PREVIOUSLY...
A sudden commotion coming from the next room interrupted her thoughts. Both Lois and Clark leapt to their feet, rushing to the door. When Lois got there first and threw it open, they were confronted by the sight of men with guns, holding the entire newsroom in their sights.
Clark ducked back out of sight, but before Lois could do the same, one of the men spotted her.
“Hold it right there!” he yelled.
Lois froze.
“Do you have your powers?” Lois whispered out of the side of her mouth to her husband.
“No,” was his disheartening response.
AND NOW...
* * * * * * * * *
Chapter Forty-One
* * * * * * * * *
Due to the lateness of the hour, Lois, Clark, Jimmy, Perry, Cat, Claude and Eduardo were the only ones left in the newsroom. All of them, except Clark, now sat in a close circle on the floor while two men with guns silently watched them. The other men were off in the storage room, doing... something that none of the hostages was in a position to see.
Clark quietly crept back to the conference room table, silently pulling the phone off of it and placing a whispered call to 9-1-1 before crawling back over to the open conference room door so that he could see the proceedings in the adjoining room.
“So do you want to tell me what the Sam Hill you’re doing in my newsroom?” Perry demanded.
The two men with guns just silently stared at him.
And so they waited, the hostages wondering what was going on and Clark praying for the return of his powers, until the man who appeared to be in charge - a big, burly man in his mid-thirties, longish hair, wearing a well-worn leather jacket and with a neck covered in tattoos - reemerged from the storage room. He approached, his eyes flicking from person to person - taking particular interest in both Cat and Lois.
Clark tensed.
“So which one of you is Lois Lane?” the man asked.
“I am,” Lois answered.
Clark cringed. Why hadn’t she pretended that Lois had gone home for the night? She could have been Sally or Beth or... Almost anyone else. Anyone other than Lois Lane. No bad guys ever wanted to talk to Lois Lane for anything good. But did she think about that? No. Once again, she was determined to dangle over the jaws of death. He tested his powers again, fighting the urge to growl in frustration when there were still no sign of them.
“What’s this all about?” Lois demanded.
“You’re the one who wrote that story,” the man said.
“What story?” Lois asked.
Clark, too, searched his mind, trying to figure out what story the man with the gun might be referring to. After all, they’d spent the last couple of days going through story after story. How were they supposed to know which story had offended these particular scumbags?
“The one about my boy, Dragon,” the man responded.
It took Clark a moment to place that story. But suddenly he had it. It was the story that Lois had been working on in both realities. The one that they’d read when they’d first arrived in this strange reality. The story that had told Clark that Lois was still alive.
“Allegations of Corrupt Jury Puts Dragon Trial In Doubt,” Lois said as if in answer to his thoughts.
“Don’t mess with the Dragon,” the man said. “He’s the cruelest, most sadistic, most feared cutthroat in all of Metropolis. He killed his parents when he was three and it’s been downhill ever since. And now you’re accusing him of messing with the jury at his trial.”
“Isn’t he?” Lois asked.
Clark felt the wild urge to scream. He didn’t have his powers. She knew that. “Don’t provoke him, Lois,” he hissed under his breath even though he knew she couldn’t hear him.
“Of course he is,” the leader said. “But you shouldn’t have told the world about it.”
“All I said was that there were allegations. That’s a long way from proof. That’s why I only got page three.”
“Still... I got my orders. We’re to take care of you before you find any of that proof.”
Lois glanced around at everyone. “Then let them go,” she said.
“Lo-is...” Clark hissed, trying to project his displeasure with this plan to her telepathically.
“It’s me you want... Let them go,” Lois continued, either not getting his message, or choosing to ignore it - knowing Lois, it could very well be the latter.
“Sorry, toots,” the man responded. “I let them go and they’re going to immediately call for help and I can’t have that.”
“We’re ready, boss.” A second man had just emerged from the storage room.
“Good. All right, everyone, get up.”
Two more men with guns emerged from the storage room as the newsroom crowd did as commanded, groaning and shaking out cramped muscles.
“Now... move...” The leader gestured them towards the storage room.
He waited until they were all inside before speaking again. He pointed to a device attached to the back of the door. Even from his position in the conference room, Clark could still hear the man. He wasn’t sure if that meant his hearing was coming back, or not. But given that his hearing was usually the first of his powers to return... He tried to float, but still was unable to do so. He might be a little more than normal, but he was still a long way from super.
“I’m sure you all know what that is,” the leader of the gang said.
“A bomb!” Claude exclaimed.
By the volume of Claude’s voice, Clark knew that Claude was already in full panic mode. But how were the rest handling it? How was Lois handling it? He glanced out into the newsroom.
Damn! There were still a couple men with guns milling around out there.
* * * * * * * * *
Lois chewed silently on her lower lip. All was not yet lost. After all, Clark was still free. She had no doubt that by now he’d called the police, but... how long would it take them to get here? She glanced at the device the leader had pointed out. It had fifteen minutes on the timer, but so far the numbers weren’t counting down. That meant she needed to buy the police more time. She opened her mouth to speak, but Claude got there first.
“Listen,” Claude begged. “You don’t need me here. You can let me go. Really. I won’t say anything. Or take me with you! Yes! You could take me with you and then only release me after the bomb goes off. I’d never even have a chance to call for help. And I won’t say anything about you. I swear. Really. I’ll forget I was even here. And...”
The lead man shut Claude up by driving the butt of his gun into Claude’s mouth. With a scream of pain, Claude collapsed back, forcing Cat to catch him as he crumpled to the floor.
“Now, just to make sure you don’t do something foolish,” the leader continued conversationally, “the trigger will be armed the instant the door is closed. And I should warn you, the bomb is very sensitive to vibrations, so I wouldn’t try getting the door open. Anyway, enjoy the final fifteen minutes of your life.” With that, his men exited the room.
“Wait!” Lois said, trying to stall him. “How about an interview?”
The leader ignored her, walking out of the room and closing the door behind him. The large bolt lock on the door, the one that was never used and couldn’t be opened from either side without a key, clicked and the numbers on the bomb began to count down.
“We have to get out of here!” Claude immediately gasped, scrambling to his feet. He rushed for the door. Only Eduardo and Jimmy tackling him were able to keep him from getting there and setting off the bomb.
Once things calmed, Perry looked around the room. “Okay, folks, I guess the best we’re going to be able to do is to move some of this junk, try to make some kind of barrier between ourselves and the bomb.”
“What about going out the window, Chief?” Jimmy asked.
“The drop to the ground would kill anyone who tried it,” Eduardo said.
Lois had to agree.
“What about Kent?” Eduardo asked. “He’s still around here somewhere, isn’t he?”
“He’s probably long gone by now,” Perry said. “Saving his own hide, no doubt.”
“He’d never do something like that!” Lois objected automatically. Still, by the skeptical looks she could see on the faces around her, she didn’t pursue the subject - reminding herself that now was not the time.
“Okay, let’s get to work. We’ve still got a barrier to build,” Perry said and soon everyone was working to do exactly that.
Lois was keeping an ear open, however, for what she knew would be coming. It didn’t take long.
“Lois?” she finally heard through the door.
Leaving her task, she rushed to the door, careful not to touch it. “Clark?”
His sigh of relief was so loud that she could hear it from her side of the door.
“How bad is it?” he asked, even as Perry came over to join Lois.
“Is that Kent?” Perry asked, sounding slightly surprised.
“Yeah,” she said using her best ‘I told you so’ voice, before continuing with a raised voice to be sure Clark would hear her. She wished she could ask if his powers had returned, but with Perry standing so close, that wasn’t possible. “There’s a bomb attached to the inside of the door. It has a timer that now says... eleven minutes, thirty-five... thirty-four seconds.”
“Okay, well, I found the keys to the storage room, so if you’ll just stand back...”
“No, Clark! The leader said that the bomb was also motion sensitive - and given that it started counting down when the lock was turned, I think the two things might be connected..”
“Have the police been called?” Perry asked.
“Yes, sir. And I’ve told them to notify the bomb squad, too. But their ETA at the moment is still fifteen to twenty minutes,” Clark responded.
“Could you... maybe find something from the outside that would reach the window?” Lois asked, hoping that if Clark had his powers, that might give him the excuse he needed to find something, anything to get them out of this.
“Like what?” Perry asked. “We’re too high up for a regular ladder.”
“I agree with Perr... Mr. White, hon... Lois,” Clark responded. “But...” There was a long pause. “Can you describe the bomb to me?”
“What good will that do?” Perry asked.
“I know something about defusing bombs, Mr. White. If Lois can describe it to me, I might be able to tell her how to disarm it.”
Lois took a deep breath. He was right. They had done this before - when the Churches had tried to blow up the Metropolis Museum. Only that time, Clark had been able to see the bomb. This time.... Okay, so maybe this time would be a bit more difficult, but... “Okay, Clark, what I see is...”
“What?” Claude gasped from behind Lois. “Are you nuts? You’re going to blow us all to kingdom come! Just leave it alone. Maybe they wired it wrong. Maybe it won’t go off. Maybe the police will get here in time.”
“He can do this,” Lois said, trying to inject as much confidence as possible into her words. After all, he had defused enough bombs in his time as Superman. Surely he could talk her through this.
Perry stared at her hard for a long moment. She met and held his gaze. She trusted her husband. And she put all of her belief in him into her gaze with Perry.
After a moment, he nodded. “Okay, folks,” he said. “While these two try to figure out how to defuse the bomb, everyone continue working on the barrier and get behind it.”
“Okay,” Lois said, turning back to the door. “What I see is...” And for a time, she ignored the sounds of people behind her as she worked to be as accurate as possible on her description of what she could see, making sure that Clark would have a clear picture of it in his mind.
“Okay,” Clark said when she had finally finished. “I think I understand it now. So what I want you to do is...”
Suddenly, Lois jumped back when someone - it sounded like a woman - started screaming, practically incoherently. She spun around to see Claude dashing for the window. Other’s plunged after him, trying to grab him. But Claude was too quick. He had the window open and had jumped before the echoes of Perry’s yell of ‘no’ faded.
There was a sickening ‘thud’ sound coming from outside the window. Everyone was, a moment later, standing by the window to see Claude lying motionless on the pavement in the darkened alley.
“Okay,” Perry finally said. “Nothing we can do to help Claude at the moment. Everyone back behind the barrier.”
The crowd was subdued as they again crouched in their positions.
“Okay, Clark, what do I do?” Lois asked again.
“I want you to get back behind the barrier with the others. Have someone else follow my instructions for defusing the bomb,” Clark said.
Lois turned, observing all the eyes watching her from behind the barrier. She turned back to the door. “It has to be me.” She could practically feel her husband’s frustration leaking in around the doorframe. But it had to be her. She knew that. She suspected he did too. No one else would trust him enough to do this. Still, she gave him a moment to come to terms with the reality of the situation before saying, “Clark?”
She heard his sigh. “Okay, is there something around that you can use to cut the wires?”
She looked around. Cat slipped out from behind the barrier long enough to hand Lois a pair of scissors.
“I’ve got some scissors,” she said.
“Are they sharp?”
“Clark!”
“Okay, okay. You need to separate the wires. But be very, very careful. Don’t jiggle the wires any more than you absolutely have to.”
“And then what?”
“You’re going to be cutting the green wire - followed by very quickly cutting the yellow wire.”
Sweat accumulated on Lois’ brow as she carefully separated the wires. Once she had finally done so, she placed the scissors in position before hesitating. “Are you sure it’s the green one - and then the yellow one?”
“Lo-is.”
The single word was enough to reassure her. He was confident this was going to work. And if he was confident, then so was she. Still... “Okay, I’m going to cut. Move back from the door.”
“Lo-is,” he said again. “Just... cut the wires.”
Lois let out a breath of frustration. She’d prefer that he move back from the door - just in case. But she also knew her husband. He would rather face this bomb up close and personal, even without his powers, than be wrong and survive the blast that killed his wife. Besides, if his powers were starting to return, he might think he could possibly do something to save her if the bomb went off. If she had more time, she might be tempted to try to convince him that putting a few feet between himself and the bomb wouldn’t make much difference in those circumstances. But time was quickly running out. Less than a minute was left on the clock.
She turned to the people in the room. “Get down,” she instructed before holding her breath and...
...cutting first one and then, hands trembling, cutting the other.
For a moment, no one moved. Then Lois let out a breath.
“Are they cut?” Clark asked.
“They’re cut,” Lois responded, relief in her voice as she rose to her feet and reached for the door handle.
“Wait!” Perry said. “That thug said that it was also motion sensitive.”
Lois’ hand froze.
“Perry’s right, Lois,” Clark said. “I want you to get back behind the barrier now. I don’t think it will go off, but just in case it does when I open the door, I want you protected.”
“No!” Lois responded. “If you didn’t move back when I cut the wire, why should I move back when you...”
“Vicky.”
The single word stopped Lois’ tirade dead.
“Move back behind the barrier,” Clark said again.
“Maybe we should just wait for the police now,” Lois said. “The bomb squad could...”
“They would just have to do what I’m going to do,” Clark responded.
“Yeah, but they’d be wearing protective gear and... besides, it’s their job.”
“Lois, move back behind the barrier.”
Lois hesitated. She knew that voice. It was Superman’s voice. It was the tone Clark got when he was deadly serious. He obviously was still concerned about the bomb for some reason and had no intention of waiting for the police or the bomb squad. So... now her choices were to refuse to do what he said, hoping that would delay him long enough for the police to arrive, or do as he said.
Or... she could be the one to open the door. She was about to voice this idea when she suddenly realized what his responding argument would be. He might still have some of his invulnerability. Which meant, his ability to survive the bomb would be greater than hers. However, he wouldn’t be able to voice any of that. So he’d just keep stubbornly insisting that he be the one to open the door.
Besides, there was still the matter of the locked deadbolt. Before he could open the door, he’d have to turn the key in the lock. And he was the only one with the key. But maybe they could each take a portion of the risk - he turning the key while she waited in protection and she opening the door while he did the same.
Vicky was the final deciding factor. They didn’t have time for this argument - if the tone of Clark’s voice was any indication. She closed her eyes briefly before giving a small nod which she assumed he couldn’t see.
“Okay,” she finally responded, backing away from the door. Her final few steps were helped along by Perry who grabbed her, pulling her back into cover.
“Ready!” Perry called to the door.
And Lois held her breath.
Her eyes focused over the top of the barrier, she saw the lock slowly, so slowly that it was as if it were taking place in slow motion, turn. Then, there was the distinct sound of...
Click.
She let out a breath of relief when she heard the door swing open, agonizingly slowly, but without a ‘boom.’ Moving immediately, she rounded the barrier, her eyes seeing nothing but Clark. He was matching her, step for step. And then...
Cat was suddenly in front of her, throwing herself into Clark’s arms.
“You saved us,” Cat said.
Clark’s eyes met Lois’ over Cat’s shoulder. It was only then that Lois realized that Cat had probably saved them. After all, when Lois had been moving towards Clark, she’d completely forgotten that the two of them were supposed to be enemies in this reality. They would undoubtedly have given themselves away had Cat not interrupted the moment. In fact, as she thought about it now, she realized that in the moment, they’d forgotten to refer to each other as Lane and Kent. Still, nothing they could do about that now.
Coming back to the present, she realized that Cat was still in Clark’s arms. She felt herself tensing as anger involuntarily began to accumulate in the pit of her belly at seeing another woman in her husband’s arms. As if sensing her building rage, Clark quickly dislodged Cat’s hands from around his neck.
“Thanks, Kent,” Eduardo said, offering Clark his hand. Clark took it firmly.
“Yeah, smooth,” Jimmy said, giving Clark’s back a pat.
Perry was the last to approach. “Well done, son,” Perry said.
Clark beamed, hearing the term of endearment from Perry. Taking advantage of the situation, he instantly asked if he could have a moment of Mr. White’s time when they got out of there.
Perry looked at him for a moment before nodding.
“Okay, everyone, let’s get out of here quickly,” Clark said, practically herding everyone out of the room.
Lois was the last to go. Clark quickly pulled her in front of him, putting his body between her and the bomb.
“What was the rush?” she whispered to him as people began, without prompting, rushing for the stairs.
“When you described the bomb... Lois, it was a very amateurish job.”
“So?”
“With amateurs, you usually don’t get a very stable bomb. It could still go off. And it doesn’t necessarily require motion or a timer or anything else.”
Lois nodded. She had figured it must be something like that. Although, she’d also figured that he hadn’t wanted to say something for fear of causing a panic.
Only then did they hear the sirens that heralded the arrival of the police and fire department. As they stepped into the stairwell behind the others, Lois reached out, pulling the fire alarm. When Clark looked at her, she shrugged.
“I figure the police will want to empty the building before dealing with the bomb. Besides, I’ve always wanted to do that.”
Her husband grinned.
* * * * * * * * *
A moment didn’t come to talk to Perry White until quite a while later. The building had to be emptied. The bomb squad had to dispose of the bomb. The entire building had to be checked out. Claude had to be checked on. He was still alive, but they didn’t dare move him until the paramedics arrived. He was put in a back-brace before he was turned over and taken away in an ambulance, still unconscious.
The police had managed to nab Dragon’s gang - who had made the fatal mistake of hanging around outside the building, hoping to watch the excitement when the bomb went off - not counting on their victims being alive to identify them.
Lois and Clark considered calling it a night - it was late, after all. But they still had a couple of hours, provided they were allowed back in the building again, and neither wanted to squander the extra time.
Finally, the bomb squad announced that the place was safe and everyone was allowed back inside. When they arrived at the newsroom, Clark walked over to Perry.
“Could I speak to you now, Mr. White?”
Perry looked at him for a moment before gesturing Clark towards his office.
Clark waited until Perry closed the door before speaking. “I just wanted to apologize to you,” he said. When Perry looked confused, Clark continued. “The story, back a few years ago... The one where I accused you of taking bribes from Luthor...”
* * * * * * * * * *
Lois waited anxiously by her desk as Clark and Perry talked in her boss’ office. It didn’t take a genius to figure out what Clark was doing. He wanted to take advantage of Perry’s goodwill to get forgiveness for the story Kent had written about him all those years ago. Still, he and Perry seemed to be in there forever - the talk obviously intense. Perry actually seemed to be grilling Clark. Clark seemed to be holding up, however - answering every question as openly and honestly as circumstances would allow if Lois knew anything about her husband.
Her heart soared when she saw Perry finally reach out to shake Clark’s hand. This reality might end in a matter of hours - or at least, she sincerely hoped so - but it would mean so much to Clark to gain Perry’s forgiveness. The way Clark was beaming when he exited Perry’s office told Lois all she needed to know.
“Feel better?” Lois asked.
“You have no idea.”
She gave his arm a rub. When she saw Cat look over at them, she removed her hand. “We should go back to the conference room.”
Clark nodded and a moment later, they were again settling at their respective computers.
“You did good,” Lois said, giving him a quick kiss.
“You didn’t do too bad yourself,” Clark responded.
“Do you have any of your powers back?”
“Well, right near the end of defusing the bomb, my vision x-ray vision flicked in and out a few times, so I was able to get a couple of quick glimpses of the bomb - which definitely helped reassure me. I tried to convey that message to you as best as I could.”
“I got that. And yes, you did reassure me.”
“And I wanted to be the one to open the door because I figured if my vision was starting to come back, my invulnerability might be, too.”
“I figured that. Although, I also knew that you’d want to be the one to do it even if you didn’t have your powers, so... It was a little nerve-wracking agreeing to let you open the door. I sort of figured that might be the reason you wouldn’t back away when I was cutting the wires, too.”
He shrugged. “I guess I thought, maybe, if the bomb went off I could... I don’t know. I just knew that I’d need to do something. And maybe in that moment, I’d be fast enough to save you, or crash through the door before the bomb blast could hit you and cover you with my body or... well, something. I just knew I had to be in position to try.”
She gently rubbed his arm in a silent gesture of gratitude. “One thing I don’t understand,” she said after a moment. “Why didn’t they just shoot us? Why go to all the trouble of using a bomb?”
Clark shrugged. “Probably making some kind of statement. Maybe they intended to use it as a warning to others.”
“Wouldn’t just shooting us have done that?”
“I don’t know, honey. But... the obviously decided to do it this way. Maybe they thought it was more... theatrical or something. And I’m glad they did decide to use a bomb. Without my powers, I’d never have been able to stop the bullets.”
Lois nodded. She supposed some miracles shouldn’t be questioned. “So when you were talking to Perry, did you learn anything else that might help us?”
Clark shook his head. “Maybe I shouldn’t have wasted time like that, but I just...” He shrugged.
“No, Clark. You needed to do that. I understand. Still, I guess that means...” Lois gestured to her computer and a moment later they were both hard at work, looking for the next headline.
“Oh, wait. I think I’ve got something here,” Lois said a short time later. “Astronaut McBride Missing.”
“The story where Garret Grady was trying to bribe an astronaut into fixing an old weapon’s satellite instead of dismantling it?” He scooted his chair closer.
“Seems he tried the same thing in this reality.”
“He couldn’t have used Superman... or at least tried to use Superman to fix the satellite. But obviously McBride was still killed when he refused to do Grady’s bidding.”
“I remember something about that time. It was your birthday, as I recall.”
“So we went to a Chinese restaurant in the city,” Clark said, remembering as well. “You insisted that it was your treat, so you made reservations in the city, claiming that it wouldn’t be your treat if you didn’t provide the transportation as well. I think it was the first time we actually dared to stay in the city during one of our dates.”
**Clark noticed Lane look around the restaurant nervously. He knew immediately that she was checking to make sure she didn’t know anyone.
Not that he could blame her. They’d never talked about the possibility of going public. Although, at this point, given how well they had gotten to know each other in the last few months, Clark was starting to wonder if maybe it was time to broach the topic. They couldn’t hide forever, after all. Not if they were going to have the life together that he wanted.
And the idea of finally being able to introduce her to his parents, to take her to the farm... He had to admit, the past few months had been hard in that regard. He’d promised not to tell anyone - and he knew that included his parents. Still, it had put a strain on his relationship with his parents when he couldn’t talk about the biggest thing happening in his life. As a result, he wasn’t spending nearly as much time with them as he had in the past.
He hadn’t mentioned Lane to his parents before they’d started dating. At first, he’d been just so confused about the accusations being made against him. Then, he’d been ashamed of his actions - sleeping with a woman he wasn’t even in a relationship with. And now... when he finally could have told them about her, he’d given her his promise.
But when they finally went public... Clark just knew that his folks would love Lois.
The hostess had just led them to a table and they’d taken a seat when Lane gasped, dropping her fork and then crawling under the table after it.
Clark waited for a moment. “Lane?” he asked.
“Is he gone?”
Clark looked around. “Who?”
“Jimmy.”
Clark looked again. Lane was right. Jimmy was currently talking to the hostess with a young woman who was markedly taller than he by his side. After a few words, the hostess began leading them into the restaurant.
“He’s being shown to a table.”
“Oh no,” Lane groaned.
When Lane didn’t reemerge, Clark slipped out of his chair and joined her under the table. “This is crazy, Lane. So he sees us together. We’ve got to come clean sometime - that is, if our relationship is going to continue long term.”
“But I want to choose how he finds out - how they all find out.”
Clark let out a breath. “Okay, so what do you want to do?”
Lois thought for a moment. “You get out, stand between me and Jimmy. I’ll come out, using you as cover.”
Clark thought for a moment before nodding. This wasn’t the best place to have a discussion about when, if and how to go public. After all, a brief look with his x-ray vision, told him they were already starting to attract attention. A few moments later, they were exiting the restaurant.**
“I remember our conversation later that night,” Lois said. “You wanted to go public. I was concerned. My mother had just got out of rehab and I thought... Well, I wanted to wait until she was stable before hitting her with our relationship.”
“I remember,” Clark said. “So then... if that was what we were waiting for... Why didn’t we? Go public I mean.”
Lois gave her head a shake. “I don’t know. But I’m sure we’ll figure it out. Let’s keep going.”
The next few stories they found were about the rise and fall of Leslie Luckabee, aka Lex Luthor, Jr. Fortunately, Lois was never a target - given the fact, they assumed, that Lois had never been Lex Luthor’s target. But that didn’t stop Leslie’s attempt to rebuild his father’s empire.
“For some reason, I spent a lot of time during those investigations thinking about children.”
“Children?”
She nodded. “In fact, I remember a dream I had one night about that time...”
**Lois hummed softly to herself as she turned the sausages. Satisfied that they were well along, she cracked a couple of eggs into the frying pan. She wasn’t entirely sure why she was enjoying this so much, but she was. She moved from the frying pan to stick a couple pieces of bread into the toaster. She hadn’t even realized that she knew how to cook breakfast, but for some reason, this felt natural. She moved back to the frying pan, smiling when a pair of very welcome arms slipped around her waist.
“Good morning,” Kent said softly, his voice no more than a breath in her ear before he planted a kiss on her neck.
“A very good morning,” she responded, turning in his arms so that she could kiss him properly.
It never occurred to her to wonder where he’d come from. It seemed perfectly natural that he should be there.
The kiss spiraled out of control more quickly than she could have imagined and it was only a moment before their scant clothing was being removed just far enough to accomplish their shared goal as they made love on the kitchen floor.
“Where did that come from?” Lois gasped, pulling her robe back around her even as she continued to lie on the floor.
“Look at you, Miss Innocent. You attacked me. That’s where that came from.”
“That’s possible,” Lois admitted. “All I remember is browning the sausages, you came into the kitchen and... then it’s all a blur.”
“Well, I am awfully fast,” Kent admitted with a smirk.
“Yes, you are. Although... Not in this area.” She grinned at him. “Oh, Kent,” she continued on a sigh, “if only you knew how different you are from normal men. Sometimes I forget and then...” Her voice trailed off. She suddenly sat up. “I forgot!”
“What?”
“I forgot! You know...”
“So we didn’t... use precautions?” Clark said. “I mean... I know I didn’t.”
“Me neither. I wasn’t thinking.”
“So...”
“Well... since we’re kind of pioneers in this area, I can’t swear that we’re safe.”
“Well, if it happens, it happens.”
“What do you mean if it happens, it happens? We’re not even married! No one even knows that we’re dating! How would we ever explain...”
His kiss broke off what was threatening to become a tirade.
“Lane, I’m not even sure if it can happen.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I’m not... human. So...”
“What, realistically, are the chances that you could even procreate with an Earth woman,” Lois completed for him, feeling an unexpected sense of loss.**
“Wait a minute,” Clark said. “That dream sounds a lot like...”
“...one time when we made love. The time that got us seriously talking about children.”
“Exactly! I don’t know why I didn’t see it before.”
“See what?”
“The dreams. The memories.” When she just shrugged, not understanding what he was saying, he continued. “Think about it, Lois. In this reality, you dreamt something that happened in our past. And that wasn’t the first time. You dreamt about the time I asked you to marry me.”
“Okay,” Lois said slowly.
“And do you remember when you first discovered I could fly... We were both thinking about wedding plans.”
“And?”
“In our reality, we were planning our wedding at that time. And remember how I said that the kiss when I returned from New Krypton... how I had seen it taking place in almost exactly the same way. And you knew how I took my coffee and were thinking that my favorite color was blue...”
“So? Clark, what are you getting at?”
“In this reality, our alternate selves are having our memories. Except, instead of coming all at once, they are coming over time - so that the memories they are getting are happening when things happened to us in our reality.”
“But how is that possible?”
“How is it possible that we are remembering the memories of Lane and Kent?”
“Simple. We have somehow changed the past. So our memories are changing to match what has happened in the past.”
“But we are still maintaining our own memories, too. We are just getting an additional set. Just like our alternate selves are getting our memories.”
“But...” Lois fell silent as she tried to digest this development. “So what does it mean?”
Clark let out a breath. “I have no idea. Except... it would certainly explain why we haven’t been able to walk away from each other. No matter how much we might tell ourselves that this shouldn’t be happening, another part of us is connected.”
“So even when I thought the worst about you, I still somehow felt as if you were my best friend,” Lois said, digesting this new information. Everything that had happened between them made so much more sense to her now - how she had been able to trust and distrust him, love and hate him all at the same time. And why, even when she’d thought the worst of him, she’d still been so drawn to him.
But what did it all mean? After all, if this were simply a case of them changing the past, then their alternate selves shouldn’t be getting memories of what had, for them, never happened - should they? But if this wasn’t a simple case of them changing the past, what the hell was going on here?
TO BE CONTINUED...
