[September 8, 8:41 PM, CET: Added a couple of lines to the final scene of this chapter, in response to a thoughtful remark made by Terry Leatherwood on the FDK thread. Thank you for your input, Terry!]
[September 11, 04:29 AM, CET: Removed any references to 'darkness' and 'blackness', because Vicki's post on the FDK thread made me see that a blind person wouldn't be able to tell the difference between 'dark' and everything else. Thank you for pointing that out, Vicki!]
***
AUTHOR'S NOTES:
OK, here goes nothing... I got some pretty good feedback from you guys on the last part; I hope I can live up to it in this part. Feel free to let me know if I didn't :-).
<ETA>
Also, some discussion has arisen on the feedback thread about whether or not it is realistic for Clark to be this clumsy in his blindness. If you think it isn't, I would very much appreciate you letting me know. Here on the boards, in e-mail, by postal pigeon or smoke signals, ... whatever suits you best. I will be eternally grateful
.
</ETA>
A gold star goes to HappyGirl for doing an awesome job BR'ing this. Her attention to detail is fantastic, and I'm lucky to have her on board.
Enjoy!
***
It has been eighteen months, by now. Eighteen months, two weeks, four days and seven hours – but who’s counting.
That’s how long it’s been since I first came to Metropolis wearing that instantly famous pair of bright blue tights under a red and yellow cape. Both were designed and hand-made by humble Martha Kent of Smallville, Kansas – or Nowheresville, as you once called it – and together, they very quickly became a universally recognized symbol of Truth and Justice. Don’t you dare put the blame for it on me, though. You’re the one who came up with that particular catch phrase!
A lot of people have been saying a lot of things about me in the past eighteen months, generally finding very little reason to agree on anything. But I think I have the right to claim a privileged position when it comes to the credibility of my opinions on Superman; and I, for one, can tell you this: it has been a wild ride.
Since I swallowed that first bomb, right in front of you, quite a lot has happened. I’ve had multiple close encounters with death by Kryptonite poisoning; I’ve gone head to head with an asteroid of apocalyptic proportions – twice; I’ve lost my memory and gotten it back; I’ve cheated my way through an allegedly government-sanctioned polygraph test; and I’ve repeatedly lost my head kissing you, against my better judgment – to name just a few of the highlights.
But never, through it all, has Clark Kent ever woken up in his own bed on an early Monday morning, roused by the wailing sound of sirens and the acrid smell of fire down the street, and not immediately bolted for the nearest exit, while spinning into Superman attire at something close to the speed of sound.
Today is a sad but inevitable first, in that respect.
Today, I remain where I am, as I slowly open my non-seeing eyes, trying desperately to gauge what time it is – I can't tell dark from light these days, so no help there. I’d switch on the built-in radio on my alarm clock, and then wait until the next news bulletin answers my question – except that I’d probably knock the thing through my downstairs neighbor’s ceiling before I could properly locate the ‘on’ switch. So I hold still out of necessity, eyes wide open and pointed at the ceiling, but staring into suffocating emptiness nonetheless. I contemplate how to get out of bed without ransacking half of my bedroom in the process, while I hope against hope that the fire department will be able to handle whatever is out there by itself, because right now I can’t even navigate my own apartment properly – let alone find my way through an unfamiliar and burning building.
I realize all too well that I will not be able to keep this hiding game up forever – or even for much longer than a few more days, at most. There are people out there who will start asking certain very pertinent questions when Superman continues to ignore situations like this one. Even if the Daily Planet somehow manages to keep things under wraps, there are more than enough up-and-coming newspaper sharks out there, just waiting for an opportunity to knock the king of newspaper-land off his throne; and they’ll all instantly know that this could be it. But really, whom am I kidding? The Daily Planet keeping anything under wraps would be the kind of front-page material that sells papers for the competition – and I’m sure Perry realizes that, too. I have no idea how long you will be able to keep steering him away from what might well become the biggest story of the year. I have no idea how long you’ll even want to keep trying. You’re an investigative journalist at the top of your field, after all, and this is one hell of a scoop – especially if it becomes a long-term issue. Sooner rather than later, you’re going to have to go for that. You wouldn’t be Lois Lane if you didn’t.
But for now, there really isn’t much I can do about it.
For right now, there really isn’t much I can do about anything.
I can hear someone making breakfast in the kitchen – I’m guessing that would be my mother – and when I stumble out of bed and find my way over there by touch – luckily without leaving all too obvious a path of destruction in my wake – she puts whatever she was holding down onto the stove and turns to me.
“Good morning, honey!”
She sounds chipper. Too chipper. So chipper, in fact, that I instantly know she’s still just as scared and confused and angry and sad as I am.
“I made pancakes. Blueberry pancakes – your favorites. Would you like some? Or would you rather just have cereal and a glass of orange juice? You can have that, too, you know… Or you can have all of the above, and then some eggs. I just sent your father out to the market for those, because you seem to be out of them. Told him to bring some Twinkies and Ding-Dongs, too, in case you get a craving for those later in the day, and…”
“Mom!”
She stops abruptly, seemingly just now becoming aware of her own babbling.
“Blueberry pancakes are fine, Mom.” I tell her, doing my best to sound calm and composed – doing my best Superman impression, I realize with a start. I try to smile at her to offset the formality, even though I have no idea if that’s going to reassure her, or just make things worse. I have no idea what I look like, smiling with blind eyes.
“Thank you for taking so much care over breakfast. You didn’t have to do that.”
“Oh, honey…” she sighs. I can feel, rather than hear her coming closer, and then she wraps her arms around me. “Of course I had to do that! I’m your mother. It’s what mothers do! What did you think? That I’d high-tail it out of here first chance I got, and leave you to deal with this mess on your own?”
Somehow, I just can’t envision my mother ever doing anything remotely like that, no matter what the circumstances.
“No, Mom… of course not! It’s just that… I just…”
It’s hard. I’m a grown man. I’m twenty-seven years old. I’ve seen the world. I’ve been through hell and back, more times than I ever want her to know. I have averted countless natural disasters with my bare hands; I have prevented some hideous crimes; I have served and protected whenever I could, and had my heart ripped to pieces when I couldn’t. And now here I am, clumsily standing next to my sixty-three-year-old mother, who is making breakfast for me in my kitchen, not just because that’s what my mother does when she visits me, but because no matter how hard I tried, I really couldn’t do it myself right now. Not without making a huge mess of things.
“When this is all over,” I tell her softly, while I find my hand clumsily grasping thin air in its search for her shoulder, “I’m going to treat you and dad both to an extremely lazy weekend, where you don’t have to do anything but lie back and enjoy the view while I cater to your every whim.”
My mother sniffs. It kills me that I can’t see if she’s crying, but I suspect that right now, she might be a little too close to that for comfort.
“We’ll see about that when we get there, son.” she tells me softly, and I wonder if that’s her subtle way of reminding me that we have no idea when this will all be over – or if it will ever be.
“For now, let’s just have breakfast, okay?”
Because I don’t know what else to say, and because she's a wise woman and she’s my mother, and I generally do as she tells me, I move towards the table and sit down. I knock over several objects on my way there, and we both pretend we don’t notice, and then she’s watching over me while I eat a plateful of bite-sized pieces of blueberry pancake – with my fingers.
***
“So tell me, Miss…”
The officer glances down at his beat-up notebook once again. It must be at least the third time I’ve seen him do that now, all in the space of the fifteen or so minutes that I’ve been here. How is it even possible that a person can forget something as simple as my name in about as much time as it takes to finish writing down the information on my driver’s license? I have to consciously suppress the urge to roll my eyes at what apparently passes for a competent Metropolitan public servant these days.
“Lane.” I tell him for the third time. “My name is Lois Lane.”
But officer Jones – at least that’s what his nametag says, because I sure didn’t get it from him – has his attention thoroughly focused elsewhere. He’s been staring dubiously at the silver-colored cylinder I brought ever since I got here, and it doesn’t seem to me that his constant scrutiny of the object in question has done anything to convince him of the truth of my story: that this thing is indeed something much more complicated and dangerous than what it looks like at first glance.
“Right, Miss Lane…” he repeats distractedly, without actually looking at me. Even now, he doesn’t take his eyes off of what’s on the table between us. “So tell me again: exactly what is it that you believe we have here?”
I suppress a sigh of pure exasperation. Then I fix him with what I suspect must be the most intense stare I’ve ever treated anyone to – the most obstinate source in the world included. Maybe I can simply *will* him into accepting that what I’m trying to tell him is, indeed, the truth.
“I do not *believe* anything, officer.” I tell him vehemently. I’ve told him vehemently before. It didn’t seem to make much of a difference. “I *know* exactly what this device is. I know what it can do. If you would just take the two minutes it will cost you to go through the department’s filing system, you’ll find that I reported a murder a few days ago. A *murder*, Officer Jones! It took place in my apartment last Wednesday, and the inventor of this device,” I point at the object on the table, “was Doctor Julian Faraday. The victim in that murder.”
I pause to take a breath, and to see if anything I’m saying is getting through to the man at last. But his demeanor doesn’t seem to have changed at all.
With a sinking feeling in my stomach – I just might be stuck here for the rest of the day – I press on. “Doctor Faraday used this thing on me right before he got killed, Officer – and believe you me, ever since then I’ve been getting all the first-hand experience I will ever need to tell you exactly what it can do. How many times do we have to go over this?”
I throw my hands up in the air, hoping that he’ll finally get the hint. I’ve had enough of this already!
He just shrugs. “It still looks like an ordinary ballpoint pen to me.”
I sigh. “As I’ve told you before, that’s what I thought when I first saw it. Then, after I realized that it wasn’t just a ballpoint pen, I went on to think it was a flashlight disguised as one. But it’s not just a flashlight, either. This thing is the one and only reason Doctor Faraday got killed, Officer Jones; do not make the mistake of doubting that. Even the D.A.’s office knows about it by now. I can assure you, this is more than just a simple ballpoint pen!”
“Oh.”
I stare at the man incredulously. “’Oh?’ What do you mean, ‘oh?’ Did you even hear what I just said?”
Officer Jones just raises an eyebrow at me. “It will really do neither of us any good if you do not stay calm, Miss Lane.”
I’m tempted to get up and bang my head against the wall – or better yet, his.
Instead, I just heave another sigh, and then I address him once again. This time, my voice is laced with the kind of long-suffering patience one usually reserves for a particularly insatiable four-year-old who has been asking impossible-to-answer why questions the entire afternoon.
“Look, Jones,” I tell him, making sure to keep eye contact this time. “I don’t know about you, but some of us here in this room, we’re busy professionals. I’ve got things to do and places to go today – and in any case, I don’t want to take up any more of your valuable, taxpayer-sponsored time than I absolutely have to. So here’s an idea, Mister Jones: why don’t you go find one of the people working on that murder case I just told you about, so we can hand the device over to them. I’ll even stick around to repeat my statement another few times for their benefit if you think you need me here for that. Once that’s all done, Officer, it’ll no longer be your responsibility to decide whether or not I’m really just some kind of nutcase trying to shove my very own crackpot theory up your nose, and you and I can both get on with our respective days. What do you say?”
He stares at me, and I’d swear I can see the wheels turning behind his eyes. It’s not very hard to tell that he’s tempted – whether that’s because he’s actually starting to believe me, or because he’s tired of dealing with me altogether, I don’t know. I don’t really care, either, as long as it helps me get out of here.
But then, just when I think I have him right where I need him, there’s a knock at the door, and he gets up from his chair.
“Is Lois Lane in here?” says a gravelly voice on the other side of the door. At Officer Jones’ nod, my heart leaps. I’m saved!
The man belonging to the voice enters the room, and I could not be more pleased. He’s clothed in civilian attire – which means I’ve just been bumped up at least one step in the hierarchy. Now we are finally getting somewhere!
“Miss Lane. I’m Inspector Juan Ferreira.” He holds out a hand for me to shake, and I take it. “I have a few additional questions for you concerning the circumstances of Doctor Julian Faraday’s death. I hope you don’t mind sticking around for a while?”
My heart sinks. It doesn’t look like I’m going to get out of here any time soon, after all. But what choice do I have? If I want this whole sorry business to be taken care of some time this century, I had better cooperate.
At least this time, I’ll be able to hand over the device to someone who will take it without feeling the need to call my very sanity into question first. At least I hope I will.
***
Judged by the standards of any normal working day, it is of course scandalously late already by the time I finally manage to feel my way out of the bathroom, freshly showered, and dressed in a randomly chosen flannel shirt over a just as randomly chosen pair of jeans. My father has the common decency to convincingly feign his sincerity when he tells me jovially that the stubble on my cheeks makes me look distinguished. I try not to imagine myself with a longer beard – it would totally ruin the Superman image; not to mention the fact that as Clark, I just don’t do beards very well.
I manage to grab one whole pair of shoes from the rack in the bottom of my closet without knocking off any of the others, and I realize while tying my shoelaces that I really don’t need my eyes at all to do that. The only small mishap on the footwear front reveals itself when my mother tells me, with an audible smile on her face, that I’m wearing two differently colored socks. She suggests rolling them up into balls by the pair – which I hate because it tends to ruin their elasticity after a while – or else buying only one kind of socks in the future. She’s right, of course. Either or both would indeed make sock selection in the mornings exponentially less of a hassle. I still wish she wouldn’t have mentioned it, though, because I’d rather not contemplate the possibility that I might have to go shopping for new socks before I get my eyesight back.
It’s past ten o’clock in the morning when I finally get around to picking up the phone and dialing the Planet’s number, because I know that I need to let someone there know that I won’t be coming in today. It’s almost late enough to make me wonder if I should even still bother to call in at all. But since I didn’t on Friday, I suppose I owe them at least that much. So I do.
Perry White is not amused.
“Great shades of Elvis, Kent, I sure do wish you’d pick and choose your sick days a little more carefully. As if there’s not enough going on around here today already, now both of my two top reporters suddenly seem to be feeling the need to go AWOL in the middle of it, too! And besides, where have you been this weekend, anyway? It’s not nice to stand up a woman in love, Kent. I thought you of all people would know that.”
I wince at the memory of what I did to Mayson. Not nice, indeed. I should have told her from the start that I really wasn’t interested in her that way, but oh, well. I guess it’s too late for that now. For Perry’s benefit, I squeeze out a single, miserly cough, and a second one after that for good measure, making sure this one is more forceful. “I’ve been feeling under the weather all weekend, Chief. I suppose I must have caught some kind of bug or something.”
Or something.
It seems to be enough to soften him a tiny bit, though. “Oh, well. People get sick from time to time, son. I suppose it can’t be helped. Feel better soon, though. I’ll be expecting some serious front page material from you for tomorrow’s evening edition, you hear me?”
I mumble something incoherent in reply. I know I will have to come up with a better excuse than this hastily fabricated case of the flu, and soon, unless I want to kiss my desk at the Daily Planet goodbye forever. But Perry seems all too willing right now to take my undifferentiated grunts for signs of compliance, and I’m not about to contradict him – not yet, anyway.
“Good. Now get into bed and hurry up sleeping it off, will you?”
“I will, Chief,” I tell him, and I don’t have to try very hard to sound gloomy and miserable.
Perry grunts in approval. Then, almost as an afterthought, he adds: “Oh, and should you happen to find that partner of yours gracing you with the honor of her presence any time this century… would you kindly tell her to get her butt into her editor’s office yesterday?”
That makes me sit up and listen like nothing else could.
“Lois hasn’t been in yet, either?”
Another grunt, this one disapproving. “No, she hasn’t. And let me tell you, son, the way things are shaping up around here, she better make an appearance soon, or we could all be in a whole heap of trouble.”
I frown. “What’s going on, Chief? Is everything all right at the Planet?”
I wonder if his cryptic comments have anything at all to do with the disheveled state he undoubtedly found his beloved newsroom in this morning. There’s no way I can run the risk of raising his suspicion that I know anything about that, though, so I keep my mouth shut.
“All right?” Perry asks gruffly. “Those aren’t the first words that come to mind when I’m trying to describe the current situation here.” he says. “But don’t you go worrying about us right now. You concentrate on getting better first. There’ll be plenty of time for you to get all worked up over this later.”
That’s not exactly the most reassuring statement I’ve ever heard. I almost tell him that, too, but then again, what can I do? It’s not exactly like I can offer to come into work anyway, under the circumstances. So I relent.
“All right, Chief. Talk to you soon.”
“So long, kid. Take care of yourself.”
We hang up, and I sigh. My mother is hovering. She’s been doing that a lot, lately. “Are you all right, Clark?” she asks. She’s been doing that a lot lately, too.
“I’m fine, Mom. It’s just that… I so hate having to lie to people – especially Perry. He’s… well, Perry has been like a father to me. No offense, Dad.”
“None taken, son.” says my father from somewhere behind me.
“I just bought myself one day off – but what am I going to tell him tomorrow?”
My mother takes my hands in hers. “Have you considered just telling him the truth, son? If you did, I’m sure he’d find a way to keep your spot open for you as long as he could while you figure out a way to deal with this. Not only that, but I bet you could count on his help finding a solution, too.”
“Yeah,” I say, without much enthusiasm. “But I can’t do that, Mom. If I did, Lois would know.”
There’s a silence. I imagine my mother looking at me thoughtfully, as she so often does when helping me think my way out of a jam. Then she says something I hadn’t expected.
“Yes, honey. I imagine she would figure it out. And what would be so terrible about that?”
I snort. She must not understand what is at stake here. “Mom, do you honestly think Lois is going to believe that Superman and Clark Kent were both rendered suddenly blind at the same time by some kind of completely random twist of fate? She may have been blinded by her crush on Superman up till now, but she’s not stupid, Mom – in fact, she’s about as far away from stupid as one can get. If she finds out I’m blind, all bets are off. She’ll know instantly.”
“Yes.” my mom agrees. “As I said: I imagine she’d figure it out. But you haven’t answered my question, Clark. What would be so terrible about that?”
I almost hope that my dad will tell her she’s crazy, but he doesn’t. There’s a telling silence on his side of the room.
***
It’s past noon by the time Inspector Juan Ferreira and his minions are finally done with me – for now, they tell me forebodingly – and I am summarily escorted back to my car by a nameless, baby-faced rookie cop who looks like he just might still be in diapers.
They didn’t tell me much about what it was they were looking for, exactly. They made me go through my statement on Doctor Faraday’s murder – three times – and when they finally seemed satisfied that the only things I really knew about the other two men I saw that night were their names and the fact that they seemed obsessively interested in Doctor Faraday’s device, they started grilling me on ‘what I thought I knew’ about said device. The way they handled it was a relief, though, after the exercise in pure, unadulterated frustration that had been my protracted conversation with Officer Jones. I’ll admit, some of the questions they were asking were a little strange, yes, but at least these people took me seriously. Or if they didn’t, they knew how to hide it very well.
There was something else there, though. They obviously weren’t willing to tell me what it was right off the bat, but they didn’t do a very good job of hiding their interest, either. I could see it in the way they looked at each other meaningfully from time to time. Now and then, there would be a knock at the door, and one of them would step outside, and then invariably come back in with an even grimmer expression on his face than before. And they would whisper things to each other – there was a whole lot of that, too.
Twice, all three of them disappeared at the same time. I was left alone in the small, windowless interrogation room, trying to decide why I shouldn’t just get out right now. They fed me stale doughnuts while I waited, and offered me the muddy sludge that apparently passes for coffee among officers of the law. I turned them down at first – both on the coffee and on the doughnuts. But when I eventually took them up on their offer, I was surprised to discover that there actually exists a human being in this world whose culinary skills are even worse than mine. I may be a disaster waiting to happen when I try to do anything more involved than punching microwave buttons according to the directions on the frozen dinner box, but even I know how to make a halfway decent cup of coffee. Whoever makes the coffee at the twelfth precinct… obviously doesn’t.
When Ferreira came back to me the second time, he simply told me I could go – just like that, no preamble, no further explanations, not even an apology for all the time I’d lost – and Rookie Cop took me out to my car.
Now I’m just sitting here, stuck in lunch hour traffic on my way to the Daily Planet. I keep one hand loosely on the steering wheel, while I use the other to call Perry on my cell phone. I had seven missed calls from him by the time I left the police station, so I know something big is going on somewhere. I almost wish I could yell for you now, to come get me out of this jam and carry me back to the Planet, car and all; but I would hardly contemplate actually doing that even under normal circumstances, and right now… well, I think we can both agree that right now, the circumstances aren’t exactly normal. I imagine you have better things to do.
Naturally, all I’m deemed worthy enough to get from Perry at this point is the busy signal, so I end up angrily tossing my phone back into the passenger seat, and resigning myself to the fact that I’m just going to have to go with the flow – or should I say trickle – of the traffic in front of me. I sigh more times than I thought I had air for, and twice I actually consider just leaving my car where it sits, and going the rest of the way on foot.
Fortunately, traffic eventually lets up a bit, and I’m able to drive the rest of the way at a marginally reasonable pace.
I ride up to the newsroom in what must be the slowest elevator ride ever. I'm alone - not surprising, given the time of day - so I rush out before the elevator doors have even fully slid open. I instantly know something is wrong.
There are just too many people here. People in Metropolis P.D. uniforms. Two men in business suits I've never seen here before, shouting out orders in staccato. A piece of yellow tape catches my eye, and I realize part of the newsroom has been cordoned off. My desk is in it.
A crime scene?
I don't really get the time to take a closer look, though, because the minute Perry notices me, he's on me like a Pit-bull on an unlucky burglar's pants.
“Lois! Where in the Sam Hill have you been? Can I see you in my office right now, please?”
He phrases it like a question, but that doesn’t fool me. I’m in his office before he even gets there. When he does, he slams the door shut and I turn to him. He looks beyond angry, but also uneasy, so I jump in before he has to find a way to get this particular awkward conversation going.
“I assume you want to talk to me about what happened here last night?”
Apparently, that isn’t what he was expecting to hear. He takes a breath, as if to say something, then stops short and stares at me.
“So it’s true, then?” he asks, in a deceptively soft tone of voice. “You were here last night?”
I frown, trying to hide my confusion. “Yes, Chief. It’s true. I… Superman and I came here to retrieve Doctor Faraday’s device.”
Perry keeps his eyes on me and sits, obviously waiting for something. I didn’t tell him the whole story and he knows it; and he knows that I know he’s not fooled that easily. I swallow.
“Well, actually… Doctor Leit and his muscle man abducted me because they thought I knew where the device was, and Superman came to rescue me. There was… uh, a bit of a struggle, as you may have noticed.” I vaguely wave my hand in the general direction of the bullpen, where a construction crew is busy replacing the broken window.
“You bet your shapely behind I noticed.” I hear my otherwise completely decent editor-in-chief mutter under his breath. I ignore it.
“But I already told the police about all of this, Chief! I know we left a mess in here, and for that I apologize, but…”
He cuts me off. “What happened to your abductors, Lois?”
I look at him, trying to gauge where he’s going with that. Is it simply concern for my safety?
No, there’s something else there…
“Well, Chief, to tell you the truth, I don’t know, actually.”
I pause. How do I do this? Perry’s investigative instincts are every bit as sharp as mine, if not more so. How am I supposed to tell this man what happened, without actually *telling* him what happened?
“I… Superman and I left here before… We went out through the window, Chief, and they were still here when we did.”
Perry raises an eyebrow at me. “Is that so?” he says, and now I know there’s really something bad going on. I just nod.
“Superman came here to rescue you from these men, and then you two simply left, without a second glance at them? Without even calling the police?”
I nod again, only now realizing how strange that must seem, from the point of view of someone who doesn’t have a clue what’s really going on. You almost never leave anywhere without somehow restraining the perpetrators first – and when you do, it’s usually because there’s something seriously wrong with you.
Of course, I know that there actually is something seriously wrong with you. But Perry doesn’t know that – and I more or less promised you I wouldn’t tell him about it.
I nod, dazedly. “Yes Chief. We did.”
“And you’re sure that these men, they were… well, you’re sure they were alive and kicking when you left them?”
“Of course, Chief!” I tell him indignantly… and then I realize what he just said. I swallow once again. “Why wouldn’t they have been?”
He sighs, and I don’t know if it’s a sigh of relief, or one of desperation. It could have been either, or both.
“I take it that means you wouldn’t be able to explain to me, Lois, why this morning when I came into work, I found two dead bodies on my newsroom floor?"
I just stare at him as I feel myself go weak in the knees and, completely involuntarily, flop down onto Perry’s couch.
