Okay - so I spent an hour yesterday on the side of the highway with four kids. That was fun. Not. Fortunately, thank God, it was the $17 belt and not the $180 alternator!! And we have AAA for a reason
. Once the tow truck got there, it took about 2 hours and 25$ to get it fixed. We weren't too far from my in-laws so we had it towed there and DH and his step-dad were able to fix it.
Anyway - thanks to Alisha, Nancy and Beth!
Last time:
Lois
One other thing. "Oh. And you need to remember one word. You won't need it for a while, but the look..." I hesitated, not wanting to tell her too much. "Just remember 'Superman'."
"Superman?" she asked with a raised brow.
"I promise that's one you want to remember."
"You've promised a lot of things."
"I know."
She sighed. "But you did say the Kerth doesn't come until *after* graduation, so..."
"Believe me when I say that once you've been through what you two have already been through and what you're going to go through to get where we are now, you'll never take it for granted. Never take Mom and Lucy and Dave for granted either. I still miss them every day and I never met Dave until I woke up in the wrong timeline."
"So who's Jimmy with then? If Lucy's not there?" she asked quietly.
I shook my head. "He hasn't found anyone yet. I hope he does."
"I hope so, too."
"Trust him tonight," I told her as I pushed off the car. "It'll be worth it."
*~*28*~*
~~~~~
Clark
~~~~~
I took a deep breath and started to knock on the door to the veranda when it jerked open.
"What do you want?" an angry younger version of me demanded.
I winced. "You're not happy with me?"
He just glared and turned to go back inside. "You lied to me."
"No," I said, shutting the door behind me. "I never lied. Misled, maybe, but never lied. I said you'd need the ring, and you did. You just assumed I meant you wouldn't be back to the hotel before you saw Lana again, but I meant you'd need it so you could sell it so you could protect Lois and Christopher."
He just glared at me and I was glad I was invulnerable.
"This year hasn't been all bad, has it?" I noticed the bear sitting on one of the chairs. "You won the baseball toss-off, didn't you?"
A half smile appeared on his face. "Yeah, I did. About time, too."
"How'd that feel?" I asked him. "Not winning, but winning for Lois?"
"Better than I thought it would," he admitted grudgingly.
"And when she kissed you afterwards? You didn't want it to stop, did you?"
He sighed. "No, I didn't." He sat on the edge of the bed. "Is Sam going to be okay?"
I nodded. "Yeah, he's going to be fine. Recovery will take a while, but it usually does after a heart attack."
"Makes sense. What about me and Lois?"
"What about you and Lois?"
"Is she the wife you're trying to get back to?" He didn't look at me. "Or did you get back with Lana at some point?"
"I can't tell you that." I sat next to him, careful not to touch him. Who knew if that might make the universe explode or something? "I can tell you she's going to need you tonight. Seeing her dad in the hospital like that... She's going to need a friend and that's you. She's going to wake you up when she's crying. Just ask her what you can do to make it better and really *listen* to her tell you what she needs from you."
"And then do whatever it is that she asks for?" he asked with a raised brow.
"Something like that," I said with a smirk. "Trust me on this one. I know this isn't the life you wanted, the life you planned, but when you get to the place you're going, you'll appreciate it that much more. It's hard to appreciate a good crop if you never have a bad one."
He snorted. "Quoting Pop Pop?"
I shrugged. "Whatever works."
I heard something I knew he hadn't because he hadn't been listening for it. "I've got to go, but be there for her tonight. Be her friend, be what she needs you to be, even if it's just for tonight and then you go back to being practically strangers who share a bed. Tonight she needs you."
He nodded. "I'll remember that."
I smiled. If things went even close to the way I remembered them, he wouldn't remember a thing about this conversation once she started kissing him. "Take care of her," I said quietly as I headed for the veranda.
"I will."
I headed down to the backstage area of the basement.
"How'd she take it?" I asked Lois when I saw her.
"She's mad at me," she said, coming willingly into my arms.
"He's mad at me, too," I told her.
"Did you convince him?"
"I think so. Her?"
"I told her to follow her heart. To tell him what she really needs from him tonight."
"Good."
I pulled the time travel thing out of my pocket.
Lois stopped me with a hand on my arm. "What if they're there? Doesn't that seem like what's going to happen? We'll get to the day after the wedding and the us that's here will already be there so there's nowhere for *us* to be. There's already been an us in every universe we've been to."
I sighed. "We deal with it, I guess." I kissed her softly. "Together."
I punched in the information and we took a deep breath and stepped through. The window closed behind us.
Lois turned to me. "Okay, do your hearing thing."
"Hello."
~~~~~
Lois
~~~~~
We both jumped and turned around, Clark moving protectively in front of me.
There we stood.
The us of this universe.
I couldn't take it anymore and crumpled into the chair next to me, tears over flowing.
My Clark knelt next to me. "It's okay, sweetheart." He pulled me towards him until I was sitting on the floor in front of him, wrapped in his arms.
"No, it's not. I want my life back. I want my life back but with Mom and Lucy and Dave. And even if I can't have that life, I have no idea how to get back to *my* life, to *our* life, to *our* kids."
He floated us slightly until we were in a better position for him to hold me to him, my head on his chest as I cried.
"We'll be back in a few minutes," I heard the other Clark whisper and I felt my Clark nod his head.
He just held me where we were while I cried it out.
"I want to go home," I whispered.
"I know," he whispered back.
"Did Jor-El send ruby slippers with you by any chance? In that ship of yours."
He chuckled. "No. No ruby slippers."
"Drat."
"Is it safe to come back in?" I heard the other Clark say.
"Yes," I called as Clark stood us both up. They came in, the other Clark's arm around the other me. "I'm sorry about that."
She smiled at me. "It's okay. I can't imagine, being where we finally are now, and then having everything ripped away from us." She gestured towards the door. "Would you guys be more comfortable sitting out here?"
We nodded and all headed towards the front of the theater.
"How was the wedding?" I asked her as we sat down.
"Good," she said with a smile. "Bernie and Ashley got married, too. *Finally*."
"At our wedding, too." I looked at her with a grin. "And Superman?"
"I should have *known* that was your idea," the other Clark said with a groan.
The other Lois and I dissolved into a sudden fit of giggles.
"He looks really good in that Suit, doesn't he?" she whispered.
I nodded. "There's no Superman where we started out this morning," I said suddenly.
"What?" she asked in shock. "Whichever Clark is supposed to be there isn't Superman? What about Van-El?"
"He's there," my Clark said. "But the other me, apparently, never even met him – not really. I mean, that Lois and Clark won a Kerth for their stories about him, but my parents said as far as they knew I'd never talked to him about being my brother and Krypton and all that."
"I wonder why that is," the other Clark asked thoughtfully.
"I bet I know," the other me said.
"What's that?"
"My Clark told me you said something about being married to the wrong woman, right?"
We nodded.
"Were you married to Lana?" she asked.
We nodded again.
She turned to her husband. "She said something about thinking flying with Van-El would be cool when she emailed me after the transport thing, but would she have wanted you to be a superhero?"
He shrugged. "I don't know. I think she would have been okay with me if I'd told her after I'd proposed like originally planned. Then it would have been *me*, her fiancée and all that rather than random guy."
Clark nodded thoughtfully. "That sounds about right. Maybe she took it okay, but isn't crazy about the powers and all that or at least the thought of a secret identity and using them in public and because of that he decided not to be a superhero."
"Maybe," the other Clark said.
"How are things for you guys?" I asked the other Lois.
"Thank you," she said. "Without you two, things would never have turned out like they did."
I smiled through the tears that had found their way back to my eyes. "I'm so glad."
She looked like she wanted to hug me. "I know this is the life you wanted for yourself. I'm sorry we can't both have it."
"Thank you." I sighed. "After traveling through however many different timelines we have, I'm glad someone's where they should be."
"How many timelines have you been to?" the other Clark asked curiously.
I glanced at my husband. "Um..." I ticked them off on my fingers. "There's our original universe, timeline, whatever. Then the one we woke up in. Then the one where the Lois had died at the cabin; that's three. Then the one where I was happily married to Joe with Christopher and a little girl."
"What?!" they both exclaimed.
Clark winced. "I didn't like that universe. It was better than the one without Lois but... We hopped into this room and I listened for heartbeats and heard that Lois and Joe..." Both guys shuddered simultaneously.
"So that was four," I went on with a look at them. "Then there was the one where you didn't have Nate." I paused. "You do have Nate, don't you?"
They nodded. "The night after we saw you guys again," her Clark said softly. "You both gave us some good advice."
"We've lived it," my Clark told him in the same tone. "Every point we visited was a turning point in our lives and that was a big one. Not just because of Nate, but because it was when I started to realize that maybe I didn't belong with Lana after all."
"So what was different in that other universe besides no Nate?" Lois asked us.
Clark and I glanced at each other. "Um," he started. "We weren't there long, but apparently, after Navance died, that Lois and Clark separated. We were there Christmas morning when he was coming to pick Christopher up for Christmas. While we were there, he said that he wasn't in love with Lana anymore and he didn't know if he was in love with Lois, but that he wanted to give them a real try."
"Kind of like Joe on the airplane to Paris," I told them.
"I hope it worked out," Lois said softly. "I think all the versions of us were in love with their Clarks long before they were."
They glanced at each other. "Do you think we could borrow the time machine for a minute?" she asked.
"Why?" I asked back.
"We'd talked about seeing if we could. Clark watched when you two left last time and saw when and where you went, but we'd like to go back to Halloween and the cabin and find out for sure who Christopher's dad is."
~~~~~
Clark
~~~~~
I glanced at Lois and pulled her slightly closer to me. "We know. We went back to both times."
"And?" the other me asked anxiously.
"You are," I told him. "It was Navance's nephew at the Halloween party but you got there in time, just like you thought."
His eyes closed and he rested his head on his wife's. "Thank goodness."
"So it was at the cabin?"
We nodded. "Yeah," I said. "We were there, too. Helping get the fire going, making sure the power was back on for a while..." My voice trailed off.
"You told me that before, but..." My counterpart's eyes narrowed. "You didn't... did you?"
"No!" I said vehemently and I noticed Lois had the good grace to look embarrassed. "We were there and we saw you kiss and I saw the look on your face," I nodded at Lois, "after but we didn't watch or listen or anything like that. Neither one of us saw either of you..." I waved a vague hand. "...naked or anything like that." I winced. "I did hide your shirt after the power went back out."
They both breathed a sigh of relief before she asked, "Why?"
Lois shrugged. "Falling asleep and later waking up in his arms was something that helped keep me going for a long time."
The other Lois nodded. "I remember it well."
"Did he kiss you and come on to you on your first birthday together, then call you Lana?" she whispered to her other self.
They both looked shocked. "No!" he exclaimed. "I'll admit that I thought about kissing her that night, but I didn't. I went and got her dinner from Japan the next night for her birthday." He looked at me with a raised brown. "Really? You called her Lana?"
I shifted uncomfortably. "I still don't remember that part of it, but I know better than to argue with my wife on something like that."
The other Clark and I heard noises upstairs at the same time. The two of us exchanged a look.
"Listen, we talked about it and if you two want to stay here and be us today, you can. We could go to the cabin for the day and you could have the life you've wanted, Lois," the other Lois said. "Even if it's just for a little while."
One look at Lois' face told me how tempting the idea was. "You don't want to spend Christmas here – your first Christmas as a really real family?" We'd come back on Christmas morning instead of Christmas night for a reason. Just like we had after we left Latislan or Greece or whatever. We wanted to spend the day with our boys.
"We do," the other her said softly. "But I've also realized how hard this would have been without my mom and my sister to help me through it and if I didn't have them, I might give just about anything for a one day glimpse of what life could be like."
She looked up at me. "What do you think, honey?"
"I think," I said slowly, "that it's your mom and sister and brother and it's your decision."
She thought about it for a long minute before shaking her head. "I think it would be worse spending a day with them and knowing it could never be, what might have been if my life had been a little different. Right now, I can deal with not having them, if I can have my sons back, my life back, but I don't know how to get there."
The other Lois thought for a minute. "You said Mom and Lucy were in accident when we were ten, right?"
Lois nodded.
"What if you went back to when we were nine and then went forward or something? Where would you end up?"
I looked at Lois and we both shrugged.
"One of the six timelines, I guess," my Lois answered. "As long as we're very careful not to change anything while we're there."
"So we go someplace extremely secluded and are there long enough to reprogram the doohickey and step back through," I said. "Fifteen minutes after midnight tonight. That way if we're still here, in this time, you'll know when to look for us and we can come up with something else. And if we end up back where we started this morning, for instance, we'll already be gone instead of two of us there."
"Sounds like a good idea," the other me said. "Good luck. And thank you. For everything. For helping us get what we really wanted even when we didn't know what we really wanted."
"No problem," Lois told him. "But I'd really like to get home now."
I took the black square out of my pocket. "Where and when?" I asked her.
"Right here is fine," she said. "When we were at Disneyworld the first week of June when I was nine but in the middle of the night – like four in the morning."
The other Lois nodded. "That sounds good."
I was happy for them – really I was – even though they had the life I'd wanted for myself. I was glad some version of me had it.
Right now I just wanted to get back to *my* life.
A minute later, we waved to the other us and stepped through. I immediately started to reset the controller and we stepped back through, to whatever timeline we were going to end up in, fifteen minutes after midnight, the day after Christmas.
~~~~~
Lois
~~~~~
They were – unsurprisingly – in each other's arms when we stepped back through.
I wanted to collapse and cry again, but I wouldn't let myself.
"It didn't work," I said, slumping down into one of the seats.
"So where to next?" Clark asked, sinking down next to me.
"Where've you been?" Martha asked. "You've only been gone a few minutes."
"Really?" I asked, shocked. No, it made sense. I put my head in my hands and stifled a scream. "Why? Why can't we get home?"
Martha sighed. "Let's go out in the theater and we'll talk about it there. It's more comfortable."
We moved to the other room and I noticed Clark was keeping his distance from me again.
Damn it.
The tears came anyway.
"How long have you two been gone anyway?" Martha asked as we sat down.
I glanced at Clark. "Eighteen hours? Something like that. We hopped several timelines, then ate and slept for a while, then hopped some more and managed to get a timeline with our lives but with my mom and sister and brother and everything, but there was already an us there." I wiped at my eyes. "We went back to 1994, before the accident happened or didn't happen or whatever and came forward again and this was where we ended up." I looked at Clark in anguish. "Why did we come here? Why didn't we go home?"
"You said there was a Lois and Clark already in the other timeline?" Martha asked.
We nodded.
"Did you go to any other 2006s?" This came from Jonathan.
"Yeah," Clark answered. "Four, I think. We're calling this the second one. The third one was bad. Lois had died in that one and we left really quickly. The fourth one had Lois and Joe married with two kids. The fifth had us married but splitting up but thinking about getting back together and one kid. The sixth was the one we wanted to be in." He'd reached over and taken my hand. "We weren't in any of them for more than a few minutes."
"So all but the third had a Lois and a Clark?" Martha again.
"We didn't see Clark in the third one but yeah," Clark told her.
"Hmmm..." She looked like she was pondering something. "So there's a total of six 2006s out there. You went back to a time before the split took place. This was the only 2006 that didn't have a Lois and Clark that was supposed to?"
"As far as we know," I said.
Martha sighed. "Then I bet that's it. Nature – and I'd guess time – abhors a vacuum. Since we're guessing that our Lois and Clark are in your timeline, this would be the only one of the six that didn't have one of you so this is where you ended up."
"So how do we get back?" I whispered, looking at Clark desperately.
"I don't think we do," he said grimly, tears in his own eyes. "I don't think we do."
*****
TBC
