Lex smiled. He brandished a handgun. To Perry, it looked like a Metropolis Police Department issue weapon. Lex caressed its barrel and said, "Let's just say that I managed to get bail."
Richard so far had said nothing. Perry shot a glance at him and noticed the other man breathing heavily. Richard had lowered his hands from the gun safe key, and had moved slightly away from the safe. He stood near the end table with the Remington sculpture on it. His face wore a mask of disbelief and shock.
Perry's heart slowed down a bit. Apparently Lex didn't mean to kill them right away.
"Why are you here, Lex?" Lois asked, still in that flat voice.
"Three reasons, Lois," Lex said, still with an air of false jollity. "You made me use up my contingency plan. You're the next contingency." He began to pace, a deliberate stride up and down the den that never impeded the field of fire of his silently waiting henchmen. "Two. You and your partner had the chutzpah to put me in jail. I owe you for that."
"I would have been fine if it weren't for you meddling kids," Richard muttered, and actually giggled. Perry figured the shock was getting to him.
Lex cast him an annoyed look, Lois a surprised one. After a moment, Lex regained his menacing air. "But the real reason I came, my dear, was for that child of yours."
Lois paled.
"Where is your son, anyway?" Lex asked.
Lois, Perry, and Richard said nothing.
Comprehension flashed through Lex's eyes. "Ah, he must be off with your partner, Mr. Kent." He smiled at Lois' flutter of response. "Do you think we weren't listening? They were at the dinner table. Did you send them in a different direction?"
Lois raised her head defiantly and kept her mouth closed.
"It makes no difference," Lex said. He gestured to his henchmen. "Search the house and the grounds. They can't have gotten far."
Five of the henchmen left the room, quickly ranging out of Perry's sight. One remained – he had more than enough firepower to control the room. Perry saw him standing, at loose alertness, ready to shoot at Lex's command. Despite the man's small stature, he seemed impressively fit, and unlike Perry, no sweat beaded his brow.
Lex turned back to his captives. "Yes, young Jason White," Lex said deliberately. "Or, should I say, Jason, who is the son of Superman?"
Richard's eyes widened and he paled as well. Then Perry saw him draw a stone mask over his face. Lois gasped.
Lex turned to Richard. "Ah, Mr. White, I see our Lois hasn't been entirely truthful with you." His voice carried a horrible satisfaction. "Actually, it seems out of the realm of possibility." He lowered his tone. "How could an extraterrestrial actually breed with a member of a different species? What a fantasy!" He stopped pacing, stood in front of Lois with a gloating smile. "But, on the yacht, when your son weakened when the kryptonite was near….and when he threw a piano….well, let's say that after having some time to reflect, I realize that miracles do happen."
Lois still said nothing. Perry noticed her breathing had become harsh and fast.
Lex sauntered around the room, his hostages remaining in a tense stillness. "What, no denials, Ms Lane?" His gaze took in Richard. "Mr. White, I see this is a surprise to you." He looked at Perry. "But not to you. I see that our esteemed editor knows more than he prints."
Perry put on his most impassive poker face. He ignored Richard's incredulous – and hurt – glance.
"What are you going to do?" Lois asked, not able to hide the nervous edge. Perry could see her edging closer to Lex.
"Ah, my third reason for coming here," Lex said. He was in full Evil-Villain Gloat Mode, thought Perry. And why not? He held all the cards. "It seems that if I held your son, you'd be a little more careful about what you investigated and what you wrote."
Lois smiled scornfully. "Like we'd let you take him."
"Oh, I don't imagine you would," Lex said. "That's why I'll have to kill you." He began losing his smooth exterior – apparently Lex Luthor had had a hard day as well. "You've been a thorn in my side long enough, Lois. That's the only way to stop you. And I'll raise young Jason to be a chip off the old block. The Luthor block."
Lois paled again, then rallied.
"If Jason is Superman's son," Lois said, in an attempt to get off the "kill Lois and Richard" part of the conversation, "you have to know that Superman would come for him." She smiled. "He'd come for him no matter whose son he was."
"Lois, Lois, Lois!" Lex chided. "We went through this at the boat, remember?" He raised his left hand. A ring with an ostentatious green stone graced his middle finger. "I hope he does come. I've got a little surprise for him. Again."
Lois and Perry looked at the ring with an identical sick fascination. "Kryptonite," Lois muttered, echoing Perry's thoughts.
"Superman isn't the only Boy Scout out there," Lex said, in horrible amusement. "I'm prepared too."
That took the air right out of the conversation. Lois, Richard, and Perry stood motionless, thoughts racing. The soft evening air came through the open windows, and Perry heard a last few chirps of birdsong in the sudden silence.
A shot rang out. Perry flinched.
"They must have them," Lex said, satisfaction in his voice. "I'll look forward to seeing Mr. Kent once again. Before he dies." He pulled out a comlink. "Report."
No answer.
Lex thumbed the link again, and said, "Report." His voice was edgy now.
Silence.
Understanding bloomed in Lex's face, and a calculating look flashed in his eyes. With one smooth motion, he reached for Lois. He put one arm around her body and with the other, held his gun to her head.
"Superman!" Lex cried out. "Superman! Show yourself!" Perry could see Lois trembling. "Or your girlfriend gets her brains blown out all over her nice home."
Nothing.
"I'll count to five," Lex said. Perry knew he wasn't bluffing. "If you're not here by then…." He left the rest to the imagination.
"One!"
Silence.
"Two!"
Nothing.
"Three!"
Richard made an inarticulate grunt of protest. The silent henchman swung his lethal-looking gun up to cover him. Perry remained still, but his hands in back were fumbling, trying to reach through the gun safe door. "There's a loaded Glock right in the front," he remembered Clark saying. Was it reachable?
"Four!"
Tension filled the room. Perry saw Lois' muscles tighten.
"Fi—"
"Don't shoot, Luthor." Superman appeared at the doorway. Perry gave a quiet sigh of relief. The fluttering of the cape drew everyone's attention. Even the henchman looked away from Perry and Richard for a moment when Superman blinked into sight. Superman gave Lois a reassuring smile, but Perry could see the worry in it.
No problem, thought Perry. He'd seen Clark use super-speed to remove or replace objects before. To Perry, it just looked like things vanished, then reappeared. Why isn't he using it? Why isn't he saving Lois? A tendril of worry curled in his gut.
Then Perry noticed two things. The green rock in the ring on Luthor's finger had a slight glow. It was an eerie, virulent, otherworldly glow. It was a glow of hellfire and damnation, of nausea-inducing wrongness.
And the second thing was that Superman was sweating. Perry had never seen Clark sweat. He looked at Clark more closely – Clark still maintained the trademark upright Superman posture, but Perry, knowing him now, could see the effort it took to do so.
His heart sank. He'd heard of kryptonite, but he'd never actually seen its effects. Lois had never printed that Superman had been stabbed with a kryptonite shiv in his last run-in with Lex Luthor, but Perry had heard the stuff that she didn't put into her story. And one of the things not printed was that kryptonite cost Superman his powers. Another was that the continent that Lex Luthor had generated in his evil plan consisted primarily of kryptonite. There was a lot of kryptonite out there, if the bad guys only knew it. Lois and Perry had hoped to keep that fact under wraps.
As if reading Perry's thoughts, Superman gave Richard and Perry an apologetic look. Then he looked back at Lois.
Uh-oh, thought Perry. I think that means that Richard and I are on our own. He's going to concentrate on Lois and Luthor.
Lois looked at Richard, one tiny glance. Perry saw desperation in Richard's eyes. Then Lois' eyes locked on Clark's, and the gaze that passed between them spoke volumes in a microsecond.
Perry felt his hackles rise. Electric tension filled the room. It had been five seconds since Superman appeared. Lex Luthor relaxed his grip on Lois, just slightly, and inhaled – probably to give some sort of ultimatum, thought Perry.
Then everything happened at once.
- With an earthshattering martial arts cry, Lois made some sort of spin move and wriggled out of Luthor's grip –
- and Richard, in one smooth motion, grabbed the bronze statuette of "The Bronco Buster" off the end table, and sidearmed it viciously at the gun-toting henchman –
- and Perry scrambled back, opening the gun cabinet door, frantically searching for the loaded handgun Clark had said was there
- and Lex Luthor automatically fired his stolen MPD-issue .38 Smith & Wesson, missing Lois
- and Superman advanced on Luthor in two large strides, not showing the weakness he must have felt
- and the statuette hit the henchman as he fired, making his shot go wild
- and Perry, in a frenzied scramble, found the Glock, and grabbed it, and turned back to the scene
- and the henchman's bullet hit Lois in the head, and with horror, Perry saw a chunk of scalp and hair lift up, blood spraying out all over
- and Superman saw it too, and leapt on Luthor with a mad growl
- and the henchman got his gun back in line, just as Richard knocked into him, beginning a frantic wrestling match for control of the gun
- and Lois lay on the floor, blood pooling from her head
- and Perry raised the Glock and aimed but couldn't fire for fear of hitting Richard
- and Lex Luthor shoved his kryptonite ring in Superman's face, ignoring Superman's bear hug, and, with his other hand, fired the MPD police weapon six times right into Superman's gut
- and the henchman kicked Richard away, and Richard twisted awkwardly, and the henchman shot Richard and Perry saw Richard's left arm begin to bleed
- and Perry shot the henchman, firing over and over till the Glock's ten-shot magazine was empty, Perry breathing heavily
- and Superman collapsed, into Lex's arms, the two men sagging to the floor together, Superman gushing blood onto the blue spandex, a wave of red creeping up his back, staining the cape, defiling it
- and the henchman collapsed, looking surprised at the bloody froth bubbling up from his lips
- and Richard saw Lois lying motionless, blood pooled at her head, and gave a hoarse cry and grabbed a carved wooden elephant from a table and rushed to Luthor and struck Lex furiously on the head with the sculpture
- and Lex not able to fight back, his body entrapped under that of the collapsing Man of Steel, his head held under Richard's arm
- and Richard shouting and crying and cursing, striking Luthor over and over, blood from Richard's arm mingling with blood from Luthor's scalp
- and Perry seeing that the henchman had stopped breathing
- and Superman and Lois deathly still, the ominous pool of red around Lois' head growing larger and larger
- and Perry looking at his shaking hands, still holding the Glock, and gently setting it down.
He went to Richard, stopped the younger man's pounding. Blood pooled from Lex Luthor's head, the scalp wounds welling up scarlet, nakedly obvious on the hairless skull. Luthor's head was misshapen. Richard had fractured Lex's skull in his mindless attack.
"Richard, stop," Perry said gently. He held Richard's arm, stopped its by-now-rhythmic motions. He saw the madness drain from Richard's eyes.
Richard let Lex Luthor's head drop. He knelt at Luthor's head, only now seeing the unconscious man, covered by Superman's still body. He looked down, and took a deep, sobbing breath.
He stood up and shook off Perry's hand. "Lois," Richard breathed. He ran over to where Lois lay in her eerie stillness. Perry followed.
Lois' eyes were unseeing, her pupils fixed and dilated. Her chest made no rise and fall. Richard cradled her in his arms, ignoring the ghastly wound on the top of her head, the wound where the blood had stopped pumping. Perry felt Lois' neck for a carotid pulse. Nothing.
"Lois…." Richard keened. He paid no attention to his own wound, the blood from his left triceps mingling with the oozing from Lois' head.
Perry pushed away the horrific discovery, unable to admit that Lois was dead. That was something he could not bear. He was an automaton now, running on his clockwork course, mechanically moving.
Perry turned to the silent tableau of Lex and Superman. Bound together in an obscene embrace, the two men lay motionless on the floor. Blood pooled at Lex's head, and on Superman's cape. Perry lifted the blood-stained cape and flinched at the sight of the frighteningly large exit wounds on Superman's back. Perry freed Superman's arm from its grip around Luthor. He used that as leverage, and rolled Superman away from Lex. The body of the Man of Steel flopped bonelessly onto its back.
"Oh, God…" Perry said helplessly at the sight of Superman's wounds. Lex must have loaded the gun with some sort of expanding projectile. The six rounds had shredded Superman's torso, taking the once smooth and invulnerable abdomen, stirring its skin and underlying internal organs into a ghastly porridge. Perry leaned closer – was that a breath?
The green glow of Lex's ring was the brightest that Perry had ever seen. And then, the glow wavered, flickered, and then died. And Superman gave a tiny wheeze, and relaxed into the ultimate motionlessness of death.
Richard hugged Lois to him, crying wordlessly. Blood dripped down his arm to mingle with the pool of blood from her head. Perry could hardly see it. The beautiful sunset had faded into dusky twilight, and darkness filled the room.
