Reflections TOC Previously on Reflections...
...Comprehension immediately dawned on him. "Ah, you're a reporter. TV, radio, or print?" "Pa-lease, I not some TV hack. Lois Lane, Daily Planet." She stuck out her right hand toward Clark.
...Clark made a superhuman effort not to smile at Lois's reaction. "The parking area is all clear, now. Mr. Kent is over toward the entrance of the garage, waiting for you. I have to go... attend to something else. Will you be all right for now, Ms. Lane?" "Sure… except you still owe me an interview," she replied slyly. "Especially since you saved my life... again."
...They rode quietly down until, without looking at Clark, Lois asked, “So, Smallville, what do you think of your first couple of days at Planet? Everything you expected?” Clark chuckled at her question. “Well, I expected that I would need to wait at least a couple of weeks before the first attempt on my life.”
...Looking up at Lois with a grim expression he replied, “From everything I’ve seen in the last three years, there only two possibilities I can think of as a motive. Either someone is purposely inciting these conflicts to increase their sales of illegal weapons, or someone is playing some kind of elaborate power game, with the world as his playing field. I’m not sure which scares me more, but it’s probably the latter.”
...She stopped, turned toward him, and smiling sweetly replied, “Nope, not for a second.” Not waiting for him to react to her statement, she exited on to the sidewalk. He shook his head and followed her out the door. He had only one thought in his mind. Either she was really going to be a big help to him, or he was going to be in big trouble. Probably both.
Reflections
Part 18
Lois was quiet as Clark walked her home. She was smart enough to know that she had surprised him with her offer, and he would need time to process it all. Now that Lois knew about what Manchester had done to Clark, she could better understand how he looked at things. She realized that his skittish behavior and reluctance to work with someone, especially a woman, was due to how his trust had been betrayed. Even more, she was sure that his loner attitude also stemmed from his belief that he, somehow, had been responsible for letting Manchester get killed. It was up to her to help him get past these feelings.
Getting him to trust someone again… to trust her… would be the easier task. She felt that they had reaching a turning point tonight in that. The other would be tougher. Clark seemed to have this hero complex and wanted to save the whole world on his own. She needed to show him that no one person can do everything. She recognized that she, herself, had had the same problem at one time. Her experience in the Congo had helped her see that she wasn’t invulnerable. That even she needed help sometimes. She needed find a way to show Clark that he wasn’t invulnerable either.
They reached her apartment, having not said anything to each since leaving the diner. She paused at the bottom of her stairs, and looked up at Clark to say goodnight.
“I guess this is my stop”
“Yes, it is.”
She could see that he was at a loss to what to say to her. She didn’t want to put any more pressure on him tonight, so she simply said, “Thanks for walking me home, Clark. I’ll see you in the morning.” She turned and walked up the few steps to her apartment entrance. As she unlocked and open the door she heard Clark softly say, “Thanks, Lois.”
Lois looked over her shoulder at him with an amused grin and replied, “Really?”
“Yeah, really. I think. I mean, sure, I’m glad that you want to help.” He scowled in thought for a moment, and then continued, “I do appreciate the offer. I’m just worried that I may be more trouble than I’m worth sometimes, especially when you discover that I can’t share everything with you.”
Lois studied him for a moment, then turned fully around and walked back down the steps, stopping at the last one before the bottom so that they were at the same eye level. “You know, one of three things is going to happen here.”
“Really”, he replied. “And what would those be?”
“One: you decide you never want to have partner, and you take off after we save the space program. Two: you stick around and let me help you occasionally, and visa versa. But you never open up enough with me to be more than a casual coworker who brings me killer coffee and helps me write a story every so often.” She paused and looked directly into his eyes, a sly smile on her face.
“And the third possibility?” he asks softly.
“You let me in enough so that we can become friends. Then the issue of not sharing everything will never come up. Because real friends eventually need to lean on each other to help them with their burdens.” She leaned over and kissed him softly on cheek. “Goodnight Clark, I’ll see you in the morning.” She turned quickly before he could say anything, and ran back up the steps, entering her apartment without a glance back at Clark.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Clark stood there stunned at what Lois had just said… what she had just did. Even though he was invulnerable, his cheek felt like it was on fire where she had kissed him. His heart was warring with his head. But before he could sort out any of his conflicted feelings his super-hearing picked up a fire alarm north of the city. Almost relieved that he didn’t have to think about Lois at the moment, he took a millisecond to check for witnesses, then streaked upward. After a quick detour past his hotel, he was once again transformed into the superhero, and became a supersonic streak heading northward.
Within seconds he arrived at the source of the alarm, a burning building in the NASA MEDI complex. It was, in fact, the same building they had interviewed Dr. Baines in earlier. Scanning the interior he determined the fire was centered in the large open assembly room. Luckily, he didn’t see any people near the fire, which would make it easier to get under control. Already he could hear the emergency vehicles on the way, so he quickly broke through the nearest door, and flew towards the fire. Hovering there, he drew in a large volume of air into lungs and held it a moment, allowing his aura absorb as much of the thermal energy as possible. He then exhaled the supercooled air into the hot spots to douse the flames. After four more blasts of cold air, most of the fire had been extinguished.
Satisfied that the fire would not flare up again, he began to examine the area. He didn’t need his super-senses to detect the gasoline that had been used to start the fire, or the deliberate nature of the starting point of the fire. Not far from the ignition point he could see several containers of flammable material. Another minute or two and the whole building would have become a fireball. Looking around at the equipment on the assembly floor, he realized that this was where the main engines for the new Shuttle had been assembled. The ‘sabotaged’ Shuttle engines. If he hadn’t showed up, any evidence in this building would have been destroyed.
But it didn’t make sense. If Baines was the one responsible for the sabotage and she knew that she was going to be exposed, what possible good could destroying this building gain her? The real evidence was on the launch pad, installed on the test Shuttle.
His thoughts were interrupted by the firefighters entering the building, spraying the area with their hoses. He could see the combination of confusion and caution on their faces, puzzled by the lack of flames in the building. That look quickly disappeared as they spotted him. The lead firefighter acknowledged his presence with a wave of his hand, and then went about deploying his firefighters to check the rest of the building.
Satisfied that there was no danger to the firefighters, he decided to make his way over to Dr. Baines office to conduct a quick search for any clues about the fire. He landed near her office and peered inside with his enhanced vision. The first thing he saw was Dr. Baines, sitting at her desk, slouched back in the chair, with her head tipped back looking at the ceiling. It only took him a second to realize that the eyes staring upward were lifeless. Using his cape, so not to disturb any evidence, he carefully opened her office door and turned on the lights. As he saw her in the office light, he turned his head away for a moment. He thought after all this time with dealing with criminal element, he would have gotten used to things like this by now. But he guessed that he would never really ‘get used to it’.
He sighed, then looked back to examine what had happened to her. A large hole at the back of her head was evidence of a bullet exit wound, and he could see the entry wound under her chin. In her left hand was an automatic pistol, a nine millimeter by the looks of it. The blood splatter on the wall and floor behind her seemed to indicate that she had taken her own life. But that made even less sense then the fire. Why would she go to all the trouble to set the fire, then come back to her office and commit suicide?
Unless… Unless the fire was really to destroy evidence connected with her death, and had nothing to do with the sabotage. He wished Lois was here to help find the missing piece of the puzzle. In fact…
He turned and left the office quickly, and approached the lead firefighter. He let the firefighter know about the crime scene, and instructed him to contact Lt. Henderson immediately to investigate. He then left the building, taking to the air as soon as he was outside. Within seconds, he was back in his hotel room in his street clothes, and dialing Lois’s phone number from the pay phone in the kitchen area. After a few rings a sleepy voice answered the phone.
“…lo”
“Lois, it’s Clark. We need to get to Dr. Baines’s office right away.”
“Clark? What’s going on?”
“I just got a tip that Dr. Baines is dead, and someone tried to torch her building. I think Henderson will be on the way there soon.”
Her voice suddenly sounded alert. “Where are you?”
“I’m at my hotel. Can you come and get…”
“I’ll be there in ten minutes. Meet me on the street”. Before Clark could answer, he heard a click as she hung up the phone. Shrugging, he gathered his wallet and glasses, and hustled downstairs to meet Lois. True to her word, she pulled up to the curb in less than ten minutes.
As he got in her Jeep, he said with a wry grin, “I don’t even want to know how many traffic laws you broke to get here that fast.”
Without acknowledging his remark, she tore off down the street, heading toward the NASA center. “So where did you get this tip? How reliable is your source? And just how did you get a source so quickly?”
“My source is impeccable, and I think I’m insulted by that last remark.”
“Fine, don’t share. I just hope this isn’t a wild goose chase, I was in the middle of a nice dream.”
“Sorry about that, but don’t worry my source is…”
“…impeccable. Yeah, I heard you. I just didn’t think people used that word anymore. So, *partner*, just who is this source who managed to snag in your first week on the job? Some reason you can’t share who this is?”
Clark sighed, knowing that he wasn’t going to get away with the ‘anonymous source’ story. “It’s just that he doesn’t want to be associated with giving information to any one reporter. But he says that he trust us, and wants to help our investigation.”
“It’s Superman, isn’t it?”
Clark shook his head. She really was too smart for *his* own good. “Yes, it was. He thinks that someone shot Baines, tried to make it look like a suicide, then set the building on fire to cover any evidence of foul play. He couldn’t stay, so he thought we could help finding out what really happened.”
“Really? Well I’m glad he trusts us. Did he say why he thinks that it wasn’t suicide?”
“Well, he said that setting the fire before killing herself made no sense. Plus he didn’t see any suicide note.”
“Sounds logical. Not a bad piece of deduction. I guess we better get there fast before Henderson gets there first and locks the front gate.”
With that, she stepped on the gas, making the Jeep take off at a high rate of speed. Clark hung on tightly to his seat, despite the fact that he was invulnerable.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Lois was once again reminded how much she had underestimated Clark in the beginning. Superman obviously respected him enough to trust him with following through on this investigation. He did hesitate a little on sharing his source, but he did finally share. Strangely, he seemed to be choosing his words carefully, as if he was thinking of what to say.
Her thoughts were interrupted when he suddenly asked her, “So what were you dreaming about?”
She blushed slightly as she stole a glance towards him, then looking quickly away, she answered, “Nothing I’d share with you.” There was no way she was going the fact that her dream consisted of her and Clark… Well, she wasn’t going to think about that right now.
He shrugged, and turned his attention back out the windshield, watching the road intently.
Minutes later she brought the Jeep to a screeching halt at the front gate of NASA. Formulating a quick plan, she turned to Clark and said, “Just follow my lead.” She jumped out of the Jeep, and ran toward the security guards at the gate. Clark got out of his side, and hurried to catch up with her.
Reaching the guards, she said in an official voice, “We got here as fast as we could. Did Detective Henderson get here yet?”
One of the guards, looking bewildered, answered, “Um… no ma’am, no yet.”
“Okay, we’ll wait here for him.” She turned to Clark and said, “Sergeant, call in that we arrived.”
Hesitantly, Clark replied, “Sure… Lieutenant.” He turned and went back to the Jeep. He made a show of climbing in and pretending to use a non-existent radio inside. The whole time, she stared at him expectantly, nodding her head slightly towards the gate, hoping he would catch on. Evidently he did, as he got in the drivers seat and drove the Jeep up to her. As he pulled up, she walked up to the opened driver’s window and asked in a loud voice, “So what did *they* say?”
“Henderson says to meet him at the scene inside,” he answered in an equally loud voice.
“Okay, then, let’s hit it.” She went around to the passenger side, and got in. As they passed the guards, she rolled down the window and shouted at the guards, “When Henderson shows up, tell him Lt. White will meet him at the scene.” She pulled her head in, rolling up the window, and smacked Clark on hurry away before they caught on. He drove quickly past the gate, heading straight toward the Dr. Baines’ building.
“Wow, Smallville, you’re quicker than I thought.”
“Gee, thanks, Lois.”
She smiled playfully at him and retorted, “Don’t want you to get a big head.”
She saw him roll his eyes as he continued to drive toward the fire damaged building. A minute later they were pulling up to a stop near an entry where a door had been broken down. Lois grabbed a flashlight out of her glove box, and they got out of the Jeep, walking as inconspicuously as possible to the open entry, avoiding the fire fighters still on the scene.
As they entered the building Lois whispered to Clark, “Do you remember where her office is?”
“I think so, follow me.”
She was impressed that he seemed to remember exactly how to get to Baines’s office through the dark, fire ravaged building. When they arrived at the office, he went right to the light switch and turned on the lights to the room. The shock of seeing the dead Dr. Baines caused Lois to close her eyes momentary to steel herself against the bloody scene before her. Sneaking a peak at Clark, she could see that he was examining the body, deep in contemplation. Funny, she pegged him at being sensitive guy, but he seemed to know what to expect and had already prepared himself for what he saw. She began to wonder what things he had seen in the last three years chasing after the gun runners.
As if sensing her scrutiny, he turned to her and asked, “Sorry, I should have warned you. You okay?”
Lois nodded her head, but said nothing. Bracing herself, she turned and started to examine the scene before her. As Clark had told her, it looked like she had committed suicide, with the gun still in her hand. She was trying to remember something she read about gunshot suicides. Did people hang onto the gun in death, or did it usually fall out of their hands? Something to ask Henderson when he showed up.
“Want to take a closer look?” she heard Clark ask.
She sighed and answered, “I guess that’s why we’re here.”
As they moved closer to the body, another stray thought popped into Lois’s head. How would Clark know what to warn her against when he turned the lights on? It was almost like he knew what to expect. But how could he if he hadn’t been here yet? He was a real challenge to figure out sometimes.
Focusing back on Baines, she began to mentally examine everything about the scene. Something was striking her as out of place, but she couldn’t pin it down yet.
“So Superman said there was no suicide note?”
“Didn’t see any. Do you see something?”
Lois gave him an odd look at the way he answered, then said, “Something is out of place, but I haven’t figure out what yet.” After a few moments, a thought struck her. “Clark, does it look like the bullet went straight through from her chin to the back of her head?”
Clark looked closely, and then replied, “Looks like it.”
She thought about it a minutes more, then held her fist in front of her chin, hold an imaginary gun. Now she knew what was wrong with scene.
“There’s no way she could have held that gun under her chin in a way for the bullet to take the path it did. If she held it under her chin, the bullet would have exited the top of her head.”
He stared at the body for a few moments, his eyes darting back and forth, then replied, “You’re right. I didn’t think of that. Henderson’s going to thank you for that piece of deduction.”
“Before or after I throw both of you in jail for obstruction and impersonation of a police officer,” a voice behind them said.
They both turned to see a very unhappy Detective Henderson glaring at them.
Lois, unfazed by Henderson, simply said, “Someone killed her, then was going to burn the building down to cover it up.”
“Yeah, I figured that out. So anything else you want to share before I throw you in jail.”
“Oh, come on, Bill. We didn’t do anything wrong. We didn’t touch a thing, and we certainly didn’t identify ourselves as police officers. All we did was pretend that we had a radio in our car and ‘someone’ told us to wait for you inside. I wasn’t under oath, so you can’t arrest me for telling a little fib.”
“A little fib??? I should just arrest you on general principle! Hell, I should arrest you for protection.”
“I don’t need protection.”
“I wasn’t talking about your protection. I’m worried about the general population. Oh… just get out of here. Wait for me outside by your Jeep.”
Lois shrugged and led Clark out of the office, heading back the way they came. She was disappointed that they didn’t have time to look around more, but she had gotten the most important news nugget. They’ll have the scoop on everybody. On the way out, Clark stopped, and stared at the burn damaged section of the building.
“Why?” he asked softly to no one in particular.
“Why, what?” she asked him, curious.
He shook his head and focused back at her. “Why all of this? What’s the gain for someone? If Baines was killed, it means she was working for someone who was cutting his or her losses. But what possibly could be achieved by sabotaging the Shuttle? It has no intrinsic value except to NASA. It’s not a normal target for a terrorist group, because no one would be hurt except for the pilot. What is there to gain?”
Lois stared at Clark, but had no idea on how to reply. She was so intent on saving the Shuttle, that she temporarily put aside thoughts of a motive. Now focused on it, her mind started to reflect on the possible motivations for destroying the Shuttle. As was her usual way, she allowed the interconnecting possibilities to flow freely through her thoughts. She could tell that Clark was watching her, expecting some input from her, but she ignored him for the moment. After a minute she looked at Clark and asked, “How much money is the Shuttle contract worth?”
Clark considered her question and asked, “I’m not sure, why?”
“I’ve got a thought. So take a guess, how much?”
“Well let’s see…” Clark eyes became unfocused as he did a few calculations in his head. “The current Shuttle is an upgrade. I think total cost to the government was about a half a billion dollars. Average profit is about 10% of that, so about fifty million. Out of the fifty, about 15% of that goes to goes to employee bonuses, setup costs, previous research… So the company got about forty-two or forty-three million profit.”
“So, sounds like serious money to me. Who built the upgrade?”
“If I remember right, it was a smaller company that had invented the new rocket engine technology. It was a big deal when it happened. I think there were some protests, but the government really wanted the new technology.”
“So if I were a loser, I might be happy that the new engines failed, don’t you think?”
“I guess so. But that would be a heck of a risk for an Aerospace company to take. Most of the big ones deal in multiple billions of dollars of year. Industrial crimes tend toward cheating on the books or stealing information.”
“We should find out who the losers were, and start checking into their behavior for the last few months.”
Clark thought about it for a moment, then said, “It still doesn’t feel… right. It would be very out of character for companies like this.”
“Like Baines was out of character?” Lois asked with a sly smile.
She could see that Clark was getting her point “Yeah, just like Baines.” Looking over his shoulder, he said, “You know, we better get out of this building. Henderson is already mad enough at us.”
Lois swept her arm forward, indicating for Clark to lead the way. As she followed him out, she was once again thinking about how natural it was to work with Clark. Still there were some things about Clark that tickled the back of her mind, and she knew there was a lot that he hadn’t shared with her yet. But she wouldn’t think about them too much for now. It was important that Clark shared whatever he was holding back on his own time.
They exiting the building and walked over to the Jeep. Clark leaned up against the front bumper with his arms crossed, staring off into infinity. For some strange reason he seemed to be peering over his glasses, but his focus was obviously not on the side of the building he was facing. Trying to be unobtrusive in observing Clark, she moved up to the side of the Jeep, and leaned over with her elbow on the hood.
After a few minutes standing like that, she heard him say softly, “They’re not going to find anything.”
“How do you know that?”
He turned his head toward her, as if surprised she was there. He quickly pushed up his glasses, and said, “Oh… um… just a feeling. You know, based on what we saw. It’s obvious that the killer was trying to cover his tracks.”
Lois shook her head at him. “You really can be strange sometimes Clark.”
His only response was a shrug. He returned his attention back to the fire damaged building. Ten minutes later, Henderson came out and headed straight for them. He ignored Clark, and walked right up to Lois, not six inches from her face and said, “You nearly crossed the line this time… Lt. White.” He turned to glare at Clark and said, “And that goes for you too Kent.”
Lois, putting on a innocent smile, said sweetly, “But we didn’t disturb anything, and I think that I actually helped you.” She then batted her eyelashes for effect. “So, any initial findings by the CSI?”
She actually thought she could hear Henderson grinding his teeth before answering, “It seems that they agree with your assessment. There’s no gunshot residue on her hand, but there’s no sign of a struggle on her. So how would someone put a bullet in her like that?
Now it was Clark who spoke up. “Do a tox-screen on her. And check for any small puncture wounds on her arms… possibly her neck.”
Henderson glare turned into a questioning look, “I was thinking about the possibility of her being drugged, but why the puncture wound?”
“I’ve been in some investigations where a mini tranq-dart was used to subdue a person, either for kidnapping or faking a suicide to cover up a murder.”
Henderson looked surprised. “I thought you were from Kansas?” he asked.
“I’ve been off the farm for a while, Detective.”
“I see. Okay, we’ll check for that. By the way, you’ll be interested to know that NASA has scrubbed the test flight. They are going to roll the Shuttle back to the Vehicle Assembly Building tomorrow, and check for the devices you identified. But the official story for now is that they will be doing it for routine, last minute checks. So I want you to sit on this until Monday morning.”
“It’s too late to get into the Sunday edition anyway,” Lois resolutely replied.
“Gee, thanks for being so cooperative, Lane,” Henderson shot back with sarcasm.
“May I ask you a question about Baines?” she asked.
“Maybe. Shoot.”
“Did you check into her finances?”
“We did, but didn’t find anything obviously suspicious.”
“But…?”
But, she was living well above her means. Either she had a nice sugar daddy or she had money in off-shore accounts.” He scrutinized her for a moment, before asking, “Do you have an idea what this is about?”
“I have an idea, but until we check it out, it might sound a little crazy. But don’t worry, we’ll share.”
“You better Lane. I’m still considering that obstruction charge.”
“I love you too, Bill. Can we go?”
“Fine, get out of here.” Without another word he turned, and headed back to the building.
Lois looked over at Clark and smiled. “He loves me.”
Clark snorted in reply, and went to get into the Jeep’s passenger side. “Guess it’s time to go. Maybe you can get back to that dream.”
Luckily Clark wasn’t looking at her as she went to the driver’s side. She was sure that she was blushing a little. After starting the engine, she swung the Jeep around and headed for the front gate. As they exit the NASA center, she could see the guards giving them a dirty look.
“Guess we won’t be able to use that trick on those guys again,” she remarked.
Clark’s only response was a small chuckle.
“Clark, I know that today is Sunday, but do you want to spend some time doing a little research?”
“Sure.”
“Okay, how about…” She looked over at the dash clock, which read 4:23. “How about I pick you up at ten?”
“Sounds good. I can bring the breakfast.”
“You don’t have to do that, you got the food last time. I think it’s my turn this time.”
“I don’t mind. Besides I know a great place to get my favorite croissants. You can buy me dinner sometime.”
“I’ll hold you to that, Smallville,” she said, smiling as she looked out the windshield. As she continued to head back to Clark’s hotel, she noticed that Clark had gotten very quiet. A quick glance over at him let her see that he was staring out his window. The darkness outside allowed her to see his concerned expression reflected in the glass.
“Something bothering you, Clark?”
It took him a few moments before he answered, “A little.”
“What’s wrong?”
“I’m starting to really enjoy working with you.”
Her first inclination was to come back with a smart remark. But she held off, sensing that something about that really concerned him.
“Why does that bother you, Clark?”
“It’s been a while since I… well since I wanted to be around someone else. I’m scared that you might get hurt. I’m scared that maybe I might…”
“…get hurt,” she finished for him. “Clark, we already talked about this. You need to decide this for yourself. Personally, I’m really enjoying being around you. At least so far. And if don’t turn out to be a closet jerk, or an axe murderer, then I want to get to know you better.” Just then they arrived at his hotel. She brought the Jeep to a stop, and turned to him, saying, “You can trust me Clark, really.”
Clark turned and looked directly into her eyes. Tentatively he raised his hand, and gently touched her on the cheek with the palm of his hand. He then drew his hand quickly away, and got out of the Jeep. Before closing the door he said, “See you at ten, Lois. Sweet dreams.” Without waiting for her to answer, he closed the door, and jogged up to the entrance of his hotel.
As she touched her cheek where Clark had touched her, she said softly to herself, “Sweet dreams...”
------ End Part 18-----
