How I Spent My Christmas Vacation: One Year Later -- Final
by Nan Smith
Previously:
The world jumped back into normal speed. Lois kicked the gun and camcorder across the room. Both women were moving feebly, attempting to get to their feet and people were crowding through the doors from the exercise and therapy rooms to see what was going on.
"Stay where you are!" Lois barked, and such was the force of her command that the rubberneckers stopped in their tracks. "Don't anybody come in here! You!" she pointed to one of men, whom she recognized as one of the instructors. "Call the police! Now!" She turned to Cornelia Newtrich, who had made it to her hands and knees. "Don't move! If I have to hit you again, you won't get up!"
Clark was pushing himself shakily to a sitting position and Lois knelt beside him, never taking her eyes off the Newtrich sisters. "Are you all right?"
He nodded shakily. "I think so. Lois, you --"
"We'll talk about it later," she said. "Can you stand up?"
**********
And now, the last part:
Lois flopped down on the big comfortable couch in Clark's apartment and propped her feet on his coffee table. "What a day! We finish the Luthor investigation and four days later we're on the trail of Intergang! I don't blame Bobby for being scared, but the stuff on that CD is going to net us a Pulitzer by the time we're finished."
"One thing for sure," Clark said, settling down beside her. "You don't lack for confidence. Have I told you yet how great you were today?""
"I think you said so in the car, but you can say it again," Lois said.
"You were my own personal super-heroine at the gym," Clark said. "You just took charge and handled that whole mess. I've never seen you in action quite like that before." He reached out to take her hand. "I knew a year ago you that you were the most remarkable woman I'd ever met or could hope to meet, but today you even surpassed *my* expectations."
She squeezed his hand. "Well, you were my hero, too," she said. "Without you I wouldn't be here. It's a joint effort."
And it was, she thought. Without him, she had been alone against the world, and without her he was lonely and incomplete. She should have realized it a long time ago. The reason she'd been able to "take over", as he'd phrased it, was that she had been protecting him. Just the thought of losing him had brought all her "Mad Dog" instincts to the surface. She'd been operating on determination and adrenaline. Nobody was going to hurt Clark if she had any say in the matter, and that had included getting hold of the camcorder before the police or anyone else did.
She had been thinking about it all afternoon, while the police had been dealing with the Newtrich sisters and interviewing her and Clark; when they had turned the Kryptonite camcorder over to Dr. Klein to keep safe until Clark recovered enough to throw it into space; and even while she and Clark had been quietly checking out the contents of Bobby's CD in the conference room. Even the excitement at the promise of a new, and potentially explosive investigation of an international criminal syndicate could not keep the thought from her mind, and with it her promise to let Clark ask his question soon.
But Clark would keep his word, she thought. And he wouldn't hold her to their bet if he thought it would make her uncomfortable. She needed to tell him, but how was she supposed to do that?
She looked quickly sideways at him and then down at her lap. He had a trace of five-o'clock shadow, she thought, but the tiny nick that he had received from the razor this morning had vanished. "How are your powers?" she asked.
"I should be okay by tomorrow afternoon, I think," he said. "I'll be more interested in what Dr. Klein says about you. Was that just a last burst of my powers -- or are yours coming back, too?"
"I don't know," she said. She was instinctively avoiding the more important subject, she knew, and told herself to stop it. This man deserved fair treatment if anyone did. "About our bet --"
"You know I'd never hold you to a bet if it makes you uncomfortable, don't you?" he said quickly.
"Yes, I do know that," she said. "But I was going to say that I think it's time I stopped acting like a coward."
"Is this the Lois Lane I know speaking?" he said, sounding, she thought, a little incredulous. "If there's anything you're not, it's a coward!"
"You might be surprised," she said. "I tried awfully hard to keep my head about you, you know. I liked you from the start -- a lot -- but falling in love makes you vulnerable. My mother fell in love once, and look what happened." He opened his mouth to protest, but she put her finger over his lips. "Don't say anything. I might not be able to work up the nerve to say this again."
He subsided, watching her with an expression that made her want to giggle nervously. "But," she continued, "I didn't keep my head. I couldn't. I fell in love anyway. It was scary -- to know that you meant so much to me that losing you would hurt more than anything I can imagine. If you were to change your mind once we were a couple, I don't know how I could stand it."
"I'm not going to change my mind," Clark said. "If we weren't made for each other, then we're as close as two people can come to it."
"How can you be so sure?" she asked.
"I just am," he said. "Maybe it has something to do with being Kryptonian. The impression I got from the other Lois was that there was some kind of bond between Kryptonian men and their mates. I've felt it since I saw you walk into that warehouse in Brazzaville. And then I actually talked to you and I knew for certain that I'd found the woman that was right for me. I fell in love with you that day. In that minute, actually," he said quietly. "And I know for certain that you're the only woman that I'll ever love."
She shook her head. "I think I believe that -- now," she said.
A muscular arm went around her shoulders and she found herself pulled against his chest. The look in his eyes made her heart beat even faster than it already was, both from panic and anticipation. The question was coming, she knew: the question that she'd been putting off for nearly a year, and this time she wouldn't stop him.
"Some people would think that was a very proprietary action, Superman," she murmured.
His grin flashed. "If you think that was proprietary, you have no idea how proprietary I can be. There isn't and never will be any woman in the world for Superman -- or Clark Kent, for that matter -- but you. Do I have to tell you that I'll never walk away from you unless you tell me to?"
"No," she said, and discovered that somehow her voice had dropped to a whisper. "And I don't mind a proprietary man -- if that man doesn't mind it if I'm as proprietary as he is."
"I was hoping you'd say that," he said. "May I ask you that question, now?"
She didn't dare risk speaking but nodded against his chest.
"You're my best friend," he said. "The best friend I've ever had. I need you in my life to be happy and I want to try my best to make you happy, too. Will you marry me?"
Lois looked up into his hopeful face. She couldn't pretend that she didn't love him. That had happened early in their friendship. But was love enough?
But he'd said that she was his best friend. She couldn't deny that he was hers as well. Without him she would have to return to the lonely existence that she had lived before he had splashed into her life in a tropical ocean, eleven hundred years in the past. He had searched the world for her and ultimately traveled through time to find her and save her life. And now he was asking her to take the ultimate step: to spend the rest of her life with him, and to let him spend his life with her. And after all, what kind of life would she have without him? Sterile; lonely; safe from hurt -- but never happy. But did she dare to take the risk?
Could she dare *not* to take it? Sometimes, as Alice had said, if you didn't risk it all you could miss out on life itself. And, with Clark Kent, she certainly wouldn't miss out on life.
When it came down to that, the answer was easy.
"Yes," she whispered, a little surprised at how simple it was to say. And then she couldn't say anything else as his lips closed over hers.
When he finally released her it took several seconds to realize that she was no longer sitting beside him on the couch, but instead that they were floating several inches above the cushions. Clark glanced down and laughed. Very gently, they settled down onto the couch again. "It looks like my powers are back faster than I expected," he remarked.
"That's a relief," she said.
"You pack quite a wallop," he said. "But then you always have."
"So do you," she said, a little shakily.
"Do you remember, I said I had your Christmas gift?" he said.
"Yes."
"Stay right here. I'll get it," he told her, getting to his feet. He strode quickly toward his bedroom, and less than a minute later reappeared. He sat down beside her on the sofa and took her left hand in his. "This is my Christmas gift, he said. "I hope you like it."
Lois watched, almost bemused, as he slipped a glittering diamond ring onto the third finger of her left hand. The ring caught the light, breaking it into rainbow colors. She caught her breath at the realization of what it meant and wondered for an instant how much of his reporter's salary he had sacrificed for it.
"Clark, you didn't need to buy such an expensive ring."
"It was my mother's," Clark said. "My father got it from his grandmother and gave it to my mother. It's been in the Kent family for seven generations."
The diamond was beautiful: not the engagement ring of a farmer's wife.
"It's lovely," she said, turning the ring in the light of the overhead lamp. She looked doubtfully at him. "Are you sure?"
"I'm sure," he said. "I've never been more certain of anything in my life."
She could feel the tears brimming in her eyes. "I never really believed that any man could love me," she said, "especially not so much. You've heard the office gossip. I'm Mad Dog Lane. I chew men up and spit them out. Why am I so special? What is it about me that makes you want *me* when Superman could have any woman in the world just by lifting a finger?"
He put his arms around her and pulled her against his chest. "Because you're Lois Lane," he said, "and none of those other women are. Whatever it is that makes you *you* is what I need. I can't be happy without you and I want you with me to boss me around for as long as we both live."
She giggled through her tears. "Well, you'll have that for sure."
"Good," he said, and kissed her.
**********
Epilogue
Lois opened her eyes. She was still in Clark's apartment, still on his sofa and the television was muttering in the background. The movie playing at the moment, she realized after several seconds, was "It's a Wonderful Life". The clock on the wall said it was one o'clock in the morning.
Her back was warm, and after a second of incomprehension, she realized it was because she was lying back against Clark, who was sound asleep against the pillows of the couch, with one arm still firmly around her. It looked like the events of the day had worn even Superman out.
She turned to study his sleeping face and smiled. Even asleep, he was gorgeous, and it was finally beginning to sink in that he was hers and had been hers from almost the minute she had met him. How could any woman be so lucky?
The sound that had awakened her came again: the music of her cell phone. She fumbled quickly for her purse and grabbed it. "Lois Lane."
"Oh, Ms. Lane!" It was Bernard Klein's voice. "I thought your phone would be turned off and I could just leave you a message! I'm sorry if I woke you!"
"Uh ... no, I was watching a movie. What is it?"
"Uh -- well, I wanted to give you the results of the tests I ran this afternoon. Maybe you could drop by STAR Labs in the morning and I could run a couple more just to be certain. It's Christmas, so practically no one will be there."
"Why don't you tell me what you've found," Lois said. "Then we'll know if it's worth it."
"Uh -" Dr. Klein appeared to dither for a moment and then gave in. "I suppose so. In the classic sense of the joke, I have both good news and bad news."
"Oh?"
"Well --" The scientist's voice was quivering with suppressed excitement. "The good news is that somehow the Red Kryptonite laser turned you into a solar battery much like Clark is. You absorb sunlight and as far as I can tell will have Superman's powers for the rest of your life."
"What?" Her exclamation brought Clark awake.
"What's going on?" he asked.
"Dr. Klein's on the phone." She spoke to the scientist again. "What's the bad news?"
"Well, I'm not sure the news is really all that bad," Dr. Klein said. "It's just that -- well, your battery can't take as full a charge as Clark's can. When you were first given his powers, you received the full charge from a fully powered battery, so to speak. But you can't retain that level of charge for very long, so the powers ran out more quickly, especially after being exposed to the Kryptonite. When you charged up again on your own, you got a lower level of the powers. You'll be faster than an ordinary human, and stronger, and probably considerably tougher, but not completely invulnerable. As for the other powers, you'll have to try them out and see what you can do. If you'll drop by in the morning, I'd like to try to determine your capabilities more exactly -- and I hope you'll keep me informed in the future."
"All right," Lois said. "We'll be there around nine."
"Great!" She had to stifle a giggle at the similarity of Dr. Klein's excitement to that of a child with a new toy. "I'll see you then. And --" He hesitated. "Merry Christmas, Ms. Lane."
"Merry Christmas to you too, Dr. Klein," she said. She closed the phone and turned to Clark. "Did you hear that?"
He shook his head. "I don't eavesdrop on your phone calls," he said. "What's the bad news?"
"Well, it's not really that bad," she said. "We'll find out more in the morning -- but he says I've still got some of your powers, and I'm going to keep them." She found that she was smiling, and leaned forward to kiss him squarely on the mouth. "I just thought of something."
"What?"
"Intergang is in for a *lot* of trouble," she said, a note of glee in her voice. "This is going to be *fun*!"
The End
