was important.
“Liar!” The ice-cold water struck again, filling his nostrils and hurting his eyes. Some went down his throat, making him cough and struggle for breath. “We know about the body transfers. When does the rest of the invasion force arrive?”
“No force.”
A heavy fist rammed into his solar plexus, doubling him over against the restraints binding him to the chair upon which he sat. Pain gripped his middle like a grappling iron and forced him to retch. Thin, acid bile burned the back of his throat - he’d already lost last night’s dinner after previous blows.
“Enough,” barked a new voice. “Dr Wilson needs it alive for the tests.”
Tests. He’d sat tests before. Lots and lots of them, at school and at university. He was good at tests.
But these weren’t those sorts of tests.
“Won’t...submit,” he ground out, defiant of the pain and the beating and the freezing cold water. “I. Will. Not. Submit.”
Harsh laughter echoed around the concrete walls. “It thinks it has a choice. How pitiful.”
“Just get it cleaned up, okay? You can have it back when Wilson’s finished.”
“Clark...Kent. My name...Clark Kent.”
Busy, rough hands around him again, unfastening buckles, yanking him to his feet. He threw an arm out, the best effort he could make at resistance, but there was no power in his limbs. Someone caught his wrist and twisted his arm up his back. “Move!”
He sagged forward, unwilling to help them by trying to walk. A harsh expletive came from his left, and then hands were grabbing under his armpits and he was being dragged along, his feet trailing behind him.
He screwed his eyes shut and focused fiercely on the one thing they could never take away from him.
Lois, I love you.
*************
Lois saw the muscles around Clark’s neck tighten and his mouth flatten into a narrow line, and knew that it had happened again. He was getting good at suppressing his reactions, but there was no denying that he was still suffering.
There was a kind of logic to it, she supposed. He’d spent so much time in the other Clark’s body that he’d built up some sort of link. Maybe if his counterpart was under extreme duress, then the effects would be so strong that they’d cross the boundary between the universes.
And there was every possibility that the other Clark was under duress. They’d discussed the situation with Trask and Skywatch, and concluded that there was a strong chance that Trask had decided to cut his losses with his failing sleeper agent, Lana, and decided to haul his subject in for interrogation. Perhaps even worse things than interrogation.
So she was prepared to accept the theory that her husband was experiencing an echo of his counterpart’s distress. In many ways, it was preferable to the theory that the teleporter machine had somehow damaged him.
Still, this was clearly no picnic for him. She could only hope that the other Clark was rescued very soon.
“I think I should take his place.”
Clark’s words cut into her musings. Take his place? Was he crazy? She sat up straight and stared at him. He was reclined limply against the headboard, having declared sleep an impossibility for the present. His eyes were tired and there were thin lines of strain across his forehead. He looked in no shape to take anyone’s place.
“No way.” She shook her head. “No way, no how. You are staying right here, buster.”
“I could give him a break,” he insisted. “And I’m more experienced than he is at these situations.”
“Is that what you’re going to say every time you sense he’s in trouble?”
He grimaced. “Okay, good point. But I want to help.”
“You’ll help best by staying right here,” she retorted. “He needs to go through this – whatever it is – by himself.” When he didn’t respond, she added, “Look, I’ve met him and you haven’t. He’s been through the wringer, granted, so he’s not as strong as you are. I think he’s strong enough, though, and he’ll only get stronger if he fights his own battles.”
“He wouldn’t be fighting this particular battle if I hadn’t-“
“Stop right there.” She reached across and placed her hand lightly over his mouth. “Don’t even say it. This is not your fault, okay?”
A fleeting grimace of discomfort passed across his features – another echo of the other Clark’s pain? “I just wish I could help,” he muttered behind her fingers.
“Oh, Clark.” She slid back down beside him and wrapped her arms around his big frame. “I wish I could help you.”
“You do,” he murmured, his hand stroking her back. “You are.”
She kissed his chest, glad to have her husband back, even if he was still connected to the other universe in some strange way. Hopefully, though, that link would fade with time and he’d be able to live his own life in peace – a life which was quite complicated enough without adding another universe to it!
Still, she couldn’t help fretting about the other Clark. Okay, she’d said he’d be able to cope and that the experience might even make him stronger, but when she thought of his tortured eyes and the bitterness he carried around with him, she couldn’t help worrying that the opposite might also be the case – that he’d go under completely.
Keep safe, Clark. Keep strong.
***************
Some time later, he was tipped onto a hard camp bed with a rough cotton pillow. A threadbare grey blanket was tossed at him and then the door to the small cell slammed shut.
Slowly and painfully, he spread the blanket over himself as best he could and curled up under it.
He began to shiver. Cold – so bitterly, agonisingly cold. He tugged the blanket up around his ears and hunched his shoulders. Perhaps he was in shock. The place surely wasn’t this cold. The shivering turned into shaking – his teeth began to chatter and his hands shook as they gripped the edge of the blanket. Nausea churned in his stomach.
Get a grip. Get. A. Grip.
But the memory replayed and replayed in his head.
Dr Wilson had cursed as soon as Clark had been dumped on his examination table. “That brute, Trask!” Cool, doctor’s hands had turned Clark’s face to one side, his breath unnaturally loud in Clark’s ears as he studied his subject. He’d probed Clark’s abdomen and chest, eliciting sharp winces almost everywhere he’d touched.
Sticky electrodes had been attached to his chest and forehead. Switches had been flicked and somewhere a machine had begun to hum. The cool hands had then continued their traverse of his body, running down his arms and legs, spreading his fingers and toes, testing his joints. He’d decided almost immediately that if those hands went anywhere near his genitals, he’d summon every ounce of strength left in his body to break free of his bindings.
But his vow had gone untested. “I can’t conduct meaningful tests on this,” pronounced Wilson, straightening up and addressing an unseen underling. “Bad enough that I have to examine him while he’s being exposed to the Smallville B - that’ll skew the results in all kinds of unpredictable ways. But with these injuries – well, I may as well examine a corpse! Take him away. And tell that idiot Trask to stop wasting my time. If he wants me to gather information that might actually be of any use to him, then tell him to bring me a healthy specimen. Not one that’s been half-beaten to death.”
Half-beaten to death. To Clark, lying on the narrow camp bed, it felt like a full beating. His torso was alive with flaming pain. It hurt to breathe. One side of his face throbbed in time with his pulse. His right knee was sending stabbing pains all the way up his thigh.
Beaten, but not shaken. Yeah, okay, so he was shaking, but he was not going to lose the battle of wits. To the bitter end, he would be Clark Kent, son of Martha and Jonathan Kent. Until his last dying gasp, he would be the man who loved Lois Lane more than anyone else alive.
As for Superman – well, he wasn’t exactly super now, was he? Superman wouldn’t have let himself get kidnapped like this.
But still. He grunted and pressed his lips together defiantly. He’d show them. He would become Superman. Somehow, he’d get out of this mess and start fixing things. Because this mess was exactly why Superman was needed in this world. To stop groups like this. To fight for justice. To protect the vulnerable. If he ever got out of this mess, Superman would be right up at the top of his list of things to do.
Well, next to marrying Lois, anyway.
“Clark?”
She was whispering his name. How sweet her voice sounded.
“Oh, God, Clark. What have they done to you?”
“I’m...I’m okay, honey. Don’t worry about me.”
“Shhh.” Her hand stroked his hair. “I’m going to get you out of here, but you have to be quiet. Can you open your eyes?”
Nice dream, he thought. Lois to the rescue. A tad implausible, of course, but that was allowed when you were dreaming.
“Open your eyes, sweetheart.”
He blinked them open. She looked funny. Streaks of green and black covered her face and an army-style cap hid her hair. Why had he dreamt her wearing camouflage paint and an army uniform? “I’d prefer you in a dress,” he murmured, “but this is okay, I guess.”
“Don’t talk,” she whispered. “Just try to sit up.”
Difficult. Very difficult, and very painful. But he did it. The room swung around a bit but she was still there in the middle somewhere. “This isn’t a dream, is it?” he whispered. Because dreams didn’t hurt as much as this.
She chuckled softly. “No, it’s very real.” She held up some sort of jacket. “Here, put this on.”
Next came pants and a cap. Army fatigues, he realised, just like she was wearing.
“Congratulations,” she whispered. “You’re now a general in the Skywatch unit. You probably outrank everyone here, so if we bump into anyone, you expect them to salute you, okay?”
He nodded.
“You’re also a bit tipsy, so I’m helping you back to your quarters.”
He nodded again. “I couldn’t be falling-over drunk instead? ‘Cause I think I’d play that part better.”
She chuckled. “Shut up and try standing.”
Which he did, but his legs wobbled alarmingly and he was soon sitting down again. “See?” he said woozily. “Told you I’d be better at drunk.”
“Drunk doesn’t get us out of here. Come on, try again.”
His second attempt was more successful, and with Lois’s arm locked firmly around his waist, they exited his cell.
The ensuing journey down endless corridors and staircases soon became a nightmarish ordeal for Clark, conducted through a haze of pain and the barest minimum of consciousness. If they met anyone or not, he really couldn’t have said. His task was to put one foot in front of the other and to not fall over. Lois had to do the rest – whatever that entailed.
Eventually, the terrain under his feet changed to tarmac and he realised they were outside. There was the thrum of an idling engine nearby. A door was opened and he was bundled inside. Hands helped him – female hands.
“Thanks, Lois,” he mumbled.
“Oh, God, Clark!” she exclaimed. “You look terrible!”
He frowned. Hadn’t they already had this conversation? He was hazy on detail, sure, but he could have sworn-
“Just drive, Lana,” urged Lois’s voice from somewhere behind him. “Now!”
Lana?
He lifted his head in alarm. Was this a trap?
“It’s okay, Clark.” Lois was right behind him, her hand on his shoulder. “She’s helping us.”
*************
