TOC Part 20 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
JOURNAL ENTRY #21
JUNE, 1997
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The assault started well outside Cadmus. Dudley, Karen, Aymee, Jack, and Penny went up to the higher floors of several neighboring buildings. Phillip worked with them to jam any radio communication signals not set to our specific frequencies that were going into or coming out of the target area.
With that in place, we sent Hawk Master into the building itself, and had her chew on some key wires. That provided enough of a distraction for Lin to get in. She couldn't get in far, but she didn't need to. She got into place and set up a teleport beacon. Alan beamed in with a tank full of shrink shampoo, which he quickly attached to the building's sprinkler system. Lin, meanwhile, disabled the fire alarm, making sure it wouldn't attract the attention of anyone outside the building.
When they were both done, Hawk Master was sent zipping through the building, setting off all the sprinklers with her heat vision. She came back before the first drops had hit the floor, and teleported back to base with Lin and Alan.
A few minutes later, we sent Hawk Master back to Cadmus. The shampoo had run out, but it had done its job. Everyone in the building had been reduced to a mere few inches of height. Hawk Master had no trouble herding them into little cages, which were then teleported away.
Lin and I entered next, sweeping the building to be sure we'd gotten everyone. Alan and Hamilton teleported in behind us and set up a force field dome to ensure that we wouldn't be interrupted. The whole operation was going extremely smoothly, but it wouldn't have been possible without Hawk Master's detailed scouting. The teleporter made it a lot easier, too.
Lin and I made our way to the lab, where we set about copying all the files we could find. We were about to put the explosives in place when cry came from one of the large boxy pieces of equipment. Startled, we moved over to it and carefully opened the lid. We both gasped. There was a baby inside. There were monitors attached to it, but it seemed to be healthy and well-developed. Old enough that it didn't need an umbilical cord.
I couldn't be sure just by looking, but I had a good guess as to where the baby had come from. It seemed Cadmus hadn't just gotten close to creating a human-kryptonian hybrid clone. They'd succeeded.
Panicked, I called the others. It was decided that we'd teleport the baby to the Fortress, and figure the rest out from there. It was the only possible option. We sent the entire crib/monitor set-up, along with all the notes and information we'd gathered.
With that done, we got back to the plan. We set explosives throughout the building, activated the timers, and teleported back to the Fortress. Force field generators set up outside the building kept the explosion in check, making certain that the building was completely consumed but that the neighboring area was not threatened. The sonic bubble even kept the sound of the explosion bottled up.
We'd done it! We'd captured most of Cadmus's major players, destroyed their headquarters, and stopped their plans. We had evidence on most of the important people we'd captured, and there would certainly be more in the files we'd taken. We'd have little trouble seeing that they were put away by the authorities for a good long time. Until we were ready to do so, we would have little trouble keeping them contained at their current size.
There was only one thing left to do. We had to figure out what to do with the baby. Looking through the notes, Phillip was easily able to confirm that it was a human-kryptonian hybrid. The kryptonian genes had come from Clark, of course, on one of the occasions when he'd encountered Kryptonite and had left some blood behind. It took a little more digging to learn about the human genes, but when we did, we were delighted by the choice of donor. It seemed the people in charge at Cadmus had decided to take a sample from the human most closely associated with Superman. The one most likely to be compatible with him. The one, perhaps, who would make the most ironic choice. Lois Lane.
The baby was, genetically speaking, Lois and Clark's child. Once that was clear, there was really only one thing we could do. We teleported into their living room. Fortunately, Clark's parents had already sent a proper bassinet. It saved us some trouble, since there was no way we wanted to use Cadmus's evil-looking metallic "crib" for this. We wrapped the baby in a Superman blanket (innocuous enough — they were available in just about every baby store in the country — but still meaningful to Lois and Clark) and left a note. We'd been forced to keep that simple, since we couldn't risk telling them too much about ourselves. It said, simply, "Lois and Clark, this child belongs to you." It was all they needed to know. Well, that and the research into how to make human and kryptonian genes compatible. That, we left in a sealed envelope underneath the bassinet. They'd find it in time, we'd decided. Let them focus on more important matters first.
We waited, invisible, to be sure that the baby would be okay. I have to admit, we also couldn't resist seeing Lois and Clark's faces when they came into the room. We stood, all of us, arrayed across the back of the room. A soft cry rose from the crib. Lois and Clark answered the call, to find the sleeping infant waiting for them. Soon, they were joined by their parents.
We watched the looks of wonder and astonishment cross all their faces, and knew, without a doubt, that we had done the right thing. There would be questions, of course, but those questions would be secondary to the reality of the baby gurgling happily in Lois's surprised but loving embrace. Our most important task was complete. We'd performed a miracle.
Comments Epilogue
