Last time, in 1990...
Lois suddenly felt eyes on her and her breath caught. She turned around, hopeful beyond measure when she knew who she would see. He had come for her at last.
Across the room, wearing a black mask, was Clark.
And now...
Through his dark mask, and through her white one, their eyes locked from across the room. Each felt like it had been an eternity since they had last seen each other. Lois feared that if she as so much breathed, the spell would be broken and she'd be whisked away again to another time and place, taken away again from Clark.
Lois didn't remember deciding to move, but she suddenly found herself in Clark's arms. Had he flown over? She didn't know, she didn't care. He was *here,* at last.
Their lips covered each others faces; her eyes, his jaw, her cheek, his ear. Until finally their lips met, hungrily, as fear disappeared and they reassured each other that they were really together again.
"I thought I was lost forever," she whispered as tears started streaming down her face. Now, having him there with her, she could admit to herself how scared she had been.
"You're here. I found you. And we're going home," Clark said decidedly.
"But --Tempus," she hesitated as she whispered his name, fearing saying it might conjure him up like some long ago evil wizard. "We have to do something about him!"
"We will. I'm counting on him to reappear again, though I'm not certain he will if I'm around," he looked around nervously.
"You're not leaving me," she said fiercely, grabbing him by the shoulders to emphasize her point and not let him go further down that train of thought.
"I may have to... if only to lure Tempus out... wherever he is. HG Wells is working on tracking him down. And we have a plan as soon as I can get---"
Suddenly a hand was on Lois' shoulder. It was Tempus.
He was tugging her into the time window, but this time, Clark wasn't letting her go alone.
*-*-*-*
~1995~
"Oh, great," Clark said resignedly. "Not this again."
They were trapped in the force field cells designed by the eccentric collectors, Tim and Amber Lake. Lois was lying on the floor in her cell, across from Clark.
"Lois, are you all right?" he asked, worried as she was lying facing away from him.
She sat up slowly, "Yeah, I'm fine. I think I got knocked out a bit---Oh, great," she said, disheartened, realizing where they were.
"Yeah, that's what I said," Clark answered with a sigh.
"You said you had a plan to stop Tempus... mightn't this be a good time to share what that plan is?" she asked, trying not to let her fear show.
"I realized when he grabbed you that he does so from *inside* his time window, thus giving you no opportunity to escape him. So, what we need to do next time he appears is to lure him out of the time window, if even for a moment, before he can act. Which, admittedly, won't be easy. He's gotten pretty slick at this," Clark said in frustration. "But we *will* stop him, Lois. Then, I can use this," he said, holding up the compact window Andrus had left for him. Clark had left HG Wells behind in 1990 as soon as he had heard Lois' heartbeat--both of them, and had taken the window with him in case he succeeded in finding Tempus. "If I can get Tempus to use this window, he'll disappear forever into eternity."
Lois sighed, thinking. "But first, we need to get us out of here. Besides, you're not dressed as Superman. If the Lakes come in and see you as Clark, that will stir some questions."
"That's not a problem. I have the suit... But I don't think the Lakes have 'us' yet. I doubt they'll come in here. Otherwise, we'd be sitting next to our doubles. I don't know how much time we have, but we need to get a move on and get out of these cages."
Lois swallowed visibly, "Does that mean you are going to do that--vibrating thingy again?"
Clark shrugged practically, "It worked before."
"But it nearly killed you! Clark! You can't!" she cried.
"Lois, I've done it before. This time, we have the benefit of knowing it works," he replied calmly. "It's okay, honey. We'll be okay."
She nodded, slightly comforted by just the sound of his voice. "I'm glad we're in this together," she whispered.
"Me too," he said with feeling. "I don't care what kind of disasters we come up against together, it's the ones where we're on our own that I most dread. These last few days---" he began.
She nodded in agreement. "I know. You don't have to say. Me too." She sighed, "What do you say we bust out of here, trap Tempus, and go enjoy Christmas at your folks'?"
"Sounds like a good plan to me," he grinned.
Clark stepped back slightly from the force field and started concentrating deeply. In utter fascination, Lois watched as for the second time her husband displaced his molecular structure to break through the force field. He vibrated before her, imperceptible at first, until he blurred into a mass of color. She let out an involuntary gasp as he nearly disappeared before her and made his way through the force field.
She held her breath till he began to reappear again. He seemed a little weak and unfocused, and no wonder! But she called out to him, "Clark, remember, you have to fly! You can't touch the ground!"
He came to and nodded that he heard her. His toes nearly touched the ground, but he was able to regain enough equilibrium to float over to the control panel. He zapped it as he had before, and Lois was suddenly free.
She ran to his arms, and he could feel she was trembling. "I don't care how many times you do that, it's still terrifying!" she said into his shoulder.
"It's okay, Lois. I'm okay," he said soothingly, but was breathing a little heavily from the effort.
Suddenly, a time window opened before them. Clark pulled Lois tighter into his side, expecting Tempus' hand to reach for her once again. Instead it was HG Wells and they both sighed in relief.
"I'm getting much better at this!" said Wells with some pride. "I was able to track you two fairly quickly. Clark, we must get back to your present. Utopia is off balance, to say the least."
"Why did Tempus send us here, do you think? I thought his goal was to destroy Utopia and something about if Lois and I never meet..." Clark asked, puzzled.
"I am not certain, Clark. He also knew you'd escape from these cages. It's almost as if... well, he wanted you to escape. Maybe he was trying to delay you? Remember, Tempus' ultimate goal is to destroy Superman, however he can. Maybe he has a more nefarious scheme at hand than keeping Lois away from you, now that he knows you've found her."
Lois moved closer to Clark. "Do you think he has access to... kryptonite?" she asked warily.
"It's a definite possibility. Though it's much harder to acquire these days, I think, we must make a plan before we go anywhere. I think we can definitely expect Tempus to appear if we take you two back where you belong. And this time, we'll be ready for him."
Wells leaned over conspiratorially and told the couple his plan.
"Sounds good to me," said Lois. "Let's go home and finish this," she sighed, exhausted from all of the emotional upheaval of the past few days.
Clark gave her a gentle squeeze and they prepared to enter Wells' time window.
In an instant, they were gone.
The door to the collection room suddenly opened and Amber Lake stepped in. She took in the damaged control box and was disheartened that their little game would have to be delayed until it got fixed.
"Tim? Do we still have that electrician's number?" she called to the other room. "I think something went wrong with our little Superman display..."
*-*-*-*
~1996~ HOME AT LAST
Lois wanted to cry with relief when they arrived back at their living room. It looked as cozy and inviting as she remembered it. The Christmas decorations were as she left them, and Clark's tree was still propped against the wall. She sat on the sofa and hugged a pillow.
"Home sweet home," she said with a grin. "I can't believe those words are coming out of my mouth, but they're true."
"We're not out of the woods yet," Clark said, spinning into Superman. "I'll be back in a jiff. Mr. Wells, don't let her out of your sight."
Herb forced a smile as he sat on the sofa next to Lois, wondering just what he could do if Tempus were to appear. "Just, hurry back..."
Lois laid her head back into the cushy sofa. "I'm nervous about this, Mr. Wells. What if it doesn't work? Or what if Tempus... comes here before Clark can get back?" she asked nervously, looking around.
She had just barely finished her comment, when the whooshing sound of Clark returning was heard. In his arms, was a stack of dozens of five foot tall mirrors.
"I can't believe you found that many!" Lois said, laughing.
Clark let out a small laugh, his hands on his hips as he surveyed his purchases. "Well, I had to go to ten different department stores, but this should do it."
Then, faster than anyone could see, he scattered the mirrors strategically around the room.
"Mr. Wells, can you step out of the living room?" Clark asked. Then realizing their friend was a bit confused, he led him to the stairway.
"Okay, Lois, how does that look?" he asked from behind the array of mirrors.
"I see... waaay too many of me," she said turning in place. "You think this will work?"
"It has to. Only I'll know where you are. Hopefully Tempus will be fooled long enough--"
Suddenly a light was in the living room. It was Tempus! Lois and Clark tried not to laugh when he reached out a hand through his time window, feeling for what he thought would be a shoulder, and instead grabbed air.
His suavely coiffed head peeked out of the window. "Well, now. That's simply not playing fair."
"I'm done playing fair, Tempus," said Superman, purposely flying quickly to different points in the room to further confuse Tempus.
Tempus stepped out of his window, just as Clark hoped he would. Clark was also relieved to not to sense any kryptonite near by. That would make this just that much easier.
Lois ducked out of the way, though she was still visible in a handful of mirrors. Clark immediately stepped in behind Tempus, opening the window in his pocket.
"This is one Christmas *you* won't ruin!" he said, grabbing Tempus by his shirt and shoving him into the alternate time window.
The window shone brighter, but with a black sheen. Tempus screamed as the window shrunk, and eventually, disappeared into eternity...
"Is he really gone?" asked Lois.
Clark spun out of Superman and put his glasses back on as Lois came up to him. "Yes, he's gone. I don't think we'll need to worry about him interfering for a very, very long time."
As if to contradict him, another window appeared. Clark tensed his hold on Lois, but it was just Andrus.
"Well done, Superman. I've just come to tell you that things are back to normal in Utopia. Tempus hasn't been heard from in the future... so I assume that means you were successful with the time window?"
"Yes, he disappeared not moments ago," Clark confirmed.
"I feel kind of bad for him," Lois suddenly confessed. All three turned to look at her. "What? The guy must have had a really crappy childhood to turn out so evil," she shivered. "Thank goodness despite all my problems... I found the one man who could bring me back to life," she finished softly, smiling warmly at Clark.
HG Wells smiled contentedly. "Well, it seems my work here is done. Andrus, shall we head to Utopia? I hear that Christmas there is really something to see."
Lois hugged the old writer. "Thanks for coming. You always seem to be there when we need you. If ever you need *our* help, please, don't hesitate to contact us."
"Thank you, my dear," HG Wells blushed. He shook Clark's hand, "Well my boy, I told you we'd get her back."
"Thank you, Mr. Wells. And, have a Merry Christmas," he said warmly.
Lois and Clark watched as their two friends disappeared into time and space...
"So, what do we do now?" Lois asked casually.
"First---" Clark began, then flew around the room and collected the mirrors. "Good thing I saved the receipts," he grinned.
She stepped up to him and wrapped her arms around his waist. "Well, we don't have to take *all* of them back... It might be kind of fun if we kept one..." she trailed off and whispered her idea in his ear.
Clark was actually blushing when she looked up him.
"Well?" she asked with a sexy shrug.
"You always keep me on my toes, you know that?" he asked, nuzzling her ear.
"Hey, a girl's gotta work pretty hard to keep up with Superman."
"Lois, you don't need to work hard at all. Just promise me, not to go jumping through time windows for a while."
She laughed warmly, kissing his cheek. "No worries there... but, um, do we have a little time before we have to be at your parents?"
He moved on to nuzzling her neck.
"Honey, we've got all the time in the world."
