Sorry for the delay. From last time:
The peacekeepers arrived on the scene just as the remaining rebels began to flee into the jungle. Lois started to give chase, but turned back to the scene unfolding behind her. Most of the attackers would make a clean escape, leaving behind a destroyed village, burned crops, dead children, and ruined lives. She wanted to hunt down the men responsible. To bring them to justice. But she was needed here, right now.
Ultrawoman!” one of the peacekeeping officers shouted to her, as though to punctuate the thought.
********
New stuff:
Lois touched down on the porch and let herself into the house. She wiped her boots on the mat and pulled off her mask before wandering into the living room. Looking around, it was obvious that she was home – in the warm, safe, and comfortable environs of the farmhouse, but her mind was eight thousand miles away. In a tiny village, where the air stank of burning rubber, where the wordless wail of mourning parents cut through any language barrier. Where the staccato bursts of gunfire rattled bones and echoed in ears. She found herself under the scrutiny of countless pairs of eyes, so hollow and haunting it was almost hard to remember that they belonged to the lucky ones – the living, not the dead. It was a perverse thought, considering the survivors lucky. Without families or homes, what did they have left?
She shook her head, trying to clear her mind’s eye of the images that were being tattooed on her memory. She gingerly pulled the chain out from under her uniform and lifted it over her head. Opening the clasp, she allowed the two rings on the chain to fall into her hand. She slipped her engagement ring back onto her finger, a physical feeling of relief washed over her as the ring was put back where it belonged. She held the much larger band in the palm of her hand, curling her fingers closed around it.
“Clark has yours, doesn’t he?” came her father-in-law’s voice from behind her. She was startled, uncertain how she hadn’t noticed his presence.
“Yeah,” she replied softly, turning to face Jonathan. She threaded the chain through Clark’s wedding band and closed the clasp before placing the chain around her neck again. “We knew we couldn’t wear them without raising a lot of questions. I guess neither of us ever thought he’d be gone this long.” She felt a lump forming in her throat. It was coming on two years since he’d left and she still couldn’t talk about that day without tears pricking at her eyes.
“How was it out there?” Jonathan asked, changing the subject.
She looked away, unsure how to answer the question. “Terrible,” she said in a bare whisper.
“I’m sorry,” Jonathan replied, placing a hand on her shoulder.
“It just feels like I’m not accomplishing anything. For every rebel we arrest and disarm, two more take his place. I can’t save everyone, I can’t be everywhere. It’s just never enough.”
“Lois, you’re not a god. You’re doing everything you can, and more than anyone could ask of you.”
She shook her head and wiped angrily at her eyes. “I wish I could do more, I wish it were enough…I just…I wish Clark were here,” she choked. Clark would have known what to do. He could have told her, shown her. She felt her father-in-law pull her into a tight embrace.
She hugged back fiercely as she took a deep breath, trying to fight back the sobs. After a long moment, she managed to compose herself. “I want to check in on Jon,” she said as she wiped away the last of the tears.
Upstairs, she changed into Clark’s old high school football jersey and a pair of sweatpants and slipped quietly into the nursery. Jon was fast asleep in his crib, his tiny chest rising and falling with each breath. She reached down and covered him with the blankets he’d seemed to have kicked off in his sleep. She took his little hand in hers, looking at his perfect fingers as he curled them around her hand. Her eyes blurred with unshed tears. For days, she’d barely seen her son, spending long hours a world away, trying desperately to solve a problem she had no hope of solving.
“I’m sorry I’ve been gone so much,” she whispered. “Mommy’s had something very important to do. I know that doesn’t make it better, but I think one day you’ll understand.” She leaned down to kiss the top of Jon’s head.
In Clark’s room, she booted up her laptop and sat down on his bed. Leaning back against a stack of pillows, she balanced the computer on her lap and began to type. She still had a few hours before her deadline and she had a column to write.
********
“Craven?”
“Yeah,” she replied nonchalantly, crossing her legs as she leaned back on Perry’s couch.
Perry just shook his head as he smiled. “You called the entire international community ‘craven?’”
“I feel it’s an accurate characterization. Besides, the nice thing about insulting the entire world? No one can sue for defamation.”
“What about the ‘insipid diplomats choking the world’s most desperate people with a thousand miles of red tape?’ You’re courting disaster, Darlin’,” Perry drawled. He pulled out his old, overstuffed leather chair and sat down.
“That’s the point, Chief. I can’t do this the nice way or the polite way, because I’ll be politely ignored. We’re talking about an entire country being destroyed and no one cares.”
“So what’s your next move?” He put his feet up on his desk.
“Ultrawoman’s addressing the Security Council on Thursday.”
“Behave yourself,” he admonished sternly.
“Well behaved women rarely make history.”
“That’s exactly what I’m afraid of,” Perry replied with a shake of his head.
“I want to run a piece in next Sunday’s magazine,” Lois said as she stood up.
“I’ll get the magazine editor to save you the space. Where are you off to now?”
“Kinwara,” she said as she walked toward the door. “Where else?”
Perry watched in quiet resignation as she walked away, carrying the weight of an unwitting world on her slender shoulders. It was more of a burden than anyone should have to bear and she was bearing it all alone. For the first time in the ten years he’d known her, he wondered if Lois Lane had taken on too much.
********
“A messenger? We are supposed to learn to fly on a messenger?” Dek Ra rushed to keep up with his older sister as they walked through the corridors of her compound.
“The messenger is a fine craft, stable and forgiving,” Zara replied crisply.
“But we want to fly strike fighters, or at least interceptors. What valor is there in flying a transport ferry?”
Zara stopped suddenly and Dek Ra nearly tripped over himself trying to keep from bumping into her. He always tried to be careful around his older sister, not simply because he did not want to appear clumsy. Ever since the accident, he’d stopped seeing his sister as invincible. She was so much older than he and Tem Ra that they’d never known her as anything besides a respected leader. But now she was human, too – flesh and blood and as mortal as anyone else. She had never talked about how bad she had been injured or whether she’d truly recovered completely, which only made him more worried about her being hurt again. He knew it was not right to leave to her alone the task of keeping their world safe. He was a man now and had a part to play in defending his home and family. Zara had risked everything and had sacrificed so much, it was time for him to help.
Zara regarded him with the stern but loving gaze of an older and wiser sibling. “You will learn in due time, my brother,” she said as she placed a gentle hand on his arm. “Do not be so impatient for battle, war is not just about adventures and valor.”
He nodded reluctantly, knowing that his sister spoke from experience, but still disappointed. It was unfair of her to expect Dek Ra to understand. He was hardly the first young man unable to grasp the sheer horror of war from the stories of those who had experienced it. Generations before him had suffered the same naïve, idealistic shortsightedness about the nature of war and duty and honor.
********
Rae Et could have relied on the impressive communications system mounted unobtrusively in the wall of her office to monitor the results of the elections. To analyze the strengths and weaknesses of various political blocs and determine the fault lines along which the Council was likely to cleave itself. She could have relied on numerous computers to model the likely balances of power as the returns became instantaneously available, but she knew the politics of this world better than any person alive and certainly better than any collection of silly machines. There was scarcely a race that she did not accurately predict. The picture she’d painted, the premonition in her mind that was playing itself out in reality, was bleak. Her silent allies had all but been vanquished. Loyalists had won in landslides in the areas which still remained under the colony’s control. Her hopes of maintaining allies in the enemy’s midst were fading and clear lines had been drawn. She did not like her chances of fighting this as a conventional campaign. The enemy’s resources were too vast. But what choice did they have?
The possibilities were clear. She would conquer or she would be obliterated. There was no middle ground.
********
”We’re glad to see you, Ultrawoman,” the doctor announced in her slight, German accent. She pushed her hair away from her eyes as she looked up at Lois’s approach. Lois placed the pallets of supplies on the ground before landing. “Sankoh! Alex!” the doctor called out to her assistants, who obediently hurried over to help with the supplies. Dressed in flip flops, cut off khaki shorts, and a gray tank top, under an unbuttoned, short sleeved white shirt, Dr. Heller looked more like a beach bum than Médecins Sans Frontières’s frontline in Kinwara.
“How is everything, Dr. Heller?” Lois asked as she surveyed the camp.
“We were raided last week,” Ingrid began. “Alex and Sankoh wanted to fight back, but I told them it was better to lose the Chloroquine than get ourselves killed.”
“I’m sorry I couldn’t have been here…”
The doctor shook her head. “It is a big country, even you can’t be everywhere at once.” She turned back toward the other side of the camp. “Luc! Viens ici!” she called in French to the camp’s other doctor, Luc Arnault. Lois gathered without much difficulty that Dr. Heller was calling him over.
“Ça va?” he yelled back, asking what was going on. “Oh, hello Ultrawoman!” He jogged over toward them. As casually dressed as Dr. Heller, he also looked more like someone on vacation than an aid worker in one of the most desperate spots in the world. He reached out a hand to her, favoring the superhero with his boyish smile.
“How are you, Dr. Arnault?” Lois asked as she shook his hand.
“Not bad,” he replied. He casually placed a hand on the small of Dr. Heller’s back. From what Lois had gathered, neither was much older than she. They’d met here in Kinwara the previous year, before things had become dire. Their rather routine tours had been extended and instead of treating malaria and providing vaccines and dental care, they were tending to gunshot wounds and victims of landmines.
Lois folded her arms across her chest. “Things aren’t getting any better, are they?” she asked grimly.
“It is too soon to tell, really,” Dr. Arnault replied. “We have more supplies and more food than we did a week ago.”
“But the attacks continue,” Lois countered.
“The UN and the government can’t disarm and detain every single rebel. There just aren’t enough peacekeepers,” Dr. Heller explained.
“And they haven’t done anything to stop the flow of weapons into the country.” Dr. Arnault added.
Lois chewed her lip, lost in thought. She felt like she was trying to bail out the Titanic with a plastic bucket. “What else can I do to help you?” she asked, trying to hide her frustration.
“We need an engineer. Our jeep has been broken down for weeks and I’m hopeless with the thing,” Dr. Arnault admitted.
Dr. Heller smiled at her partner. “And our well has been contaminated, we need to dig another.”
“I can help you with the well now,” Lois offered. “As for the engineer, I’ll talk to UN’s logistics office, but I’m not sure what they’ll be able to do.”
Dr. Arnault shook his head sadly. “We could really use Gunner’s help about now.” He looked at Lois as he scrubbed a hand through his sandy hair. “Gunner Rassmussen was our logistician. He was killed a few months ago. He’d lived in Kinwara for a dozen years and was the best damn engineer I’d ever met. I swear you could give the man a roll of tarp, a nylon rope, a hammer, and a pocketknife and in half a day, he’d have shelter and clean water for two hundred people and he’d already be starting on making one of his crazy stews.” Dr. Arnault chuckled softly, a sad smile on his face.
“How did he die?” Lois asked, the reporter in her showing through.
“He was on a supply run. His convoy was ambushed. We’re not certain what exactly happened,” Dr. Heller explained.
“I’m sorry,” Lois replied, knowing the words were inadequate.
Dr. Heller looked away as she put her hands on her hips. “Gunner loved this country. He gave his life for it. I hope it wasn’t in vain.”
********
Clark leaned against his cane as he watched troops prepare to board the waiting transports. He was certain the forces had gotten used to his habit of watching the work at the docking bays before and after major operations. The soldiers stood in perfect formation, stone still, as they awaited their orders. General Commander, Fourth Class, Talan approached in long, even strides. She was now the youngest General Commander in the history of the Kryptonian forces. While he’d still been unconscious after his rescue, Zara had presided over Talan and Ching’s promotion ceremonies and their entry into the Order of the Guardians, the highest honor bestowed by the government.
“Good tidings, sir,” she said as she saluted.
“Commander,” he replied. “You have a pretty impressive force here.”
“We are launching the largest offensive in the planet’s history,” she explained nonchalantly.
“Is this what you thought you’d be doing when you joined the military?”
“No sir,” she replied as she gazed out at her troops. “When I was younger, we were largely a police force – keeping order in the outer settlements and responding to emergencies. We never thought war would break out.”
Clark gestured at his cane. “I’m sorry I’m not well enough to go with you.”
“I’m not, sir,” she said simply. Talan smiled softly at him before turning and walking away toward her troops.
********
Lois stood up from her seat at the end of the conference table. On ordinary occasions, only members of the Security Council had speaking privileges, but the table had room for four invited guests of the Council. She now occupied one of those seats. She looked around the horseshoe shaped table and the fifteen ambassadors seated there. The gallery behind them was overflowing with ambassadors from the other members of the UN. The media gallery above the floor of the chambers was packed.
Ultrawoman cleared her throat, which was suddenly dry. She heard her pulse thundering in her ears and wondered if the rest of the room could hear it as well. “Ladies and gentlemen,” she began. “I am here today to bring to your attention the conflict in Kinwara. I assume that the only reason so little has been done about the situation there is because you are unaware of the magnitude of the problem. Because there is no way that responsible people who were aware of this problem would do as little about it as you have. Tens of thousands are dead. Hundreds of thousands are refugees and millions are still at risk. The UN’s own forces have had their hands tied because of the mandate you’ve written and relief workers are under almost constant attack. I’m here to ask you to do something about this.” She felt her nervousness recede and a tiny spark of anger took hold of her. It grew slowly, at first.
“I’m asking you to do what you’ve pledged to do. I’m asking you to keep the promise made by great men and women when they founded this organization fifty years ago. I’m asking you to prove that we are not wrong to put our faith in you and this Council. Stop the flow of weapons to the rebels, pressure the man behind them, President Sangara, to disarm, support your own peacekeepers, and declare aid workers off limits. But even if you do not, I am here to tell the world that all of the relief workers in Kinwara who travel under the colors of the UN or the Red Cross are under my protection. An attack on them is an attack on me and I will respond. The rebels have declared war on the ordinary people of Kinwara. The world has claimed ‘Never Again,’ many times in the past. I hope that at last, we’ll live up to that promise.”
She stepped away from the podium and strode out of the Council chambers amid the brilliant flicker of flashbulbs. Lois left the UN plaza and took off for home. Officially, Lois Lane was still in Kinwara on her second trip to the region. She went home for a few hours a day to see Jon, but it felt like she really had been separated from him for ages. She knew it was hard on him, but didn’t know what else she could do. Overwhelmed didn’t begin to cover how she felt.
Before touching down, she scanned the farmhouse; Martha was playing with Jon in the living room. Lois spun into her own clothes on the porch. As she entered the house, she heard her mother-in-law say “looks like mommy’s home.” Lois found herself smiling as she walked into the living room. Jon’s eyes lit up when he saw her. He stretched out his arms to her and for the first time in days, her heart felt light. She scooped him up easily.
“Mama!” he announced eagerly as he held tightly to her.
“I know, sweetie, I missed you, too.”
“We watched your speech,” Martha said, smiling.
“Could you tell I was nervous?”
“Are you kidding? You were great! But I think you made those diplomats nervous.”
“Well, they deserve it,” Lois replied, somewhat bitterly. “I could do so much more if they’d just help a little.”
“You’re doing everything you can. That’s all you can ask of yourself. You should know that. You’re the one who taught that to Clark.” At what Lois assumed was her puzzled expression, Martha explained. “When he first became Superman, he was overwhelmed and so upset about all the people he couldn’t save. You told him that whatever Superman could do was enough.”
“He told you that?” Lois asked, finding herself smiling wistfully.
“Oh, yes,” Martha replied. “I don’t think you realize how much you helped him then. How much he looked to you to figure out who and what Superman should be.”
“Well, right now I’m the one who could use his advice.” Martha, I have no idea what I’m doing,” she confessed.
“Just keep at it dear. Keep writing about it. Keep talking about it. Keep going.”
“I’m not sure I can. All this time I’m spending away from Jon, the burden I’m putting on you and Jonathan…”
“Jon couldn’t be a burden if he tried!” Martha exclaimed, but Lois knew that taking care of a one year old was extraordinarily taxing. “We are a family and we take care of each other in good times and bad.”
Lois managed a tight lipped smile. “It just seems that you and Jonathan spend a lot of time taking care of me. I’m not sure I’m ever there for you.”
“Honey, Jonathan and I are so blessed to have the two of you here, and if it seems like you need a little taking care of, that’s because you take care of the whole world. Someone needs to look after you every once in a while. When Clark left, we were all left behind to miss him, but you had to try to be him, to be what he’d been to the whole world. Lois, I don’t know anyone else who could do what you’ve done. Who could handle that kind of responsibility.”
Lois reached out for her mother-in-law’s hand and squeezed it gratefully. “Thanks,” she said softly.
********
“It will take time to rebuild, ma’am,” Alon explained. He stood in front of Rae Et’s desk, his hands clasped in front of him. For thirty-five years, he’d been the elder stateswoman’s most steadfast and competent ally, and even he was never at ease in her presence.
“Rebuild? Rebuild with what?” she demanded. “Our allies in the Council have been swept out, along with the weak-willed and the pragmatic. Zara’s faithful are all that remain. Pray, tell me with what will we rebuild?”
“The First Ministers still trust me,” Alon replied. He knew he was lucky that he had not been implicated in the downing of Zara’s ship and the fiasco that had unraveled from there. That mess had taken down Pelmon, Trey, and a handful of rather useful minor players they had in the military.
“Assassination will not work now. It will only galvanize the Council. They’ll appoint zealots as their new First Ministers and retaliate furiously. We cannot withstand that sort of onslaught now.”
“I understand, but I am still in a position to obtain information,” the old man answered. “We must bide our time. Our forces should appear to melt away and we should allow the conflict to die down until the time is right for us to strike.”
“Time may be the only thing on our side,” Rae Et muttered. She stood up, gathering the folds of her greatcoat as she did. “We will talk again later; I am due in the Belaar shortly.”
*******
”You came back to me,” she whispered in his ear as she wrapped her arms around his neck, her fingers tangling in his hair. She buried her head against his shoulder.
He swept her up in his arms and laid her on the bed. He stretched out beside her and touched her cheek, his fingers brushing lightly against her soft skin. She looked at him with warm, tender eyes that made him feel so loved and safe. He kissed her lips, feeling her respond immediately as she pulled him toward her. They slowly peeled away the barriers of clothing between them.
“I love you,” he whispered as he reached to brush a strand of hair away from her face, but he found he couldn’t move his hand. He tugged to free himself, but looking at his wrist, he saw the manacle binding him. His other hand was similarly imprisoned in the cold, metal grip of shackles and chains. Suddenly, he was pulled backward with a force so great it slammed him into the hard stone wall that appeared from nowhere behind him. He felt the breath escape him in a ‘whoosh,’ but he was prevented from doubling over by his own arms, bound over his head.
“Clark!” He heard Lois scream. He struggled impotently against his restraints.
“Lois!” he yelled, tugging so hard at the chains that his wrists bled. “Lois!” His eyes went wide with fear as a figure he would have known anywhere approached from the shadows. He opened his mouth to yell at Lois to run, to fight, to get away as fast as she could, but no words came. Nor grabbed her, dragging her away. One of his large, rough hands covered her mouth, keeping her from screaming, but Clark could see the terror gleaming in her eyes. She was pleading silently with him to do something, to help her, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t move, couldn’t speak, couldn’t even beg Nor to leave her alone.
“Kal El, you pathetic mongrel, do you really think there is anything you possess, anything you cherish that I cannot take away from you?” Nor’s laughter tore through him and he shut his eyes.
“Clark, please help me,” he heard his wife plead.
“I can’t!” he yelled at last, the sound echoing loudly.
He snapped bolt upright in the darkness and realized he’d been having another nightmare. He rubbed his bare wrists. He was still unable to wear the ceremonial wrist cuffs when he slept. Clark tried to shake the dream from his mind, to forget this latest iteration of the horrible scene that played itself out in his head every night.
There was a soft knock at his door. “Clark, are you all right?” came Zara’s concerned voice.
“I’m fine,” he replied curtly. He got up, limping slightly as he made his way to the washroom. He splashed cold water on his face and stared at his reflection. He hadn’t slept well in weeks and it showed. The dark circles looked as though they’d been permanently etched under his bloodshot eyes. He’d regained a good bit of the weight he’d lost, but he still looked gaunt and anxious – his cheeks drawn in a little too tightly, his skin pinched and sallow in color. Clark shook his head. He could stare at his reflection forever and never see in it the man he’d once been.
