I was hoping to have this betaed before posting, but it didn't work out that way. I was also hoping to have a title for this monstrosity... err, gift... but that didn't work out either. Many thanks to Tank for bouncing ideas with me when I had written myself into a corner.
This is lovingly dedicated to Bakasi. I hope you like it.
Lois Lane was angry like she had never been angry before in her life. She was angry at Perry, at Clark, at the powers that be that had put her in this precarious situation even though she probably would have been fine without any help.
Who was she kidding? She was going to die and it was all her fault.
If she had never tried to take any time off, if she had just written that mood piece like a good little girl, if she had done something--anything--differently then she wouldn't be in this predicament. But of course, that wasn't how things had happened.
It had been a rotten week from the beginning. She'd been trying to investigate the space program when Perry had assigned her some filler story that was a total waste of her talents. It was about a condemned building that was being converted into some useful parking spaces. When she had balked, he hired some newbie to replace her for that, and whatever other stories she shouldn't be forced to handle. It was probably supposed to be a slap on the wrists, but she couldn’t say that she minded so much being taken off garbage duty.
If her little tiff with Perry wasn’t enough, she had blown the big story. She had missed her opportunity to sneak onboard the space station Prometheus, caught by an over-achieving security guard who had checked out her paperwork just so that he wouldn't have to admit that he'd been caught checking out her legs. It was going to be the story of the century, reporting on everyday people who had been given the opportunity to forge a life on the edge of space.
What should have been her big story had been blown wide open quite literally when in her absence a bomb had been located onboard the Prometheus. She would have paid her life savings to be on the transport when that bomb was found, but instead she was stuck in a security guard’s office.
And if the story was big enough as it was, a strange man had literally flown in to save the space program.
Lois hadn't seen it in person, but it didn't take a genius to recognize a hoax when she heard about one. Men didn't fly, at least not without a lot of smoke and mirrors. She wasn't sure what anyone had to gain from trying to pretend that some bizarre flying man had rescued the space program, but she was certain that somebody was laughing long and hard as the less-intelligent news sources had jumped all over the story as if it were based on fact.
It was enough to drive even the sanest woman over the edge. She’d been so close to the edge for so long that she was getting a little bit worried about her self. It was past time to recharge her batteries. Several weeks ago she had made motel reservations, knowing how close she had been flirting lately with burnout.
With the lousy week that she’d been having she had more than a few second thoughts about taking the time off. She would rather go out on a high note than sneak out with her tail between her legs. There was no way she should take the time off when her game was off.
At the last minute, she had decided to go through with it. A little R&R might be just what the doctor ordered.
With such short notice she hadn't had much of an opportunity to pack, so she had simply grabbed the overnight bag that she kept ready for stakeouts. It didn't include a swimming suit but it did have one of her most comfortable pairs of sweat pants along with little amenities like a toothbrush and some deodorant. The Lexor had provided everything else that she needed, down to a bottle of opulent bubble bath.
She was indulging in the rich, hot lather of the Jacuzzi when she had accidentally happened to check out the view. In the office building next door she could clearly make out a familiar face.
She automatically reached outside the tub for her stakeout bag. She adjusted the long lens on her camera for a better look. Sure enough there was Congressman Ian Harrington involved in a complicated exchange of envelopes. She snapped some pictures as the familiar rush of adrenaline coursed through her body.
She had slept lightly that evening, all thoughts of rest disappearing from her thoughts as her next story started shaping up in her mind.
The next morning she had raced into the Daily Planet. In no time at all she had a set of prints blown up for all to see. Emblazoned in red letters across the front of the envelope was the no-nonsense label ‘Top Secret.’
“Perry, I need a task force,” she demanded.
“Fine. You can have Jimmy,” he said dismissively.
“We’re talking the United States Congress,” she argued to the top of his head as he continued to study the papers on his desk. “There’s no way a gopher like Jimmy could help me. I have to get by the Secret Service, after all.”
“Okay, you can have Kent.”
“Who?” She finally caught her boss’s full attention as he swiveled his frowning face up to meet hers. “Oh, you mean the parking lot guy. The rookie.”
“It’s Kent or nobody,” he warned. She cut her losses and went to gather up Kent.
Suffice it to say, sharing the honeymoon suite at the Lexor with a complete stranger wasn’t all that it was cracked up to be. The new guy was all golly-gee-this-is-a-nice-place as Jimmy and she unpacked and set up surveillance. He was as moony-eyed as a junior high boy standing outside of the girls’ locker room as they arranged that she would get the bed.
She wasn’t sure why he had even bothered to ask. She was the senior reporter, after all. Besides, she fully expected that she would have to carry the full weight of the investigation while playing nurse-maid to her green co-worker.
At least, it wasn’t long before they hit pay dirt. Just that evening they were able to record another conference between the good senator and his two unknown cohorts. While Lois had no idea what they were talking about, she was as sure as only someone with her level of experience could be that the story was even bigger than she had originally anticipated.
She called into the office and set a few wheels into motion while she continued her surveillance.
Jimmy was able to come up with nothing on the man who had accepted the Top Secret information from the Congressman, probably in exchange for an envelope of money. They knew from their surveillance that his name was Roarke, but other than that he remained no better than a ghost. The suite had been rented by a consulting firm that had no financial records that could be located, other than a pre-paid five-year lease.
One of Perry’s old sources finally came through with the suggestion that Roarke might be an international arms dealer formerly stationed in Beirut who allegedly had expanded his territory to include electronic weapons systems.
Somehow knowing that Perry was taking her seriously now, serious enough to check out her story with his own personal informants, was encouraging. He even assigned two other reporters to tail the Congressman and the arms dealer, although she would be surprised if anyone got anywhere trying to tail someone with a Secret Service detail at their side.
In the meanwhile, life at the Lexor was getting more boring by the minute. Hour after hour the offices they were observing sat empty. Board games only filled the time while the real arms and legs of the operation went on without her.
Besides, it wasn’t as if the new guy was any company. For heavens sake, she hadn’t even met him before he was cast in the role of her newlywed husband. He tried to be an affable guy, but he really set her on edge when he pretended that she was cheating every time she got a little bit too far ahead.
Kent actually made a move on her at one point and, if housekeeping hadn’t burst in at that moment, she was one reflex away from assaulting his manhood.
It was all just another reminder of how far out of her control the investigation was spinning. Perry had given her a task force in absentia. Now they were doing the real work while she was holed up with a wannabe in a chic, out-of-the-way location.
Soon after the unfortunate incident with Kent’s lips on hers there was movement in the office building. They recorded more conversations about tests, although there was no way to narrow down what type of tests they were talking about. Whatever they were, they were set for the day after tomorrow at dawn. The shades had been drawn before they got the full details of the presentation, but a time-frame was still a solid lead.
Perry called them early the next morning. The rest of the team had pulled an all-nighter on their behalf, coming up with a solid theory. The code word tsunami had been the giveaway.
The theory was that Roarke was bribing Harrington to reverse the Congressional vote that had been taken to install a new weapons system entitled Project Shock Wave.
It was a theory, but it ultimately didn’t help them. What they needed to find out how the weapons system would be sabotaged. Clearly someone wanted to spike the test and then replace this weapons system for another. Either that or another government was trying to subvert their own.
What she needed was either more time or more evidence. Since she couldn’t manufacture time, she would just have to gather more evidence--enough to convince the authorities to call off the test since she was sure that lives were at stake.
Jimmy had mentioned something about the consulting company leasing a warehouse on Pier 31. It wasn’t much to go on, but at the moment it was all that she had.
There weren’t any windows for her to see inside, so she ended up trying her hand at picking the lock. That’s where she was when Roarke’s buddy caught up to her with a knife at her throat. She tried to play it cool, but this guy couldn’t be bluffed. He also matched her move for move when it came to martial arts.
An hour later she was chained along with the ‘good’ Congressman to a support beam at the pier. He was terrified, but she would expect no less from him. He had probably been born with a silver spoon in his mouth, had his path cleared for him with old money, and now had every last detail of his life worked out for him by aides and a security detail. He’d never been in danger before, at least nothing that a good publicist couldn’t spare him from.
While Roarke muttered his tales of gloom and doom, Lois kept her eyes open for any possibility for escape. She was angry like she had never been angry before in her life. She was angry at Perry, at Clark, at every last member of the task force at the Daily Planet that had let her down. She probably would have been better off without help from any of them.
Who was she kidding? She was going to die and it was all her fault.
She glanced overhead just in time to see a strange sight. It was the Flying Man, only it didn’t look like an illusion. He was like a multi-colored god in a cape. The spandex showed off every detail of his chiseled body, from his tight calves to the chiseled biceps he stretched out in front of him and everywhere in between. He paused for a moment, hovering overhead with no obvious means of support. He caught her eye, giving her a spectacular view of his face. Michelangelo couldn’t have carved anything better.
Just as quickly as he appeared he was gone.
Moments later the greenhorn reporter came running across the beach calling her name. He was wearing a suit and tie with dress shoes that slipped on the slop of sand underfoot.
“Did you see him?” she gasped. Kent tugged at the chains that held her in place, despite the fact that she had forgotten they were there.
“See who?” he muttered like a dolt.
“The Flying Man. What do they call him anyway?”
“I don’t know. First things first--we've got to get you out of here.”
“Sure,” she agreed mindlessly, her eyes still searching the skies.
“It’s too late,” Harrington interjected. Pulling his hands loose from his bonds he pointed a shaky hand at the water as it pulled back from the shore ominously. “The tsunami will be here any moment.”
With a jolt Lois felt her bonds release as Clark gave them an angry tug. “Run!” he instructed as he took off running, the wrong way. The congressman tore off at a speed she didn't think he was capable of while Clark headed down the beach and into the surf, looking danger in the eye like a madman.
Lois watched as he dove, practically flying into the water. Seconds later he was gone. She strained her eyes, trying to catch sight of him in the foam.
A shadow past over her and she leaned back, unable to see the top of the towering wave.
She had no choice but to run, although it tore at her heart to leave a man down--even if he was an imbecile who obviously didn't know enough to run from danger. She only did that when it held the promise of a front-page interview.
The shadow receded just as quickly as it rose.
On a whim, she stopped running and turned back to watch the disaster unfold. If she was going to face death, she was going to look it squarely in the eye on the way down.
The surf was collapsing in itself. She had never witnessed a tsunami before, but hadn't thought that was a normal precursor to the damage. The wave receded and its replacement was much less ominous looking, hardly more dangerous than a surfer's delight.
She was still shaking her confused head when Clark walked onto the beach. His clothes clung to his body like a second skin. She was surprised at how well-built he was, although his bulky jacket hid the best details. Apparently, farm life had been good to him.
He jogged over when he saw her.
"What were you thinking?" she demanded, surprising herself with the emotion in her voice. "You could have been killed. You ran right into the-"
"It's okay. I'm okay," he reassured her.
"I'm not even sure what happened," she gushed, although she never admitted to such a thing.
"I don't know either, but it looks like the worst has passed."
She shivered as she looked out at the docile beach. Reflexively, Clark slipped out of his jacket and placed it upon her shoulders.
"Sorry that it's so wet, but hopefully it's better than nothing." She hadn't realized how wet she had gotten, just watching from the sidelines. Still, the gentlemanly side warmed her more than the soaked wool ever would.
Lois gaped as she turned back to her co-worker. The sopping white cotton of his shirt revealed more than it concealed. Blue color crossed his chest, covered by a red symbol she had seen on the cover of the Star.
"You do too know what happened to the tsunami," she pointed out boldly, "because you did something to make it go away. You're the flying guy!"
"I don't... I don't know what you're talking about," he stuttered, although the guilty look in his eyes disagreed.
"I don't know how you could live with me for a few days and expect to keep it a secret," she bluffed. Since he obviously hadn’t figured out how he had given himself away she was hoping he would reveal even more while he tried to cover his tracks.
“I’m flattered. Really, I am.” He chuckled nervously. “But I can’t think of anything that happened in the motel that would lead you to believe that I am anything more than, well, Clark Kent.”
“Say what you like, but I know what I know,” she informed him flippantly. “So what did you do to the water to get it to go back to normal?”
He shrugged. “I just got wet. I don’t know any more than you do.”
She wiggled out of his jacket and handed it back. There was no sense in letting his fashion sense reveal the secrets that she planned on writing up for the next edition of The Daily Planet. He slipped it over his shoulders and she casually buttoned it up, just as if they really were a newly married couple. He quirked an eyebrow at her, but she simply smiled benignly.
“I’m going to go put something dry on,” she mentioned casually, hoping he wouldn’t notice that she was trying to ditch him. He didn’t need to know that she always kept a spare outfit at the office. “Is your apartment far from here? You probably should go get showered and changed, as well.”
“I’ll be okay,” he assured her. “We should probably hurry into the office and get this written up. A congressman just sold this country out to the highest bidder, almost causing a natural disaster along the way. Perry won’t mind if I leave a puddle of dirty ocean water under my desk.”
“But you’ll catch your death of cold,” she argued lamely. “This is print media, not television. Certainly it can wait for an hour or two for you to take care of yourself.”
“Nonsense. I plan to be more than ready should Perry want to rush to print. We want the media to be quoting us when they play catch-up on the story.”
“Suit yourself,” she mumbled, more than a little bit disappointed. She would still write up the story, but it would be more awkward with the Flying Man lurking about. She had little doubt though that she would do what needed to be done, even if it took a little longer than she hoped.
The ride into The Planet was unpleasant. Lois suggested a new timetable repeatedly, but the Flying Man wouldn’t be persuaded. Back at her desk, she got right to work. She slopped together the bare bones of a story about the Congressman while the Flying Man wrote up the technological portions of the story.
While he was still hard at work, she started writing up her own story. The Flying Man finished before she did, but she coyly promised that she would marry together their two stories into one as soon as she finished.
She was still in the bullpen, researching and writing when Perry came in with the dawn. She was hoping that he would fill in some of the details of the Flying Man’s background so that she could check back issues of the local papers for any unexplained occurrences that coincided with his residence in any given location.
Perry wasn’t too happy that the tsunami story wasn’t ready to go to print yet. She rolled her eyes and added a bit of the old Lane polish. She wasn’t sure if she should write it up as one big story with both her segments and the Flying Man’s, or if she should keep them as two separate stories just so that the general public could get a taste of the Flying Man’s personal writing style. She finally submitted it both ways, just to give her editor the opportunity to make the big call.
She also ran her other ‘story idea’ past the Chief. She was surprised that he was more reticent to run the story than she was. Apparently a story of this size had to be backed up by more hard facts than he thought she had at the moment.
“You’re the best,” he assured her. “If you tell me something I believe you. Can’t let you write it though.”
“Sure you can,” she conned him. “My reputation stands on its own merit.”
“Not when you’re talking UFOs,” the old editor warned. “You need hard physical evidence to back your claims up.”
She knew what she had seen, however. It wasn’t just a simple case of he said/she said. It was a fact. She would work night and day to prove it.
The first place to look was obvious. She snooped around the Flying Man’s desk until she found the note that he had discarded about his new apartment. She took a cab and, when he didn’t answer the door right away, let herself in with her lock picks.
She was surprised at how nice his apartment looked, even in this skuzzy neighborhood. A coat of fresh paint covered each wall to complement the golden maple stain on the woodworking. While he didn’t appear to be a slob, she had expected the Flying Man’s apartment to be somewhat of a bachelor pad. On the contrary, there wasn’t a speck of dirt to be found.
In fact, the place was vacant. Her footsteps echoed as she walked from room to room, but not even a single piece of paper remained.
“Oh, Lois!” she muttered miserably to herself. “Do you know what you’ve lost?”
“Not as much as I have.”
“Huh?” Lois whirled to see him standing there, the Flying Man. He looked utterly miserable, so much so that she needed a mental kick to remind herself that he was just a story.
“Never mind,” he moped. “Just do me one favor, will you?”
When she hesitated to respond he pleaded with her. “Please?”
She shrugged, unwilling to commit herself to anything without knowing the terms.
“I can pack up in a heartbeat and move myself with no strings attached, but my folks aren’t like that. Dad was born in that farmhouse. Mom has lived there for over thirty years. Their roots run deep. They would need a couple of weeks to move, minimum, plus time to sell off the farm and the homestead. Will you sit on the story until they can get out of town?”
She wasn’t sure why they would need to get out of town. It wasn’t as if they were in danger or anything.
“I know I’ve only been here for a few days, but I’ve already made some high-powered enemies. Don’t look at me that way. I may not be the high and powerful Lois Lane, but I did manage to stop a saboteur from inside of the space program and intervene in an attempted terrorist attempt that started in the US Congress. Terrorists and saboteurs of that magnitude tend to be bankrolled by people with deep pockets who will do anything to take down a threat. Since I can’t be hurt that means that the people around me are in danger.” He paused and gave her a winning smile. “Please, let me protect my parents.”
She didn’t care about strangers, she reminded herself furiously even as she found her heart won over by his awe-inspiring charm. “Is that one of your super powers?” she wondered aloud. “You fly, lift several tons, and get people to do things that they don’t want to do?”
As impossible as it was, he managed to up the wattage on that killer smile. Her knees melted. She steadfastly resolved that she wouldn’t succumb to his mind-controlling allure. “Does that mean that you agree?”
“On one condition,” she decided, trying in vain to regain her edge. “I need to go with you, just to make sure that you’re not playing me.”
“No problem. We can leave just as soon as you’re packed.”
And that’s how she found herself pressed up against a god with a cape, flying above the cloud line. If he was charming when he smiled, he was devastating when he flew.
She chided herself that it was just the circumstances. She had read the studies that showed people were more likely to fall in ‘love’ when they were put in dangerous situations, like dangling from a rope bridge over the Amazon. Surely there couldn’t be anything more adrenaline-pumping than sailing at 30,000 feet without the benefit of a plane.
Still her attention kept getting dragged away from the stunning views back to the toned abs beneath her fingertips.
It was almost a relief to descend in a farmer’s field, giving her poor heart respite from its tug-o-war.
“Where are we?” she asked, disappointed that the question hadn’t crossed her mind before.
“This is where I grew up in Smallville, Kansas.” She sucked in her breath as he grinned again.
“Really? Smallville? Of course, it’s real. I couldn’t even make that up.”
“It’s just an old farm, but it’s been home to me for as long as I can remember.”
Just then the back door swung open and a silver-haired woman sprinted out the door. She stopped short when she saw the suit. Lois could visibly see her change gears.
“My lands! You are real!” she gasped, as if she had never seen a man fly before.
“It’s okay. She knows.”
The older woman’s features shifted from surprise to shock to a more guarded countenance. Surprisingly most of her face was still. Only her eyes revealed her emotions. She probably had years of experience protecting the truth.
“You must be Lois Lane,” she finally said. Lois nodded and extended a hand in greeting. “Clark mentioned how brilliant you were. I should have known where that would lead.”
“Relax, Mom. She isn’t out to get us.”
Clark’s mother sniffed stiffly. “Probably not. She’s probably just after the story.”
“Wouldn’t you be?” he countered.
Lois was strangely surprised that he would stand up for her, particularly with such a no-nonsense tone of voice. Surely he knew that the truce was only temporary. At some point she was going to need to return to The Planet with a story in hand.
Actually getting the time off of work had been much easier than she had anticipated. Apparently some federal bigwigs had shown up at the office after the paper had hit the newsstands with a search warrant for Lois and Clark. When Lois had phoned in, she hadn’t been given the opportunity to explain what her plans were. Instead, Perry had practically ordered her and Clark to get out of town and leave no forwarding address where they might be served.
Lois hadn’t looked that gift horse in the mouth, but she knew better than to overstay her welcome. As soon as the Kent family had the opportunity to pack up and leave she would print what she had.
“Where’s Dad?” Clark asked.
“He’s out in the barn with Wayne.” Clark’s mom opened the back door and hurried them inside. “You best come on in before he sees you and starts asking questions.”
“Who’s Wayne?” Lois asked, more out of semi-polite curiosity than out of a desire to fill in her story.
“A friend of Dad’s that lives a few miles down the road. Neither of them are the talkative type so I imagine it won’t be a long visit.”
Clark’s Mom, who curtly insisted that Lois call her ‘Martha’, served up pie a la mode for them all. They sat in silence, chewing thoughtfully.
Martha had the type of assessing glare that would serve her well in the news business. It was almost as if she could see past the flimsy exterior to weigh the worthiness of Lois’ heart with one steaming glance.
No stranger to trials, Lois sat up stiffly and matched the intensity of the mama bear’s challenge.
The stare-down was still tied when a stout man dressed in a flannel shirt and stereotypical overalls walked into the kitchen door. Clark was across the room in three long strides, enveloping the man who presumably was his dad in a bear hug.
“When did you get in?” he jovially asked. “Never mind, I’m just glad to see you. You got a couple of minutes to look at something in the barn?”
Clark quickly agreed and the two men left before Lois was even properly introduced. That was probably for the best, since it wasn’t as if Midwestern manners abounded in the kitchen at the moment.
Martha waited until the men had probably reached the barn before she broke the silence. “I take it you plan on printing what you know?” she finally inquired in a tone that implied she knew the answer already.
“Of course,” Lois answered matter-of-factly. “No offense, Mrs. Kent; but it’s what I do.”
“Why?”
Lois laughed. Nobody could possibly be that naïve. Certainly even a farmer’s wife would realize that the public would want to know every detail of the Flying Man’s personal life.
Before Lois could answer, Martha continued, “It would be newsworthy if Billy Joel or Rod Stewart flew in to save the day. If it was Steven Spielberg who brought movie magic to life or Harrison Ford turned into a real-life hero, I would grant you that it would be front page material. But who cares about Clark Kent? Writing a story about him is like writing a story about some no-name plumber asking Clinton a question. It’s nothing, because he’s a nobody.”
“Just because he flies people will care about him,” Lois retorted.
“I know this will give your career a big boost,” Martha acknowledged, “but it will essentially be the end of the good that Clark can do. You leave him alone and he’ll be able to recover victims of earthquakes and mudslides before the disaster teams go in and can only find bodies. He can put out fires and rescue hostages. He’s the dream addition to every fire department, police force, and ambulance district. Not to mention what he could do in the newsroom, but of course you don’t care about that.”
Lois’ jaw tightened. “You obviously don’t know me very well if you think that I don’t care.”
Martha’s expression softened. “Obviously none of us know each other very well. That’s kind of the point I was making. If you knew Clark well you would know that he would never put his friends and family at risk. The minute that you go public, he’ll go from spending every free minute fighting for truth and justice to hunkering down at home making sure that nothing happens to his loved ones. While that may be good for the Daily Planet, the world itself would suffer a huge loss.”
“You have an awfully exalted view of yourself.”
Martha laughed hollowly. “Surely you aren’t naïve enough to think that only Clark’s life will be affected by this. Clark is a powerful threat to some people out there. There’s nothing that can hurt him.”
“Nothing?” Lois asked dubiously.
“Nothing that can *physically* hurt him,” Martha amended, although Lois failed to see the difference.
Martha took a slow sip of coffee, obviously weighing her words carefully. “Surely you can see that one invulnerable man could tip the balance of power in immeasurable ways. Wars could be won. Fortunes could be made. Whole countries could be held hostage.”
Lois remained unconvinced. “Certainly you don’t think your son is capable of taking on the world.”
“Probably not,” Martha allowed. “He has a good heart and a strong sense of justice.” She caught Lois’ eye and paused for effect. “But do you really want to take the chance that he wouldn’t trade his dad’s life for the life of a stranger? Don’t you see that while he’s physically safe that big heart of his makes him just as vulnerable as the rest of us? One whiff of a threat against his dad or myself, or against any of the friends that he’s made over the years, and the world will have lost one of the greatest assets it’s ever held.”
Lois snorted. “And I suppose that would be my fault.”
Martha shrugged. “Not entirely. But you wouldn’t be altogether innocent either.”
“That’s awfully generous of you,” Lois sniped.
“There are probably a million people that read The Planet directly every week, not to mention the untold masses that read the stories picked up by the Associated Press or the television media. That gives you a lot more power than the average Joe.”
“I understand the point that you’re making,” Lois openhandedly allowed. “But you have to understand that I’m in the news business. I’m not in the habit of covering up news.”
“I wouldn’t expect you to. But I would expect you to make a wise choice. You can choose to expose my son, potentially rendering one of the world’s greatest resources impotent. Or you can work with my son, taking full advantage of his abilities, to expose corruption.”
Martha removed the napkin from her lap and laid it aside her plate, signaling that she was done with both her arguments and with her refreshments. The defense was resting its case.
Obviously this woman was wasted as a farmwife. She belonged either in a used car lot or in a court of law.
Lois had to admit that she was tempted just a bit. Not enough to totally change her mind, but just enough to give her pause. She had never been one who confused gossip with news. No, she preferred to uncover injustice or be the first to dig past the surface of breaking news.
Her thoughts were interrupted by cries from out back. “Martha! Martha, come quickly!”
There was something about the tone of voice that caught Lois’ interest. She shot out of her chair and through the kitchen door, with Martha hot on her heels. She paused as she rounded the back of the house, unsure of where to run next until her hostess showed the way across the yard and into the barn.
It took a moment for Lois’ eyes to adjust to the dark. She paused in the entranceway to get her bearings. There were some tractor-like machines off to her left and a bunch of cans off to her right. Directly ahead of her Clark was sprawled across the wooden floor. The man she had almost met earlier cradled the Flying Man’s head in his lap.
“It was that stupid rock that Wayne brought over,” he fussed. “It had to have been.”
“Clark? What happened?” Martha asked as she practically flew over to her son’s limp form. “What rock?”
“Just something he found Tuesday when that big storm knocked over one of his trees. Weird looking, but I didn’t think it would hurt anybody.” He glanced up sharply, as if noticing Lois’ presence for the first time. “Clark must have hit his head on it and knocked himself out.”
“But that doesn’t make any sense,” Lois pointed out. “I didn’t think anything could hurt him.”
His eyes darted from Lois’ to Martha’s and back, as if to assess the situation.
Before the older man could make up his mind, Clark moaned and shifted as if to sit up. Automatically, the man assisted the man in his lap.
“Thanks, Dad,” Clark said weakly.
“Are you okay?” his mother fussed.
“Of course, he’s not okay,” Clark’s dad snapped. “He’s laying on the ground like an invalid.”
“Give me a hand,” Clark urged. “I’m fine.”
Lois opened her mouth to call him on his bald-faced lie, but her co-worker was already grunting and groaning in an effort to locate an approximation of upright. He swooned a bit, steadying himself on a metal behemoth that had been abandoned behind him. Clark’s face, which had been bright red while lying on the wooden planks, now was as pale as death.
He shuffled forward carefully, his gait uneven in a way that reminded her of a brain-injured athlete her father had treated when she was only a little girl. He stumbled as he past her and her arm automatically shot out to steady him. Even through his clothing it was obvious that he was burning up with fever.
Clark’s mom shot her a dirty glance, as if her help was some sort of interference. Not that Lois cared what anybody thought. She was doing what the old biddy hadn’t done, and she would continue doing it until she didn’t feel like doing it anymore.
Yet even as she helped the Flying Man hobble toward the kitchen she couldn’t help but realize her loss. Just as she had discovered the story of the century, the story that trumped every other story she had ever read or written, she saw it slipping through her fingers and vanishing into thin air. She could just kill Perry.
~*~
Even as his parents hemmed and hawed around him, flitting about mother-henning in a way that they had never needed to when he was a child, Clark kept a careful eye on his co-worker. She was watching him, as well, although he couldn’t tell from her neutral expression what she thought about the situation. Was she mentally dissecting him? Did she pity him in his infirmity? Did she think he was putting on an act to try to con his way out of his deal with her?
There was a part of him that didn’t care, that wanted her to fade into the buzzy background noise that the pain created. Still, after what seemed like a lifetime of protecting his family’s privacy at all cost, he couldn’t afford to let his guard down. There was no telling what Lois would do if she thought he was trying to renege on their deal.
~*~
That evening Lois found sleep to be slow in coming. It wasn’t just the change in time zone or the fact that the Flying Man’s family was used to a toddler-like early bedtime, it was also that her thoughts wouldn’t let her go.
She had caught a glimpse of Martha’s face when she had seen her son laying prone in the barn. Humans couldn’t pale on cue like that. Was it possible that whatever gave them the ability to fly also let them the ability to control their metabolic rate? Was that also how Clark had been able to generate a thermometer-popping fever?
Or was it legitimate? Were they all really fearful for Clark’s very life?
If it were a true crisis, then Clark was in a danger she had never faced. Fever like that could do permanent neurological damage, couldn’t it?
They certainly acted worried enough to make it appear as if the danger was real. She hadn’t asked him if he could still fly, but walking was beyond his means. She didn’t need to ask if he were still capable of lifting a space shuttle, since his hand shook so hard that he wasn’t able to drink a glass of water without assistance.
Chances were that it would be more difficult to maintain a metabolic farce while asleep.
She slipped from her borrowed bed and descended the stairs on nearly silent feet to the front room. Jonathan had set up a cot there so that the infirmed wouldn’t need to tackle the stairs.
From the edge of the room Clark appeared to be fitfully sleeping. Lois crept closer, trying not to disturb him.
He appeared so innocent in sleep. His face was still flushed, his hair was sweaty, and the sheets were wrapped around his legs where he had tossed and turned, and yet his brow was smooth with rest.
Without thought she reached a hand out and pressed its back against his cheek. He was still as warm as a furnace to the touch.
“I’ve been keeping an eye on him, too,” a soft voice whispered from across the room. Lois turned to find Martha curled up under a quilt in the Lazyboy across the room. “He seems to be sleeping alright, so I’m guessing that the pain level is down. The fever still hasn’t broken though.”
“Hmmm.” Lois nodded, unwilling to admit that she wasn’t worried so much about his wellbeing as she was checking on his alibi.
“I could use some warm milk. Would you like me to get you a mug, as well?” Marth offered.
“Sure,” she agreed, though she doubted that warm milk were any more effective at inducing sleep than any of the other old wives’ tales and folk remedies were at curing their various ailments.
A few minutes later the two women sat across from each other at the kitchen table. Martha had turned on a few lights under the cabinetry, leaving the room with an appropriately dim glow. They sipped in silence, each lost in their own thoughts.
“This is the first time that I’ve sat up with him all night since he was only a few months old.”
Lois looked up, surprised. Her own mother had never been one to keep a close watch on her when she was sick, claiming that it was dangerous to spread germs throughout the family. Still, Clark’s mom made it almost sound as if he hadn’t been sick since he was only a baby. She seemed like the type of woman who would fuss about, tenderly taking care of the ill.
“I worried about him for other reasons, but I never had to worry about his health. He played just as rough as the other boys, but he never broke a bone. Never caught a cold. Never even got an upset stomach after eating Jonathan’s chili.”
Lois tried to look interested, but found herself stifling a yawn instead. Her hostess shooed her off to bed, where Lois found sleep easier to come.
~*~
Clark felt a bit better in the morning. The pain was gone, although he still had all of the energy of a limp dishrag. He took a deep breath and cringed. Okay, so not all of the pain was gone. His head still hurt when he moved too quickly and his sides hurt when he breathed too deeply, but pain didn’t crowd against him like a constant, unwanted companion.
It had been strange chatting with his dad over breakfast. Dad was obviously still concerned, although they talked as if nothing had happened. And yet his dad still watched him with unusual intensity.
The sun had been up for ages but surprisingly his mother was still asleep. Lois was sleeping, as well, but as far as he knew she wasn’t used to getting up before the dawn.
The walk to the barn was slower and more careful than usual, in spite of Clark’s insistence that he was doing just fine. They took unofficial breaks every ten or fifteen minutes while Jonathan asked his son’s opinion on this or that little trifle.
They’d been working for less than two hours when Jonathan stiffened and glanced toward the house, claiming that he wasn’t going to make it through the morning without a cup of coffee and a little snack to go with.
“You’re not getting old. Are you, Dad?” Clark teased weakly, although they both knew that the ruse was practically transparent.
As they meandered back toward the kitchen, the curtain flitted back into place. Certainly if Mom had wanted to talk to them she would have just come out to chat. That meant that Lois was up and already on the move. Clark braced himself before crossing the threshold.
Sure enough, Lois was manning the coffeepot as the men came inside. “Do you guys take cream or sugar, or do you prefer it black?”
“Black for me,” Jonathan answered with an overly polite smile. “Clark here takes his like candy. Is it six or seven teaspoons of sugar?” He paused at the refrigerator to shuffle things around, emerging a moment later with something bready that smelled like apples.
“I’ll get it,” Clark decided, although he wanted nothing more than to fall into a chair for awhile. “I just add until it looks right.” He paused at the refrigerator to pull out a jar of very white liquid, probably cream he had milked and separated himself.
“You drink like a pansy,” she teased.
Clark looked at her with eyebrows raised. She wasn’t treated him like a big story today. Was she swayed that easily by a little illness? (Okay, so it wasn’t that little of an illness, but she was normally like a missile that didn’t give up until it hit its target.)
“Well, you do,” she insisted as she took a sip of her darker brew. She seated herself at the table and changed the subject. “Thanks for letting me steal your bed last night.”
“Don’t mention it,” he replied casually. He glanced across the table and saw his father watching them intently, as if he were trying to figure out all of the dynamics of the conversation. Clark couldn’t blame him. It had suddenly become complicated.
“So how are you feeling?” she mentioned. Her head was dipped shyly to hide her face.
“Normal, I suppose.”
“Normal for you or normal for a normal man?” she clarified.
He thought for a moment before saying, “Normal for a man who was knocked-on-his-butt sick yesterday.”
“But that’s not normal for you,” Martha argued as she came in from the front room.
Jonathan rose and quickly got his bride a cup of coffee and a slice of apple turnover. She pecked him on the cheek as a thank you.
“Your mom’s right,” Lois chimed in. “Besides, I’ve seen healthier looking meth users.”
“I bet you have,” Jonathan agreed. His face was blank so Clark couldn’t tell if his dad was insulting him or his co-worker or both.
“I look fine.”
“No, you don’t,” his mom dismissed him. She turned toward her houseguest. “Did you sleep well after our talk?”
“Like the near dead. No offense, Clark. How about you?”
“On and off. If you add up the fifteen minutes here and twenty minutes there I think I got about four hours last night and another two hours after Clark quit tossing and turning and moaning, and got up for the day.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.” Lois sounded genuinely disappointed. “Maybe you can catch a nap later.”
“A couple of quarts of coffee, and I’ll be fine,” Martha assured her.
“Let me top you off,” Lois offered. She paused at the sink first to clean up her dish and fork. “I’ll call Perry in a little while to let him know we’re stranded out in the middle of nowhere.” She paused and glanced at the office greenhorn. “We are stranded, aren’t we?”
“Pretty much,” he confessed ruefully. “But it’s okay. I always wanted to be normal.”
“Normal’s not all that it’s cracked up to be,” Lois told him matter-of-factly.
“I’m sure you’ll be back to your good old self in a week or so,” Martha optimistically predicted. Nobody else chimed in to agree.
~*~
Lois was at odds with herself for much of the day. Everybody seemed to know their place on the farm except for her. She had nothing to do except hang around and observe. While she made the most of her observations she also admittedly was more than a touch stir crazy. She simply wasn’t any good at waiting.
Clark seemed to be feeling better. He wasn’t so pale, for one thing. He walked with confidence, and his hands didn’t shake when he lifted everyday items. Plus, he smiled every once in awhile.
She also knew he was on the mend by watching Martha’s and Jonathan’s behavior. Clark’s dad took fewer breaks in the heat of the day than he did in the cool of the morning. The worried wrinkles on Martha’s face faded into smiles.
There was actually a Norman Rockwell quality about the family. Lois wondered if that was another super power that came along with the flying. Maybe those attitudes just came with owning a barn and chickens. They certainly weren’t average in Metropolis, particularly not in the Lane household.
With a twinge of guilt Lois thought back to what Martha had been talking about yesterday. She was certain without a shadow of a doubt that Clark would give up everything he could do as the Flying Man to protect this idyllic family thing that he had going. If he was as tight with his friends as he was with his family he would probably do anything to protect them too.
But that wasn’t any of Lois’ concern. She simply reported the news. She didn’t make it up, and she certainly didn’t cover it up. A voice nagged at the back of her mind that failing to cover something that wasn’t really newsworthy wasn’t the same thing as covering it up.
But surely a flying man’s origins were newsworthy. Wasn’t it? Did the fact that he led a pedantic life make it of less interest?
She leaned back thoughtfully as Jonathan and his son laughed together. For someone who was so black and white, she wondered why the world all of a sudden had turned so gray.
~*~
Although he was feeling better, Clark slept on the cot in the front room again that night. It didn’t seem right to invite somebody to your home and then inconvenience them, even if Lois wasn’t a traditional guest.
Actually, Lois surprised him quite a bit. He had imagined that she would doggedly pursue him for more details for her story. Instead she had been taciturn.
Perhaps it had been his illness that had tamed the mad dog. Perhaps she didn’t think there was anything to his “story” other than what she had already unveiled.
Regardless, he was too tired to worry much about it. Although he had felt much better over the course of the day, he had been tired by sunset. Whatever that rock had done to him was still taking a toll on his energy levels.
He closed his eyes and chose not to worry about what tomorrow might bring.
~*~
At the sound of the first thump Lois was instantly alert and grasping about for a potential weapon. She seized a baseball bat that was perched beneath the window and crept to the door. She paused with an ear to the wood, trying to determine if there was any activity in the hallway. When only silence greeted her, she willed her feet to be silent as she headed to the landing and listened for sounds from downstairs.
She could make out voices, even if she couldn’t determine what was being said. There was a tinny quality to one of the men that reminded her of AM radio.
She was simultaneously grateful for the cover that darkness provided while she cursed the way it slowed her down not to see clearly as she descended the steps.
Whatever was going on involved a fight just around the bend in the hall. In her mind’s eye she could trace the sounds of a struggle from the front hallway across the hall and into the kitchen.
She froze until the action passed by. There was no sense in getting caught before she even knew what was going on. She waited impatiently, but after only a few seconds of silence she rounded the corner.
The kitchen door banged to her right. She sprinted to the left, heading out the front door and circling round the house. The melee led her toward the barn.
Light flickered through the gaps between the boards from the flashlights circling inside.
A man’s voice cried out. It sounded like Clark. She pressed her eye in one of the larger gaps trying to see what was happening. She could see the backs of some heads, but it wasn’t much.
“Who are you? What do you want?” Her co-worker sounded weak again, much as the last time she had come into the barn with Clark, back when he was talking about a rock. As far as she knew, Jonathan had disposed of the offending stone yesterday.
The tenor that responded almost laughed as he answered. “So many questions from someone in such a precarious position. Let’s just say that I’m a federal agent on a little,” he paused, as if searching for the right lie, “fact-finding mission.”
“You’re the same guy who served that phony warrant at the Planet,” Clark decided.
“Perhaps.”
Lois suddenly regretted that she hadn’t paid attention to Jimmy when she had called in earlier in the day. The office gopher tended toward exaggeration when he was excited and it didn’t seem as if the blow-by-blow account would be important at all in the grand scheme of things.
“We have reason to believe that you, Mr. Kent, might know how to contact the alien invader.”
Clark spluttered his surprise. “Me? Know about the Flying Man? I haven’t even managed an interview. If I knew how to contact him you better believe that I would take advantage of that professionally.”
One of the heads lurched, and Clark groaned again. Probably a short straight-punch to the gut. “I don’t care what you do to get ahead on the job. I just know that cameras don’t lie.”
“What are you talking about?” her co-workers voice slurred a bit, making her wonder what had happened before she came.
A voice inside her warned that she needed to sneak off to phone 9-1-1. The more logical part of her realized that without knowing the full story, she wouldn’t be able to fully warn the police of what they were getting into. She circled closer to the rear of the building, hoping to find another way in, preferably something with a better view.
Voices blurred as she climbed some boards which hopefully led up to the hay loft. She crawled carefully overhead, grateful that the gaps between the wood didn’t leave room for squeaking. She froze as a nail groaned but the men below were making enough noise not to notice.
Flopping onto her stomach, she army crawled into position and peered over the ledge. Below her, Clark lay on his side. His hands and feet were zip tied behind him. The dimness gave him the illusion of a disfigured face, or perhaps it just hid the bruises which would make sense of his messed-up appearance. Blood flowed freely from the bottom of his face, but she couldn’t tell if it was coming from his nose or his lips.
The renegade agent was spouting at the mouth, hopefully giving the Flying Man a chance to recover. “The working theory is that he has mind control over you. That would explain why you went into that building and then he came out. He beckoned you with his mind.”
“But why me?” Clark argued, only to be repaid with a kick to the ribs by some federal thug who stood guard over his hapless prisoner.
The senior federal thug didn’t seem to notice the renewed pain of the man he was ‘interrogating.’ “We know that the alien landed not far from here around the same time you were born.”
“So maybe I met him during kindeygarten?” Clark’s gasps hid the sarcasm his comment so richly deserved.
“Do you understand the scientific method?”
The Flying Man nodded mutely.
“Our working theory is that if we subject you to enough pain, eventually you will focus all of your energies on contacting the alien invader. When he infuses you with his power, we’ll be here.”
Lois shuddered. If this was the way he treated a man who might possibly know how to contact the Flying Man, there was no telling what he would do if he knew that he had the Flying Man himself... particularly after he had been rendered powerless.
She knew all that she needed to know. She wiggled away from the ledge, determined to bring in help. There probably wasn’t much that the Andy Griffith and Barney Fife could do against an organized military outfit, but it was better than not trying at all.
She heard the sound of footsteps and cursed mutely that she couldn’t see who was coming. “Sir, it’s likely that our position is about to be compromised.” There was a pause, either for a salute or for permission to proceed. “The house is secured, sir, but the female managed to momentarily take down one of our assets and get a call through.”
Martha’s worth immediately shot up in Lois’ opinion, although she didn’t pause to dwell on it. Without the sounds of a fight to cover her exit, it was imperative that she her escape was silent.
“Load up,” the excrement-in-chief ordered. “Put all of the prisoners in the back of the van.”
“Let the rest of them go,” Clark pleaded weakly. “It’s me you want.”
The correction was haughty, but it didn’t sound as if any injuries followed this one time. “You misunderstand my position. I am not after any prisoners. I am trying to stop an alien invasion. That flying man is only the advanced scout. When he sees the might of the United States military, he’ll think twice about launching his full-scale invasion.”
“What are you talking about? He’s done nothing but help.”
His cries were ignored. “Load him up. Burn down the evidence of our being here.” Lois couldn’t make out the rest of his orders as she shimmied down the back of the barn. There was a rusted piece of something leaning out back, so she took it with her thinking that any weapon would do in a pinch, particularly one that resembled an old blade.
She kept to the tree line as she made her way to where the vehicles were parked. There wasn’t much that she could do to rescue the Kents, but perhaps she could slow down the escape.
Most of the activity was taking place near the house, the barn, or the van so she crept past to where the lead vehicle was parked at the bend in the driveway. Hopefully, if she immobilized the first truck it would trap the rest inside.
She jabbed her rusted metal into the tire closest to the wind break. At first the dull blade bounced off, but with persistence she was able to make a good-sized hole. Air leaked slowly, too slowly in her opinion.
She considered her options. The best ways to immobilize the vehicle probably lay inside the Jeep. She climbed in the open back, thankful once again for the moonless night. She scrambled over the seat, hoping to find the keys left inside.
Her luck had run out. She heard voices approaching. She sank out of view and mentally ran over her options again.
In the distance she heard the familiar sound of approaching sirens. She wondered how many blocks away the police still were.
~*~
Trask, as one of the men had called him, was obviously insane. Clark had tried logic, but it failed. He tried making a deal, but it was obvious that he wasn’t in a position to offer anything.
Even after cutting his feet free, one of the soldiers had needed to assist him to the back of the van. His vision blurred as they hurried him along.
The step into the back of the van was impossibly high, not that he was trying very hard to be cooperative. He knew what these men were capable of if they thought that their actions would remain unseen.
He sank to the ground at the back of the van. Two men in fatigues flanked him, each grabbing him under an armpit. They tried to hoist him up, but without any cooperation his dense molecular structure made it difficult. His head slammed into the back door. They almost had him into place. He couldn’t hold out much longer.
“Clark!” he heard from inside the cargo area.
“Mom?” His voice sounded gravelly, even to his own ears.
No matter what the personal cost, he couldn’t let them take his parents unless he went along to protect them as best as he was able.
Sirens rang in the distance. Rachel, Sherriff Harris now, was probably circling the pasture behind the Irigs’ back field, which was the closest route from town. From the sound of the competing sirens, she had brought out every officer that was on duty, a wise precaution knowing who they were up against.
One of the cars in the small convoy started up, followed quickly by another. The sound was strangely muffled to his ears.
He no longer protested as they tried to haul him into the van. He closed his eyes and leaned against the side of the truck, his head swimming.
The van lurched as an explosion rang out. His ears roared for a moment, blurring the sounds of the approaching police vehicles.
He didn’t even see the hands which grabbed him, hauling him back out of the vehicle and throwing him out onto the ground.
“I know you’re out there, somewhere!” Trask screamed wildly. “Sabotage will not work with me. You have to the count of three to reveal your location before I start shooting. One... Two...” A gun cocked nearby. He hoped it was aimed at him and not one of his parents. “Three!”
The shot rang out, but he didn’t feel it. He sobbed, falling to the ground. His head spun again as bile rose to his throat.
His worst nightmares were coming true. His parents were dying on account of his bizarre abilities.
Voices shouted around him as the melee around him continued.
“Clark? Clark, are you okay?”
‘Dad?’ he tried to sob, but no sound came from his throat.
“I need an ambulance out here ASAP,” a voice, Rachel’s voice, called. “And somebody bring some wire cutters too. The Kents are both back here.”
“It’s okay, Clark. It’s over,” Lois assured him. Her hand touched his shoulder and he leaned into her without conscious thought.
“Mom,” he sobbed.
“She’s alright. So’s your dad. It’s gonna be okay.”
~*~
Clark was heavily sedated when Lois finally got a turn to visit him the next morning. She wasn’t sure why she even got a turn, except maybe out of gratitude.
Apparently she was forgiven for the things she hadn’t written just because she’d risked herself a little bit when she had stuffed the Jeep’s tailpipe full of four hand grenades. She hadn’t even considered it much of a risk since she hadn’t pulled the pins, but it was a sight to behold when the vehicle was started and the resulting air flow had forced the grenades out a high velocity. One of weaker models had exploded, leaving the hair on the right hand side a bit singed, but she was not really any worse for wear.
He no longer even resembled the Flying Man. His nose wasn’t very straight and there were stitches here and there to cobble his swollen face together. His pallor was a mottled collection of purples and blues, particularly around his eyes.
But he was alive. And so were his parents.
She hesitated for a moment before bringing her camera out of her purse. He may not appreciate it now, but would likely thank her in the future when there was photographic evidence of his humanity. She used up the entire roll, taking pictures from every angle, including both close-ups and shots which included the plethora of machines he was hooked up to.
The flashes and clicks didn’t disturb him in the slightest.
The doctors said that he would make a full recovery, although they were keeping him in ICU overnight for invasive monitoring and ventilator support. At the moment, however, he looked very mortal.
She stowed her camera in her pack, patted her co-worker’s hand in silent support, and headed outside.
She charged the long-distance call to the Planet’s tab, and waited for Perry to get on the line.
She tried to muster all of the enthusiasm she normally projected when nailing a page one exclusive, but it wasn’t as easy with the vision of her recovering co-worker still fresh in her memory. She dickered with him on how many column-inches he should save her, and gave him a quick summary of why her as-of-yet unwritten story should have the paper’s prime position. “A rogue government agency just brought a convoy into small-town USA, kidnapped a farmer and his wife, and tortured the son just for information about the Flying Man.”
He promised to have somebody find out what they could about the guys who had issued the phony warrants at the Planet for a sidebar before she dropped the other shoe and told him at length what she knew about Clark’s condition.
“I thought he was the invulnerable Flying Man,” Perry softly pointed out.
She paused, and swallowed the lump in her throat. She loved Perry more than she loved her own father, but sometimes the greater good was more important than honesty. Clark had known full well what the dangers were of having his real identity revealed. After what she had experienced, she knew he was right.
Besides, there probably would never be a flying man again.
“Do you have your calendar?” she quietly quipped, although her voice was too steady for much humor. “Mark it down. I was wrong.”
Three things I want in my fic:
1. Lois eager to reveal Clark’s secret
2. A wet Clark
3. Revelation
Preferred season: 1 or 2
Three things I don’t want:
1. Tempus
2. Dan
3. Ralph
