As Carol doesn't think I need to thank her for her beta work, I won't this time
*.*.*.
- from Part Nine
"We're escaping?" Clark asked as one of his old jump-suits flew across the room and hit him smack in the face.
"You bet. But first we have to come up with a plan before the microphones are installed."*.*.*.
Part Ten*.*.*.
The final illuminated digit of the clock changed from 0 to 1 but no one noticed. Donna sat alone in a room near Lois and Clark's watching them on a monitor, her tired eyes too busy to register how late into the night it was. Something had happened since Clark's disappearance and she wasn't sure who to.
She'd been working with the alien constantly since she had graduated, steadily climbing the ladder to her current position within Bureau 39. For some reason she'd been born without the maternal instinct, which had allowed her to focus solely on her career. Her sister had got married and had kids, in fact Donna's oldest nephew was currently planning his own wedding and while she'd always managed to play the doting aunt, she had never really liked children. Which was why Clark had always been 'the alien' in her eyes and not a little boy under her care. She'd never seen any humanity in him, she'd never looked for it, but watching him with Lane she could see the obvious affection between the pair. It was love, pure and simple. Donna took a gulp from her glass of water. She knew she was jealous and she hated it. This alien specimen she'd been studying had found in a matter of days something she hadn't found in her whole life. Not that she'd grown up without love, her family loved her and she loved them, but it wasn't that sort of love he'd found with Lane, it was different. It was rare and special.
Earlier in the day, after being concerned about the effects the sun exposure had on Clark, they'd exposed him to kryptonite to weaken him in an attempt to make sure he wouldn't be able to escape. He had already encountered a very small dose from the gas Mrs. Cox had used to render the pair unconscious before transporting them back to Metropolis, but as designed it had only upset his system enough to allow the drugged vapour to affect him. Lane had been locked in the bedroom as they debilitated him but she hadn't been absent at all. She'd been pounding on the door, yelling at them to stop hurting him. Although she couldn't feel it physically, his pain was now her pain. It had taken Donna many threats and the production of a large needle containing some sedative to get her to quieten down enough for the lab technicians to concentrate on their job, although she'd never stopped threatening them. Now they were lying on the bed, Lois cradling Clark's head against her chest as he struggled to readjust after the exposure. Yes, it made Donna feel jealous and it also made her feel guilty. Clark was no longer an alien to her, she could see now that he was a man, albeit one from another planet. She wasn't sure if he had changed after meeting Lane, or if seeing him with her had changed her own opinion but something had caused her perception to shift. If it were down to her she'd try to initiate a programme to introduce him into the world but it wasn't her call to make. It once had been Trask's and now it was Luthor's. Donna knew well enough that neither man would allow that to happen.
She went to take another sip of water, only to find the cup empty as she held it to her parched lips. Placing the glass back down onto its coaster, she stood up and switched off the monitor, leaving the clock to slowly count away the minutes on its own.
*.*.*.
Lois ran her hands soothingly through Clark's dark locks, massaging his scalp and playing with the ends of his hair between her fingers. He was so lucky, she thought, not a split-end in sight and she'd seen how cheap his shampoo was. Her eyelids started to droop as her motions and the steady breathing of her companion lulled her towards slumber. Clark was already asleep. She was so far gone that she barely heard the creaking of the door and the footfalls of the person it emitted. A detached part of her mind thought she was already asleep and that at some point she would wake up in her own bed, alone and feel bitterly disappointed that she had only dreamt Clark. Still, he would make a perfect hero for her next romantic novel that she would never dare publish. Tall, dark, handsome, intelligent, caring, swe--
"Wake up!" hissed a woman's voice, jolting Lois out of her dreamlike thoughts.
Clark's head jerked up off her lap, allowing Lois to sit up enough to see the woman's silhouette in the darkened room. "Who's that?"
"Follow me," the stranger's voice was still an insistent hiss, "I'm going to break you out of here."
The captives exchanged a look. Clark seemed hesitant, unwilling to trust some newcomer who had broken into Luthor's bunker but Lois decided to take the plunge, desperate to leave. "What's the worst that could happen?" she asked Clark, trying to nudge his indecision as she scrambled off the bed.
"We could be killed," Clark mumbled ominously as he followed suit, keeping as close to Lois as possible as he went with the two women through the darkened maze of tunnels. Lois might not know the identity of their 'helper' but he could see better in the dark than humans, although not brilliantly as he also needed visible light to see, and he *did* know who it was. He knew that Dr. Wicks was as likely to kill them as rescue them, although he couldn't really imagine her doing either, she had always seemed rather placid and unimaginative to him. Still, here she was, apparently risking everything to free them. He couldn't help but wonder why and then he wondered *why* he wondered why. He'd never been that curious before, or had he? Had he just suppressed his curiosity because it never got him anywhere? Bureau 39 had only told him what *they* wanted him to know, not what *he* wanted to know. Was this yet another new side Lois had brought out of him? He didn't know.
He breathed in the sweet air of Metropolis at night as Dr. Wicks brought them out of the underground bunker where they had been held captive for about the last 24 hours, although it had felt a lot longer to them. Street lights twinkled beside the high-rise buildings, mixing with car headlights and the soft light from people's bedside lamps. Metropolis never knew true darkness but the shadows cast created strange and almost frightening shapes and figures in the unlit alleyways, turning the streets into something unfamiliar and otherworldly even to those who used them routinely during daylight hours.
As soon as Donna knew they were out of sight of the LexCorp security cameras she stopped and looked at Lois and Clark with a scrutinising glance. She pulled her jumper off and handed it to Lois, who eyed the article of clothing suspiciously. "You can't walk around Metropolis in a jumpsuit, even at night, unless you want it to look obvious that you're escaping from somewhere that's supposed to be secure. That'll hide what you're wearing well enough."
"What about me?" Clark asked her, suddenly conscious that he was wearing the exact same incriminating outfit as Lois.
"You can fly," Donna said simply, then she took in a breath as her demeanour changed. "I have no idea what'll happen now. Luthor will probably work out that it was me who set you free but that's not your concern, it's mine. What you have to worry about is not getting caught again. For you Lois, that's easy. Make sure you're always with someone completely unconnected with us. No one will be able to make a move without raising suspicion that way. Clark, you need to fly to the other side of the world and stay there, always alert. I don't honestly know if you'll ever be able to hide from Luthor and Bureau 39 but you can move fast enough that if you see them, you can escape them. Most importantly, you two have got to keep away from each other." She shrugged, her self-confidence shot as she realised how wrong she had been over her previous assessment of Clark. "That's my advice, anyway. Take it or leave it."
The pair watched as the scientist turned away and melted into the background then vanished. "She's right," Lois said emotionlessly, not trusting herself to be able to hold herself together if she let him see how badly the idea of never seeing him again affected her.
"No!" Clark exclaimed. "I'd rather be locked up in a lab with you than live on the run without you. Come with me, we can go to the other side of the world together."
"My place is here," Lois told him, fighting back the tears that threatened to tell the truth that she wanted nothing more than for him to take her into his arms and fly off into the ether but they couldn't hide forever. The only way for them to have a normal life would be if she could somehow bring down LexCorp and Bureau 39. It wouldn't be impossible, she had destroyed companies before. Maybe none of them had been as big and powerful but that only made the targets that much more alluring, especially as it was now personal. For some reason though, Lois couldn't tell Clark this. She knew he'd get all protective over her and start worrying about her safety. Just because she was a lot less invulnerable than he was. "You should go."
"I don't want to leave you on your own. If Luthor should catch you--"
"He won't," Lois placed a hand on his arm and fought the shiver that the simple touch sent tingling down her spine, "so long as I go now. I promise to lock all the doors and windows and sleep with a weapon under my pillow, OK? But *you* need to go. Now."
Clark sighed in resignation. He knew he'd never win if he battled against her but he cared so much more for her safety than his own. And he had nowhere to go. He wanted to go back to the Kents' if he couldn't stay with her but wouldn't that be one of the first places they'd look for him? It was, after all, where they had found him last time. "OK but I will be back to check on you every now and then."
"Fair enough, just don't get caught."
Clark nodded and without looking at her again he flew away. He knew that if he watched her as he left, he wouldn't be able to leave her behind. He had only managed to fly out of the reporter's sight before the pain hit him. In the rush of escaping he had forgotten about the kryptonite exposure, and he struggled to keep his altitude as he pushed his body harder than he had ever pushed it before. She had told him not to get caught, he couldn't let her down, no matter how difficult it was to keep going. What he needed to do was to go somewhere with a lot of sun to get his energy back so that he could use his abilities to protect Lois from Luthor. He gritted his teeth as the clouds massed around him and the light grew brighter as he flew across the planet and into the next day. He'd be back, he wouldn't lose her that easily. Now that he knew what he wanted, he would fight with all he had to get it and would never give up. A life with Lois Lane, that was his ultimate goal.
*.*.*.
Finally Lois had got into her apartment, her hands shaking too much for her to undo the locks with any speed. She closed the door, drawing the bolt across and collapsed onto the floor. Suddenly all the worry and tears she'd been hiding since waking up in the bunker came flooding out. She could hardly believe it had only been that morning. She hadn't given into the despair for two reasons: Clark and Bureau 39. She wouldn't give Luthor the satisfaction of knowing that they'd got to her and she wouldn't increase Clark's guilt because she knew he already blamed himself for their capture. If she'd fallen apart like this in front of him, she didn't know if he'd have been able to cope with it and she knew she would never have been able to cope with the look of absolute guilt and horror she knew would be all over his face. It would have caused her even more pain and in turn cause him more pain and it just would have got worse and worse until both of them were complete and utter emotional wrecks.
"Lois?!" a woman's voice called out to her, followed by running footsteps. Lois started to rise back onto her feet when Lucy came racing over to the door, drawing her sister into a massive hug. "Oh, God Lois, I've been so worried. I've had Mom and your boss on the phone all day and I had to bribe your landlord into giving me a spare set of keys."
"Lucy," Lois gasped, before pulling herself free and heading to her couch where she sank down onto a cushion, unable to rely on her legs, "what are you doing here? Why aren't you at college?"
Lucy snorted as she joined her sister, sitting a little closer than usual as she sensed Lois' need for comfort. "Term doesn't start for two weeks and we have a bug problem in our house. Halls ought to be ready in time for classes but we can't live there at the moment so I thought I'd come back here, only to discover my sister's gone AWOL. Where *have* you been."
"I can't say but I am *so* glad that you're here. I have made some pretty powerful enemies, who are going to be a lot less likely to attack me with you staying here."
"Gee, thanks for making me feel so welcome."
"Sorry," Lois had recovered enough strength to stand again, so she headed towards the bathroom to try and scrub any reminder of Bureau 39 off her skin, sad at the thought that she was also going to be cleansing herself of Clark. "I'm gonna have a shower then I'm off to bed."
Lucy watched her leave, then she picked up the spare bedding that had been left on the couch, wondering who her sister was sheltering for a story this time and what exactly she was sheltering them from. "Er, Lois!" she called over the noise of the running water coming from the bathroom.
"What?"
"It is all right me being here?"
A moment later Lois' wet head peeked through the door, squinting at her little sister, trying to understand what she was going on about this time. "Sure. Why wouldn't it be?"
She held up the bedding so that Lois could see it. "It's just that this was left out here, folded up neatly but still out. Is someone else staying here, 'cause if they are I can--"
"No," Lois said, a little too sharply. She softened her voice, hoping not to arouse Lucy's interest any more than it had been by the bedding being there in the first place. "No. I had a source staying here a couple of nights ago, I guess I just never got around to putting it away."
Lucy nodded as Lois' head vanished again back into the shower. It was such a shame; Lois was such a private person and Lanes were an inherently nosy breed. She'd never really know what was happening in her sister's life, not unless Lois wanted to tell her. Something about the bedding had spooked her, although not quite as much as whatever had happened to her before arriving home and Lucy knew it would take a great deal of prodding for her to find out what from her tight-lipped sister.
*.*.*.
Lex stared out the windows of his penthouse at the dark rooftops of Metropolis. The day was bright and sunny with clear blue skies but it should have been dull, overcast and raining. To the multimillionaire, this was his proof that there were no such things as fate, destiny and higher powers directing life on Earth. A conscientious creator would make sure that the weather reflected their main character's mood, and he knew enough to know that he would be the hero, even if he wasn't technically 'the good guy'. However nature was not going along with his wishes and today was just another one with cloudless blue skies. The weather was only one more thing he intended to have under his control one day, although perhaps not just yet. He knew he'd have to wait for the technology to be invented first. Perhaps he ought to start looking into meteorological scientists and see what ones he could pay to create a machine to enable him to control the weather. He was sure there must be such a man and most likely already settled in Metropolis. A smile of relief appeared on his face as he heard the doors open and heavy footsteps enter the room. Finally someone was coming to inform him of what he already knew. He'd been waiting for hours for this moment and was seriously considering firing someone for incompetence.
"Sir, there's been an alarming development with regards to the alien, Clark."
"Yes, Nigel, I am well aware of that," Lex swivelled around in his chair to regard his aid. "They've escaped. An inside job, doubtless someone from Bureau 39. Or maybe more to the point, STAR Labs."
Nigel approached the desk, emotionless. "Mrs. Cox has already assembled a group of guards to search for them but I fear it is a hopeless task. Given Clark's abilities, the chances that they are still on this continent are very small."
Lex stood up and walked around the desk, thinking aloud. "The key to Clark is not Clark or his abilities, but the woman. I have been doing some research into our new friend; she is not the run and hide type. When is my next event to be held, Nigel?"
"Three days, the White Orchid Ball, with the planned announcement on Space Station Luthor."
"And we have sent invitations out to all the press organisations, have we not?"
Nigel nodded in confirmation, "Yes, in order to gain their backing for the proposal."
"Miss Lane is the top reporter for the Daily Planet and considering our recent interactions, she'll be there." He took out a cigar and lit it, puffing the smoke into the air, turning it thick and dark. "Obviously we cannot grab her in the middle of a crowded ballroom, that would be rude and I am a better host than that."
"So what is your plan then? Maybe to plant a tracking device on her, so that she can take us to Clark?"
Lex honestly considered Nigel's idea for a moment, "No, but an interesting thought. No, I intend only a little reconnaissance. I fear we are at a stalemate situation and before we plan our next move we need to know exactly what we are up against. We need to make sure that Miss Lane stays here and continues with her normal routine, but our biggest problem is our lack of allies in the scientific community. We must do something about that, so that next time we have Clark under our control, we will know that no one will let us down again."
"What do you want me to do?"
He sat back into his chair as his he plotted his scheme in his head. "Send Asabi to me, we need to discuss the ball, and set up a meeting with Dr. Wicks. I have a few things I wish to talk to her about."
*.*.*.
Clark hovered above the Kansas farmhouse, looking down on the quiet and peaceful countryside. He was high up enough that anyone who saw him wouldn't notice him and would probably mistake him for a bird if they did. The last chords of the dawn chorus filtered up through the sky to his ears as the red sky faded into the yellow light of day. There was no activity at the Kents'. He could detect no signs of life there except for the cat, slinking around the nearby barn as it hunted rats. He couldn't see anyone lurking around, watching the farmhouse, which he didn't find at all comforting. Surely Luthor would have someone in Smallville watching the couple for suspicious activity, even with Lois and Clark safely locked away. He briefly wondered whether or not their disappearance had been picked up on yet but pushed that thought away. Right now, it wasn't his main concern.
After double checking to see if there was anyone around, he swooped down and flew in through a window faster than the human eye could see and landed in the kitchen. He walked over to the sink to turn off the dripping water; the whole house was suspiciously quiet and the constant drip sound was sending shivers down his spine. As he turned the handle his eyes fell on the contents of the sink. A familiar saucepan containing water and some sort of goo that appeared to be the dinner Lois had tried to cook for them that night. He swallowed and fought the impulse to x-ray through the walls, because the first place he knew he'd look would be the spare bedroom. Not very helpful in his search and just some more torment for him. He had to find the Kents, he needed to know that they hadn't suffered because of him. As he took a better look at his surroundings, he realised that nothing had changed. He knew them well enough to know that Martha kept the place very neat and he had always intended to clean up in the morning, but considering how long he'd been away it didn't look good that Martha hadn't bothered to do it for them. What had they done to her so that she couldn't do the washing up and clear the table? He moved through the house; it was completely empty. Beds were unmade, especially the one in the spare room where he was currently stood. The duvet was missing, obviously the pair had been wrapped up in it before they had been bundled away back to Metropolis but there was no Jonathan or Martha in sight. At least there was no trace of blood, he had been so worried that he'd come across their tortured bodies lying beside each other in their bed. He'd found nothing. Their bed hadn't been made either but it only looked like it had been slept in. If something had happened to the Kents, it hadn't happened in the house. Still, if Lois and Clark had been moved out, why not Jonathan and Martha? He headed back out to the kitchen, determined to search through the barns and fields. He'd find them, he had to.
He left the house and walked out into the fields, scouring them for any sign of the Kents or people who might be watching them, people that he could get answers from after applying a little bit of pressure. There was no sign of anyone, except a neighbouring farmer working a few fields away. Clark doubted that the man was a spy of Luthor's, there had been a few pictures dotted around the farmhouse of him and Jonathan throughout various stages of life. They had known each other for decades from what Clark had seen, certainly a lot longer than he'd been alive, so if the farmer was a spy then Bureau 39 must have known about his arrival years before Krypton had exploded. Which is why he dismissed the thought almost instantly.
Clark found himself walking towards the copse where Jonathan had hidden the globe from his ship. He stopped automatically beside the tree without having to go through the complicated ritual Jonathan had used to locate it. A dash of white coming from the hole in the trunk caught his eye. Clark reached in and pulled out a slightly battered piece of folded paper, but it was not battered enough to have been left out for more than a few days.
He opened it gingerly, not wanting to tear it. It was a note, written hastily, but for him from Jonathan. It gave him the address of a friend of theirs where they had gone to stay until the situation with Bureau 39 was under control, and little else. Clark neatly refolded the paper and put it in his pocket, not wanting to risk anyone else finding it or them, and he flew off to find the Kents.
*.*.*.
"Clark!" He'd barely touched down in the garden of their friend's house when he found himself engulfed in two pairs of arms as the Kents hugged him. "We were so worried about you, you'd just vanished."
"Yeah," Jonathan agreed, "we've spent the last day looking for the two of you."
Clark smiled and managed to pull away from their embrace. Martha looked at him, concern in her motherly eyes. "Where's Lois? Is she OK? What happened?"
"She's fine, I think," Clark told them, and gestured at the house, "why don't we go inside and sit down. I'm still not entirely sure what happened but I'll tell you what I know. I'm so glad you two are unhurt. When I arrived and couldn't find you, I was beginning to fear the worst."
"We're fine," Jonathan assured him, as they lead Clark inside and towards the dining table, "now tell us what happened."
Clark took in a deep breath, and he told them the story from when they'd woken up at Bureau 39.
To Be Continued...
