The Bombshell
Chapter Ten
Superman shut the door to the booth, then lifted the handset and sagged against the wall. He closed his eyes and imagined that he felt a twinge from the synthetic green Kryptonite pulsing through the walls. He couldn’t envision how Robin could possibly cope with being shut up in a box for the rest of her life, never seeing the sun, never able to fly or use any of her powers, never being free –
He felt as if he were the one in the containment room. His father’s old refrain – “don’t let them know what you can do or they’ll put you in a room and dissect you like a frog” – echoed in his head. And now he’d helped put a fellow Kryptonian in that dissection room.
This conversation would be more difficult for him than anything he could remember doing in his life.
“What d’you want, Superman?”
Robin’s angry drawl reached his ear and pulled him away from his maudlin musings. He straightened and looked into the monitor. “Robin? Are you okay?”
Her face took on a ‘you-have-to-be-kidding’ slant. “Oh, I’m just peachy-keen, ain’t never felt better.” She snorted in disgust. “What’d’ya expect?”
He hesitated, then plowed forward. “I need to know something, something only you can tell me.”
She shrugged into the camera in the apartment. “So ask. I got nowhere to go and nothin’ to hide.”
He steeled himself. He had to know. “Very well. Why did you threaten to kill Lois?”
Robin’s eyebrows leaped upwards. “You mean she ain’t told you yet?”
“I want to hear it from you.”
The girl sighed. “It was a stupid idea. I was stupid. Again.”
“Okay. So, tell me about it.”
Her eyebrows burrowed downward. “You really wanna know?”
“Yes.”
“Well – “ Robin shifted and actually looked embarrassed. “I – she had you and I wanted you.”
It was Superman’s turn to express surprise. “That’s it? You threatened my wife’s life because you wanted me?”
“It ain’t like she dint have no ace in the hole! I thought I was gonna die when she pulled out that green rock.”
Superman’s own face hardened. “You were going to kill her. I’m glad she did what she did.”
“Oh, so you’re glad I’m stuck in here like this?”
“I’m glad Lois is alive, yes.”
Robin started to yell at him, then apparently thought better of it and lowered her voice. “I’m sorry. I wanted somebody to love me. I just wanted to belong to somebody.” She sighed. “Somebody nice, like you.”
“Like Lois belongs to me now, you mean?”
“Yeah.” She brightened. “Yeah! I knowed you’d unnerstand! Just like Lois! Hey! Maybe she could share you with me? You know, a week with her and a week with me? Somethin’ like – ”
“No!”
She recoiled. “Wow. Okay, you don’t have to get all snotty about it.”
Superman forcibly calmed himself. “Robin, here’s no way I could have let you remain free if you had managed to kill Lois. I would have hunted you down and brought you here myself.”
The girl’s face fell. “You mean – you’d do that to one o’ your own people? You’d lock me up like a mad dog? Just for – for that?”
“Just for trying to kill – “ He took a deep breath and counted to ten. “First of all, Robin, I don’t own Lois. She’s married to me of her own free will. And she doesn’t own me, either.”
“But I only – “
“Second, you haven’t grasped a bit of what we’ve been talking about during all your lessons. This society is based on the rule of law. It’s more important than family or friends or personal preference. It’s the only way to ensure that everyone is as safe as he or she can be.”
“But – “
He overrode her protest. “Third, you lack the moral fiber necessary to be a hero. You don’t respect the rule of law or the need for discipline in an ordered society. You can’t kill someone just because you’re inconvenienced!”
“You don’t unnerstand – “
“The world can’t have a super-powered murderer running around loose! Can you imagine the kind of chaos that would result? Do you understand that?”
The girl furrowed her brow. “They don’t bother me none and I won’t bother them none.”
“Haven’t you been listening to anything I’ve said? It doesn’t work that way! You can’t – “ he stopped himself in mid-shout and exhaled deeply. “I’m sorry, Robin. I assumed that you’d be more like me than you are. I shouldn’t have done that. I should have investigated you more thoroughly.” He snorted. “Serves me right, though. I condemned Lois for not investigating Lex Luthor, for not looking past the surface and finding the reality underneath.” He sighed. “And I’ve done exactly the same thing. I took you at face value and assumed that you were who I wanted you to be instead of delving for the truth.”
Robin reached out and touched the screen. “Superman – Clark – you really love her, don’t you?”
He sighed again. “Yes. I do. I love her more than I love my own life.”
She leaned back and dropped her hand. “Yeah. I heard about it a time or two. Never saw it before I come here. Never knowed no one what loved like that.”
“I know. I’m sorry, Robin. That’s one of the reasons I wanted you to live with my parents. They could have taught you a lot it you had only listened to them.”
Her tone softened as she asked, “Like what?”
His hopes for Robin rose ever so slightly. “Respect for life. Love for freedom, for everyone and not just for yourself. Reasons to treat people right. How to help others without expecting anything in return. Why you should care about what happens to the innocent and those who can’t defend themselves.”
She nodded. “I know. Believe it or not, I been listenin’ to you.”
“Good. Can you tell me anything of what you’ve learned?”
The girl stared into the camera. “I – I really never thought about that stuff much, what was so different between right and wrong. I always thought it was something the folks with money got to decide. Never thought it was something that stood up on its own, something that just was without bein’ made to be. Leastways, I never thought much about it not before you started teachin’ me. I was just tryin’ to stay alive and keep my head down. Didn’t want nobody to know what I could do.”
“I know. I went through a lot of the same kinds of problems.”
“Yeah.” Robin blinked several times. “But you found someone to love you.”
“You could find someone like that, too. You have the time. You just have to make some changes.”
“No. I cain’t.”
“Yes, Robin, you can. Where there’s life, there’s hope.”
“Not for me.” She shook her head. “It’s too late for all that. I got too much blood on my hands.”
Blood on her hands? “What? Robin, what are you – “
“Marshall Pippin recognized me.”
“What? Who? What are you talking about now?”
“I ain’t ever gettin’ outta here, am I?”
She was jumping from subject to subject and he wasn’t following well. “I don’t know. I know we can’t let you out until we’re sure you won’t be a danger to others. Then we’ll – ”
“B-but I am! I’m a danger to other people!”
“You can learn. You can change. You can become the hero you said you wanted to be.”
“No. It’s too late for that. Lois will tell you. She been diggin’ into my past, she’s too smart not to, and by now I know she done found me all over the map.” She wiped dampness from her eyes. “Marshall was the guy on the plane who recognized me. Told me he’d call the police and tell ‘em what I done in Nashville. Said he’d make sure I spent my time in jail, said he wasn’t gonna let me get off easy.”
“I don’t understand – “
She looked directly into the camera. “All I could think was I couldn’t let him do that to me! I was gonna start a new life here! I was gonna be somebody! And I weren’t goin’ to jail again!” She glanced around herself at the tube she stood in, at the apartment into which she was locked. “But now I’m in jail for good! It ain’t a real jail, but you ain’t lettin’ me out, not never! You cain’t! And we both know it!”
Focus, he told himself. “Robin, I want you to sit down and – “
“No! I cain’t live here! I cain’t stay here! I crashed that plane and kilt everyone! I panicked! All I could think of was not gettin' arrested! I weren’t gonna let that happen! And then – then the plane blew up – and the fire – somebody screamed – ”
Killed everyone – “Robin! Are you telling me you crashed that plane on purpose?”
Her tears began in earnest. “Y-yeah! No! I dint do it a purpose but I done it anyway! I got scared and pushed it into the ground cause I dint wanna go to jail! You can tell your wife I done it! She can stop lookin’ now!”
“Oh, Robin.” He hesitated. “I don’t know what to say.”
“I do.” She wiped her eyes again. “Tell her I’m sorry for what I done to them folks on that plane, and for what I almost done to her. Tell her I’m glad it worked out this way. It’s for the best. And – and thank her for me for them pancakes. They was real good. Ain’t nobody been so nice to me for a long time, maybe not never.”
“You can tell her yourself. She’s here.”
The girl’s voice softened again. “No. You tell her. She’ll believe you.”
“Okay, I’ll tell her if you really want me to. But I’m sure she’ll be willing to talk to you. She doesn’t hate you.”
She lowered her head and shook it slowly from side to side. Her ash blonde hair flowed like a shampoo model’s tresses. “It don’t matter. This is goodbye.”
“What? No, Robin. Wait. You don’t have to – “
The click in his ear confirmed what his eyes told him, that she’d hung up. The monitor went blank, too, and he sighed as he opened the door.
Lois stepped closer and almost reached out to him, then stopped herself. “How is she?” she asked softly.
“Not good. She asked me to – to tell you she was sorry.”
To his surprise, instead of scoffing, Lois asked, “Do you believe her? That she really is sorry, I mean?”
He nodded slowly. “Yes. I’m not sure she realizes exactly what she – “
WHOOM! BOOM!
The floor shook and alarms blared in the control room. A monotone computer voice spoke from hidden speakers in the ceiling. “Breach in room thirty-nine west wall into passageway eleven west. Occupant no longer contained. Breach in room thirty-nine west wall into passageway eleven west. Occupant no longer – “
Lois snapped a look at her husband and saw the grimace of pain on his face. She grabbed Superman and shoved him towards the communications booth. “That little room is lead-lined! Stay in there! You’ll be safe from the Kryptonite!”
Superman dug in his heels and stopped them both. “No!” he shouted. “Robin needs help! I have to help her!”
“You can’t go to her!” she shouted back. “It’s already affecting you! That stuff will kill you!”
“I can’t leave her to die!”
“You can’t risk yourself!”
He pushed Lois away and took a step towards the door. “I won’t let someone die if I can stop it from happening!”
“I won’t let you!”
Bernie Klein stepped in front of the Man of Steel and pressed his hands Superman’s chest. “It’s too late! She’s gone!”
Superman pivoted around Lois and the doctor and headed for the door again. “Then I’ll find her no matter where – “
“That’s not what I meant!” shouted the doctor. “She’s dead!”
He stopped in mid-stride and turned slowly. “What?”
“It’s too late.” Dr. Klein pointed upwards. “Listen!”
The computer’s litany had changed while they’d argued. “Occupant of room thirty-nine is located in passageway eleven west. Life signs are at zero. Occupant is now deceased. Occupant of room thirty-nine is located in passageway eleven west. Life signs are at zero. Occupant is now deceased. Occupant of room thirty-nine is – ”
*****
Clark sat on the sofa with his head in his hands. It was Friday morning and he hadn’t slept since coming home from Star Labs days before.
He couldn’t get Robin out of his mind. He couldn’t accept her death. He couldn’t believe he’d found someone else from Krypton, someone else who’d also lost a home and was trying to make another, only to lose her so abruptly and so devastatingly.
If only he’d tried harder, he might have been able to save her. If only he could have found the right words to make her hesitate, to make her change her mind. If only he had realized what she was planning. He might have been able to convince her not to die.
If only he’d realized that Robin would behave so precipitously, Lois wouldn’t have needed to use the Kryptonite on her. And he didn’t blame Lois for being prepared. He should have thought of it. He should have realized what she was capable of doing. He should have been prepared for any eventuality.
It was his responsibility. It was his fault. The woman he’d begun to think of as a member of his family was dead, and he’d lost one more link to his home.
And he’d never know just who Kara had been to him. Was she his cousin? Was she the daughter of some diplomat who’d bought or forced a chance for her to have a new life on Earth? Had her mother or father been his uncle’s servant, or had perhaps both of them been in his employ? Or was she the daughter of some stranger off the street who’d neither known nor cared who Jor-El was?
It didn’t matter. He’d failed. He hadn’t been able to save her. She was dead, and the truth made no difference now.
Some hero he was. There wasn’t even a grave where he could mourn her properly. Star Labs had sealed her body in a lead-lined coffin to prevent Kryptonite contamination, and he’d taken her out of the atmosphere and guided her casket into a terminal cometary orbit. In a few days, her mortal remains would be vaporized by the sun’s heat, and there would be nothing left to mark her passing, nothing to show that she’d ever lived.
Except a dozen and a half grave markers and broken families. It was a horrifying legacy.
He hadn’t told Lois about the plane yet. He hadn’t been able to tell her that Robin had killed all those people in a moment of panic. It was still too raw, too painful, too mentally draining to think about. It was too much for him to bear, too much to think that a super-powered Kryptonian could kill so many people for such a weak reason, too much to accept that Robin had taken all those lives so casually and not felt any guilt until her last moments.
As Superman, he’d refused Bernie Klein’s offer of help. As Clark, he’d called Perry and told him he needed to use a couple of sick days, the first ones he’d used in a long time. He’d made some lame excuse about a head cold and told his boss he’d try to make it in on Monday or Tuesday.
Perry hadn’t been fooled, but he’d played along. He’d suggested that Lois stay home with him and nurse him back to health. She hadn’t had much time off recently even with the vacation time they’d just taken, Perry had said, and maybe she needed the rest as much as he did.
He’d accepted for her and left her a note with the message from Perry taped to the bathroom mirror. Facing his wife at that moment had been beyond him.
He lay down on the couch again and closed his eyes, hoping the tears would hold off long enough for him to find some respite in sleep.
*****
Lois slipped into the living room and tiptoed to the couch. Sure enough, he was there. At least he looked like he was finally asleep. She’d leave him alone for now.
She crept into her office, turned on her computer, and downloaded her e-mail. Jimmy had worked his virtual magic once more and had dug up reams of information on Robin McGyver of Virginia, alias Loren Glass of Kentucky, alias Delta Ames of Mississippi, alias Kara Allen of Louisiana, alias Jennifer Anne Young of Florida, alias –
She shook her head. It didn’t matter. What did matter was that Robin had left a long string of unsolved assaults and injured victims behind her, along with at least four escapes from city or county jails, and nine outstanding warrants for her arrest on charges ranging from solicitation to prostitution to loan sharking to extortion and racketeering. It looked like the girl had been living under the radar as a minor criminal for years There were also six known failures to appear after posting bail, and –
Lois stopped and stared. The girl had been the lead suspect in the murder of a small-time pimp in Georgia and was wanted for questioning in three other suspicious deaths in various locales.
It couldn’t be. Lois had known murderers before, and Robin hadn’t acted like one. She hadn’t appeared to enjoy the pain of others.
Yet she’d almost killed Lois, just because the girl wanted Clark for herself and had believed that Lois’s death would allow her to have him. Maybe she had been a murderer.
Lois leaned away from the screen and pushed her hair back with one hand. She’d suspected that Robin had caused the plane crash – perhaps she’d even done it accidentally – but she hadn’t believed until now that the girl had been a practiced dispenser of death, either on the wholesale or the retail level. She’d been raised badly, treated horribly, and apparently no one had ever demonstrated proper morals or ethics to her until Clark had made the effort. As far as Lois could tell from what little she knew and what little she’d read, no one had ever really loved the girl.
But she’d known the law, despite her disadvantages. She’d understood the difference between right and wrong. She’d known that her powers were special and that she could do anything she wanted, but she’d still decided to live an amoral, selfish, and destructive life.
Until, perhaps, her last moments. From the few disjointed statements Clark had made, Lois figured out that Robin had finally realized how badly she’d lived and how many people she’d hurt. She had either decided that she was too great a danger to be allowed to live and that she couldn’t be tried or punished for her crimes, or she’d chosen the only escape route open to her. Either way, she’d refused to live as a permanent captive.
So she’d committed suicide by bursting through the wall of her cell and standing in the liquid Kryptonite spray until she fell unconscious, never realizing how painful and damaging her final action would be for Clark. To the end, she’d remained selfish, even while apparently thinking she was being noble for perhaps the only time in her life.
Lois shut down the computer and slipped back into the living room. Clark hadn’t moved. He still looked troubled, even in sleep, so she took a blanket and covered him as gently as she could. He didn’t need the warmth, of course, but maybe the presence of the blanket would give him some comfort.
As she turned away, she heard him whisper, “Lois?”
“I’m here, Clark.”
He sounded so distressed, so alone, so bereft. “Please – will you come sit with me?”
Her heart broke for him, for all that he’d lost, for all that he’d never know about his family and his first home and his origins. She had her parents, which were a mixed blessing at best, but she also had Clark’s parents. She had Lucy, a sister she could talk to about almost anything. She had Perry, the best boss a reporter had ever had.
All Clark had, after his parents, was her. She was his home, his root, his bridge to a normal life. She was the one who made his double life as the man and the hero worthwhile.
And Lois realized that it was reason enough for her to live, reason enough for her to be who she was. Her husband was the strongest person on the planet, but he was also Clark Kent, a fallible man who needed her strength to help him be Superman. She reflected for a moment on the day early in Superman’s career during Luthor’s testing of his powers, when Clark had questioned aloud whether Superman was worth anything if he couldn’t save everyone. She’d told him that all that Superman could do was enough, even if he couldn’t do everything. At the time, she hadn’t known that she’d probably kept the hero from putting the blue spandex away for good.
Maybe they’d have children some time in the future. Maybe they wouldn’t. In the meantime, she’d give to him all she had and hope it was enough. She couldn’t save people like Superman could, but maybe – no, surely – she could save Superman. She was certain that no one else could. He definitely needed her for that.
She sat down beside him and gently stroked his forehead. “Of course I’ll sit with you. I love you, Clark.” She kissed his cheek. “I’m here, darling. I’m not going anywhere.”
His breathing evened out as he finally drifted off to sleep. Lois sat beside him, lightly kissing his forehead and stroking his hair in turn, until she lay down beside him on the couch, wrapped him in a gentle embrace, and joined him in soft slumber.
# # #
